Welcome back to my guitar journey! As always, I have used FenderPlay for the purpose of this week’s lessons. I am definitely in need of some adjustment to my goals. When I first started I said that I would spend 3 hours a week learning the guitar, however, after understanding the pain I would go through from playing so much (see GIF), I think we need to dial that back.
As of today, I will practice a course until I memorize the sequence of the notes and play to the tempo. I am finding that by not spending the extra time on these courses, I am falling behind on skills and the courses are getting to be too difficult. This is just a part of goal-setting, making sure you know when to adjust when something is too difficult. Making these adjustments will allow me to continue with my goal and avoid the cessation of the learning.
COURSE 11: D & G Chords
This part was actually pretty awesome, I learned two notes and can play them both pretty efficiently. The app is covering the most used notes to ensure I feel like I have tools in my toolbox when it comes to playing a new song. I always struggle with keeping up to the tempo they set in the lessons, however, in the practice sessions, you are able to set the tempo to 75% or 50% as well. So, I have been able to use this function to slowly progress to the normal 100% tempo.
COURSE 12: Sunny Afternoon by The Kinks
This was a fun tune, however, again, I had no idea what the song was! Here was my attempt at this. Do you think I did okay? Listen here.
COURSE 13: C Chord
This was a long and very difficult lesson. This is one that I will have to return back to and practice more. For some reason, I CANNOT stop touching other strings. I know this is happening because the notes are not the same as the teacher on the app. Also, I try plucking each string to make sure it sounds right, and, well…. it DOESN’T! It drives me bonkers that I cannot get it and I was just misplaying it during the songs and other exercises. The video I made is the Exercise: G-C-D. You can watch here to see how much I struggle with the placement of my fingers during the second note (C chord). STRUGGLE BUS!
Summary of this week
This was the end of what is called ‘Level 1’ on the app. I feel inadequate enough to not want to move onto Level 2, however, I did take a sneak peek at the lessons and songs I will learn… listen here.
What Lady Gaga song was that?
Screenshots of this week’s lessons:
