So after floundering around with various things over the past year, I've decided for the new year to put a plan together and get some organization to my efforts. I'm pretty charged up about the progress I've made in the past year and I want to capitalize on it and "ride the wave".

My problem has been trying to run before I could walk. I don't have the foundation I should have for what I ultimately want to do and I've been reaching for what I can't do rather than utilize what I can do. My dedicated practice area was also a bit of a mess and made it too easy to say "eh, I don't feel like it" when it came time to practice.

Step 1 was to organize my practice area and make it rediculously easy for me to practice. I bought a new PC dedicated to my practice/recording area. I have a better desk with lots of desktop space. I have a guitar stand that lives there. These sound like little things, but they make a big difference. Rather than grab my guitar, grab my laptop, clear off some space, grab my guitar stand...you get the picture... I grab my guitar, head downstairs, power up my equipment and off I go. Only because it's in the basement which can be damp and cold I don't keep my guitars there.

Step 2 was to get my multi track software and direct input equipment working with my new PC. Unexpectedly my G5 works very well as a direct in and monitoring device in conjuntion with my amp, so I'm going with that. My Yamaha USB audio device will be used to drive my studio monitors and record vocals (assuming I can pursuade my daughter to do it). I've already made a couple of recordings successfully, so this is working well.

Step 3 was to put together a reasonable plan. My plan lists songs I want to learn, songs I want master, and skills I want to gain and improve. It may be aggressive, but I chose 12 songs thinking on average I should be able to learn a song each month. From this, I'll put together monthly goals.

One my goals is to learn the fretboard cold to help me accomplish another goal of learing the chord tone soloing technique. I'm on my way with this using the Fretboard Workbook by Barrett Tagliarino.


This thread is "Mission of the Month", sooooo by the middle of February, I plan to:
- be able to play Blackbird by the Beatles all of the way through cleanly.
- be able to name any note on the fretboard "quickly"
- be able to draw out and play the major scale in any key anywhere on the
neck

The fretboard work may sound agressive, but the plan laid out in the book I'm using makes this seem very attainable. I've already mastered the "5 root shapes" skill quickly, so I seem to be on my way. They key to all of this seems to be spending a short amount of focused time on it on a daily basis and I'm prepared to do that.