Hi Tomo,
I've been a producing as a hobby for the last 7 years and around 5 years ago I got my first acoustic/hybrid guitar. I wanted to learn how to play it to impress the ladies haha and also to make better music. I didn't know how to start so I just learnt a few open chords, a couple songs and started to slowly improve, becasuse of my producing I was able to create the sounds and stuff I wanted But I couldn't shake the fact that I knew absolutely nothing about the guitar, I just knew what sounds good together and it took a lot of trial and error to create a simple 8 bar sample.
There so much information out there, I didn't know how to start mastering it so I ended up falling out of love with it. Over the last few years I learnt a few more songs, (some more complicated than others) and have just been playing those on repeat until I came acroos John Mayer, BBKing and you over the last couple of weeks. Because of that I found some structure and knew somewhat what direction to take.
I am stilla beginner, I know the A minor pentatonic scale across the fretboard, some open chords, barre chords (Minor'Major/Diminished), have decent idea of which notes are which on the 5th and 6th string, but again i can't do anything with that. For the last week since joining GW I've focused 100% on the chromatic scale and messing arround with the A minor Pentatonic Scale, but I still feel like Im lacking some direction. I've been spending 15-20 mins doing just chromatic scale and finishing off for 2-3 mins just messing aorund with the A minor pentatonic scale.
My question to you is should I drop everything and focus 100% on the foundation phase until I have mastered it or is it ok to sprinkle some stuff in sessions here and there like practicing solo's and songs? Based on what I've seen from you I've written down the foundation to master before moving on to more advanced things
1) Chromatic Scale - Dynamics
2) Triad - (Horizontal and Vertical) Inversion in C - *C F Bb Eb*
3) Swing Groove - R37 *Left hand Mute* (1411, 4411, 5414) Bb
4) Shuffle (Blues) - Triplet Feel (1111,4411,5411)
WAAAAAADUP NAHOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I know you were asking Tomo, but I always through fun stuff to play. I try to make sure I also think about the foundation skills while practicing other than purely foundational skills.
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-LaVoy
Thank you Nahom for sharing your guitar journey! So happy to read this.
You’re very welcome! Our GW team really want make people smile!
Plesae watch these videos with a lot of attention to the details.
I think you should focus on foundation so you will improve later smoothly.
Don’t worry about A minor Pentatonic scale.Play it on one string from Root to 5th etc. Do less things and do more details. For blues soloing…. more listening good old blues!
No need to drop everything but you need to focus on more foundsation. You still can work on your listening, listen same songs or same album so you can really focus on that style of music. For blues soloing, One String Approach or just two strings… or only top 321 set strings. Less is better. No need to play A Minor Pentatonic from 6th string to 1st string! Listen more BB King please!
1) FT01 Simple Chromatic Scale Exercise 1233 (Learn this with less pressure, soft picking etc)
https://tomovhxtv.vhx.tv/videos/ft01-simple-chromatic-scale-exercise-1-2-3-4
2) ET01 C Major Scale (One String One Finger Approach/Name Of Notes/Intervals/Singing Do Re Mi)
https://tomovhxtv.vhx.tv/videos/et01-c-major-scale
3) ET12 Major Triad (Learn inversions One String Approach first with intervals not shapes and no noises!)
https://tomovhxtv.vhx.tv/music-theory-i/videos/et12-major-triads
4) FB Blues Shuffle Bassline (Play it slowly without any noises)
https://tomovhxtv.vhx.tv/foundation-core-music-lessons/videos/fb-blues-shuffle-bassline
5) FT Root 3rd 7th Swing Groove Technique (Left hand muting technique and learn R 3 7 chords)
https://tomovhxtv.vhx.tv/foundation-core-music-lessons/videos/ft-root-3rd-7th-swing-groove-technique
Do above and you can expand to next steps. You can follow these lessons so you can see it.
Tomo
Thank you LaVoy for sharing your thoughts and the beautiful drawing haha!
Thank you Tomo for taking the time to read through my post and answering my question. I really appreciate it. THe one advice that has helped me the most from you is Be kind toi yourself, I always was mad at myselfwhen I wasn't able to do something that I wanted to do. I will focus on the foundations you laid out for me for the next 30 days, practicing 1hr everyday. I will record my playing as much as I can and share my journey as well. This will also help keep me accountable. Thank you Tomo!
Welcome Nahom! That's a great list to focus on. I'd also echo LaVoy's comment - I think we all like to play songs. Once you feel pretty good (not 'mastered' - we'll be mastering these for as long as we walk the earth) about R37 swing and chromatic 1-2-3-4, you may want to work on Blue Monk comp / melody / etude. In addition to the lesson in the jazz standards section, Eiji started a Blue Monk challenge a while back - that thread has a ton of great stuff from members and Tomo:
https://tomovhxtv.vhx.tv/forums/general/75939-blue-monk-challenge