Learning Methods, What's working and what isn't?

[tapper mike]

Recently I've decided to get serious about Travis Picking.

There's a lot of content on the web about it and not all of it is great. Some of it is over simplified and some of it is way to advanced. I tried the free route of just hunting down tabs and YT vids and it wasn't taking me where I wanted to go. I thought about going back to True Fire which has an amazing system for learning but The one thing I found out is that The truefire app didn't save my previous purchases from years gone by when I was exploring western swing.

I also fount that the lessons were too limited in and on themselves. I wanted a complete method.
I bought this guy's E-book with links to examples on this YT video


What I didn't like about it is it's not that interactive. I'd love for him to lay everything out in Guitar Pro rather than pdf. Though I know his logic. Once released into .gp everyone has the study material. Nonetheless he does have time markers for the video in the pdf.

[lfm]

As idea I like having it all on video, if tabs or fretboard like the software FretsLive or whatever it is called.
- you always loop A/B anywhere and even use a player with speed reduction if needed
- for pc I like PotPlayer which has those features
- some live stream players do not have this, so use OBS software to record screen and make mp4-videos to use PotPlayer.

But to find a course that has what you want and also have these features is not easy.

Example of FretsLive or LiveFrets or what software is called



Otherwise books are excellent, tabs in the book and if having audio downloads too.
- Usually some reading between excercises too.
- It depends on exactly what you want to learn.

Paul Davis is rather cool tutor, usually with tabs in video.

[BertKoor]

What I didn't like about it is it's not that interactive.

Yeah well... you want a REAL teacher? Then FIND a real teacher!
You sit in a room together once in a while, you get lots of true interaction, and he gets paid.

[tapper mike]

What I didn't like about it is it's not that interactive.

Yeah well... you want a REAL teacher? Then FIND a real teacher!
You sit in a room together once in a while, you get lots of true interaction, and he gets paid.

Are You going to drive me? Are You going to pay for it?
Right now it's a 45 minute drive for me to the nearest guitar store with lessons. They don't have teachers who specialize in Travis Picking which I want to learn The going rate for a 2 hour radius around me is $80 USD a half hour. I'm already a rather competent guitarist with decades of live performance behind me. Travis Picking wasn't essential for my performances.

If you like a certain approach for learning I'm happy for you. Say why YOU like the method. But don't tread on me or anyone else in this thread who chooses a different method than you.

slfm demonstrates a great example of a more interactive environment where you can slow it downand break down sections of the playing that you can easily rewatch relearn when you have time,

[Mister Natural]

Geez nothing is working w/these fingers . . . I still play poorly but nice of you to ask Mike
: = (

[lfm]

What I didn't like about it is it's not that interactive.

Yeah well... you want a REAL teacher? Then FIND a real teacher!
You sit in a room together once in a while, you get lots of true interaction, and he gets paid.

I found that teachers are very set in their ways. Especially piano as my experience then.

I wrote and told what I targeted, which roll models I had and type of playing I was going for.
- first lesson is free
- and they just do the classical stuff, then do Für Elise, then chopin or whatever.
If you can stand that route you surely can learn to play classical, not so sure about anything else.
- maybe you get as a start at Für Elise, in their ladder somewhere. They adapt like that, but not more is my view.

Tutors want to teach what they already know.

So needle in haystack to find tutor where everything fits.
- and you spent 100 times the money achieving very little

We also had a keyboard player in a band real long ago, he did lessons for 16 years or something like that.
- put sheet music in front of him and he shortly plays it
- just learning by listening not so much

I looked around quite a bit at various video lesson based courses. So you see a lot of really good players do tutorials. There is also varied quality to that.

Really sceptical to fokus on personal tutors.

[tapper mike]

My ability to learn many things has rapidly diminished. Mostly I operate on wisdom. Nonetheless I try to learn new things as everything I've done before even well bores me to do it now. So I have little options but to embrace that it's going to take a little more time to learn new things. The early steps of muscle memory when starting a new direction is challenging but so long as I get up and do a little each day and look for progress on a long term basis then I know I'll get there. So to has it been with Travis Picking for me. I'm better than I was when I first started and if every day I do a little maintenance playing as well as try to learn something in the process there is progress.

Play guitar for the joy of playing guitar. If you can't do that then find something else that brings you joy.

An un guitar related story

Years ago I was working on the roof for a business.  Some practical joker removed the latter.  I undaunted jumped off. It was a single story and I having my fair share of jumping from high positions easily landed and was fine. It was 14 feet. A few weeks later some kid threw his frisbee and it landed on the roof of a two story house. I grabbed a latter climbed up and jumped off none the worse for wear as I knew how to jump.  Retelling this story to a friend of mine who was an ex recon marine. He'd jumped off of air planes as did my Dad when in the airforce.  So I went through the course and repelled at first working up to having someone jump on my back then pulling the cord for me and eventually got to the level where I could jump and pull my own cord.  It was expensive and my buddy had a lot of pull to lower the cost.  Fun scary and an expensive hobby to maintain which is why I stopped.

Playing guitar while not as exhilarating as skydiving, hang gliding or juggling chainsaws is considerably cheaper does require some skill sets.  The more you know the more you can do.  If you always do what you've always done you'll always get what you've always had.  That same ex-marine was an amazing guitarist so long as he had an audience of eight or less.  I'd take him out to blues jams I'd go up on stage play a few tunes but he just couldn't go there.  He never expanded his musical abelites and  eventually he tired of playing the same songs to himself. Finally he sold his guitars and never played again.


First pat yourself on the back you are part of the few.  Less than 1 in 100 people who say they want to learn guitar, buy a guitar and take lessons are still playing after a year. 

You may not feel you need to learn more or challenge yourself and are quite content to play what you've always played.  And still if you always do what you've always done you'll always get what you already have. The longer this goes on the less satisfied you will be with playing guitar.  That's what happened to my ex marine buddy who guided me through the whole skydiving experience.  If you want more then yes there will be challenges before you.  However it's going to take work.  Dedication.  Everyday focusing on what you want to improve on and it may take a considerable amount of time to reach your goal.  Many times it's harder to unlearn a bad habit than to start a good habit to replace it.  It may interest you enough to face the challenge or you may find settling into your comfort zone more appealing.  Trust me I've tried many things and failed at somethings miserably so I understand the challenges.


 

[tapper mike]

Sometimes a personal coach which may not be operating in his wheelhouse also works.

I had a great teacher who really devoted himself to teaching what someone might want to learn rather than his own "style" He'd study what was going on and then do his best to teach along the way. He wasn't a master of everything under the sun. But I knew if I could elicit a positive emotional response from him I was on the right track. He got me to practice everyday consistently and every week I'd have to perform for him what I'd studying. My playing clearly showed I when I was diligent and I wanting to do my best for his approval did just that. I didn't notice my improvement over time but he did. He gave me the confidence to play out more. I'd have never become a performing guitarist in a band playing out four nights a week without him believing in me. Same went for my studio time as a session musician.

Those are the few and far between and while I appreciate all of his efforts he no longer teaches and I no longer need him as a teacher. I went through about five teachers before I studied under him. Most were little more than glorified high priced babysitters.

[tapper mike]

This is not my first rodeo when it comes to fingerstyle guitar.
I've played jazz chord melody similar to Bill Tyers



And more "classically inspired chord melody. Similar to Gabriella Quevedo


I'm more interested in travis picking as an accompanist method than a chord melody. I know it sounds strange but I want to sing over my own guitar playing while I'm playing.

Having seen what is available in regards to Travis picking I chose Mike Music Method.

This is working for me.