I really don’t like making New Years Resolutions. It always strikes me as something people do because.. “it’s a thing you do”.
This year though, I inadvertently made one, and it’s turning out to be a good thing.
Over the winter vacation, I had a great conversation with my wife that ranged all over, and was one of those conversations that can be a turning point. The topic was “What is it that’s important to you? What makes you happy?”
Turns out, something that made me happy was definitely not taking a bigger role. I wasn’t making time for it, so it was falling behind.
Music.
Fifteen or so years ago I was in a blues band, playing bass, and having a great time. We were gigging out, we were playing the most god awful bars you could find, but it was fun, and while there were times it was challenging, there were also times of great joy… those moments when things just come together and we rocked the place.
Because of my work schedule, I had to leave the band (lots of travel makes it hard to stay on the performance schedule), and music sort of fell on the wayside. I still had my guitars, I still played… a little, but I definitely stopped growing and learning. Things slowed down.
My kid is getting pretty serious about their music, and has been steadily pushing me to play more. I’ve been resisting under the normal arguments “I suck, I don’t know enough, I’m embarrassed). We’ve played a few times, and it made me sad, because what I knew was too limited, too constrained. And my fingers hurt.
Over the winter break, after that conversation with my wife, I decided it was time to change that. Music is something I truly love, I just never made the choice to dedicate time and energy into learning in all the things I didn’t know, and… of course, I needed to PRACTICE.
So, since somewhere around New Years, I’ve thrown myself into finally learning guitar properly. YouTube is a wonderful source of lessons, demonstrations, and backing tracks. That, coupled with help from Zach, and lots of practice, I’m starting to fill in the gaps in my guitar knowledge that was sorely lacking.
But, most importantly of all, I’ve been sticking with a regular practice schedule with a very simple rule. Play every day. Even if it’s only 10 minutes… pick up an instrument, and run scales, run fingering exercises, play some part of a song. Keep your fingers active, keep the knowledge alive, and keep building.
Since January, I’ve held to this schedule. I play every day. Sometimes 10 minutes, sometimes an hour or two. What’s happened is my fingers are building up calluses, and I’m learning pick and finger control – things I never had before. I’m learning to solo, something that’s always been a mystery to me. Music theory is filling in, though very slowly, and with the possible pitfall a lot of guitarists fall into. A lot of theory on guitar matches to patterns and arrangements on the neck. The theory is subsumed by learning patterns and relationships between positions, rather than the theory itself and how the neck represents it. I’m okay with this for now, but I recognize I’ll need to fill things in later.
I’ve also invested in a new (to me) guitar. It’s an Ovation Balladeer, made in 1972. I’ve always had a weak spot for Ovations, and even though they’re not the magic they were once considered, I still love the feel, styling, and sound of them. I found one on Craigslist that, unfortunately, had a broken headstock. It’s currently at the luthier being repaired, hopefully done soon. For acoustic practice, I’m using a Takamine 6 string I inherited from friends over a decade ago. It has horrible action, an uncomfortable neck, but it sure is strengthening my fingers and building up my calluses. 🙂
My goal is to keep this up through the year. To get to the point where given a key, I can solo and play along with it comfortably. There’s a long road to this, but now, after 2 months, I’m starting to see progress. I spend an hour playing over a backing track on my SX electric guitar (a yard sale find about a year ago), and it feels… good. Still not the expressiveness I want, but it sounds like music, and feels a bit like music. Progress.
At some point, I’m sure I’ll be able to share some things I’m playing – not yet though. But I’m cautiously hopeful that sometime I’ll be able to stand up in front of folks with some friends, we’ll play a song, and at some point we’ll start a go-around for soloing, someone will nod to me, I’ll kick my pedal, and I’ll solo… in a way that will make me smile, and make others smile, and… hopefully… give me joy.
