Oh man ... just the words "music theory" kind of caused a little panic attack scenario and then the dry erase board ... I thought I was out until you immediately dropped the pen and I knew I'd make it through ... ha ha ... just kidding. On a serious note ... it must be important if YOU say it is which means I'll have to watch the lesson a couple of times and experiment with the concepts. I've never taken a lesson in my life and never really wanted to know so therefore I never really progressed the way I should have over a lifetime of fooling around with my guitar. Now that I am taking lessons from you ... I consider Sonic Junction taking lessons ... I feel like I want to know everything I can. So if I have questions ... I'll be back. As always, thank you.
Dude you're a great teacher and the song is so lovely. Your words in regards to singing mean a lot because you're such a great performer as well BUT ... and there is always a but when it comes to me .... I don't sing much because I don't consider myself much of a singer, no range, which is a deadly combination when coupled with an inability to do magical tricks on an acoustic guitar (other than what I have recently learned from you). When I do sing, my only option is to try and sell it through emotion ... and my kids still usually tell me jokingly don't give up my day job ... ha ha ... which I never had any intention to do in the first place. I don't know where I'm going with this other than to say thanks for the lesson Chris ... I think it was an important one ... and you can bank on me eventually posting a video of me trying to sing this beautiful song.
Oh my goodness ... what a beautiful song. I can't say I've heard it before just now which surprises me. Thank you and I can't wait to learn how to play it properly.
Chris - thanks. I think with this lesson I didn't spend a sufficient amount of time with you and the tabs. I'm not a huge tab guy but there is something to be said for using them. There are things I'm playing wrong/diferently early on. I fixed that today. I just kind of jumped in and figured if I got close to what you were doing it was good enough. Now that I've been hanging around here for several months I think I would benefit from just starting over from lesson one. You told me once or twice there is no rush. I'm gonna finally take that advice. BTW Avalon is great. If you ever play close by I'd like to come and check it out.
Chris - I'll work on that. I didn't have a complete understanding of what I was supppsed to do or better yet ... what a trill is supposed to sound like. I didn't really pick it out to well on the lesson. I understand now. Thanks again for all the help.
Rainy and dreary day today so I figured I'd post a video of our last lesson with The Nashville Blues. The shocking reality of me singing LOL but hey we're all friends here right. I don't sing much or play for anyone so there you have it. I'm not sure how long I've been a member of this site ... maybe 3 or 4 months but I feel like my confidence and pickin' has improved so much. I'm happy to be here and wish I would've found lessons earlier in life but thankful that I have now. I love this song and think it was a great lesson.
Kip, once again, great job! There are 2 things to work on here:
- You are adding a few beats around 2:04-2:06. Those trills are triplets so the notes are coming alot faster than you think. I'll make a quick video to show you what I mean.
- It looks like you're holding a lot of tension in your arm. Your wrist and hand look great and loose but your elbow isn't moving at all. Not that you want to be totally playing from your elbow, btw, but your whole arm should act as a single relaxed system. It might feel wierd since you haven't played this way before, but try bringing the whole guitar over to your left a few inches. That should drop your right arm down a bit. See how that feels. I suspect it will be strange but you might notice your arm freeing up.
The thought ran through my mind about I have good days and bad days .... then I thought how can that be but you're right. Playing the guitar is realy no different than anything else. I try to play for at least an hour every day - probably a little more since I've joined this site and started with your classes but there are days when things feel so natural in my hands and then other days I can't even play an acceptable rythm. Anyway, I just thought I'd chime back in and say thanks for the encouragement and underscore the good day - bad day thing.
Now as for this particular song, I love it ... and it is challenging for me. Others may find it a breeze and I am knocked out impressed by how some of the folks picked it up so fast. Watching Tony Rice play this song is mind blowing - you as well - I'm trying to get to a point with it where it sounds cool for me. It's good to know that I don't have to play it as fast as ya'll to think it sounds cool. Playing a particular section is no problem ... it is when I sit down and try to play it beginning to end where it goes haywire at any given point. Some of that is simply stamina ... and some of it is I need to keep pick'in.
Yep - that C to B flat and preceding lick together might be the coolest thing I've heard in a long time ... reminds me of the Stones in overdrive. How is that possible ha ha. Thanks for showing us how to pick that. Now to learn it.
I'm just about ready to declare this song isn't for me ... but I won't just yet. It does feels hopeless after at least a month of practicing and sometimes I think I'm close and others like right now ... not so much. I think I can live with the idea of never being able to play this at the correct tempo ... I'm not really sure how many amatuer guitar pickers can play it up to speed beginning to end but I'd certainly like to play the song through without mistakes and chopiness. I think this one will be a song that will be with me forever ... slightly out of reach ... but something to shoot for. My fingers hurt.
Now you've gone and done it ... as if this solo isn't mind blowing enough you throw a "Trill" (sp?) triplet or whatchamacallit in to really make life interesting. I see it written right there in the tab ... boogie woogie into a trill coming out of that into another cool pattern but my pick direction at that point is way haywire ha ha and then the C sharp vs the C note ...
Great lesson though and a way cool song - thank you.
Kip, you're killing it! Really great job, no kidding. The music comes through when you play and that's really what matters most. There was one spot where I noticed you played one pickstroke backward (upstroke at 0:42 should be downstroke), but fundamentally it looks like you've internalized the alternate picking because I can see the up/down motion being preserved in your hand/arm even when you're taking a rest.
So with all of that being said, try coming up with your own solo using the melodies, licks, patterns, etc that you've learned so far. Ultimately, the reason to study this stuff is so that you can steal the parts you love the most and make them your own.
Really great job. I'm thrilled to have you on here!
Real cool solo ... hours of fun and days or weeks of pickin' practice ahead for me to get to a point where the fingers remember their way without having to think about it too much. You can really see on the video of Norman Blake playing that it seems to come so naturally and it makes me wonder how much practice it took for him to make it sound so real and natural. Along those same lines, Chris - I didn't know or hear of you before SJ (my loss) but since have watched and listened to as much of what is available as I can. You're a great picker and have obviously played your whole life, it would be of great interest to me and perhaps others to know how your musical journey started and how much time you spent and still spend just practicing. Ok - thanks for the great lesson.
Ok - I figured I'd put this video practice of the 1st couple of Nashville Blues lessons. I can't help myself but once a new lesson goes up I find myself happy to start it even though I haven't finished Banks of the Ohio or Gold Rush but I'm closing in onit (not to mention Soldier's Joy). Too much fun for one old dude to handle. Timing issues here as well as mastery of the moves and notes but I've only just begun to pick ha ha.
Kip, great job!!! You've got me smiling and tapping my foot over here! 2 things:
1) You've added 2 extra beats after your second time through the form (at 0:31)
2) Try hammering on the the Bb note on the lick that happens at 0:14, 0:29, 0:44, 0:59. That will create a touch of dynamics within the phrase that will help I think
3) And a third thing that you could try is crosspicking a forward roll on the low notes at 0:18 and 0:48.
The concept of notes and even chords having color is a beautifl ... verbal way to describe how I feel when writing, playing, or listening to a song. For most of my life ... when I played or wrote ... I was happy to play in the most basic and simplist way possible. I think it is because I'd never had a music or guitar lesson and to be honest I'm just not that great of a picker even though I have played at playing for most of my life. For the past several months my senses are beginning to come alive as I discover colorful and vibrant alternative ways to play the same song. What used to be a great unknown and scary place for me, i.e., up the neck is becoming less and less initmidating. My playing is slowly getting better but my melodies have improved quite a bit. I stumbled around a bit but I'm very happy to have landed here.
Ahhh ... thank you Chris. I did bare down on the lesson last week and it came to me after continuously watching the super slo-mo for days on end and then it really became obvious to me what I was doing differently when I watched your backward roll lesson. I love the personal interest and time you take with your students so thank you for that as well. I will not repost a video until I'm done with the backward roll lesson and I can sing the song so that's either a warning or a just heads up that it will be a while.
Chris - that was a very cool perspective of why you like the song and a point well taken. I will try and keep it in mind when hearing a song that strike my fancy. I'll go an check Norman's performance out. Side note - the same thought as Bryan has below was running through my head particularly the part about your guitar.
This is really beautiful. Seriously, nicely done. There's a sensitivity and unhurried beauty to the way you are playing it. It's so nice that you needen't do anything different. That said, it is different than the classic crosspicking pattern, which is a 3 note pattern. So addressing that I made a little video:
In the latter half of the 1st solo - I feel compelled to play it like I do in take # 2 and # 4 of this short video but I believe you want me to play it the way I do in take #1 and # 3. Does it matter and am I doing take # 1 and # 3 correctly as you intended?
Pick direction is a constrant struggle as I found on your next lesson Cross Picking on Banks of the Ohio but I'm working on it and trying to enjoy the journey. Also, you did say you enjoy checking in and helping out ... I don't want to be a pest but I've spent a lot of time with this lesson and would like to get it close.
Kip, for some reason I missed this video when you posted it before. But I'm glad I found it because it pertains to the most recent one that you uploaded for Gold Rush. You are right, you should mostly play it the way you do it in #1 and #3 which are mostly right. #2 and 4# take some liberties with the timing that are too much. There is an issue with 1 and 3 though: that first G note happens 3 times instead of 2. That means that everything that followed in your version was early by 1 16th note until you pause and correct at 0:08. If you play that first G note 3 times but do everything else the same (after you play that 3rd note, your right hand will be a mirror image of what you've been playing because of the extra note) you will come out correctly and not have to pause at the end.
Can I go off topic for a second - not sure its appropriate but I just watched a video on Youtube where Chris is picking a song that I think is called Let Him Go On Mama? Anway, the first half is picking - no singing - is that part of the song that he sings in the 2nd half of the video? I really don't think it is but cool deal all the way around.
Hey Kip, I believe the video in question was a medley of a fiddle tune called "Whistlin' Rufus" into a John Hartford song called "Let Him Go On, Mama."
Oh man ... just the words "music theory" kind of caused a little panic attack scenario and then the dry erase board ... I thought I was out until you immediately dropped the pen and I knew I'd make it through ... ha ha ... just kidding. On a serious note ... it must be important if YOU say it is which means I'll have to watch the lesson a couple of times and experiment with the concepts. I've never taken a lesson in my life and never really wanted to know so therefore I never really progressed the way I should have over a lifetime of fooling around with my guitar. Now that I am taking lessons from you ... I consider Sonic Junction taking lessons ... I feel like I want to know everything I can. So if I have questions ... I'll be back. As always, thank you.
Dude you're a great teacher and the song is so lovely. Your words in regards to singing mean a lot because you're such a great performer as well BUT ... and there is always a but when it comes to me .... I don't sing much because I don't consider myself much of a singer, no range, which is a deadly combination when coupled with an inability to do magical tricks on an acoustic guitar (other than what I have recently learned from you). When I do sing, my only option is to try and sell it through emotion ... and my kids still usually tell me jokingly don't give up my day job ... ha ha ... which I never had any intention to do in the first place. I don't know where I'm going with this other than to say thanks for the lesson Chris ... I think it was an important one ... and you can bank on me eventually posting a video of me trying to sing this beautiful song.
Right on Kip! Thanks for the kind words and I look forward to that video!
Oh my goodness ... what a beautiful song. I can't say I've heard it before just now which surprises me. Thank you and I can't wait to learn how to play it properly.
Chris - thanks. I think with this lesson I didn't spend a sufficient amount of time with you and the tabs. I'm not a huge tab guy but there is something to be said for using them. There are things I'm playing wrong/diferently early on. I fixed that today. I just kind of jumped in and figured if I got close to what you were doing it was good enough. Now that I've been hanging around here for several months I think I would benefit from just starting over from lesson one. You told me once or twice there is no rush. I'm gonna finally take that advice. BTW Avalon is great. If you ever play close by I'd like to come and check it out.
Chris - I'll work on that. I didn't have a complete understanding of what I was supppsed to do or better yet ... what a trill is supposed to sound like. I didn't really pick it out to well on the lesson. I understand now. Thanks again for all the help.
Kip
Rainy and dreary day today so I figured I'd post a video of our last lesson with The Nashville Blues. The shocking reality of me singing LOL but hey we're all friends here right. I don't sing much or play for anyone so there you have it. I'm not sure how long I've been a member of this site ... maybe 3 or 4 months but I feel like my confidence and pickin' has improved so much. I'm happy to be here and wish I would've found lessons earlier in life but thankful that I have now. I love this song and think it was a great lesson.
Kip, once again, great job! There are 2 things to work on here:
- You are adding a few beats around 2:04-2:06. Those trills are triplets so the notes are coming alot faster than you think. I'll make a quick video to show you what I mean.
- It looks like you're holding a lot of tension in your arm. Your wrist and hand look great and loose but your elbow isn't moving at all. Not that you want to be totally playing from your elbow, btw, but your whole arm should act as a single relaxed system. It might feel wierd since you haven't played this way before, but try bringing the whole guitar over to your left a few inches. That should drop your right arm down a bit. See how that feels. I suspect it will be strange but you might notice your arm freeing up.
Hi Kip --- I think your singing is great. Nice tone and phrasing. You really shape it which is cool.
The beat goes on ... I post the vid just because for some reason I think it's a cool thing to do I guess.
I'd love to see more folks do that. I'm obviously not there yet with the song but here is where I'm at.
The thought ran through my mind about I have good days and bad days .... then I thought how can that be but you're right. Playing the guitar is realy no different than anything else. I try to play for at least an hour every day - probably a little more since I've joined this site and started with your classes but there are days when things feel so natural in my hands and then other days I can't even play an acceptable rythm. Anyway, I just thought I'd chime back in and say thanks for the encouragement and underscore the good day - bad day thing.
Now as for this particular song, I love it ... and it is challenging for me. Others may find it a breeze and I am knocked out impressed by how some of the folks picked it up so fast. Watching Tony Rice play this song is mind blowing - you as well - I'm trying to get to a point with it where it sounds cool for me. It's good to know that I don't have to play it as fast as ya'll to think it sounds cool. Playing a particular section is no problem ... it is when I sit down and try to play it beginning to end where it goes haywire at any given point. Some of that is simply stamina ... and some of it is I need to keep pick'in.
Thanks!
Yep - that C to B flat and preceding lick together might be the coolest thing I've heard in a long time ... reminds me of the Stones in overdrive. How is that possible ha ha. Thanks for showing us how to pick that. Now to learn it.
I'm just about ready to declare this song isn't for me ... but I won't just yet. It does feels hopeless after at least a month of practicing and sometimes I think I'm close and others like right now ... not so much. I think I can live with the idea of never being able to play this at the correct tempo ... I'm not really sure how many amatuer guitar pickers can play it up to speed beginning to end but I'd certainly like to play the song through without mistakes and chopiness. I think this one will be a song that will be with me forever ... slightly out of reach ... but something to shoot for. My fingers hurt.
Now you've gone and done it ... as if this solo isn't mind blowing enough you throw a "Trill" (sp?) triplet or whatchamacallit in to really make life interesting. I see it written right there in the tab ... boogie woogie into a trill coming out of that into another cool pattern but my pick direction at that point is way haywire ha ha and then the C sharp vs the C note ...
Great lesson though and a way cool song - thank you.
Alright here is my lesson 3 ... old strummer dude ... finally trying to learn how to flat pick after years of not learning.
Having fun.
Kip, you're killing it! Really great job, no kidding. The music comes through when you play and that's really what matters most. There was one spot where I noticed you played one pickstroke backward (upstroke at 0:42 should be downstroke), but fundamentally it looks like you've internalized the alternate picking because I can see the up/down motion being preserved in your hand/arm even when you're taking a rest.
So with all of that being said, try coming up with your own solo using the melodies, licks, patterns, etc that you've learned so far. Ultimately, the reason to study this stuff is so that you can steal the parts you love the most and make them your own.
Really great job. I'm thrilled to have you on here!
Chris
Real cool solo ... hours of fun and days or weeks of pickin' practice ahead for me to get to a point where the fingers remember their way without having to think about it too much. You can really see on the video of Norman Blake playing that it seems to come so naturally and it makes me wonder how much practice it took for him to make it sound so real and natural. Along those same lines, Chris - I didn't know or hear of you before SJ (my loss) but since have watched and listened to as much of what is available as I can. You're a great picker and have obviously played your whole life, it would be of great interest to me and perhaps others to know how your musical journey started and how much time you spent and still spend just practicing. Ok - thanks for the great lesson.
I
Ok - I figured I'd put this video practice of the 1st couple of Nashville Blues lessons. I can't help myself but once a new lesson goes up I find myself happy to start it even though I haven't finished Banks of the Ohio or Gold Rush but I'm closing in onit (not to mention Soldier's Joy). Too much fun for one old dude to handle. Timing issues here as well as mastery of the moves and notes but I've only just begun to pick ha ha.
Kip
Kip, great job!!! You've got me smiling and tapping my foot over here! 2 things:
1) You've added 2 extra beats after your second time through the form (at 0:31)
2) Try hammering on the the Bb note on the lick that happens at 0:14, 0:29, 0:44, 0:59. That will create a touch of dynamics within the phrase that will help I think
3) And a third thing that you could try is crosspicking a forward roll on the low notes at 0:18 and 0:48.
Overall, great work.
Chris
The concept of notes and even chords having color is a beautifl ... verbal way to describe how I feel when writing, playing, or listening to a song. For most of my life ... when I played or wrote ... I was happy to play in the most basic and simplist way possible. I think it is because I'd never had a music or guitar lesson and to be honest I'm just not that great of a picker even though I have played at playing for most of my life. For the past several months my senses are beginning to come alive as I discover colorful and vibrant alternative ways to play the same song. What used to be a great unknown and scary place for me, i.e., up the neck is becoming less and less initmidating. My playing is slowly getting better but my melodies have improved quite a bit. I stumbled around a bit but I'm very happy to have landed here.
Ahhh ... thank you Chris. I did bare down on the lesson last week and it came to me after continuously watching the super slo-mo for days on end and then it really became obvious to me what I was doing differently when I watched your backward roll lesson. I love the personal interest and time you take with your students so thank you for that as well. I will not repost a video until I'm done with the backward roll lesson and I can sing the song so that's either a warning or a just heads up that it will be a while.
Thanks again -
Kip
Ha! It's my pleasure Kip. Take your time!
Chris - that was a very cool perspective of why you like the song and a point well taken. I will try and keep it in mind when hearing a song that strike my fancy. I'll go an check Norman's performance out. Side note - the same thought as Bryan has below was running through my head particularly the part about your guitar.
Cross picking practice is going slow but its going. Doesn't sound quite like the lesson but I've never tried it before this lesson.
Am I on the right track ... I will continue watching the lesson and try to at least duplicate the right notes.
Kip,
This is really beautiful. Seriously, nicely done. There's a sensitivity and unhurried beauty to the way you are playing it. It's so nice that you needen't do anything different. That said, it is different than the classic crosspicking pattern, which is a 3 note pattern. So addressing that I made a little video:
Best,
Chris
In the latter half of the 1st solo - I feel compelled to play it like I do in take # 2 and # 4 of this short video but I believe you want me to play it the way I do in take #1 and # 3. Does it matter and am I doing take # 1 and # 3 correctly as you intended?
Pick direction is a constrant struggle as I found on your next lesson Cross Picking on Banks of the Ohio but I'm working on it and trying to enjoy the journey. Also, you did say you enjoy checking in and helping out ... I don't want to be a pest but I've spent a lot of time with this lesson and would like to get it close.
Kip, for some reason I missed this video when you posted it before. But I'm glad I found it because it pertains to the most recent one that you uploaded for Gold Rush. You are right, you should mostly play it the way you do it in #1 and #3 which are mostly right. #2 and 4# take some liberties with the timing that are too much. There is an issue with 1 and 3 though: that first G note happens 3 times instead of 2. That means that everything that followed in your version was early by 1 16th note until you pause and correct at 0:08. If you play that first G note 3 times but do everything else the same (after you play that 3rd note, your right hand will be a mirror image of what you've been playing because of the extra note) you will come out correctly and not have to pause at the end.
Can I go off topic for a second - not sure its appropriate but I just watched a video on Youtube where Chris is picking a song that I think is called Let Him Go On Mama? Anway, the first half is picking - no singing - is that part of the song that he sings in the 2nd half of the video? I really don't think it is but cool deal all the way around.
Too thick to navigate - too thin to plow.
Hey Kip, I believe the video in question was a medley of a fiddle tune called "Whistlin' Rufus" into a John Hartford song called "Let Him Go On, Mama."