Do I stay or do I go???

[atomikman]

Hello ZADavid,

Stay here, this dude (TAC) is very good at explaining and you can watch vids over , add to favorites (as you know.)

Ive been here since January and I’ve come so far on my journey, with just 10 minutes a day for a month you’ll see major improvements. Then you can plan your week and go longer minutes and the price is always the same lol , and then fall in love with what your true goal is to be – PLAY GTR…

guitar geeks unite – everyone in here is very cool and helpful , seek other advise from longer members before you bail… Take care

[Loraine]

@ZADavid Have you checked out the Skills library yet? Lot’s of other courses besides the daily challenge.

[David_Leo]

If you are new to guitar, I think it’s really worth it. Make sure you go through the other lessons (30 days to play, etc.) not just the daily challenges. If you are a more seasoned player, you may not find it as helpful. The recent changes have not been all positive, resulting in a community that is struggling somewhat to stay together.

[Cadgirl]

I think you’ll like it once you get into it a little more. I agree with @Loraine to check out the skill courses. If I had joined during the upgrade I would have been disillusioned. Hopefully they are still working on getting the bugs out of the forums. They still are really slow.

[ZADavid]

Hi All and thanks for your responses atomikman, Loraine, David Leo and Cadgirl.

My lost entry had a bit more detail.

Like many I see here, I’ve been fooling around with guitars for 40 years, but never had a lesson. Chord hacker at best, sounds good around a campfire… but always wanted to master this. I have both a Folk guitar, a Yamaha FG 180E which was a present from my folks as I graduated high school and a classical guitar, a Yamaha CG130A of similar vintage, but bought in a thrift store for $80 a couple of years back when I tried once more to get back playing. (its easier on the fingertips).

Came across Tony’s sales pitch and thought it was a great idea, 10 minutes a day of something different to stretch ones abilities. Signed up, and now wondering. The daily challenge is ok, but don’t get where they are going yet. I’ve wandered through the skills libraries and did the 30 day challenge and found that okay as a refresher, working through some of the others.

My biggest gripe is the SPEED (lack thereof) of this site and continually getting logged out. Its like a throw back to dial up download and reaction times. Then I read somewhere they’ve made great strides in the speed and I shake my head and wonder.

I have 20 of 60 left days to claim a refund or continue.

cheers folks I’ll continue for a while.

Happy, tuneful Guitars!

[Loraine]

@ZADavid I feel ya on the downfalls of the new site. It is way too slow and getting signed out constantly is a hassle. I also agree that I haven’t seen a vast improvement on the speed, and it sounds like that’s a huge challenge to TAC and the IT folks. The old site was more user friendly with regard to both speed, staying signed on, following conversations in the forums, and other features that are missed. I think it is easier to get to the daily lesson and skills lessons, but that’s about the extent of my happiness with it. Obviously TAC has put a lot of time and money into this new direction and site, so we’ll either have to be resigned to work with it or move on. I’m a life member, so it’s a bit different. Good luck in your decision, and happy plucking!

[PhilBarru]

@ZADavid I understand your frustration with the rollout of the new site. It has improved in speed and stability but slower than anticipated. I joined in Jan 2020 and have been doing the daily challenges consistently ever since. Generally, I spend more than 10 minutes on each lesson but I put in at least the minimum 10. It was definitely difficult to see where it was going at first but I really started amazing myself at my improvement after the first year rolled around. I truly believe that fostering the habit of playing every day for at least 10 minutes has great results. There is about a year worth of daily challenges so I am now going through lessons the 2nd time and the change in my ability is stunning. I also am beginning to utilize many aspects of the challenges into my general guitar playing.

You say you haven’t taken lessons before but I have taken lots of them. I can tell you that the cost of TAC is nominal compared to almost any other lesson or guitar training I have seen. As others have said there are also lots of other courses included in your membership.

I strongly suggest you connect with one of the virtual open mics. You can find links to them in the forums. Get involved with the community. It is a big part of the benefit of TAC.

[jumpinjeff]

Hi @ZADavid , I found quite a few other places that were teaching me how to play stuff but this site (TAC) is the only place that I found that teaches how to play guitar. It is a fantastic training center for learning how to play guitar. I use the word training intentionally because I found it is training, mind and body. It is the gymnasium of the guitar education world. Without this training I was not able to learn to play the things I wanted to play even though I had memorized the movements and locations I couldn’t physically get to the places in the right time that the songs I wanted to play required. Based on my research this site is unique in that regard. Michael Jordan could show me how to slam dunk and I could go through his motions and never get the ball to the hoop. Gotta train your body to jump that high, squats, jump squats, speed training etc. Hope that makes sense. Only you can decide if it will work for you. It did work for me.

As far as where it is going? Music is a big circle so the beginning is the end and the end is the beginning. The subdivision of notes can get smaller or bigger and time can be faster or slower. Within the circle once you are trained, you get to go where ever you heart desires.

[AttyTJ]

+1 and the best suggestion is what @jumpin’Jeff recommended. Use it as a training plan, and I suggest hit the 30 days to play, as it will bring back things you do but didn’t know why, and expose you to things you didn’t every dream. After anther 35 days of focused effort, then may your decision, but I think you may find it is worth it.

Welcome to TAC @zadavid, it is good to have you along for the Journey.

[Alfred]

The site speed can still be a bit… unfortunate… at times, but I don’t have speed issues loading the lessons, just the forums.

I am with others on this. Stay is a simple answer for me. Between the clear lessons, and the focus, along with the 10 minute daily exercises. Some I breeze through, and some I struggle with. It is the struggle that I am here for. I am improving, and I have only been here since February of this year. I have tried another pay site, and found it wasn’t for me. Here I found the focus I needed to progress, and a supportive community of like minded people who were always helpful and positive.

Do your daily exercised, then get involved with the community. From there you will start to naturally sus out the direction you want to go with the skills lessons, and enhance your daily learning by adding new skills weekly to your box of tricks.

It sounds like you can already strum some songs. Why not take a look at the fingerpicking skills courses and see where you can plug them in to songs you already know?

As was mentioned, come check out one of the Video Open Mic nights. I think you will find that they area welcoming and fun for anyone at any point in their guitar journey. My son even shared just his first 4 chords on an open mic, and had a good time doing it.

Sorry you lost your first post… that sucks.

[Bill_Brown]

Hi @ZADavid , Just wanted to give you my 2 cents worth. You’ve been TACing for only 1 month (I read your profile) – I think you have to give it more time – you’re not going to get better over night – no matter who’s ‘Program’ you choose. Yes, I get that this site runs really slow. I also get frustrated when suddenly finding that I somehow got logged out and have to log in again. But this site has more courses, more information, the best teacher, and the greatest Community – better than any other site on the web (that I’ve seen) – for sure. Like you, I’d been fooling around with a guitar for over 40 years and really wasn’t going anywhere with it. I joined TAC in December 2020 – just a few months ago. I can now really see the improvement in my playing, but I still have a ways to go to get where I’d like to be. I know that it’ll take patience, more practice, and learning, to get there.

As far as ‘direction’, that’s up to you. I suggest doing as many of the “Skills” courses as possible – I’d start with any of the “Jumpstart” courses and do the “Foundations of Fretboard Navigation”. “Fretboard Wizard” is definitely a gem, but it has a separate $cost. You can find some of that information on the web for free, but no one explains it like Tony, and no one else quizzes you on what you’ve learned – which helps to reinforce your knowledge of the subject. Well worth the extra $ (IMHO). The Daily Challenges are just to get you to do something with the guitar for 5 days of the week. If you feel like you need more than the things that are offered here, then you should attend (virtually) some of the VOM’s (virtual open mikes). There’s information about them in the Forums.👍😎

[ZADavid]

Hi Everyone,

Thanks Loraine, PhilBarru, Jumpin’Jeff, Alfred and Bill_Brown for your replies and thoughts.

I get that you all seem very encouraging about the site and the teaching offered here, indeed I think Tony is quite fantastic. The cost is not excessive compared with individual lessons, I did check what they would cost and this is a fraction of the cost for a daily prod to practise, which truly is the only way to improve (unless you are a prodigy and I learnt long, long ago that I am not).

Once again thanks to all. Seems this is a good bunch of folk and a good place to hang around.

Cheers

David

Ps is there anyway to close a thread? I have my answer…

[Zephyrpn]

I want to thank @ZADavid for asking the question. I’ve been in TAC since December and I have a lifetime of piano and classical guitar background. I’m often disillusioned by my progress. But flat-picking, for example, is totally new to me and I’m encouraged by seeing the responses to your question. A forum might help me too.

[Bill_Brown]

Hi @Zephyrpn , Like I said above to @ZADavid , the ‘Skills” courses are an excellent place to explore😎. You’ll find instruction and exercises on a wide variety of playing styles and techniques – lots of fun stuff! If you feel you can look at the fretboard and know exactly where you are, or you can listen to a song and figure out the song’s key and chord progression, then you likely don’t need “Fretboard Wizard”. But if you’re not quite sure about things like that, then you should consider that course also. You’ll have to contact TAC HQ about enrollment. With your existing musical background, I would highly recommend that you attend any of the virtual open mikes (VOM’s) – if you search in the Forums, you’ll find info on them as well. The VOM’s are a great way to see and meet (virtually) the TAC Community “as they do their thing”! You can just observe without having to participate. They happen Friday & Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons. There is also a VOM that is centered in the UK, called “Scones” – not sure what day they do their thing, but you can find the info in the Forums👍. Have fun and play guitar🤩

• This reply was modified 4 years ago by  Bill_Brown.

[ZADavid]

Once again, thanks everyone for your replies.

I’ve already got stuck into the skill section, completed the 30 days, foundation to the fretboard, currently working on 12 bar blues at the moment.

As for the open mikes, well not sure anyone really needs to be subject to me at this stage! Maybe once I have something to share I will explore that. I might try and lurk in the back ground though to get an idea of how they work.

Kind regards and happy strumming.

David