By the end of the day when I’ve finally got some time to practice I was too sleepy to do it. So in order to record something I decided just to play some 1234s.
Today I’ve repeated the same routines I did yesterday and found out where my issue with the 2nd bar of the solo was originated.
1234 exercise
4231 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4312 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4321 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
Scales
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
CAGED system
I’m getting better in remembering shapes and switching between them. Not too great though, still need to look up some of them before the recording.
Major chords
Minor chords
Major 7th chords
7th chords
Minor 7th chords
Ear training
I was on an almost perfect streak for the first 100 questions with only 5-6 mistakes. But as soon as Minor 3rd appeared all went south… Also I mixed up some buttons and increased the number of mistakes for Perfect 4th for instance. Need to be more focused to exclude things like this.
Songs
MGMT – Kids [Solo]
Today I made a breakthrough. The hardest bar for me was the second one and I thought that it was because of the bar itself. But it appeared that I just hadn’t used alternate picking for the whole bar and had to pick up or down multiple times in a row, which on the higher speeds is pretty much impossible. So I slowed down once again and trained myself to play everything correctly. This bar appeared quite easy so the progress will definitely follow 🙂
Summary
There was a long practice. Nearly 1.5 hours if I’m correct. And it was really fun. Although the next parts of the solo became worse, I’m still really happy with the 2nd bar. There are no more reasons for me to stop increasing the speed, and I’m looking forward to it.
Today I repeated everything I’ve practiced yesterday and also returned to Kids by MGMT solo practice.
1234 exercise
4231 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 140 bpm
4312 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 140 bpm
4321 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 140 bpm
Scales
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
CAGED system
Trying to remember all positions for every chord for now.
Major chords
Minor chords
Major 7th chords
7th chords
Minor 7th chords
Ear training
Got to the level with 7 intervals again!
Songs
MGMT – Kids [Solo]
Was trying to practice every bar separately. It went pretty well, but I didn’t have much time to finish the practice, so the whole thing will be played tomorrow.
Summary
The solo is really tricky. Hopefully with the new approach I’ll be able to play in consistently-ish tomorrow.
Today I practices 1234s and scales as usual but also added one more routine on the CAGED system.
1234 exercise
4231 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 130 bpm
4312 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 130 bpm
4321 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 130 bpm
Scales
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
CAGED system
I just started this routine, so the goal was to play all CAGED progressions throughout the neck for all basic chords.
Major chords
Minor chords
Major 7th chords
7th chords
Minor 7th chords
Ear training
It was pretty hard today, but I managed to get to the level with 7 intervals on the 200th attempt. It means that if I was gonna make a mistake, I’d stop the training there. But fortunately here is the full practice with 400 answers.
Summary
Today I finally started something brand new. I didn’t know about CAGED system at all, and it’ll definitely come in handy in understanding of the chords on the fretboard.
This week was kinda relaxed on practice. I mean, I still practiced daily, but All of Me and Autumn Leaves are not that hard and are fun to play. So to spice it up a bit I concentrated mostly on the Kids by MGMT solo.
Originally it’s played as 16th notes at 123 bpm. Last week I just learned the solo and played it as 8th notes at 123 bpm, recording every bar separately 😀 By the end of the week I managed to get to the speed of 8th notes at 160 bpm. It’s not consistent at all – I’ve been recording myself daily for 20-30 minutes and from that footage I only get 2-3 successful attempts. So I’m gonna change the approach and practice each part separately, increasing the speed. Then I’m gonna connect them all. Hopefully, this will help me progress faster.
Anyway, here’s the video. There are no questions this week, and also I tried to organize it differently for it to be shorter 🙂
The goals for this week were:
[Done] 4123, 4132, 4213 as 8th notes at 150 bpm on the 5th fret
[Done] Get to the level with 7 intervals on ear training at tonedear.com 3 times
[Done] All of Me consistently at 150 bpm (both open and barre chords versions)
[Done] Autumn Leaves at 120 bpm
My goals for the next week:
4231, 4312, 4321 as 8th notes at 150 bpm on the 5th fret
Practice ear training at tonedear.com daily
Kids by MGMT solo at 170 bpm consistently
Implement Modules 19-20 routines
1234 exercise
4123 on the 5th fret – 8th notes @ 120 bpm → 8th notes @ 150 bpm 4132 on the 5th fret – 8th notes @ 120 bpm → 8th notes @ 150 bpm 4213 on the 5th fret – 8th notes @ 120 bpm → 8th notes @ 150 bpm
Scales
Major scales – 1-12 frets – EADG strings – 16th notes @ 90 bpm Minor scales – 1-12 frets – EA strings – 16th notes @ 90 bpm
Today I was just chilling and playing the same stuff as yesterday in order to get the videos to my weekly report.
1234 exercise
These are really smooth and easy 🙂
4123 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4132 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4213 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
Scales
Still not legato…
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Strumming
Module 18 pattern [Autumn Leaves]
70 bpm. I managed to play the whole progression without mistakes and the sound was pretty good as well, except for maybe 2-3 chords. So I’ll count it as a win.
Songs
MGMT – Kids [Solo]
8th notes @ 160 bpm. After another 20 minutes I managed to play the solo semi-decently 2-3 times, which is horrible. I need to work on the consistency, so I will practice each bar separately and increase the speed of them separately. And only after that I’ll connect them all into one progression.
Ear training
The best attempt yet! 8 intervals in total and under 10 incorrect answers in each.
Today I finally broke through the wall of 160 bpm in playing Kids solo and repeated everything else to increase the consistency.
1234 exercise
I’m completely relaxed now while playing these 🙂
4123 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4132 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4213 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
Scales
Not sure how many more days will it take for me to play the scales decently at this speed. So I have nothing else but more practice.
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Strumming
Module 18 pattern [Autumn Leaves]
70 bpm. The chord transitions are better. Hopefully, tomorrow I’ll be able to play it perfectly to proceed to the next routines.
Songs
MGMT – Kids [Solo]
8th notes @ 150-160 bpm. Today I finally beat that wall of 160 bpm. It took some time and relearning how to play a few things at slower speeds, but now here it is!
Ear training
Again I couldn’t get to the wanted level. Hopefully this is one time situation and tomorrow I’ll get there once again to reach my goal.
Summary
I’m glad about my solo progress today, but the tooth still hurts, and also I damaged my left hand index finger yesterday… So hopefully tomorrow I’ll be okay and play it better.
Today I’ve been practicing through the pain after my visit to the dentist. I just repeated everything I did yesterday.
1234 exercise
4123 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4132 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4213 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
Scales
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Strumming
Module 17 pattern [All of Me]
Today I managed to play All of Me perfectly both with open and barre chords, so this is time to leave this song and switch my attention to the next modules.
Open chords
120 bpm
Barre chords
120 bpm
Module 18 pattern [Autumn Leaves]
70 bpm
Songs
MGMT – Kids [Solo]
8th notes @ 140-155 bpm. I just couldn’t play decently because of the toothache, so I even got really mad in the end of the video and just stopped playing. But I tried to implement something useful – pulling-off instead of picking in one part where there are 32nd notes in the solo. At the higher speed picking all of them would be literally impossible.
Summary
Toothache got me so hard that at first I thought that I’m gonna skip this day. But fortunately after taking some pills the pain reduced and I managed to maintain my daily practice and upload schedule 🙂
Today I sped up to 160 bpm on Kids solo, got to the final speed of 1234s, played scales a bit better and once again played All of Me and Autumn Leaves.
1234 exercise
4123 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4132 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
4213 on the 5th fret
8th notes @ 150 bpm
Scales
Major scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Minor scales
16th notes @ 90 bpm
Strumming
Module 17 pattern [All of Me]
Open chords
120 bpm
Barre chords
120 bpm
Module 18 pattern [Autumn Leaves]
70 bpm
Songs
MGMT – Kids [Solo]
8th notes @ 150-160 bpm. Huge leap of speed. Unfortunately I don’t think that these kind of jumps in speed would happen again, because it’s already pretty fast. But this one is really great in comparison to yesterdays 140 bpm. I didn’t manage to play it at 160 bpm clean, and that’s unfortunate, but there was a few pretty close attempts, so I’ll definitely get there tomorrow.
Summary
I’m happy about the progress. Unfortunately my tooth started to hurt, so hopefully I’ll fix this issue tomorrow.