6 months into jazz - overwhelmed and not sure where to focus. Advice?

**onezeho** · Today, 03:34 PM

Hello everyone. I'd appreciate some advice, but first I'd like to provide a little context about my musical background and where I am right now

I'm 25. I picked up guitar at 16, but for a long time it was just a casual hobby - strumming chord-based songs, picking things out by ear, improvising with no real system. I only started taking it seriously about 2-3 years ago

For a while I got pretty deep into music theory - YouTube channels, reading, trying to wrap my head around harmony. My theoretical knowledge grew, but my actual playing didn't keep up. Until fairly recently I'd barely touched scales, positions, ear training, or rhythm work in any structured way.

About six months ago I made the switch to jazz. I started listening a lot and realized this was the direction I wanted to go. I worked through Jens Larsen's material - shell chords, basic jazz concepts - and for the first time started taking the metronome seriously

From there I moved into standards: Take Five, then All of Me. Working through those made it very clear how weak my rhythm was, so I spent a lot of time on the metronome, triplets, and swing feel. The swing thing eventually clicked in a way I didn't expect - not through any explanation, but physically. At some point the triplet eighth just settled into place and I felt it from the inside. That was probably the biggest single moment for me these past few months

Right now I'm working through Chris Parks' Barry Harris material. I've got the major scale in one position down - triads, thirds, chords, up and down - and I'm working on chord tones, chromatics, and the diminished 6 scales. But I'm starting to feel overwhelmed. There's a lot coming at once and it's getting hard to hold it all

The gaps I'm aware of:

Ear training, especially transcribing - melodically I can get somewhere, rhythmically I fall apart
The connection between what I hear, sing, and play
Understanding the function of notes within the harmony
Improvising through chord changes
Feeling free inside swing when actually playing
Fretboard knowledge

My main question: looking at the full picture, where should I focus right now? Keep pushing through Barry Harris even when it feels like too much? Shift toward ear training and transcription? Work more on rhythm? Or is there something more fundamental I'm missing altogether?

**marcwhy** · Today, 05:56 PM

Hi - welcome to the wild world of jazz guitar!

So, what does your teacher recommend right now?

**wolflen** · Today, 06:35 PM

Yes as marcshy asks..I would recommend a very good teacher.

You have alot of fragments but not one piece of "whole cloth"

I was in a very similar place years back..I had alot of things I could do but they were not "connected" to anything I knew about.

In a harmonic context for example--do you know the chords in the major and minor scales in all keys..?

.. and from there--do you know the inversions of the chords (triads and four note chords) of the major and minor scales?

Do you see how knowing these two harmonic studies are necessary in a jazz context?? Can you see they are related?

Now this type of stuff is really basic ground work in chord studies/Harmony!

This is what my teacher started me with..and applying some of this to tunes..how and why- ( theory) the chords worked in them.

Then of course the scales/arpeggios of the chords.

And so much more.

Now comes the reality--This takes alot of time dedication and constant practice.

If you do it..you will be glad you did.

Just my take..hope it helps