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30 Days to Play – Speed Options
Hi! I’m in Week 3 of the 30 Days to Play. I’m a very new player (just picked up the guitar for the first time for the 30 Day plan) so I’m quite slow. When Tony is leading the “Play” sessions after the technique discussion he mentions having three speeds for each loop. However, the loop only ever has one speed. Right now, it is the right speed for me at very slow. However, I would like to make sure I’m keeping up with progressing my skills. Do you know how to access the faster loops? Or, should I simply play them at 1.5x 1.75x 2x? What is a good practice to know I’m learning the skills at the right tempo on the Play loops. Cheers!
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14 Replies
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I would recommend getting a metronome to use that has a tap feature that allows you to understand your speed.
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Thank you!
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Hi @KayMesser and congrats on working your way through the 30 days to play. The metronome that @HowardM recommends is indispensable. There are physical metronomes you can buy and also metronome apps for phones – some free and very good.
Using a metronome will help you build both great timing and speed.
When you begin the daily challenge – have no fear – the chance to slow down and speed up the practice and play along tracks will be there! 😎🎶🎸
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Thank you! I have a metronome app on my phone, I just wasn’t sure what speeds to try for the exercises. I can play around to see if I can figure out a good series of speeds to use. Cheers!
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@KayMesser , you should be able to adjust the speed of the play along videos in the “30 Days” course. In the lower right of the video box you should see “1x”. If you click that a menu pops up presenting various speeds at which the play along video can be watched (expressed in x times the posted video). Hope that is helpful.
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The same question led me to come to the forums today. I was not able to find different speeds either and I now refuse to believe the speed settings provided by the video player is what Tony means with different speeds that are provided.
Initially I thought that maybe the speed settings actually were meant when I could not find different videos with different speeds. Which I already considered lazy, since speeding up videos introduces distortion. But when I was working on the quick draw exercises from week 2 of “30 Days to Play” it became obvious something is missing. Using the speed settings alone would not get me to a 5 second countdown sped up to 1 second at all.
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The quick draw is where I noticed it as well. I am trying to just simply count myself for the 3 second draw but I noticed that I started counting really slowly as I was trying to fret the strings 😅. I might just try a timer on my phone to replace the video loops that were removed.
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Hi @muh and @KayMesser , welcome to TAC. I hope you both experience pleasant journeys here. So, a little history about TAC. In March of 2021, TAC underwent a format change. Besides going “all in” on the current philosophy, TAC was experiencing IT issues that had to be addressed. Conserving sever space was one of those issues. As a result, the separate “speed” videos (among other things) were removed and replaced with what you see now. For the most part, the single video lesson with the ability to change speeds has worked, but there are some instances where there is distortion in sound. You may have to pull out a calculator to figure out what speed you’re playing when not at the 1x speed. As for the “Quick Draw” exercises, it’s best to stay at the 1x speed and wait till the count gets to the number you want to start at.
Good luck to you both, and don’t be afraid to ask the Community for help😎
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Thank you for the explanation. Would it be possible to add a disclaimer that the additional speeds are no longer available?
Your suggestion how to use the quick draw exercises is exactly how I ended up doing them. I just used the quick draw exercise as an example to highlight how the speed setting itself can’t be what was meant in the learning video itself.
Again, thank you.
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Hi @muh , I believe that it’s easier for TAC to have older members give the explanation about the separate videos than it is to put out a disclaimer on each lesson. Some of these lessons are many, many years old. The way to judge the age of a lesson is to see how many tattoos Tony has (or doesn’t have) on his arms (lol) and compare with what you see on the Acoustic Tuesday Show (AT Show).
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Thanks for the great laughter this morning. I did notice Tony’s tattoos or lack thereof but never put it all together. You made my morning sunnier.
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I agree with @muh . A short explanation would be very helpful for new people like myself. I’ve spent time on several lessons searching for the alternate speeds, thinking that I was missing something myself. I was concerned I was not getting the full experience and must be missing something since Tony mentioned those several times. I would suggest that the best customer experience would be to proactively share that with new users rather than waiting for them to get frustrated enough to ask.
I understand that it is easier for a person to explain that vs. posting a short “disclaimer” that would could be perceived as a negative to some students. Maybe consider adding another short video as a 3rd tab, in addition to the Learn and Play tabs, of the first lesson where Tony mentions the various speeds. That way you could present the explanation to all clueless newbies like myself so they wouldn’t be confused early on in their journey. 🙂
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This is an excellent tip. Silly I didn’t think of it on my own, but much appreciated!
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@KayMesser I’m sure the subject has been covered, I wanted to point out that even when there were 3 videos at different speeds, all Tony did was speed up or slow down the videos to show the different speeds. He didn’t play each one separately at the different speeds. So, in essence using the 1x drop down and changing the speed either faster or slower does exactly what the previous videos did. Typically Tony will give the base speed at 1x, so you can determine the slower and faster speeds by adjusting up or down based on the speed chosen.
The metronome is an invaluable tool. As a beginner, play at a very slow speed, and as you improve, increase in increments of 3-5 bpm until you’ve reached the base bpm.
I understand the confusion over the older videos mentioning the 3 speeds. If you find that a disclosure would be beneficial, my suggestion is to contact Victoria at Supprt (button in bottom left and opens to chat window). Make the suggestion that it be sdded and why it would be beneficial. Maybe TAC will incorporate it.
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