Skip to main content

Day Seventy (Year Four)

I got to everything I had hoped for today, which included:

1) Lick #3 from Guitar Aerobics
2) More work with the DVD booklets I pulled out last night
3) the solo from "Yellow Ledbetter"
4) The Blues Goldmine book.

Having put in three days worth of work on the Guitar Aerobics book, here's what I'm noticing... while the book is billed as a "1 lick per day" format, it hasn't worked that way for me since the first day.  Instead, it has evolved into something wherein I work through all of the licks leading up to the current one, and then tackle the current one.  So, by the end of the week, I'll be going through all seven licks whenever I sit down.  What's cool about it to me is that, while all of them are easier to play tonight than they were on Monday or Tuesday, just that improvement is obvious when I get down to whatever the rest of my daily practicing is.

I ran through some of the same licks from the DVD booklets again tonight, and those are sounding about the same as they did last night.  Tomorrow's goal is going to be to use the DVDs as well, instead of just playing off of the transcriptions.

As for "Ledbetter," I did a couple of things with it, but didn't take the final step of slowing it down to make sure I get everything down exactly.  Part of that rests in the fact that, of the three different versions of that song that I have, the solo is never played the same way.  So, what it comes down to is this: should I learn the solo note for note first, and then take that knowledge and use it to play it more by feel and emotion, or should I start with the feel and emotion side of things, and then go back, learn it note for note, and use that as a way to provide other soloing options?  The more I think about it, the more I'm inclined to go with the latter of the two choices.

The Goldmine book went well today, too.  Those turnarounds are getting easier.  If I have a secondary priority tomorrow, it's those lessons, just to make sure that I'm getting as much out of them as I can, and that I'm getting the tempos right.

Tomorrow needs to be a day with a long practice session.  If only for my own sense of self and sanity.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dat Two Hundred Thirty One (Year Three)

So, apparently the new Airborne EP that came out yesterday is MP3 only!  Downloaded that as soon as I figured it out this morning, but didn't have time to sync the ipod after doing so.  Therefore, I naturally had a ton of time to listen tonight that was away from my computer. On the plus side, though, I was able to spend some of that extra time with a guitar in my hands, working on the chord progression for this month's song.  I've got an opening chord change that I really like, and the flicker of a two guitar approach, with one of the two parts capoed up the neck dancing somewhere in the back of my brain.  If all goes according to plan, it could work out really well. Also, finally over halfway in the Grohl bio.  Considering I was hardly home at all today, I feel like I got a decent chunk of that read. Tomorrow should (hopefully) be another decent day for music, with a chance to play in the evening, and enough time for a few runs through the Airborne EP....
Post a Comment
Read more

Day Two Hundred Twenty Seven (Year Two)

So, the new Springsteen disc is amazing.  There's enough of a mixture of his upbeat rockers, his ballads, and his message songs to make this his best record since The Rising .  And speaking of that record... Buying The Boss the day it comes out always takes me back to a specific moment in life.  It was July 30th, 2002, the year after 9/11, the year after someone on the streets of New York told Springsteen "we need you now."  I had driven to Oshkosh, WI to visit some friends, when I remembered that Springsteen's disc was scheduled to come out that day.  I drove downtown to The Exclusive Company, but had to park a few blocks back.  At the time, there wasn't much going on downtown, but when I got out of the car, I could hear this music coming from up the block somewhere.  The closer I got to Exclusive, the more it began to dawn on me, they had set up a giant set of speakers in their upstairs windows, and were blasting the new album out into the streets....
Post a Comment
Read more

Day One Hundred Forty Two

So, I haven't been sleeping much lately, and I've been staying up late. listening to music, doing a bit of playing, and watching old episodes of Behind The Music on the internet. It's funny, you know, because I never met the rest of my "band," I've become the critic. It's all right, don't get me wrong, but for a decade now I've always hoped that I'd find a way to release something. It'll happen, I know it will, but it's continually happened slower than I expected it to. I've gotten close to getting something released, as I've documented before here before, but with the winter coming and the cold closing in, I'm facing another chance to make something musical of the winter. I'm going to start by finishing up the old things that have gotten pushed to the sides in the last few months. With the buildup of everything since the summer, it should be easier. Even if all I do is spend the winter writing lyrics, trying to g...
Post a Comment
Read more