Skip to main content

Day Three Hundred Thirty Seven (Year Four)

Tonight didn't feel quite as crisp, playing-wise as last night did, but it was still a good night. 

Tonight it was the major scale's turn to be run all the way up the neck.  The patterns I've been focused on from The Guitarist's Guide To Scales Over Chords are feeling better underneath my fingers.  For sure the major scale patterns and their corresponding pentatonics.  I'm okay with the minor scale (but not as comfortable as I wish I was), but am fine with the minor pentatonic stuff the book highlights. 

I still come back to the fact that my scale knowledge and my lead playing are the biggest aspect of my playing that is lacking right now, and I'm determined to change that by the end of the summer.

I didn't do anything with backing tracks tonight, but a lot of that it definitely on the list for the weekend.  Instead, I took a quick look at the first workout that Steve Vai did for Guitar World back in 1990, and had a bit of fun with that.  One of my long-term goals is still to commit to doing his 30 hour workout that came out in 2004.  Maybe that should be a summer thing too.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Day Two Hundred Six (Year Four)

Today was the first official day of the second half of my "album-in-a-month" challenge. As for today's goals, I wanted to see what I could get done in regards to track order, and get at least a little bit of a start on the lyric writing process. I spent more time working on the track order question than I did on the lyrics today, but as a result of that, I ended up with something that I think will work in terms of order. I did sit with the notebook for a few minutes at the very end of the day, and got a solid starting line of lyric and some other ideas that I hope will be jumping off points for lyrics. What I'm thinking I might do, however, is switch my focus from the lyric writing part of the process directly to the recording part of the process.  That way, if I can get the music recorded and burned onto a CD, I can take the music with me in the car, and listen and try to see what images and thoughts the music brings up.  It's a tactic that has worked for...

Day Two Hundred Ninety Two (Year Five)

Today was the last seminary village cookout of the year. While we were all sitting around the picnic tables eating dinner, I got a chance to talk with a few of the Mrs.'s classmates about guitar related stuff. As it turns out, more than one of them wants to be more proficient on guitar. I'm not saying that this will lead to more teaching opportunities, but I told one of them that I would throw a folder together for them. Essentially, anytime I get a chance to talk shop is a great chance for me to reinforce some of the things I have been focusing on. If nothing else, it gets me thinking ahead to tomorrow's day off and a chance to get into the studio for a decent amount of time.

Day Three Hundred Forty Two (Year Four)

Tonight was a slightly unfocused night in the studio. It was a night of acoustic stuff, but most of what I got accomplished involved tinkering with different songs by Jackie Greene and Johnny Cash.  If nothing else, I set up the next list of songs I want to figure out. Tomorrow night I need to start getting back to the Acoustic Goldmine book, as well.  Every time I sit down with the acoustic for an extended period of time, I reconnect with the emotional side of that instrument.  There's so much to learn still in that book, so much information designed to improve my playing.  I need to take better advantage of it. I know it's crazy, but I'm already looking forward to Friday.  I really need to spend a lot of the day in the studio.  Getting a weekday off of work is such a rare commodity.  I need to do a good job of using my time wisely.