Category: 52 Week Guitar Player

Wow, that was a week and a half! I’ve reached all my goals and even more, got through Module 13 and Module 14 and had so much fun finally practicing something music theory related.

I totally agreed with somebody’s comment under my When I Come Around cover – there is no need to look at the left hand all the time, especially while playing something easy and muscle memory related. So this week’s motto was “Don’t look there” and I practiced almost everything looking at the window 🙂 This approach led to some mistakes which were not a thing before, but I think I managed to adapt to it more or less, so I’m happy about that.

The main issue with 1234s this week was 2314 combination. My brain just couldn’t comprehend it after playing 1423 for a couple of weeks before. I tended to switch to the next string after playing 23 part instead of 14 one. But by the end of this week I seem to get rid of this habit. The combination is not perfectly played yet, not at all. But this major issue is gone.

I still struggle with the 34s in 12-13-14-23-24-34 exercise. My middle finger lives his own life and moves around a lot. So I started practicing this combination separately keeping my middle finger on the G string and trying not to let him go away from the strings. I’m getting there at the slower pace, but I need much more practice to achieve the current speed I use for this exercise.

The scales are the fun part for me 🙂 It may sound weird, but I haven’t practiced one before, so it’s really fun. After 1234s it’s something different and finally more music related. So I enjoy playing them and trying to do it consistently. Pronouncing notes while playing scales are really tricky for me. It takes a lot of time, so I only practiced it once this week. And I completely forgot about the circle of fifths, so I had to figure out myself whether this scale is with sharps or flats. It was really long, but it was fun 😀

I also practiced the intervals ear training at tonedear.com, but I only had time to do it once. I started from the easiest level and practiced for about half an hour non-stop. In that time the level increased only twice – Major 2nd and Minor 2nd were added. After that I didn’t succeed in increasing the level more by making mistakes too often to make any progress. But the final result is not bad – 78.27%.

The goals for this week were:

• [Done] Play at least three 1234 combinations starting with 2 at 300 bpm
• [Done] Increase my ring-pinky endurance and precision in 12-13-14-23-24-34 exercise
• [Done] Find notes on all strings in fretboard knowledge exercise in less than 1:30
• [Done] Watch through Module 13 again and start the ear training

My goals for the next week:

• 2341, 2413, 2431 as 8th notes at 150 bpm
• 34s without moving my middle finger at least as 8th notes at 100 bpm
• All the scales consistently as 8th notes at 150 bpm across the fretboard
• All the scales pronouncing notes in less than 8 min [the first attempt was in 13 min]
• Get to the level with 7 intervals on ear training at tonedear.com

As always, here’s the video.

1234 exercise

2134 on the 5th fret – 8th notes @ 110 bpm → 8th notes @ 150 bpm
2143 on the 5th fret – 8th notes @ 110 bpm → 8th notes @ 150 bpm
2314 on the 5th fret – 8th notes @ 110 bpm → 8th notes @ 150 bpm
34 on the 5th fret – Quarter notes @ 80 bpm → Quarter notes @ 100 bpm
12-13-14-23-24-34 on the 5th fret – 8th notes at 120 bpm → 8th notes at 150 bpm [Then made a step back to 130 bpm]

Fretboard knowledge

All strings at once – 1:35 → 1:30

Ear training

Intervals – 317 of 405 or 78.27%

Songs

Ozzy Osbourne – Crazy Train [Ear training]
Cream – Sunshine Of Your Love [Ear training]
Europe – The Final Countdown [Ear training]
Arctic Monkeys – Do I Wanna Know? [Ear training]