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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.
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