This morning I’m refreshing myself on the chords for set list for a gig tonight. A few new ones in here. I don’t know how we survived before iReal…
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Nice one Julian, some good tunes in there! Looks like a nice varied set 
It’s the full Farran 
. We have some more Tom Waits farther down, in addition to Jockey
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Oh man, I finally worked my way through mentally transcribing Alexandria, VA. Now I just have to put it all together smoothly. I feel proud.
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I started working on Honky Tonk last night. I got started on it once before but got distracted apparently. I’ll learn it all the way through this time!
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Nice one Michael… so worth sticking with it til’ the end. Especially for those tremolo chord tricks! 
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I’m currently learning arpeggios and looking forward to understanding how to use them in a musical situation 
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Nice one buddy!.. honestly, the foundation you’ll lay down by truly knowing your arpeggios is profound! Your improvisation and part building will get more and more melodic. It’s a gradual process, but start by outlining the arpeggios in a simple but pretty chord progression… something like “Autumn Leaves” works well. Then start to turn those target notes into phrases
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Would anybody have electronic practice journal examples or ideas for one that they can share? I want to make a journal template to track my practice and a few specific personal things. I think I know what I want to track but would also like to share any ideas back and forth with the community here if there is interest.
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I’d like to have a format that allows separate pages for every day of the weekday and an additional weekly summary/plan for the following week. That’s easy enough.
I started something in Google Docs, but I really dislike it. I’d also like it to be shareable for teachers or friends. I have Microsoft OneNote, but it’s not used by very many people. Suggestions are welcome here. -
I started something in Google Docs, but I really dislike it. I’d also like it to be shareable for teachers or friends. I have Microsoft OneNote, but it’s not used by very many people. Suggestions are welcome here.
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MY MAJOR PERSONAL CHALLENGE I’D LIKE A PRACTICE JOURNAL TO ADDRESS - I have trouble focusing on only a few tunes or exercises in a time period. I constantly find something new I want to learn before completing what I already have. Jumping around is a relatively inefficient use of practice time and slows learning.
I might as well accept my scattered attention span using formal notes to help mitigate that. Sometimes it is useful to evaluate, pause and strategically shift focus anyway. I’d like to track the songs and exercises at hand, what’s on hold, and what’s to be occasionally reviewed. Otherwise, I might forget about things.
Hi @Che_Boludo!
I have also been spending some time thinking about practice journals and ways to set/track goals. I’ve uploaded a picture of a format I think works well, gleaned from my work as a software engineer. If you’re new to the concept of Kanban boards, essentially you use the progression of an item (or card) from left to right across a series of columns as a way of monitoring the status of the task the card represents.
So in the example I posted, you can see that the practice task “Chromatic Walk Benson-style” is in the column “Can Do Every Time”, which signals to the user of the document, that the author feels confident that this goal has been reached.
You can also use each individual task card to add information about the task, and update it with notes as you progress. I have attached another screenshot of this detail:
The great thing about this method is it’s really flexible (you can set up the cards and columns however you wish). It also gives you a very visual way to track progress across a host of practice items, and also have a nice ‘dumping ground’ of things you’d like to look at, some point in the future. So if Alex posts a cool lesson that I want to take a crack at, but know it’s not relevant to my current goals, I might put a card for it in the ‘Not Yet Started’ column, or even make a new column to the left of that one, titled “Wishlist” and put everything I fancy tackling in there.
This particular board was made using Trello but there are tons of options out there that can replicate this. However, being able to share your practice journal with others was a requirement for you (which you can do with Trello).
I think this is a great topic for discussion, and might even benefit from a separate thread but thought I would chime in as I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this recently.
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That’s absolutely fantastic Superhairibo! I’m familiar with the term Kanban but didn’t know much beyond reading the word. This is a spaced repetition program which is very effective for learning. I used a similar but simpler system for vocabulary learning in the past. Although simple it was adequate for that use or remembering information, not really anything complicated with metaphorical moving parts. This is at an entirely different level.
You actually jumped ahead to part 2 of my project which has been to find a way to use spaced repetition for learning. I think you solved that. Thank you!
I don’t mean to stereotype software engineers; actually, I do intentionally want to stereotype your kind of people, but I mean it in the most complimentary way possible. 
Nerds are the best at these things. I think only nerds like and learn jazz so this is not a real surprise.
I would still like to put together something a little more “old school.” I still want something that can record notes for reflection purposes and planning. I have also been looking at ways to incorporate audio snippets of whatever the goal might be, e.g. a George Benson walking bass line. I also want to be able to clip snippets self-recordings for review. That’s where I think Microsoft OneNote is the strongest option from what I’ve seen, but not very many people use it even though they might have it included with their PCs.
I think this is a great topic for discussion, and might even benefit from a separate thread but thought I would chime in as I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this recently.
I restarted this as its own thread after realizing that I probably didn’t post in the best place for visibility. So a new discussion topic has been established.
Regarding nerds, I am probably going to be applying to psychology graduate programs over the next several months or the coming year. I already have a degree in industrial/work psychology, but I want to do research on something more directly related to learning and cognitive science. Beyond just my personal use, thinking of doing academic research on something like this has been my prime motivation to put together a practice system like this. I actually haven’t touched my guitar in a very, very long time, and if I wasn’t thinking about this stuff, I probably wouldn’t have picked up a guitar anytime in the near future.
From the social psychology side of things, communities of practice and learning are extremely valuable for knowledge transfer and learning complex skills. With that said, I’m down to collaborate or contribute to anything if I have something to offer.
This is awesome. I can’t wait to look at this deeper later today. Thanks!
I’m also down to share and take feedback with some of the methods and tools that exist in the abstract but also in the 3-dimensional world that includes other people.
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How is your focused practice going? I’ve fallen completely off the rails with too many tunes going at once. I need to finish what I start.
I can relate to that. I started out with Nuages, then I got into The Girl from Ipanema (love Alex’s octave melody on that) and now I’m having a lot of fun with the Open Chord Magic If that wasn’t enough I’ve started fiddling about with “Georgia” as well. Still, I’ve asked Alex to make me a backing track for Nuages and he’s kindly agreed so I’m hoping that’ll give me push I need to work on a recording I’m happy enough with to post here. So yes, I could do with a bit more focus and discipline. On the bright side, at least I’m sticking to AFG now instead of the whole of YouTube
Mate I’m getting thoroughly spanked by life at the moment. Relationship ended, triggering an apartment hunt and then lost my job a week later so currently trying to get sorted before I can get back to my studies 
How about you?
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Oh man. You are getting spanked. It sounds like you got the Blues. Even better it sounds like a Country song. I’m not intending to make fun and hope you get a chuckle. See 3:03
You Never Even Called Me by My Name
My practicw is OK. Still having trou ble focusing. I need to put my computer in some sort of restricted mode to turn off all the apps and distractions. I just came back from a meeting and might be joining a local public radio station to host their R&B Jukebox program once a month.
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Blues? I got that Mood Indigo buddy…
I’m thinking about running a practice camp where folks are stripped of their devices and are locked in a cubicle with a single exercise and their guitar - I know I need that somtimes!
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Sign me up please! If I can get a cubicle with a window that would be appreciated.
I remember the practice rooms in college. Nothing in them but usually out of tune pianos and stands to place your paper music on. YOU JUST NEEDED TO GET OFF YOUR ASS, TAKE A LITTLE WALK AND PLANT THAT ASS IN A DISTRACTION FREE ROOM.
SoMETMIES yOUTUBE IS GREAT TO WATCH MINDLESSLY WHILE REPEATING A DIFFICULT PASSAGE OVER AND OVER. Stupid capslock
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