Matt's Guitar Problem

The Numbers 5h31m practicing Are You Gonna Be My Girl x4 (80% learned), Learn To Fly x4 (80% learned), Technique x3, Fly By Night x2 (30% learned), Wanted Dead Or Alive x2 (25% polished), Time of Your Life x2 (90% learned) Current count: 4 perform-able, polishing 1, learning 12 Needless to say, this round of the Weekly Recap is a little different, with less focus on time spent, and more focus on how much progress I feel like I'm making, with how many songs.  I got thinking that my goal isn't to put hours in on the guitar, but that I want to be able to entertain and to play a lot of different songs.  More songs will intrinsically mean more styles, and more rounding out of my guitar playing. The format and focus change was sparked after last week's moment of impostor syndrome.  I've been lusting after a Gibson Les Paul for a while here, and I decided to scratch the itch by going and playing it.  When I actually got to the store, I took a lap through the rest...

Jeez, it really has been over six months since I last focused on playing the guitar. But.  I'm back!  I'm again wanting to learn a bunch of new songs, and this time it's as much to fight off Impostor Syndrome around my guitar skills as not.  I'm definitely able to play well, but I can only play a handful of songs from start to finish, with or without the music in front of me.  Unsurprisingly, this means that my practice goals are still to learn new songs. The current learn-it set list is "Fly By Night" by Rush, "Learn To Fly" by Foo Fighters, and "Are You Gunna Be My Girl" by Jet.  I'm going to mix in a Beatles song after I noodle through a couple of them. Last season's practice really did pay off.  I'm comfortable performing (singing + guitar) "Blackbird", "Dust In The Wind", "Signs", and "Space Oddity".  "Wanted Dead Or Alive" is still pretty close to something I can play...

The Numbers 2h49m analog, 0m RockSmith 176 bpm downpicking, 264 alternate picking Space Oddity x2, Signs x2, Dust In The Wind x2, Swing Life Away x1, Stairway To Heaven (vrs 1) x1 3x Martin, 2x Stromburg I didn't put much time towards the guitar this week, between video games and feeling run down (see item #1).  I did find it much easier to put the practice in if I put together half hour practice chunks -- a warmup or technique exercise, then two songs.  This will be how I do day-to-day practice for the next few weeks, to shake the idea out. No open mic this week.  If I scribble out a lead sheet, "Space Oddity" will make it into the roster next time.  A local weekly paper also listed their favorite ten open mi venues, and I'm going to try to make it to one or two of them each week.  Check out the local scene as I've been wanting to. I also spent a little too much time staring at guitar, and order an Ibanez AE305NT, a solid-top acoustic with a cutaway,...

The Numbers 4h38m analog, 0m RockSmith 176 bpm downpicking, 264 alternate picking Space Oddity x4 ,  World I Know x3,  Signs x2, Blackbird x2, Dust in the Wind x2 , Wanted Dead Or Alive x2,  Stairway To Heaven (v1) x1 5x Martin Open Mic - Blackbird, Dust In The Wind, Signs. Kind of a "meh" week, blame my dating life.  Got back to Angel's Landing and did another quick set, solid playing this time, and room to improve for the stage performance.  Just another thing to work on, but I'll be happy to knock off a lot of the stage fright. I meant to work on some new material this week, but I instead focused mainly on tightening up the almost-ready songs.  Given a lead sheet, "Space Oddity" is going into the open mic rotation -- progress!  It also seemed like doing half-hour sit-downs was the best way to get practice in.  Warmup and/or a magazine/book exercise, then one or two songs.  It seems like less of a time investment than looking at ...

The Numbers 6h46m analog, 46m RockSmith 184 bpm downpicking, 264 alternate picking Signs x5, Stairway To Heaven (v1) x4, Blackbird x3, Dust in the Wind x3 , Space Oddity x3 , World I Know x2, Everlong x2, Working Man (one solo) x2, Drunken Lullabies x1, Closer To The Heart x1, Shipping Up To Boston x1 Martin x7, Ibanez x2 I wound up trying something different and setting a plan at the beginning of the week, which honestly worked out really well -- I strengthened, refreshed, or added new material as I wanted to.  I didn't feel up to the open mic, but practiced through the target songs, and caught a show at Sheabeen's on Saturday.  Turns out they have an open mic on Thursdays, which I'm going to check out soon. I subscribed to Acoustic Guitar magazine, and I'm going to start working in the GW and AG articles as part of the planned practice.  I think it'll help round out my skills and introduce me to some new music that I might not otherwise play. The Irish ...

The Numbers 6h46m analog, 39m RockSmith 176 bpm downpicking, 252 alternate picking (didn't do this much) Signs x5, Blackbird x4, Dust in the Wind x4, Wanted Dead Or Alive x3, Stairway to Heaven (first verse) x2, World I Know x1, Heavy x1, Everlong x1, Hold On Loosely 1, Space Oddity x1 I went to open mic and performed (gasp!) on Monday the 18th, and did reasonably well.  Blackbird was a little spotty, Dust In the Wind was a little easier, and I didn't try to sing Signs.  A week later and I'm very comfortable with the song, and feel like it's performance ready.  The Martin got almost exclusive playtime during the week, partly because of the fresh strings from the 11th, partly because I'm trying to shore up the performance songs. Reviewing the "new song plan" from August 23rd, "Signs" is perform-able, "Space Oddity" is maaaybe 30%.  I didn't feel that "Don't Fear The Reaper" was something I wanted to play or perform,...