Try this guitar challenge
STEP 1: Watch the video to learn the bite-sized piece of music
STEP 2: Click the "PLAY" tab below the video to play along with Tony until you can do it on your own.
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Responses
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Day 3 – High and Lonesome
Responses
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This was pretty hard. I could hit most of the notes but only going very slowly. Not exactly the Allman Brothers but I’ll keep trying. I printed out the tab from yesterday and jammed a bit to that and that sounded pretty good, so progress.
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the pinky stretch was difficult for me -bzzz a lot
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Loved this especially the turn around!
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Da blues…da blues…da blues! Such a great way to make a living. I only wish I had the talent of the big blues heroes. Taking something relatively simple and turning it into genius! Peace and love TACsters! Cheers
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Another nice practice session! This program is the best!
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Right! 10 minutes? I am circling back later and again tomorrow morning before I start day 4. I realized that my guitar has deplorable action below the 7th fret, which is taking the fun out of this. Time to go shopping!
Pinky is not totally useless, but close.-
I think any time is a good time to go guitar shopping I am like some wonderful of my lady friends and their shoe shopping. If you have a decent instrument with good tone a music shop set up might really improve the action. there is so much guitar set up info on the Enet that you can probably improve the action with a few simple adjustments yourself with some basic tools.
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Got some of the timing but I’m slow to put it together snd get it right. Think I need to take a week off and just work on the last three days whew!
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I am actually playing this, up and down the fretboard, and it’s fun. Been stretching my pinkie like crazy and it’s paying off. Wow.
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Another great fun day!
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That was so much fun! I played it for a very long time. My fingers are killing me. I really think this is my first time playing all four fingers properly. I played it all. I’m even getting faster. I can’t believe I am a guitar player!! Thank you, Sir. One year!
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Ditto pinky issue…
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I agree with Kevin. I have never understood the contradiction between “take it slow”and “just play for 10 minutes”. The sales pitch is a bit deceiving.
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Good practice for stretching the reach of my pinkie. I wish my fingers were a bit stronger or longer! I felt pretty good about this one and it is something I can get better at without too much frustration!
-
Now I remember why I stopped last time playing guitar, my small hand span just doesn’t want to span that last stretch – but I am staying with it. I even got a small scale guitar and it still is not easy but I assume that my hand will learn to do it eventually. I am determined!
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Same issue with pinky as others have stated, but it seems to get better a little at a time. Pick accuracy was bad today and still need to work on timing. Will keep working.
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When I try to span 4 frets to use my pinkie finger, it just lays across the strings sideways and mutes everything. What am I doing wrong? My little finger just won’t cooperate!
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Once again I’m unable to make the stretch with my pinky finger on Bars 1, 3, 5, etc. so I’m working on a bit of a work around but it’s clumsy. Hoping I can eventually finesse the movement.
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Really enjoyed this riff! I love the blues!!
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I can play this challenge but the stretch from the fifth to the seventh fret slows me down. It is a fun exercise and I played it a bunch of times along with the ones from Monday and Tuesday. I’m liking this week so far.
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Another fun blues exercise!
-
It was hard to show up today, but I did. In the sales pitch Tony states “10 minutes” but at the end of this session he says keep on practicing until you can get it down…. I feel like I’ll never get it
-
Understand he’s speaking to an audience of thousands (not all at once, but over time it adds up to 10s or 100s of thousands). You don’t have to be any where near perfect in that time. Also 10 minutes is the minimum, you can go as long as you are still having fun…..but cut it off at about 30 minutes and take a break from it. Much more productive that way
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This could be fun when I get it better under my fingers! Unfortunately, I cannot reach the 7th fret with my pinky nor the others with the extra stretch, but it sounds OK when I just do the second section of the paired measures twice. The turnaround is a little tricky–repeat, repeat, repeat. I need better lighting.
-
Damn pinky gotta mind of its own
-
I’ve been really getting into this weeks lesson. I’m following right along and even throwing extra little riffs with the pentatonic scale. It’s really been fun. You approach to the lessons are great and easy to follow. I’m glad I found TAC!
-
Good challenge. Took me a number of tries, but got it under my fingers.
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My pinky wants to curl in towards my hand and I can’t stretch across 3 frets. I’ll continue to try and stretch it as best I can.
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Hi everyone, Hope you all are kicking butt! I have been hearing Tony speak a lot about the Fretboard wizard. I have not done that course yet. Should I do it before moving on with these 5 day routine challenges?
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There are many different areas of learning to actually play the guitar. There is the mechanics, pick control finger placement, slides hammer or pull oofs, string muting, scales, strumming patterns. I could go on all day about the mechanics of picking. There is the mental stuff, What are the purpose of sharps and flats What are the major keys what is a relative minor or the differnce between a Dominant 7th chord and and a major 7th chord what notes make up a 7th or 6th or minor, or half diminished, sustained or diminished or the knowledge you need to combine the mechanical and brain knowledge. For me the mechanical stuff was hard work and the mental stuff could be picked up from the internet or books, videos,etc.
I learned to play guitar backwards and picked up the mental stuff years ago. Because I’m lazy and found some of the mechanical parts to be ,,, hard and boring, I have lacked in that and now have to practice practice practice all or the items I mentioned above to become a proficient picker.
If you have strong pick placement, strumming habits and can form all of the chords in 1st position( major and minor chords up to the 5th fret} it would be time to tackle the mental stuff. Just a suggestion but don’t put the cart before the horse. Learn some basic skills and buy a simple Fretboard/music theory book to begin to understand how you can progress above the 5th fret. If you can’t currently finger basic chord forms and strum different patterns at 120 Beats per minute you will become lost and very frustrated trying to understand and implement fret board theory. People rave about the fretboard wizard course,
I’ll bet it is great for people who have some mechanical picking proficiency. If that is you go for it. That is my 2 cents. So now I will put the soapbox away and go practice.
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Its all coming back to me. Remember this when i took the course. Got it after shoveling snow, unfortunately I don’t have snow blower
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This one went fairly well when I remembered seeing Tony move his wrist forward/away from the body to get more curl/arch in the fingers. This helped me not to mute the strings. Cloudy skies and snowy landscape makes it cozy to stay inside and play guitar. But I’ll get out and hike in it, too, and come back for another session. Hope everyone is having fun with this challenge.
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I keep working on the pinky but discouragingly, I see little improvement. It makes it frustrating to play today’s 12 bar blues. I’ll continue to give it a go, but not much fun when the pinky simply can’t make that stretch yet.
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Very satisfying after snow blowing two long driveways with thick 6″ wet snow! I made it!
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Excellent challenge. Watched a Blues guitarist at a live show last night and recognized patterns in this lesson.
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The 12 Bar Blues are always a lot of fun, this is my second go around and went so much better and so much more fun!
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Wed Dec 10 2025
Watched but unable to play. Left hand Little finger out of commission, still!!
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Agood challenge!
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Got it AND definitely want to continue working on finger-positioning for consistent and effective muting but this was a great lesson.
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Don’t let a cat walk on your computer while responding.
A great exercise but my pinky has a mind of it’s own.-
I’m going to put up a large block letter sign above my computer so that I don’t forget the cat warning. Great philosophy. Wait a minute, I don’t… have a cat. Hmmmm, still it rings as a great philosophy.
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A cut out guitar would be easier for the high notes. It’s great that the pattern moves up and down the neck. I am learning to just do two strings better.
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This is a great excesixe
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This went well but need another session to get my pinky up to snuff. Enjoy!
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Am I the only one who thinks the riff isn’t finished until you go from the 2 – 4 to the 3 – 5 in the 12th measure?
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I prefer to end it on 4-5 in the 12th measure (high e, B string)
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No, you are right, it doesn’t seem finished. But it’s designed to b e a ‘turn-around’ that you can go right back up to the beginning and repeat endlessly, if you want to end of course, feel free to end with the first double stop of the first measure.
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That 11-14 position is tough against the guitar body. Now I understand why guitars have that cut out.
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I agree, the pinky needs a little training . I’ll try it again tonight after work . Have a great day everyone .
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Having fun with this weeks challenges. I’m alternating my practice with last weeks challenge which makes the use of the pinky much easier. What seemed absolutely impossible last week is greatly improving. It just takes time to develop the muscle to stretch that pinky. For those struggling just keep trying your best and it’ll improve. I’m also much better at hitting those double strings than I was 30 days ago
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yeah that pinky is a problem, have to cheat a little and do some finger shifting
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Hi, really struggling with ringing out the tones, especially using my pinky, blocks the b string from ringing out. Any tips?
-
My challenge is to train my hand and Pinky to be in the correct position to act like a button, so I can develop strength and accuracy dropping the pinky on the fret.
If I practice the home position on the 9th Fret, I can start building muscle memory and train the correct finger action -
Excellent lesson, I can’t stop playing the turnaround. Great lesson today. I can’t wait to read the comments, and I hope everyone is doing well and that all Christmas shopping is finished.
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After doing the lesson a few times i found myself laying the index finger across The Treble E, B, G and the D strings It was just more comfortable and natural for me to stretch out my ring and pinky to their proper positions. If it works for you, great. If not maybe you can figure out a better solution to make the pinky stretch easier.
-
Thanks, Jorgemac, that did help some; at least I can reach now. But I still get buzz/muting as my pinky is too short to get it vertical; in fact to even get it to reach it lays on its outside.
I don’t have issues with picky stretches, I just don’t do them. 😉-
Pinky, not picky. Though sometimes they can be!
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The index finger stretched across both strings at the 4th fret puts your hand and finger tips in a better position to stretch out for the 6th and 7th position notes without any string buzzing. So, I find it easier to do the pinky stretch if I have laid my index finger flat across the B and G string on the 4th fret, on most of this exercise. it just makes it easier to to get a better 90 degree finger tip angle to the the fret board 6th and 7th note with my ring and my pinky finger. If you get a good downward angle on the pinky you will not have any problem with string buzz from the fretted B string. Have fun.
Congratulations, !
Challenge complete
Come back tomorrow for your next challenge
This was pretty hard. I could hit most of the notes but only going very slowly. Not exactly the Allman Brothers but I’ll keep trying. I printed out the tab from yesterday and jammed a bit to that and that sounded pretty good, so progress.
the pinky stretch was difficult for me -bzzz a lot
Loved this especially the turn around!
Da blues…da blues…da blues! Such a great way to make a living. I only wish I had the talent of the big blues heroes. Taking something relatively simple and turning it into genius! Peace and love TACsters! Cheers
Another nice practice session! This program is the best!
Right! 10 minutes? I am circling back later and again tomorrow morning before I start day 4. I realized that my guitar has deplorable action below the 7th fret, which is taking the fun out of this. Time to go shopping!
Pinky is not totally useless, but close.
I think any time is a good time to go guitar shopping I am like some wonderful of my lady friends and their shoe shopping. If you have a decent instrument with good tone a music shop set up might really improve the action. there is so much guitar set up info on the Enet that you can probably improve the action with a few simple adjustments yourself with some basic tools.
Got some of the timing but I’m slow to put it together snd get it right. Think I need to take a week off and just work on the last three days whew!
I am actually playing this, up and down the fretboard, and it’s fun. Been stretching my pinkie like crazy and it’s paying off. Wow.
Another great fun day!
That was so much fun! I played it for a very long time. My fingers are killing me. I really think this is my first time playing all four fingers properly. I played it all. I’m even getting faster. I can’t believe I am a guitar player!! Thank you, Sir. One year!
Ditto pinky issue…
I agree with Kevin. I have never understood the contradiction between “take it slow”and “just play for 10 minutes”. The sales pitch is a bit deceiving.
Good practice for stretching the reach of my pinkie. I wish my fingers were a bit stronger or longer! I felt pretty good about this one and it is something I can get better at without too much frustration!
Now I remember why I stopped last time playing guitar, my small hand span just doesn’t want to span that last stretch – but I am staying with it. I even got a small scale guitar and it still is not easy but I assume that my hand will learn to do it eventually. I am determined!
Same issue with pinky as others have stated, but it seems to get better a little at a time. Pick accuracy was bad today and still need to work on timing. Will keep working.
When I try to span 4 frets to use my pinkie finger, it just lays across the strings sideways and mutes everything. What am I doing wrong? My little finger just won’t cooperate!
Once again I’m unable to make the stretch with my pinky finger on Bars 1, 3, 5, etc. so I’m working on a bit of a work around but it’s clumsy. Hoping I can eventually finesse the movement.
Really enjoyed this riff! I love the blues!!
I can play this challenge but the stretch from the fifth to the seventh fret slows me down. It is a fun exercise and I played it a bunch of times along with the ones from Monday and Tuesday. I’m liking this week so far.
Another fun blues exercise!
It was hard to show up today, but I did. In the sales pitch Tony states “10 minutes” but at the end of this session he says keep on practicing until you can get it down…. I feel like I’ll never get it
Understand he’s speaking to an audience of thousands (not all at once, but over time it adds up to 10s or 100s of thousands). You don’t have to be any where near perfect in that time. Also 10 minutes is the minimum, you can go as long as you are still having fun…..but cut it off at about 30 minutes and take a break from it. Much more productive that way
This could be fun when I get it better under my fingers! Unfortunately, I cannot reach the 7th fret with my pinky nor the others with the extra stretch, but it sounds OK when I just do the second section of the paired measures twice. The turnaround is a little tricky–repeat, repeat, repeat. I need better lighting.
Damn pinky gotta mind of its own
I’ve been really getting into this weeks lesson. I’m following right along and even throwing extra little riffs with the pentatonic scale. It’s really been fun. You approach to the lessons are great and easy to follow. I’m glad I found TAC!
Good challenge. Took me a number of tries, but got it under my fingers.
My pinky wants to curl in towards my hand and I can’t stretch across 3 frets. I’ll continue to try and stretch it as best I can.
Hi everyone, Hope you all are kicking butt! I have been hearing Tony speak a lot about the Fretboard wizard. I have not done that course yet. Should I do it before moving on with these 5 day routine challenges?
There are many different areas of learning to actually play the guitar. There is the mechanics, pick control finger placement, slides hammer or pull oofs, string muting, scales, strumming patterns. I could go on all day about the mechanics of picking. There is the mental stuff, What are the purpose of sharps and flats What are the major keys what is a relative minor or the differnce between a Dominant 7th chord and and a major 7th chord what notes make up a 7th or 6th or minor, or half diminished, sustained or diminished or the knowledge you need to combine the mechanical and brain knowledge. For me the mechanical stuff was hard work and the mental stuff could be picked up from the internet or books, videos,etc.
I learned to play guitar backwards and picked up the mental stuff years ago. Because I’m lazy and found some of the mechanical parts to be ,,, hard and boring, I have lacked in that and now have to practice practice practice all or the items I mentioned above to become a proficient picker.
If you have strong pick placement, strumming habits and can form all of the chords in 1st position( major and minor chords up to the 5th fret} it would be time to tackle the mental stuff. Just a suggestion but don’t put the cart before the horse. Learn some basic skills and buy a simple Fretboard/music theory book to begin to understand how you can progress above the 5th fret. If you can’t currently finger basic chord forms and strum different patterns at 120 Beats per minute you will become lost and very frustrated trying to understand and implement fret board theory. People rave about the fretboard wizard course,
I’ll bet it is great for people who have some mechanical picking proficiency. If that is you go for it. That is my 2 cents. So now I will put the soapbox away and go practice.
Its all coming back to me. Remember this when i took the course. Got it after shoveling snow, unfortunately I don’t have snow blower
This one went fairly well when I remembered seeing Tony move his wrist forward/away from the body to get more curl/arch in the fingers. This helped me not to mute the strings. Cloudy skies and snowy landscape makes it cozy to stay inside and play guitar. But I’ll get out and hike in it, too, and come back for another session. Hope everyone is having fun with this challenge.
I keep working on the pinky but discouragingly, I see little improvement. It makes it frustrating to play today’s 12 bar blues. I’ll continue to give it a go, but not much fun when the pinky simply can’t make that stretch yet.
Very satisfying after snow blowing two long driveways with thick 6″ wet snow! I made it!
Excellent challenge. Watched a Blues guitarist at a live show last night and recognized patterns in this lesson.
The 12 Bar Blues are always a lot of fun, this is my second go around and went so much better and so much more fun!
Wed Dec 10 2025
Watched but unable to play. Left hand Little finger out of commission, still!!
Agood challenge!
Got it AND definitely want to continue working on finger-positioning for consistent and effective muting but this was a great lesson.
Don’t let a cat walk on your computer while responding.
A great exercise but my pinky has a mind of it’s own.
I’m going to put up a large block letter sign above my computer so that I don’t forget the cat warning. Great philosophy. Wait a minute, I don’t… have a cat. Hmmmm, still it rings as a great philosophy.
A cut out guitar would be easier for the high notes. It’s great that the pattern moves up and down the neck. I am learning to just do two strings better.
This is a great excesixe
This went well but need another session to get my pinky up to snuff. Enjoy!
Am I the only one who thinks the riff isn’t finished until you go from the 2 – 4 to the 3 – 5 in the 12th measure?
I prefer to end it on 4-5 in the 12th measure (high e, B string)
No, you are right, it doesn’t seem finished. But it’s designed to b e a ‘turn-around’ that you can go right back up to the beginning and repeat endlessly, if you want to end of course, feel free to end with the first double stop of the first measure.
That 11-14 position is tough against the guitar body. Now I understand why guitars have that cut out.
I agree, the pinky needs a little training . I’ll try it again tonight after work . Have a great day everyone .
Having fun with this weeks challenges. I’m alternating my practice with last weeks challenge which makes the use of the pinky much easier. What seemed absolutely impossible last week is greatly improving. It just takes time to develop the muscle to stretch that pinky. For those struggling just keep trying your best and it’ll improve. I’m also much better at hitting those double strings than I was 30 days ago
yeah that pinky is a problem, have to cheat a little and do some finger shifting
Hi, really struggling with ringing out the tones, especially using my pinky, blocks the b string from ringing out. Any tips?
My challenge is to train my hand and Pinky to be in the correct position to act like a button, so I can develop strength and accuracy dropping the pinky on the fret.
If I practice the home position on the 9th Fret, I can start building muscle memory and train the correct finger action
Excellent lesson, I can’t stop playing the turnaround. Great lesson today. I can’t wait to read the comments, and I hope everyone is doing well and that all Christmas shopping is finished.
After doing the lesson a few times i found myself laying the index finger across The Treble E, B, G and the D strings It was just more comfortable and natural for me to stretch out my ring and pinky to their proper positions. If it works for you, great. If not maybe you can figure out a better solution to make the pinky stretch easier.
Thanks, Jorgemac, that did help some; at least I can reach now. But I still get buzz/muting as my pinky is too short to get it vertical; in fact to even get it to reach it lays on its outside.
I don’t have issues with picky stretches, I just don’t do them. 😉
Pinky, not picky. Though sometimes they can be!
The index finger stretched across both strings at the 4th fret puts your hand and finger tips in a better position to stretch out for the 6th and 7th position notes without any string buzzing. So, I find it easier to do the pinky stretch if I have laid my index finger flat across the B and G string on the 4th fret, on most of this exercise. it just makes it easier to to get a better 90 degree finger tip angle to the the fret board 6th and 7th note with my ring and my pinky finger. If you get a good downward angle on the pinky you will not have any problem with string buzz from the fretted B string. Have fun.