petelanger
Forum Replies Created
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Another one of my favorite tunes ever! Sweet!
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Wow! That is so well done, nice arrangement!
Purple Rain (the song, the album, the movie) really rocked my world back in the day!
Let’s Go Crazy, When Doves Cry, I Would Die 4 U
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I still sound sort of like this myself, and I’ve been TAC-ing since July last year. I don’t have a uke, but I have a mandolin. I’m not any better on it, actually just started messing with it.
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My understanding is that TAC teaches you fundamentally how to handle your instrument. Once you have a good foundation you will have the skills to play a thousand or maybe 10,000 songs.
As a beginner you could spend weeks or even months learning how to play ONE song and then that’s all you got. Now the next song, then another….. etc. Maybe in 6 months you can (sort of) play about 5 songs not very well.With TAC you spend an extended time to get good with your instrument, then you can learn multiple songs in a single day.
I am not speaking from experience, this is what I have gleaned from being a member. I am 8 months into my journey with TAC.
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Wow. Where to begin to respond. First know that there is a chat on the home page. Victoria usually is the one to answer and she is very prompt, 10-30 minutes typically. Here is a link to the Quick Start Guide which gives you a roadmap on how to get started here.
After 30 days the next step is 5 day routine. Then you can move on to the Daily Challenges which are so much more than a “four week rotation of skills with ie: Blues, Chords, Strumming, Soloing”. Every week you cover the 5 core guitar skills: Monday – technique, Tuesday – guitar lick, Wednesday – Improv (soloing/scales), Thursday – Rhythm guitar and finally Friday – Chord transitions. You do this every week for as long as you are in TAC. There are many members here who have been doing it for 5 years, several more than 10 years. They all still find it valuable!
I love this program, I tried a number of other ones as well and TAC is easily the best for it’s structure. Could it be improved? Heck yeah, it sure could but it’s still an excellent value.
https://tonypolecastro.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/TAC_User_Guide-v5.pdf
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Here is the Starting TAC thread with the-old-coach‘s response that is worth a read:
https://tonypolecastro.com/family-forums/topic/starting-tac/#post-2150393tonypolecastro.com
Starting TAC - Community Support - Tony's Acoustic Challenge
Starting TAC - Community Support - Tony's Acoustic Challenge
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You can’t fail TAC! Give yourself a break. You have said that TAC has proven to be no more successful for [you] than [your] past attempts at learning guitar. Is that not a Win?
I have said the same thing here multiple times before, and I know that many others concur. Of course there are thousands of TAC members who are inactive, that is really the only way to not progress in TAC. Some of them are perhaps making progress on their own or with some other help. It isn’t the only thing out there but I think it’s the best because it keeps you coming back day after day.
TAC is all about giving your best 10 minutes to the challenge and then marking it complete. If you have time and you are still enjoying the process then add on more time. We don’t pass or fail daily challenges.
It’s about finding things that went better today than in the past, it’s about sharing your wins with like minded people and encouraging others who share theirs.
You are not alone in having doubts and most of us started TAC not understanding how to approach it. I think it would be well worth your time to read through this thread from last year: https://tonypolecastro.com/family-forums/topic/wondering-if-i-should-stay-with-it-or-not/#post-2150460
tonypolecastro.com
Wondering if I should stay with it or not - Community Support - Tony's Acoustic Challenge
Wondering if I should stay with it or not - Community Support - Tony's Acoustic Challenge
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I just read this post from the FB Group “Guitar Beginners”:
I’ve been playing 50 years professionally and I’ve never met a beginning guitar player who didn’t think their fingers were too fat, or too thin, or not long enough, or too long…… I have a lazy ring finger on my left hand. It does not tuck in as tightly as my other three fingers. When I practice, I have to learn to change the position of my wrist… whatever results in a clean land on a fret. If you think you’re truly handicapped, I recommend you look up Django Reinhardt. This man is regarded as the greatest jazz guitarist in history, and he only had two functional fingers on his left hand. His ring, finger and pink you were horribly disfigured in a fire and were left useless. My point is no matter what your physical features. If you’re determined you’ll be able to overcome them. So a methods and physical exercise exercises that can help overcome these that all professionals use, even myself 50 years into it. I’m always challenged with new pieces to learn. I’m always retraining my hand. This is Guitar, the way it works.
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Tremendous consistency! Way to go!
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I had a ton of playback issues back in July when I started, but only on the PLAY videos, the coaching videos always played fine. What I would get is kind of checkered line in the progress bar and it would just freeze there without playing. Occasionally it would play fine but if I stopped and rewind, etc. it would inevitably fail.
I tried every device in my house and the only one that had issues was my Dell Windows 11 laptop that I’m using now. It played on every other laptop, phone or tablet just fine. Opened a support ticket and we never could get to the bottom of it. I switched to a Linux laptop and used that for a couple of months. Then I tried my Dell again and it’s worked fine for the past 4-5 months, still have the Linux box next to me but I never power it on anymore.
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Welcome to TAC. I seriously doubt that playing with a prosthetic would be the best route for you. It’s hard enough to control your fingers and with an extension – I’m not seeing it!
However, many players have overcome handicaps. I wouldn’t get too wrapped up in having to complete the challenge exactly as presented.
Here’s a little motivation:
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I assume you opened a support ticket @Aureum thank-you!
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Weird! Yes, it’s the same for me. That is the Play tab just plain doesn’t open.
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This! I felt the same for the first few weeks, but even when I felt I was floundering I later realized that I was actually learning. It’s amazing, just do the thing (10 minutes at least per day) and everything takes care of itself. There have been many weeks that seemed a lot more manageable since then. On the other hand there are weeks like this one…. especially the bottom part of this week was very hard for me again (rhythm and the chord transition challenges).
It’s good to be challenged though! If it were always easy you would not advance very much. The learning is in the struggle. Sometimes it will motivate you to work, work, work at it, but only do this if it’s enjoyable! Other times you just let it go and amazingly find the same skill is so much easier the next time around.
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In the skill courses section there is a section called “Strumming Jumpstart”. I think it covers most strumming patterns. Using outside resources isn’t a bad idea, my YouTube feed is loaded with options. Plus I had joined several guitar programs before TAC and I still occasionally will pull up info from them as well.
Don’t think that you have to complete the entire daily challenge. Just do what you can and mark complete! When I started I had to just focus on a measure or 2 from Monday and Tuesday’s challenges. Maybe learn a scale and then repeat on Thurs and Friday because I couldn’t do the rhythm and chord transitions at all at the end of the week. But as time progressed I was able to move further and then when those songs came back around I could go further into the week.
But I guess TAC isn’t everybody’s cup of tea. But please note that a number of TAC members left the program and then came back. I wish I remembered their stories but the gist of it was they didn’t recognize the value until they were away from it for a while.