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bigsky1470 (Matt) – How I TAC
1.) How many days per week do you play?
Since I started TAC just about a month ago, it’s been every day – 7 days a week.
2.) What time of day do you play?
During the week, I’ll spend at least 1/2 hour when I get home from work at 3am (I work 2nd shift, 4-10s, so my “Monday evening” is most peoples’ “Tuesday morning”). On weekends, it’s usually in the evening.
3.) Where do you play?
I play in my living room, at my desk. I have a “Marshall Amplification” barstool I picked up at a scratch-and-dent sale, and an extra monitor so I can watch the video on my laptop and follow along with the tabs on my second screen.
4.) What was your guitar life like before having a guitar routine & how has implementing a consistent guitar routine helped you? (if possible name 3 ways).
It seemed more like a chore to actually learn everything. I’d do the spider exercise and practice a few chords, but for fun, I’d have to look at and follow along with YouTube videos. I learned a few basic chords, D, A, G, E, Em, Am, A7 and D7, but I’d get stuck on C and F, get frustrated, and give my guitar a rest.Now that I have a routine, and by using the TAC method, 1) I’m learning, but having fun doing so. 2) Celebrating small wins has made playing guitar a much more positive experience than focusing on what I wasn’t getting – I quickly picked up on the Blues A scale, so I can focus on that instead of how I still cannot get a good C chord. 3) Having a routine has become an excellent mindfulness exercise at the end of the day to help me relax. I think I picked an excellent time to start this routine, since I live in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota. Until a few weeks ago, I don’t think many people outside of the Twin Cities had even heard of Brooklyn Center. Needless to say, being under curfew, living on edge waiting for the Chauvin trial verdict, and everything else that’s going on has been stressful. Having this routine has been really great for helping me relax and focus on something positive.
5.) Bonus Question: What is one non-guitar item that is a must have in your guitar routine?
Beverage – sparking water on a work night, and a beer or two on the weekends.
In my pic, I’m on my barstool at my desk – I’m holding Adeline, my acoustic – a Yamaha FG700S I got from the Guitars 4 Vets program. Behind me is Carmen – a 2005 Squier Affinity Stratocaster I found at Music Go Round for $150 a couple of years ago – it’s in great shape, and it even still had the plastic on the pickguard when I bought it! When I do play her instead of Adeline, I’ll plug her into Mustang Sally, a Fender Mustang LT25 amp, and I’ll usually use either the Blues Lead 1 or Rockabilly presets.
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