Good day!

Had a fun practice today. Bob went to visit a neighbor, so I took advantage of the quiet house.

Guitar

Finger workout

Played all chords using strum #8

Practiced folk fingerstyle picking-Example 1 (I think I'm beginning to understand what he's doing on this.)

Tinwhistle

Star of the County Down

Road to Lisdoonvarna

Si Bheag, Si Mhor

Cooley's Reel

Fiddle

Shortnin' Bread

Ida Red

Bilem Cabbage

Cripple Creek

Old Joe Clark (listened to my CD to learn how it sounded, then played it)

Whew!

Friday...

Tinwhistle

Si Bheag, Si Mhor
Cooley's Reel

Guitar

Practiced all chords using Rust #9 strumming pattern

Finger workout

Mother Lode...

Tinwhistle

I listened to a CD I made of several tinwhistle tunes from the Whistle This website. Does that count for anything? =0)


I found quite a few songs I can work on for guitar practice. Some Selah, Keith Green, Honeytree, etc. I'll have to look up a few chords we haven't covered yet, but that shouldn't be a problem.

Guitar

Finger Workout-2nd and 3rd fret (I should see what the next level of exercises is like.)

Chord practice

1 minute changes:
B7-Fmaj7 32
C7-G7 27
Dm-D7 39
A7-E7 60
B7-Dm 30

Practiced the strumming patterns learned so far.

Started to practice "Killing Me Softly", but had to go help Bob fix the fence and get the horses back in. Farm life.

Duh time...

Guitar

Here I am, scouring the internet for Christian song lyrics and chords so I'll have something worth practicing, when, DUHHHH! I did this same thing a while back and I have a folder full of songs upstairs! PLUS, I have several CD's of myself singing some of the songs I'm looking for. SO, I can transcribe some of those to practice. Yes!

Otherwise, I strummed through "Little Pilgrim". I have to look up a couple of chords that I don't know.

Tinwhistle

Cooley's Reel
Si Bheag, Si Mhor
I am getting a little smoother on these. Not bad, considering how seldom I practice the whistle!

All for now.

Monday...

Re-run of yesterday...pretty much.

Finger Workout: 3rd and 4th fret

Chord practice-played through all chords a little.

1 minute changes:

B7-E less than 50
C7-Fmaj7 42
G7-Dm 41
C-D7 52
E7-A7 60

Rhythm Guitar-practiced strumming patterns

Ear Training:

I had trouble distinguishing between D and D7. Dm was easy. Only did the first ear training exercise.

Practiced "Killing Me Softly".

Sunday eve...

Guitar

Finger workout-began on 4th and 3rd frets. Working toward the 1st fret, which involves the most finger stretching.

Chord practice-went through all chords learned thus far, playing them each for four strums. Went through all several times.

1 minute changes:

Dm-G 53
B7-E 40
C7-Fmaj7 28
D7-A7 48
C-G7 48

Rhythm Guitar Practice-practiced a couple of strumming patterns

Practiced playing "Killing Me Softly"-went okay but I'd like to do more with the strumming pattern. In time.

Yup...

Guitar

Finger Workout

1 minute changes (stage three chords)

Worked on the Folk Fingerstyle a bit. (Lesson 1)

Checked out Stage Four and learned G7, C7 and B7.
Also learned how to use Fmaj7 in place of F.

Drew up chord charts for all chords I've learned so far.

Wow...two days in a row!

Guitar

Stage Three Practice

1 minute changes:
C-Am 54
C-A 42
C-G 50
G-E 50
G-D 54

Basic Finger Workout

CPR
GCDAm
AEDE
AmCGEm

(Got some of those wrong!)

SSR
GCAmEDm

Explored the website to see what's there.

Finally!

Pigged out on practice today! It's been hard to fit it in the last few days. I kind of have to alternate between exercising and practicing music. Only so many hours in a day!

Tinwhistle

Cooley's Reel
Si Bheag, Si Mhor
South Wind

Fiddle

Ida Red
Bilem Cabbage Down (get it? boil them cabbage down...)
Cripple Creek

Guitar

Did 1 minute changes:
Am-E 58
Am-Dm 42 hard
A-Dm 52
E-D 66
Em-D 54

Went on to Stage 3 Training.
Learned (re-learned) G and C chords.
Also learned names of open strings. (already knew)
Did the Basic Finger Workout which is really hard, but gets your hand in shape to stretch for harder chords.
Learned a basic strum with an upstrum.

Ear training:

Chord quality recognition (is it major or minor)

Chord Progression Recognition:
1. G C D C
2. Am Em D C
3. Am C G E

1 minute changes with new chords:
C-Am 57
C-A 36 hard
C-G 42 hard
G-E 49 hrd
G-D 60

Whew!

Saturday...

Guitar

Practice was pretty much the same as yesterday.

I also watched a video on the Technique page on Folk Style Fingerpicking. Very interesting!

I see there are finger exercises also, which I may try soon.

Friday...

Guitar
Stage 2 Practice:

1 min. changes
Am-E 56
Am-Dm 40 hard!
A-Dm 42 also hard
E-D 63
Em-D 63

Ear Training:

Worked on hearing the difference between A and Am. Easy.

SSR-Recognising a single chord: E A D Em Am Dm

CSR-Recognising chord progressions:
1. Am E Am Dm
2. D A Am E
3. E D Dm A

Wednesday...

Fiddle

Cripple Creek-2X

Tinwhistle

Cooley's Reel-2X

For Guitar practice I should dig out some old CD's of myself singing old songs and figure out the chords; then use those for easy song practice.

1 minute changes: DA(65)DE(66)AE(70)AminD(59)AminA(62)AminE (52)

Chord practice: strum/pick/strum all 4 chords

Today's practice...

Guitar

Did 1 minute changes-60 reps of each chord change, which means I should go on to the stage-two practices.

Ear training-SSR (Single Sound Recognition)
CPR (Chord Progression Recognition)

Started Stage-Two Practices by working on Amin chord.

Tinwhistle

Si Bheag, Si Mhor
The South Wind
Cooley's Reel

Fiddle

Cripple Creek

BTW, for tinwhistle I'm using the www.whistlethis.com website. They have special tablature which helps you quickly learn songs and you can upload yourself playing songs for others to hear and critique. I wouldn't dare!



For fiddle I ordered a course from www.fiddleguru.com. This also uses a special tablature which makes it easy to learn to play songs. I sure wouldn't want to do anything the hard way!

Playing catch-up...

I started guitar practice a few days ago after taking a 29 year hiatus from the instrument. Mind you, I didn't play all that well 29 years ago, but I had taught myself some chords using a John Denver songbook with chord charts. In that way I learned enough to accompany myself at church singing fairly unsophisticated songs. Hopefully, I will learn some new skills this time around and someday I hope I will be able to compose some worship songs which will glorify God. He'll have to help.

So in this post I'm going to list what I've done in the last few days and afterwards I'll try to do one day at a time.

I'm using a free online guitar course at justinguitar.com and it looks like a good place to refresh my memory and learn some new things.

Hopefully, I will list some definitions in the side-column so I can remember some of these new terms.

July 4
*practiced finding all the C's on the fretboard
*watched beginner videos so I can figure out sequence of practicing (turns out this is the most difficult part of the course-hee,hee)
*1 minute changes DA DE AE

Stage-one practice schedule
*chord practice-strum/pick/strum 5 min.
*1 minute changes-DA DE AE 1 min. each
*songs/chord sequences 5 min.
*JUSTIN training-ear training 5 min.

July 5

Did chord practice, 1 minute changes, strummed along on easy song and did JUSTIN training.

July 6

Did chord practice, 1 minute changes, chord sequences and ear training.