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Wow! We had 37 members participate this month! Everyone did an awesome job and should feel super proud of their work this month!
So without further ado, the winner of our July Challenge is…
Our August Challenge is LIVE and the theme is: Fingerpicking Etudes! Hope to see everyone in the new challenge: https://rockclass101.com/august-2021-challenge
P.S. Stephen will post feedback for folks on page 5 and 6 soon 🙂
@wongbrown – Nice improvement! Flow is much better! Keep up the good work, Sheila!
@ukandrea – Sounds great! Keep working on it 🙂Drifting is normal, but it shouldn’t be noticeable until about the 15 min mark. If you’re making shorter videos, then something is happening. I’d post this on the Ableton support forum.
@turkgoose – Bravo! Wonderful performance! I’m only hearing a couple things to work on. First, try to keep the timing steady coming out of the percussion section and back into the riff. Second, keep working on that ending lick. It’s a toughy! But overall, it was awesome! Well done 🙂
@gstriph – Great job, Jerry! I think this is one of your strongest performances I’ve heard this year 🙂
My only advice is to continue working on timing, specifically keeping it steady. But overall, bravo this month!
@ccwuke – Great feel throughout the performance! Well done and keep up the good work 🙂
@biancak – Lovely playing, Bianca! And I love that you challenged yourself with something out of the norm.I think what makes it challenging to get sustain out of the higher notes is that the frets become so small. Which makes it harder to fret fingerings. If you played on a larger sized uke (like tenor), it becomes easier because the frets are larger, but then if you have chords that require stretch/reach, that becomes harder! There’s always a give or take lol.
@lisadmh – BIG improvement on getting that relaxed feel down, Lisa! My only suggestion is to slow the tempo so it grooves a little more. Check out the version by Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald to hear that slow groove tempo.
@rafaela – Bravo, what an incredible first post! Timing, note clarity, and even the ending lick – which is super hard – was spot-on! Well done and I look forward to hearing more of your performances 🙂@smokealot – Performance was great! Excellent feel throughout, well done! And I passed on your kind words to Steven 🙂
@wongbrown – Well done, Sheila! Most of it is there – I honestly think if you played along with Steven in the tab player, that would get the rest locked in. Try 8 bar sections at a time.
@somasoma321 – Great playing, Ian! Fantastic job on the timing. That’s prob the hardest part of that tune! Keep up the great work!@ebetsimo – You playing sounds great! But with this song, you want to swing that rhythm. Check out this lesson for help on getting this feel down.
@ukandrea – BIG improvement over your earlier take! One tip, work on the timing coming out of the percussion section. Try to keep it a bit more steady. But overall, bravo!@cheun133 – Performance was great! Watch out for rushing, like the bar before the ritardando. But honestly, this is me nitpicking. It was well played, keep up the great work!
@shmu88 – Bravo, Sam! You nailed the vibe/feel! Only thing I’d say is keep working on the tricky transitions in bars 8 and 9. Keep up the great work!
Great questions! Let’s knock them out.
1) You have to compare the chord tones against the parent major scale. So if you have:
A C E G
Compare it to the A Major Scale:
A B C# D E F# G#
You can determine it’s:
A (1) C (b3) E (5) G (b7)
A minor 7
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Chord qualities and harmonization can be derived from the minor scale. We didn’t cover that in the course.
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2) Each scale contains 7 chords that are built by thirds. When you determine the quality of the chords using the method above, for major you end up with (using C Major as an example):
This is better explained in our songwriting course (ebook – page 2).
Some songs stay diatonic to the key – meaning they never venture beyond the 7 notes/chords. Some songs do not.
3) This is a hard one to answer as there are different approaches you can use. A good place to start is to figure out the chord progression to determine the key.
4) Yes! I’d start with learning intervals (distance between 2 notes). For example, a minor 2nd is the Jaws theme. If you can associate sounds to something familiar, that’s a great first step to memorizing and recognizing tones.
A lot of these questions you asked can be further explained. I’d recommend taking a Skype lesson with Stephen. He can help you understand these concepts better by demonstrating and breaking them down in real time.
I’d target my practice to bring those areas up to speed. But if you hit the performance deadline and need to play the entire song, choose a slower tempo to keep everything steady.
Welcome, Izzy! I’m glad you found us 🙂
Check out this course. It’ll be a good intro to fingerstyle playing. And def join the challenge! BTW if you ever need help on the lessons, don’t hesitate to ask!
@johanna2509 – Beautifully played, Johanna!
@lbilkie – Hard to say what the issue is without playing your Lanikai. I’ve actually never played one, so I’m not sure on neck size/action. Is there a local music store that could look at it and maybe do a setup if needed?