I need to focus

[LIChick]

Grrr. I'm venting and a little mad at myself.
I have a hard time really learning a song. Learning it to the point that I can play it really well, smoothly and that it sounds good.
I fall in love with a song, get the music start to try to learn it, get frustrated because it's too challenging and I'm not very good, get stuck about 2 bars in
--the ususal frustrations...Grrrr
Case in Point: I WAS doing "Travelin' Soldier" (Dixie Chicks) then I WAS trying to do "You Were Mine" (Dixie Chicks) and found my interest waning and my skills limited. Now I'm working on "My Happy Ending" (Avril Lavigne). The good thing about this one is that I got it from www.e-chords and it has only 4 chords in it.

I seem to jump all aver the place, lacking the discipline to just do one thing. :mad:
Then when I take lessons, the instructor wants us to do what's the homework and I want to do that to learn and I want to do my own thing...

[Malcolm]

Can't tell from your post if you are acoustic or electric. I think acoustic and if so ... are you are havaing trouble with the "fancy" chords. I'd suggest making them simple -- i.e. if there is a F#m7dim just make an F or F# till you get the song down to where you can play it through.

Then go back and work on adding the harder chords. Our band plays country and we do this all the time. We'll take a Willy Nelson song and transpose it back to simple Major or Minor chords The audiance can not tell that much difference, and besides we never will sound like Willy anyway. They clap and very few walk out.........

To the second part of your post. The reason the instructor wants you to learn a certain song has nothing to do with his taste in music --- there is something in the song he wants you to learn how to do. Perhasp a slide or a pull-off, etc.

If you are paying for instruction do what he/she says, otherwise just do it on your own and save the money.

[LIChick]

Thanks, Malcolm. You said a lot. I never knew too much about improv. I always thought that music was written in stone. Most people (and me, included are NOT musicians and can NOT tell the nuances of chords.
I loved your line : "They clap and few walk out...."
Yes, I have an acoustic, nothing fancy.

P.S. my husband is on his way to Dallas/Irving TX on business.

[Malcolm]

When he calls remind him it's You'all, not Useguys......

[Wannabe]

Grrr. I'm venting and a little mad at myself.
I have a hard time really learning a song. Learning it to the point that I can play it really well, smoothly and that it sounds good.
I fall in love with a song, get the music start to try to learn it, get frustrated because it's too challenging and I'm not very good, get stuck about 2 bars in
--the ususal frustrations...Grrrr
Case in Point: I WAS doing "Travelin' Soldier" (Dixie Chicks) then I WAS trying to do "You Were Mine" (Dixie Chicks) and found my interest waning and my skills limited. Now I'm working on "My Happy Ending" (Avril Lavigne). The good thing about this one is that I got it from www.e-chords and it has only 4 chords in it.

I seem to jump all aver the place, lacking the discipline to just do one thing. :mad:
Then when I take lessons, the instructor wants us to do what's the homework and I want to do that to learn and I want to do my own thing...

Sounds suprisingly familiar to me LOL :p I know exactly what you're talking about, I'm having the same problem myself, I get so frustrated with myself :rolleyes:
I've found that if I try too hard to get something I end up getting too tense and that doesn't acheive anything so I usually leave that for a minute and trying something else and then come back to it. eg. I'm trying to learn a song called 'My Baby' by Cold Chisel which I'm getting slowly, I'll try and play that for a while and get as far as I can until things start going wrong, the I'll leave that and practice my scales which I'm learning which usually loosen's everything up again and then I go back to the song :)

That's just my approach :D

Ange

[Caffeinated Cat]

When I'm trying to learn a new song, I'll usually play through it a whole bunch of times, at least to the point where I can play it somewhat smoothly (while screwing up the harder parts). Then I take the harder parts and focus on those. Maybe I'll just play through the hard parts really slowly, with a metronome so that I can stay in time and judge my progress. I'll play through a part a bunch of times until I've got it going good at a slow speed, then turn the metronome up a couple of beats per minute (barely noticeable). Chances are that with such a small increase in speed, if I could play it okay at the slower speed I can play it almost as well at the slightly faster speed. Then practice through it a few times until it's okay, then increase the speed anothe 2 bpm at a time until I've got it up to speed.

There's this really hard solo I'm working on, and I can play it okay at slower speeds, so I just take the 2 bars of the solo that cause me problems and go through the routine I just outlined. Sometimes when you try to play something that's a bit too hard / fast for you, your fingers will come up with their own ways of dealing with the situation, and they might not come up with the right solution on their own. I notice that on this solo - I can play it at full tempo but it's really messy because my fingers play it their own way. When I slow it way down, I can concentrate on playing it a different way for better accuracy. Then when I slowly increase the tempo, I make my fingers keep doing it the same way.

My two cents worth :D

[Bongo Boy]

When he calls remind him it's You'all, not Useguys......I thought it was "you'ns". But then, I was livin' on Austin...not 'real' Texas.

[Malcolm]

Bongo --- Right on ---- Before I retired I traveled North America on business. I got to where I could tell, within 500 miles, where a person was raised by the way they said you. Got to be a game I'd play.