I had joined the site years ago, but never really got past the first few videos, partly because of time and procrastination, and partly because I found myself overwhelmed with the music theory part of it all, when all I wanted was to have some tunes from contemporary artists under my belt to sing along to and the beginner song list back then was very limited. So I just stopped my subscription. Stick with me, it gets better.
In the 20 years that I had owned my guitar I only learned some 10 songs that I liked. I stuck to those to "decompress" after work or so, but what frustrated me the most all that time was that I simply didn't understand the fretboard; you know, the math behind it and felt overwhelmingly impossible to grasp so all songs required a lot of memorization for me. Hence my one song for every two years average. Needless to say that I never moved past the fourth fret, and if the chord chart of a song had something other than open string chords, I just forgot about the idea of learning it.
Now, with more time and a recently rediscovered interest in the guitar, refuelled by Keith Richards' "Under the Influence" documentary on Netflix, I rejoined GT a month and change ago.
This time around I felt somewhat past Fundamental's 1, after watching a couple of videos from that track, and went straight to Fundamental's 2 with Christopher. It gave me a new grasp on things, although it still felt it a bit disconnected from actual music and the constant note-naming sometimes made me dizzy. (Sorry Christopher, but I know they are very old tutorials too, and by now you probably have known about some things that could be improved). I learned a lot, no denying that, but moved on to Blues 1 with Anders rather quickly, because you don't need to have much of Fundamentals 2 solid for that one. It's pretty self-contained. The blues track has great videos, and I'm really hooked on the Delta blues and also on the Texas style. Can't wait to get to Blues 2. I had been at it for a couple of weeks when...
I saw the announcement for Fundamentals 2 on Saturday and clicked out of curiosity.
Man, you guys really nailed it with this one. Love it. I binge watched like 60% of it guitar in hand Saturday, Sunday, and this morning.
This time I really got it, I finally understood the fretboard! It makes perfect sense to me now. What I specifically love about it is that the sweet Lisa puts the concepts in a musical context right away. Not with a random exercise or sound bit, but with an actual song that sounds a lot like something you would hear on the radio (not the lyrics heheh), with little riffs thrown in that one can also do, not only the instructor. It's a world of difference between these songs and your regular videos of a two or three bar backing track from the older tutorials.
Oh, and the chords, the chords. I got why the chords are the way they are! And I finally understood why throwing in a finger here or there turns a chord into a sus4 or a 7 and completely demystified what those terms were, but more importantly what purpose they serve in the musical context. You can see suspense building up, not only in the chords, but in Lisa's eyes too! The jam tracks feature is the best too, because after the lesson you just continue on your own for a few rounds solidifying the concept before moving on. Without having to wrestle the A to B loop into position with the video. I also lost the fear of barre chords and, in a day, I was able to play all the 10 songs I knew with different barred versions of the open string chords I had memorized them with, without thinking too much.
So this time really felt like I was learning music, not following the Mr. Miyagi approach of wax-on, wipe-off to practice where the connection with the actual thing comes in after much time, and only if, big if, you make it through (which I didn't the first time around).
Of course, I have to admit that practicing scales with the metronome with Christopher definitely made it easier for me to go through Lisa's scale practice tunes and grasp the lesson's theory, with the mind freed from the muscle memory building aspect of it.
Just wanted to say congratulations to all those involved in producing Fundamentals 2, it shows a great deal of commitment to your customers.
I also wanted to say that the Experienced tracks (the Blues one, in my case) could benefit from adding a video or two at the end of every concept, with an actual song like Lisa's where one can apply the concepts in more of a musical context, rather than that of a simple backing track with a few bars, which is good, but having experienced this other way of learning, seems limited now.
Another thing that I would suggest we all could benefit from is adding a little section to each Lesson's Content page, with two or three songs hand picked from the website's real song list, which take advantage of the techniques in that lesson. One can choose to learn them or not. It could go right under the progress bar, and metadata info. I know that you probably don't want to influence someone to learn an artist that they don't like, but sometimes we beginners need to be told exactly what one should learn, because otherwise we won't go looking for it ourselves.
Sorry for rambling on and on, but this time I really needed to say thanks and provide some feedback on my experience so far because my motivation levels are very high.
Kind regards,
Renato Vargas
