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You will be kicking that metronome up before too long man and it has been said before in many places, the speed will come with time. When I start some of the pieces we are working on right now I start at around 40 bpm. I think it is just part of the process and there is nothing to be embarrassed about man.
Originally Posted by andre66
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05-05-2012 01:02 AM
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Just got this book and started working on exercise 1.
I've played guitar on and off for 12 years and I'm decent at it on a technical level but when it comes to rhythm, notes, theory, etc, I'm terrible.
I know what the notes on the staff are, and have learned how to read music. But I'm doing terribly with exercise 1, I can't get through at 30bpm without making mistakes and having to pause for my brain to cool off. My metronome does not go lower than 30bpm.
Am I needing to start with a different book for sight reading, or should I press on?
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The modern method book is not the best method to begin sight reading if you are an absolute beginner at it. What you need is a book that teaches you to read notes on one string at a time in first position before moving up the neck. The rhythm should begin with whole, half, quarter, eigth, and then sixteenth in that order. Leavitt's modern method is organize in that manner, from easy to difficult. The problem with it for an absolute beginner at sight reading is that it doesn't contain enough drills per topic. Pick Mel bay's modern guitar method grade 1 up from your local music store or Amazon for much more drills. Also, try David Oakes's Music reading for guitar. For me Leavitt's is the best book for any guitarist to study if his goal is to truly master the instrument, but you have to know a little about sight reading before tackling it. You can continue studying Leavitts's modern method. Just be wary of it's limitations for the level you are at.
Last edited by smokinguit; 06-02-2012 at 03:46 PM.
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Hi there, small coyote, and welcome!
There is *a lot* in that first exercise. You are reading the notes, and needing to find them on the fretboard. Most adults can only cope with learning 2 or 3 new notes at a time (absolute max, 7). Leavitt does have a more basic 'absolute beginners' book where he goes more slowly, but also many others, as suggested above.
For exercise 1 just now, I would suggest only attempting a few bars at a time. Aim to get a section under your belt before going on to the next bars. Reading, and finding the notes, it does all get easier.
Good luck!
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Ok I will try and slow it down some and not expect so much from myself on this one. Originally Posted by ten left thumbs
Hi there, small coyote, and welcome!
There is *a lot* in that first exercise. You are reading the notes, and needing to find them on the fretboard. Most adults can only cope with learning 2 or 3 new notes at a time (absolute max, 7). Leavitt does have a more basic 'absolute beginners' book where he goes more slowly, but also many others, as suggested above.
For exercise 1 just now, I would suggest only attempting a few bars at a time. Aim to get a section under your belt before going on to the next bars. Reading, and finding the notes, it does all get easier.
Good luck!
I get a weird feeling when I try this exercise, I keep a metronome going and try to hit every other beat while trying to read the notes. It takes me just a little time to know which note I'm looking at, and less time to know where it is on the frets. But it is very slow going at 30bpm, and after a couple of bars my brain just feels fried haha. Pretty awesome.
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I understand what you are saying, trying to process the rhythm, the notes and their locations all at the same time was a lot to take in at once. Originally Posted by ten left thumbs
Ah, well, OK, here's the deal, ultimately you need to be able to play with a steady beat, metronome on or off.
"Pulse has a steady beat,
feel it moving in your feet,
always steady keep in time,
tap your feet and say this rhyme,
pulse has a steady beat..."
However, if you are thinking hard to make out lines and spaces and read the notes, and find them on the fretboard, then you haven't got an ice cube's chance in hell of getting right notes and right rhythm from the start.
That's why any absolute beginners book has a section with rhythms played on a single notes. Books likes Oates, or Leavitt Basic Guitar phase 1. So you will need to work on the right rhythm and right notes separately, before putting the two together. If you keep the discipline up you will get there, but you will need to go through phases of imperfection on the way.
The good news is though last night I was able to run through exercise 1 at 30bpm with only a mistake or two, and am about ready to tackle exercise 2.
I spent 12 years playing guitar the way that I wanted to play, learning pieces of this and parts of that and paying no mind to things that took actual work like rhythm, timing, and music theory. It did a number on my ability to play guitar and wasted a lot of time.
So anyway, I'm all about not listening to myself and taking suggestions from others. I picked up Music Reading for Guitar by Oakes, and am going to start on that tonight. I can't wait!
My only problem is after spending 30-45 mins on this each night, I'm really confounded as to what to do with the rest of my guitar playin time lol. I feel dirty playing the same old garbage out of rhythm and not progressing my skills.
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Well, look, play the same old stuff IN RHYTHM and with attention to TONE. 90% of music is the same thing over and over anyway; there are only 12 notes, 5 lines, 4 spaces, 6 strings, all small and easy numbers to deal with. Do this for yourself: think hard about what you really want to sound like and what you really want to play, then take the necessary steps to get there. But when you're fooling around with the guitar, fool around seriously. Even the highest-level pros like to fool around with the guitar, but they still want to sound good. And keep this in mind: guitar playing is accumulative. Everything you do right affects everything else in a positive way. Every good scale helps your arpeggios, every good chord helps your ear-training, etc.
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You don't need to spend that much time on it. You will burn out since this is all new material. Spend no more than 15 minutes on one small topic discussed in the book. Here's a tip to learning the notes: pick one string, say high E, and learn natural notes from open E to G at the 3rd fret. Find an empty staff paper and write thoses notes on the staff in a random fashion and then play it on the guitar. Do this several times for a few days without the metronome. Also when you are outside of the practice room, try to visualize where the notes are on the guitar and how they look on the staff. Your recognition of where to put your finger as you see the notes on paper will improve.
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Thanks for all the tips! I'll try to incorporate that into my practice.
As far as goal, I'd really like to play jazz guitar, hence why I'm on this forum. I don't know much outside of pentatonic blues in one position, and a bunch of pieces of random music, and some solos from various songs.
I like Pat Metheny's style and sound, and would like to be able to create music similar. But really any jazz will do, and I feel like based on what you guys have said about this book it'll really get me on the right path for that.
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Hi coyote, You're making progress!
Like others here, I found I can only spend so much time on Leavitt. Then I need to find something else because the next leavitt page is just too challenging. The rhythm section of Oats will be helpful but possibly not the notes because he starts in 5th position and Leavitt doesn't get there for a l-o-n-g time. If you have little theory you might want to check out the major scale, how it is constructed, because that is important for jazz. And other things.
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Yeah I just noticed that he does start in 5th position, haha I was actually thinking about that in the shower this morning >.>
I shouldn't have a problem just playing in first position in Oakes instead of 5th, or just switching it up. Exercise 1 in Leavitt takes me up to C on the B string, and if I do first position on Oakes it picks up at open E then F and G on 3rd fret.
Gah I guess it doesn't matter lol and I should be happy with myself that I can actually locate the notes now.
Currently I don't mind too much spending all my practice time on these two books, I think when I start getting burnt I'll just try learning some new songs after spending some minutes on this stuff. Rigid learning by getting the sheet music, and starting at the first bar, slow tempo, right rhythm, etc. Instead of what I used to do which is get tabs and pick my favorite pieces and just learning that with no rhythm.
edit: I do have some music theory, I should be spending some time connecting it with the guitar though. I just never feel like getting around to building the major and minor scales on the guitar lol.Last edited by a_small_coyote; 06-04-2012 at 04:06 PM.
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Hello to all, just found this forum and you have inspired me to pick up the guitar again after a couple of years off. Until then I had been playing for almost ten years but never really nailed it. I got tuned in to jazz music through learning to swing dance and my dream is to play with some of the bands that do the rounds in our lindy hop scene here in London. Anyone else just starting out on page one or have I missed the boat?
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Hey Greg, Originally Posted by gregfriedrice
Welcome aboard.
This is a popular book, I hope some others will start from page one. I know that 'a small coyote' recently started posting.
Regardless, some of us 'originals' try to check back on the earlier threads and share our experience.
I hope you will post some recordings as you go, it's a great way to increase your focus and hold yourself accountable.
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Hi there,
Started exercise 1 -4 last night. I find that I was able to play all 4 exercises without a metronome in quarter notes quite easily. But when I try to play a metronome at 60bpm it was a complete disaster!!! It took me 3 hours to play exercise 1 without any error at 80bpm (i find 80 easier than 60)...
Also, I taped myself playing and find that sometimes I hit a note harder than others.... Never thought such a simple exercise would take me soooo long. And now my feet hurts from constant tapping...
Do any of you find that as you practice more and more, you aren't really reading the notes off of the page but actually relying on muscle memory?
Great thread, Thanks!
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I have another question. Regarding sight reading... Is the ultimate goal being able to see a note on a page and then "play" it in your head? Right now, reading is just "translating" a note on a page into a letter and positioning my finger on the corresponding fret. It seems incredible to me that a musician can read a piece of music and then play it right away.... Just sounds too good to be true.
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Yes that does sound to good to be true and would take an exceptional memory. I wouldn't be surprised if some could do it though. Originally Posted by jokkon
For me, when I sight read, I look ahead, from a beat or two to a whole measure, and can anticipate what the music is going to sound like. And sometimes after a few measures I can understand the feeling/mood of the piece. When things go well and the music isn't too difficult, while sight reading I can make it sound musical.
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Couple comments: Burn out is a real issue. You need to find a pace and an attitude you can keep going with. This book assumes a lot of progress.
Second, re recording. Don't feel like it has to be perfect before sharing. You'll find a lot of my own recordings here really aren't all that good. I don't see it as a performance - just a measure of where I was on that day.
Now, to address this:
You're doing find, just keep doing it. You will find, with more experience, with understanding what key you're in, you will get better at anticipating what comes next. What you can do to help this skill specifically: Originally Posted by jokkon
Take a section and try scat-singing it before you play. Don't worry about getting the pitches 'right' - just get the rhythm and the general shape - up or down?
Once you know a section, sing, hum, or whistle as you play.
This is all good for improv because you connect with the note you hear in your head, and you connect the note in your head to the note your fingers play.
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I've already spoken to some here via mail - but I should publicize the nature of this snag I find myself in; maybe some of you will see a perfect solution.
I want *very* much to "record my way through" the Berklee books (thanks for that phrase, fep) -- but after doing three of the assignments, I've found that, because I don't sight-read well enough to sight-read the duets, I end up spending all my quite-limited energy on the Berklee material, leaving none for just playing, for ear-training, etc. If I did nothing else, I could probably record a duet well enough to post in two days. Sounds preposterous, huh?
So, why not spread the work out over the whole 7 days? Good question. Maybe because I fear not getting it done, even with seven days, so I turn workaholic and do nothing till it's out of the way.
Maybe I should take some time and just work hard on sight-reading. However, it *is* true that once we begin working out of the fingering patterns (no open strings), my sight-reading is far better. Perhaps I'll jump to Part II and join you guys, to see whether it goes any faster.
FEP: can you make an estimate about how long it took you to reach a reasonably adept (whatever that is) level in sight-reading? When you began reading the Real Books last year, could you already sight-read?
These method books are, imo, without peer. We mustn't let this group languish. But I do believe that, as it's going now - one week per unit - those who can't sight-read the duets (and the other stuff, too) are going to meet with too much frustration in trying to "perform" the pieces and post them proudly.
Bright ideas, anyone? Plain ideas? Possible ideas? Just ideas?
kj
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Here we are - my version of Sea to Sea. A few duff notes but I wasn't striving for perfection! After the 10th take definitely started to feel I was playing from memory rather than reading the notes but I guess that's unavoidable. Recorded with the built-in mic on my laptop hence the noise. I've got a USB interface coming in the post so subsequent recordings should sound a lot cleaner I hope. How is everyone else getting on?
https://www.box.com/s/d76ef5d2cc9ff225d201
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I didnt wan't to make a new thread for this and it's completely unrelated to this topic, but you guys have been quite helpful and I hope you can help me save some forum space by letting me ask here
I wrote a pretty sweet hook and I'm playing around with the theory, and not surprisingly, what I came up with on the guitar far exceeds my knowledge of theory, well maybe not by much. But I can't figure out this chord.
It's played on the G/B/E strings. 4th fret G string, 3rd fret B string, open E. So the chord notes are B - D - E.
It's a minor 3rd and a perfect 4th, and I have no idea what this type of chord is. The second chord is the same except B - D - Gb which I believe is just Bminor.
Thanks for any help you can offer!
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Without and more information than you porvided:
The first chord is a Bm(add11) chord.
And the second chord is a Bm, spelled B D F#
Note that the fifth of a chord can often be omitted.
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Thanks for the speedy response. I feel like kind of an idiot now because I worked those chords out at work, away from my guitar and from memory, of course I was wrong. Originally Posted by fep
The chord I was wondering about was actually G - D - Gb the first note being open G. I was hoping to figure out what chord this was so I can understand a little better what I'm playing here and why it sounds so damn good.
I'm thinking it's an inversion but I can't quite figure it out. Thanks again for helping!
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Hi coyote, it could be a Gmaj7 chord, but without knowing the context it's hard to say.
I did do a couple of videos on the subject of chords, you may find this helpful. They are posted later on in the MM threads, but no harm in watching them now.
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Stand alone that is a D/G, spoken as D with a G bass (although context could change how you name a chord). It is more properly spelled G - D - F#. It is real nice with an A on top like this: Originally Posted by a_small_coyote
XX5775
another way is:
x10.12.11.10.10
Steely Dan uses that chord quite a bit. Check out the chords to their song 'Josie'.Last edited by fep; 06-17-2012 at 09:48 AM.
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Ah ok thank you for the help! Originally Posted by fep
I'm not sure what you guys mean by context in this example, there's not a lot of context because it's such a short hook. I guess you mean which key or scale? I'm still working that part out lol.
The only two chords in the run are XXX432 and then XXX032, which sound really great together. But I'm thinking the theory of why they sound so good and what else to throw in there is gonna be just beyond my theory reach right now haha.
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