Guitar progress

So I've been trying to learn to play acoustic guitar for a little over 5 years now. In that time, it doesn't feel like I've made any progress. This is after spending at least 15 minutes practicing every day, as well as weekly 30 minute lessons. Is my lack of progress a function of not spending enough time practicing, or should I accept that I'll just never be able to play the guitar with any level of proficiency?

This is pretty vauge, how would you describe progress?

Can you play any songs, can you play at least a handful of chords cleanly and make clean transitions? Do you know any scales?

It really comes down to what you want to do Mark. When I started a few years ago I wanted to play some songs, write some songs, which meant I needed at least some theory. So I did that (wrote a few songs I mean), now I just learn songs mostly. I play around with scales, but meh... I can jam in a few keyes so I am good.

So effectively, my learning has stopped - aside from learnng songs.

Being more specific will help others help you.

I can make some chords better then others. Still can't do barre chords, and not sure that I even want to. I've done a few scales, but it's been a while since I've done them, so it's not fair to say that I know scales. The only song I'm comfortable saying that I know is Free Fallin by Tom Petty. As for why I started in the first place, I still have no idea. The only reason I've been able to come up with is that I would like to be able to play the few songs that I like, in the privacy of my own home, where nobody will ever hear me play. I have no desire whatsoever to play for an audience or to write my own music.

I say I haven't made any progress because I still don't feel like I've advanced beyond beginner. I still can't do the things that someone who has tried for 6 months can do, and it's been 5 years.

I honestly wouldn't worry about it. You laid out the reason for learning guitar: you want to play some of your favorite songs. That is pretty much where I am at. And in terms of who learns what in what time frame, who cares?

I don't think there is anything to gain by keeping a scorecard. Enjoy the instrument and take what you want from it.

Edit: barre chords. Some are harder than others, and when I am faced with one, I usually use a "cheater chord". A few whiskeys and we all sound the same anyway.

Given the limited time in my schedule as it is right now, I have no desire to attempt barre chords. Given that nobody will ever hear me play, it doesn't matter if we all sound the same after a while. I guess in the long run I haven't been having fun for a while now, and have no idea what to do to get back to that. With my subscription here, I've started from the beginning (again). I've gotten to chapter 3 of the beginner course, and haven't really gotten anything new out of this. All it's showed me is how terrible I am at this and how the last 5 years have been a huge waste. I just want to feel like I'm having fun and not like it's a chore to practice.

Adjust your expectations. Fifteen minutes a day is a very, very short practice time.

And remember, Barre chords are always a fixed shape movable all across the fretboard so when you've learnt the Major and minor shapes on both 5 and 6 strings, it's very straightforward. Learning power chords can also help prepare for and visualize full Barr chords.

Everybody hits a rough patch, but in different ways so try not to be so hard on yourself. I agree with John of MT that you need to expand your practice time, though.

I realize that 15 minutes isn't a lot of practice time, but (as I said in a previous post in this thread), my schedule right now doesn't allow me to practice any more then that. How exactly am I supposed to practice longer when I don't have the time to? I appreciate the responses here, but nothing said here seems to help me in any way. Also, I've done power chords as a way to get to barre chords, yet I still can't get barre chords to sound the way they are supposed to, and given my level of frustration with them, it's better that I just don't try them at all.

Originally Posted by: markantonelli7

So I've been trying to learn to play acoustic guitar for a little over 5 years now. In that time, it doesn't feel like I've made any progress.[/quote][p]What exactly are your musical goals?

[quote=markantonelli7]This is after spending at least 15 minutes practicing every day, as well as weekly 30 minute lessons.

As you've probably already realized, that's not enough time to get much done. It's barely time to warm up & cover material you already know. I completely understand if that's all you can manage given your schedule. And it is possible to maximize your time. What exactly are you doing for those 15 minutes?

Having said that, here is my standard reply to students asking for practice plans.

Every individual has a different daily life schedule & amount of skill they bring to the task of learning guitar. With that in mind here is a generalized list of how to approach learning & practicing.

1. Practice your guitar some every day.

2. If at all possible, practice earlier rather than later, so you won't run out of time & then feel guilty about not getting in your daily practice. If this means getting up an hour eariler, then do it. This is always preferable to waiting until the end of a long, frazzled workday, then rushing through a tired, uninspired, frustrating practice session. And staying up an hour later to do it!

3. Start with a warm up of something fun that you can already do. Chord changes, a simple song, a scale, a melody. Anything, but something you can already do that is fun. Even if this is the only thing you do, or have time for, at least you played your guitar, got your fingers & mind moving musically & it was fun.

4. Eventually change to something that is problematic. Something new you are not good at yet. Scales, chord changes, memorizing notes, reading music notation. Spend time learning something new & challenging. Go forward in the Fundamentals course!

It is important to keep in mind that this is new stuff you aren't good at yet. Be patient with yourself. Remember that everyone has to climb the leaning curve. We all had to go through this difficult stage. Some people work faster, some slower, but everyone has to put in their time.

5. End with something fun that you can already do. Again, a chord progression, a scale, a melody, a simple song. Anything, but something you can already do that is FUN. This lets you end your practice session on a good, productive note. You can leave the guitar satisfied rather than frustrated. You will be encouraged about your skill & look forward to playing the next time or day.

An example of an hour practice session:

5 minutes of warm up. Stretch your arms, hands, fingers. Slowly & deliberately play some simple chord changes & scales or scale fragments. The goal is to get your mind & body acclimated to the guitar & music.

10-20 minutes of playing something fun that you can already do. Chord changes, a simple song, a scale, a melody. Anything, but something you can already do that is FUN. Even if this is the only thing you do, or have time for, at least you played your guitar, got your fingers & mind moving musically & it was fun.

10-20 minutes of trying something that is problematic. Something new you are not good at yet. Working on a song you are learning, single note lines from a song, a challenging set of chord changes, memorizing notes, reading music notation. Spend time learning something new & challenging.

It is important to keep in mind that this is new stuff you aren't good at yet. Be patient with yourself. Remember that everyone has to climb the leaning curve. We all had to go through this difficult stage. Some people work faster, some slower, but everyone has to put it their time.

10-15 minutes of something fun that you can already do. Again, a song, a chord progression, a scale, a melody, a simple song. Anything, but something you can already do that is FUN. You are ending your practice session on a good, productive note. You can leave the guitar satisfied rather than frustrated. You will be encouraged about your skill & look forward to playing the next time or day.

Playing guitar requires a lot of fine motor skills that can only be acquired by a lot of repetitious practice. There is simply no substitute for hours logged on the machine.

What, when & how to practice depends entirely upon each student's goals & situation. But once you've acquired the basic skills to play guitar, the best approach to a practice plan is one that focuses strongly on:

1. Learning songs.[br]2. Learning or refining skills needed to play songs.[br]3. Improving weak areas.

Hope that helps! Please ask more if necessary & best of success!

You should have GT make this a nice big sticky Christopher...

Originally Posted by: ChristopherSchlegel

here is my standard reply to students asking for practice plans.

Every individual has a different daily life schedule & amount of skill they bring to the task of learning guitar. With that in mind here is a generalized list of how to approach learning & practicing.

1. Practice your guitar some every day.

2. If at all possible, practice earlier rather than later, so you won't run out of time & then feel guilty about not getting in your daily practice. If this means getting up an hour eariler, then do it. This is always preferable to waiting until the end of a long, frazzled workday, then rushing through a tired, uninspired, frustrating practice session. And staying up an hour later to do it!

3. Start with a warm up of something fun that you can already do. Chord changes, a simple song, a scale, a melody. Anything, but something you can already do that is fun. Even if this is the only thing you do, or have time for, at least you played your guitar, got your fingers & mind moving musically & it was fun.

4. Eventually change to something that is problematic. Something new you are not good at yet. Scales, chord changes, memorizing notes, reading music notation. Spend time learning something new & challenging. Go forward in the Fundamentals course!

It is important to keep in mind that this is new stuff you aren't good at yet. Be patient with yourself. Remember that everyone has to climb the leaning curve. We all had to go through this difficult stage. Some people work faster, some slower, but everyone has to put in their time.

5. End with something fun that you can already do. Again, a chord progression, a scale, a melody, a simple song. Anything, but something you can already do that is FUN. This lets you end your practice session on a good, productive note. You can leave the guitar satisfied rather than frustrated. You will be encouraged about your skill & look forward to playing the next time or day.

An example of an hour practice session:

5 minutes of warm up. Stretch your arms, hands, fingers. Slowly & deliberately play some simple chord changes & scales or scale fragments. The goal is to get your mind & body acclimated to the guitar & music.

10-20 minutes of playing something fun that you can already do. Chord changes, a simple song, a scale, a melody. Anything, but something you can already do that is FUN. Even if this is the only thing you do, or have time for, at least you played your guitar, got your fingers & mind moving musically & it was fun.

10-20 minutes of trying something that is problematic. Something new you are not good at yet. Working on a song you are learning, single note lines from a song, a challenging set of chord changes, memorizing notes, reading music notation. Spend time learning something new & challenging.

It is important to keep in mind that this is new stuff you aren't good at yet. Be patient with yourself. Remember that everyone has to climb the leaning curve. We all had to go through this difficult stage. Some people work faster, some slower, but everyone has to put it their time.

10-15 minutes of something fun that you can already do. Again, a song, a chord progression, a scale, a melody, a simple song. Anything, but something you can already do that is FUN. You are ending your practice session on a good, productive note. You can leave the guitar satisfied rather than frustrated. You will be encouraged about your skill & look forward to playing the next time or day.

Playing guitar requires a lot of fine motor skills that can only be acquired by a lot of repetitious practice. There is simply no substitute for hours logged on the machine.

What, when & how to practice depends entirely upon each student's goals & situation. But once you've acquired the basic skills to play guitar, the best approach to a practice plan is one that focuses strongly on:

1. Learning songs.[br]2. Learning or refining skills needed to play songs.[br]3. Improving weak areas.

Hope that helps! Please ask more if necessary & best of success!

So basically, Christopher, you're telling me that I have to practice for an hour every day to get my playing where I want it to be. The fact that my schedule, at least for the next couple of weeks, doesn't allow for me to do that seems to be irrelevant. I mentioned earlier in the thread that the only goal I have been able to come up with is that I would like to be able to play the few songs that I like, in the privacy of my home, where nobody will ever hear me play. I will say that there are certain aspects of the guitar, like barre chords for example, that I have no desire to even attempt to learn. Given the seemingly infinite number of songs that just use the basic chords of G, C, D, and E minor, I think I'll be able to find something to play.

During the time I was taking weekly lessons, my 15 minutes of practice was spent working on whatever was discussed in the lesson. Usually that consisted of working through the exercises in the method book that I have (A Modern Method for Guitar: Volume 1 by William Leavitt). The two goals that I worked towards with this book were learning how to read musical notation, and learning how to play without looking at either my fretting hand or my strumming hand (trying to develop the feel that any proficient guitar player has while playing). As of the last lesson I took, which was about a month ago, I had gone up to exercise 8 in the book. I've not yet achieved any feel when it comes to playing the guitar, because I still have to look at my fretting hand. This is the only way I can get my fretting hand to get to where it needs to be while still being in time. I also still have no ability to read musical notation.

The other item discussed during my lesson was a particular song I want to play, whether it be in the songbook I have, or something I would look up the chords and the strumming pattern for. Once those two things were determined, I would then play through the chord progression, in the correct strumming pattern, with a metronome clicking, as my way to work toward playing the song at the correct tempo. The only song I have been able to do this with is Free Fallin by Tom Petty. According to my notes, I started working on this song on February 8, and was finally able to play it at the correct tempo on April 30. I'm not sure how long it should take someone to play this song, but that's how long it took me, at 15 minutes of practice every day.

It seems to me that your response to my question in this thread, Christopher, is that if I can't practice for an hour every day, then I just shouldn't bother even trying to play the guitar at all. I don't think that the goal that I stated at the start of this post is asking too much. This is just a fun hobby that I would like to acquire, I'm not trying to get a record deal so that I can record all the songs that I've written (which is another aspect of the guitar that I have absolutely no desire to attempt). I just want to feel like I'm actually making progress, while still having fun, because picking up the guitar is feeling more like a chore then anything else

Originally Posted by: markantonelli7

So basically, Christopher, you're telling me that I have to practice for an hour every day to get my playing where I want it to be.[/quote][p]Well, no. When I replied I wasn't exactly sure what your goals are. What I am saying is you need to keep your expectations realistic in relation to how much time you are able to devote to practicing.

If you can only manage 15 minutes, that's fine. But you need to maximize that time & manage your expectations accordingly.

Originally Posted by: markantonelli7I mentioned earlier in the thread that the only goal I have been able to come up with is that I would like to be able to play the few songs that I like, in the privacy of my home, where nobody will ever hear me play.[/quote]

If that's your only, or primary goal, then drop everything else & work on one song at a time, focusing on the chord changes & strumming/picking patterns required & drill those parts for your 15 mintues. Why work on anything else if that's your goal?

Originally Posted by: markantonelli7During the time I was taking weekly lessons, my 15 minutes of practice was spent working on whatever was discussed in the lesson. Usually that consisted of working through the exercises in the method book that I have (A Modern Method for Guitar: Volume 1 by William Leavitt).[/quote]

If those exercises are helping you improve technique, then that's great. But if they aren't helping you get better at the techniques you will need to play the songs you want to play then they might not be the best use of your time.

Any good guitar instructor will have a general curriculum that is a balanced approach of ideas & skills. But if it's not working for you, then you might want to have a discussion about prioritizing your goals with your instructor.

[quote=markantonelli7]The two goals that I worked towards with this book were learning how to read musical notation, and learning how to play without looking at either my fretting hand or my strumming hand (trying to develop the feel that any proficient guitar player has while playing).

Well, those are more goals. I usually encourage students to learn to read music. But in some cases, I say it's okay to not worry about it. Or at least put it off until you have time to devote to it.

Another approach here is to combine tasks. If you're learning a particular song, then get the sheet music for it (a transcription that has both notation & tab) & you can work on learning the song while you are working on reading some music notation.

Not looking at your hands is a matter of playing until it becomes automated, completely second nature. You can practice that skill by drilling chord changes in a song you are working on. Just pick two chords in the song to move back & forth between as an exercise in itself. That will help automate those motions while working on technique required for part of the song.

[quote=markantonelli7]The other item discussed during my lesson was a particular song I want to play, whether it be in the songbook I have, or something I would look up the chords and the strumming pattern for. Once those two things were determined, I would then play through the chord progression, in the correct strumming pattern, with a metronome clicking, as my way to work toward playing the song at the correct tempo. The only song I have been able to do this with is Free Fallin by Tom Petty. According to my notes, I started working on this song on February 8, and was finally able to play it at the correct tempo on April 30.

Hey, that's progress! Congrats. :) Now you have a standard of how long it will realistically take you to learn a song. And I think that's a good indication of what I'm saying: if you only have a little time to devote, you can still accomplish musical guitar goals, but it will take some time. Be patient with yourself & the process. As long as you are making progress, then try to enjoy it!

[quote=markantonelli7]It seems to me that your response to my question in this thread, Christopher, is that if I can't practice for an hour every day, then I just shouldn't bother even trying to play the guitar at all.

I said that's not enough time to get much done. You can still get things done, but it will take longer than if you had an hour to practice. We have evidence of that in your reply about learning the Petty song.

I understand that you only have 15 minutes a day. And since it's important to prioritize & keep your expectations realistic, I encourage you to just work on songs you want to play. If a new skill or technique comes up in the context of learning a new song, then add it in as necessary. But only if it's necessary to learning a song. Make learning songs your priority. Don't worry about anything else, if that's what makes playing guitar fun for you. You know you can do that, because you've done it!

I hope this helps encourage you to keep playing guitar! Please ask more as necessary. Best of success!

Hey & welcome to GT!

Originally Posted by: djgillham

My questions are: (1) when will my fingers be more flexible and cooperative.[/quote][p]Those type of questions are difficult to answer definitively without more information & evidence. It varies greatly by student.

How much basic manual dexterity for fine motion skills do you bring to the task? How long have you been practicing? How much time do you practice every day?

In general, I see older beginners take anywhere from 1 month to 6 months to gain some basic skills to form open chords & strum them slowly in time. I've seen it take as long as a year. But that was an older learner & he was enjoying the process anyway!

Originally Posted by: djgillham(2) without the tab I'd be blind. When do the notes start making sense?[/quote]

I'm not sure what you mean here. Do you mean learning the musical alphabet notes on the fretboard? Or this is a memory issue with just knowing which frets to play without referring back to the tab? It's not necessarily a bad thing to keep looking back at the tab or to look at your fingers. As a beginner it's a necessity & it will gradual improve with reptetitious practice.

Originally Posted by: djgillham(3) thus far I have been going over each lesson and can recognize major chords and make the adjustments to embellishments, etc. based on them, but often when moving on to the song portion I become like a deer in the headlights. Very discouraging. When will this pass?[/quote]

Again, hard to say or know definitively. But I know the only way to get there is lots of repetitious practice. :)

Originally Posted by: djgillham(4). Should I have things memorized and 100% before advancing lessons or is this all a journey and part of the process?

Not necessarily. You can move forward in order to stay motivated & have fun. Just make sure to keep practicing the material in those previous lessons until you do have them under your command.

[quote=djgillham](5) how long will I have to slouch to see the frets, make angle adjustments with my wrist to reach notes in chords, and will my fat index finger ever work to successfully Barr?

Again, hard to say. But it sounds like you could improve your posture a bit by tilting the neck up a bit in order to see the frets without straining your neck. Also, you might try to move your hand around more to the strings to minimize your wrist angle.

I cover porper posture in this lesson.

https://www.guitartricks.com/lesson.php?input=13958

[quote=djgillham]will my fingers one day loosen, stretch and dance across the fretboard?

Only if you put in the practice time. :)

[quote=djgillham] (6) when I try and stand to play it feels like a sobriety test but I notice the guitar positioning is quite different than sitting. Is this an area I need to incorporate in practicing so I can get acquainted?

Yes. It's best to use a strap & find a setting that allows you to keep the guitar in the same position sitting & standing. Spend time practicing while sitting & standing.

Be patient with yourself. Try to enjoy the process. Hope that helps!

Originally Posted by: markantonelli7

So I've been trying to learn to play acoustic guitar for a little over 5 years now. In that time, it doesn't feel like I've made any progress. This is after spending at least 15 minutes practicing every day, as well as weekly 30 minute lessons. Is my lack of progress a function of not spending enough time practicing, or should I accept that I'll just never be able to play the guitar with any level of proficiency?

Take a break, try other instruments like piano drop the time restrictions and play until you are done for today or come back later or not at all.there is no right or wrong answer.