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Excellent job Rickey, your timing is great! I’d work on the five – six finger switch though. Your wrist should not rotate during this part, perhaps you were doing something funky that made it uncomfortable. Feel free to send me an email or post a video reply and I’ll be happy to take a look and see what’s going on. Keep up the good work though, it sounds great!
Wow Lisa, way to go! And congrats on the new uke!
I made a short little video with some feedback for both of you, let me know if you guys have any questions 🙂
Hi Anne, actually I’d advise against purchasing a Luna. I’ve noticed that they have a quality control issue, which is something I talked about in our review of their pineapple ukulele. I’d go for a Kala instead. Great brand, great ukes!
Hi rillke, I’m glad you enjoy the challenge and the steps. I’m looking forward to hearing your progress on the song and technique 🙂
My pleasure Lyndall! Structured practice is the best way to get results. And by the way, if anyone likes to write things down that they’re working on, one of our members created a great practice spreadsheet which is available HERE.
Sounds great Phil, honestly you’re almost there! Keep up the good work.
Totally normal Vida. Sometimes when we lift up the string pulls with our finger(s). It drives me crazy too! For the challenging chord sections, focus on playing the transitions only; you can put it into a time frame, for example: Strum one chord on beat one, then strum the next chord on beat 3. Loop this one bar, start slow and as you get a hang of it increase the tempo.
Welcome Carmen! Glad to have you onboard with us!
So this is actually one of the most common questions I get asked: Where to start? This week I’m working on creating: Learning Paths. Which will be guided step-by-step plans for where to start in regards to beginner, intermediate, and advanced players. It’s much needed as we currently have over 215 lessons. And it will dive into detail on topics such as the ones you’re interested in.
In the meantime, let’s see if I can give you a couple ideas on where to start. First, you’ll need to establish a strong foundation in music theory, specifically as it relates to harmony. Luckily, we just released a course covering the fundamentals of this. The first module (5 lessons) in An Introduction to Music Theory & Jamming will be a a great first step in developing your theory knowledge.
Next, you’ll want to devote a lot of time to developing your ear. One of our members is actually working on the same thing. Check out this forum post for advice on how to get started with that.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Hi Lisa, no exercise per se, but I can make a suggestion. The best advice I can offer is to be conscious of this every time you play. We should never have tension in our playing hands, but it is something I see a lot with beginners. And I think it’s because they are focused on so many other aspects of playing. This also extends to fretting too hard.
Hi rillke, that piece is EP004 – 2 Chord Jam from our Concept Lessons series. Great playing, that would be a great song for the challenge!
Thanks for the feedback Phil! The songs that Steve is trying to tackle fall into levels 1 through 4. Those levels are not beginner-friendly. This is why I introduced the “beginner series” level. Songs in that category are beginner-friendly. For someone just starting out, the best place to start is our Beginner’s Course. There are 27 lessons in the course and it takes you from A to Z. It’s written to set you up for success and getting to the point where you can play your first songs.
Building a solid foundation in your playing is important before trying to jump into harder songs. Which brings up a point that I touched upon in a recent forum post. One of the most common questions I get asked is: Where to start? I’m planning to create what I’ll call: Learning Paths. Which will be guided step-by-step plans for where to start in regards to beginner, intermediate, and advanced players. It’s much needed as we currently have over 215 lessons. I’ll begin working on this project this coming week.
You may want to check out the Beginner’s Course too, there’s a lot of great content in it.
I’ll be focusing on adding more beginner tunes over the next few months. There will be two new ones coming in the next month for sure 🙂
Sounds great Margo!
On my end, I finally got around to practicing what I initially set out to work on for this month’s challenge: Triplet picking. Here’s a short little video of the technique used in an upcoming country lesson: Tennessee Waltz. I opted to use a bit of free time and create a feel that started slow, peaked, and then declined. I think it sounds really cool and suits the ending of this song very well.
Btw, I’m really enjoying this technique, it’s a lot of fun! I’m looking forward to using it in future lessons too.
Hi Steve,
It sounds like you may be trying to tackle some songs that are currently above your playing ability. Now there’s nothing wrong with this and the advice that I usually offer is to give it a shot, even if it is beyond your playing ability. Because even if you don’t learn the entire piece, you’ll get better in the process.
Now on the flip side, your goal is to be able to play a song from start to finish and specifically a solo fingerstyle piece. This was the exact reason that we introduced Courses into the site. I wanted to be able to provide a foundation in technique and theory that would help you conquer the performance tunes. So if I was you, I would set aside some of your practice time to developing technique.
Start by working through our Fingerpicking Course. This will help your right hand with dexterity and help your left hand dive beyond chord based playing. I would couple that with taking a look at our Beginner Level songs. A great one to start with is “Aura Lee“. It’s got a great melody, it was used in an Elvis song, and it’s got great potential for being the first song you add to your repertoire. I’ve got two more beginner levels tunes coming out soon, one of which is the theme to The Addams Family.
Have you seen our September site member challenge? This month is perfect for you to participate in as it hits directly at what you are wanting to work on. Take a look at it and I hope you join the challenge. If you need any help with figuring out what to do, just let me know 🙂
Cheers,
Andrew
Hi Mt, here is a short video with some tips and an exercise for hammer-ons and pull-offs. Let me know if you have any questions 🙂
If anyone else is new to this technique, be sure to check out this introduction lesson.
Glad you are feeling better Kay – I know all too much about that and constantly hear my PT in my head yelling at me to “Take breaks” 🙂 Great challenge, well thought out! Looking forward to seeing your progress!
Welcome Rick, glad to have you onboard! To answer your question: Yes, all premium members can download/print out the tabs as a PDF document. All tabs also include standard notation.
Underneath the part 1 performance/lesson video you will see a gray box that says “Download Tablature”. Click that link and you’ll be able to get the tabs 🙂 here’s a picture for your reference:
