ShawnE

@Dad3353 Cheers Douglas... plenty of great advice & suggestions there as always! Will take all of that onboard going forward... all very simple things for me to implement &/or keep in mind...! Since the turn of the year I substituted a lot of "song practice" time for straight up strum practice.. extra time noodling between chords I guess but with a goal of naturally easing up the wrist/hand during strumming (& further improving chord changes as an added bonus of that) & think it's paying off... still a long way to go with it of course but it at least definitely feels more free-flowing than it did back in December. Hopefully that'll start transferring into new song practices. @Crusoe Thanks a lot! Sticking with it for sure... I sense I'm at the stage now where things begin to kick up a gear!

Apologies for the two months absence - super busy with life stuff! I hope anyone who's still around from last year are keeping well & have had a good start to this year! On my front.. bad news is I didn't have time to record updates or really progress much through modules... However.. good news is I still managed to put in circa' one hour practice pretty much every day which has just helped me further cement the early foundational stuff as well as the new things learned in the first module of grade two, which I've now completed between the start of Jan & now... in the next module I'm about to start I (finally) start taking a first look at the F.

This is just a video of my general review on the online course I'm following now I've completed grade one... might be a useful little watch for anyone considering learning guitar or looking for opinions of an online course who may stumble across this thread (now or in the future).

Short snappy update as I come to the end of a consolidation phase... bigger & newer things to come in the next week or so.

I couldn't help but get a little festive. Been practicing stuff that should well & truly annoy my family when performed in mum's living room in a couple weeks time.

@Dad3353 Cheers Douglas, definitely open to noodling ideas. I've learned the Am chord... but I haven't learned the Bm chord. That one will be to come. Though I'm sure there can't be no harm in me taking a little gander at it in advance during these last couple of weeks freely messing around. @Crusoe Haha thank you! It does feel very distant when I think back to day one. Crazy to think it wasn't even 4 months ago. Gearing up for plenty more, though!

100 hours officially completed... couldn't help but put together a little compilation. Still rubbish but on we march!

Took a step backwards this week in hopes of eventually taking several steps forwards by mainly focusing on songs that work the two chords I find most difficult - C & D.. well, save for Dm.. but I'll tackle more of that another time. I think another couple of weeks consolidating this type of stuff & then I'll feel more ready to move onto the next chunk of learning. I'll next be reflecting on my first 100 hours & then after that it'll be December so... I'd may as well start practicing with a few Christmas bangers.

@The Pinky Thanks a lot! Haha yeah I also find it a full on quantum leap... especially any song with 2 chords to a bar (& 4 different chords within two bars) or really just anything over 100bpm. I think I've got a good chunk of the fundamentals down now... so just a case of continuing on for (hopefully) ongoing improvement with fluidity & rhythm when playing so it can flow more naturally... I'm fully prepared for it to take a verrrrry long time to fully shake off the signs of robotic-ness, though!

Month three - now entering a consolidation phase until I feel comfortable enough to move onto... you know... that F thing & the second grade of the course I'm following.

No comment

@Dad3353 Some simple theory stuff is coming up in grade 2 of the course I'm following I believe... I'm about to start the final module of grade 1 so will likely start grade 2 in the next month or two... I can't say theory has gripped me with intrigue just yet but I am known to regularly dive down rabbit holes for hours and hours on end when interest grips me so there's still a good chance that could happen hah! @The Pinky Yes agree with that... if the majority of it can be enjoyed then it's definitely easier to continue on! Luckily I've not found even the mundane practice too boring or chore like as of yet... but then it is still early days really haha!

@Crusoe @Dad3353 Cheers both! Hahah yes 10 weeks from dreadful to bad.. and that in itself is not bad! My latest module has had me dabbling with the G today (a simplified two finger version.. at least for now) & strumming along to 6:8 time signatures instead of the 4:4 I've had up 'till now... think I might be edging back to dreadful for the next few days before it starts heading forwards again!

10 weeks in... not too much change as I've mainly been going over the same things for the past 2/3 weeks... hopefully just some small improvements with bits & pieces. The polishing of chord changes, technique, strumming, picking, rhythm etc. continues.. onwards & upwards with the G chord next. Thanks for watching!

This one isn't for the squeamish... if you don't like looking at calluses forming you may want to give this one a miss... if you're morbidly curious like I am then you may want to give it a watch... Short 6-7 minute documentary outlining the 54 days it took for my calluses to develop before settling down.

@The Pinky That's awesome that you had a little kickstart though & picked it back up.... & all the more worthwhile if you've got to a point where you feel you're doing better now than you were even as a youngster. That guidance & structure to learning is probably all it takes for a lot of people... it's good to see where you're heading with it & understanding that there's a path of progress clearly mapped out. At least to the point where you may feel proficient enough to reassess your learning & take it down a different specific path. A lot of people have told me about how they've started following certain online lessons or even lessons with a teacher & then eventually changed route because they decided on a different style of playing or something similar... perhaps years down the line for that to ever come to fruition, certainly for me! At the moment I'm getting around an hour of practice in every day. Usually 15 mins most mornings & then a good 45 minutes or more in the evening. Spot on with the learning at different rates as well...!

@Dad3353 Yes good shout with the noodling! I do that when I can... usually just fumbling around the chords I find most difficult with different strumming.. I like to call it "making music" Or I might have a dabble at playing through a song without hunching over to look at the fretboard (that's given me an idea for a video), or I'll set the metronome & just play around with the changes... it is more fun you're right & I think that type of playing around is what's pushing my progress possibly more than anything else because it's letting me go over & over & over stuff in an enjoyable way without having one eye on the next exercise. In fact, it's so much more enjoyable than standard timed exercises etc. that I suspect it results in a lot of people reaching a certain level of proficiency with this basic stuff that they then just call it a day with the learning & don't bother furthering themselves (or facing up to further frustration haha) anymore. Of course, I've personally got one eye on the 2043 guitarist of the year award. @The Pinky Thanks very much! How long have you been learning? Long enough to consider yourself playing yet? I still proudly tell people I practice guitar, I don't play it

Well.... I learned the C chord this week. However, with that opening me up to an abundance of new songs I was immediately reminded that I have to work on continuing to polish up not only the chords I've previously learned but also the action of changing between them all - of course, I'm aware certain changes are more commonly used than others so it makes sense to at least prioritise those for now - namely the changes that specifically take place in the songs I'm practicing. So, it took all of 10 seconds into a new song to discover that I'll be putting a ton of work into the changes between Em and D, Em and C, and C and D (just as a main focus - still doing all other standard practice stuff & whatnot) for the next week or two before I reassess. I don't expect to vastly improve these within a matter of weeks but I do want to feel more comfortable with them before introducing yet another chord (.....G!). Thanks for watching!

@Dad3353 Yeah I sometimes find I want to bend my thumb at times (not often) but become instantly aware of it & manage to fix it. Hoping that irons out & happens less & less in time. Otherwise doing my best to keep it positioned behind! Good point about the going back over all the stuff I've learned & sort of consolidating it as well... will be sure to keep a healthy chunk of previous exercises in my practice & to play at least one song from all previous weeks so I'm still playing every chord I've learned so far every day. Cheers!!

A second week with the main focus on the Am, Dm & Em so now we have a little run through of the 5 songs I've been practicing once a day to start getting to grips with them. Took me a little while to warm up so plenty of mistakes in the first 3 songs in particular but pretty happy with my run through of the last two songs - overall I'm pleased enough after 7 weeks! Excuse the piston arm. I think it's a tad better than it has been & after running through a little of my next lesson (which includes first use of the C chord) I can see varying strumming power is starting to be discussed.

@Dad3353 I know, the damn piston arm I find there's a correlation between how much I pump the arm & how well specific chord changes have progressed... as soon as I get more comfortable switching specific chords I naturally relax the strumming arm without even realising... I noticed that when my time was focused on the D, A & E 2 weeks ago as suddenly my strumming typically became much lighter & was just from the wrist - it also naturally swings much lighter when I just sit there switching between Em & Am. As soon as Dm is in the mix it starts swinging two to the dozen like a tense mechanism while the rest of me zones in on the switch.... hopefully just a matter of another week or two's focused practice & the piston will subconsciously relax until I more consciously call upon it. Nevertheless, will monitor it for sure! I make sure it's relaxed each time I do a few minutes of strumming exercises each day. As always.... big thanks!!

@Dad3353 Haha thank you! Practice will recommence with far more attention to thumb placing... that all makes sense!

New introduction of Em, Am & Dm.... lot's of work to do with these minor chords before I'm comfortable enough to move onto a new chord & whatnot.

I like it... I'll have a little dabble... my song repertoire is understandably a bit thin at the moment!