Finger Picking Good
...although, to be strictly honest, it's more like, "Finger Picking Stumbling and Bordering on a Position from Which Adequate Just Might be Visible", but that just doesn't have quite the same ring.
So yes- my progress with the guitar.
Being able to play the classical guitar has long been a goal of mine, and one that I have made very slow (and in fact up until this past year pretty much imperceptible) progress toward, especially when you consider the fact that my instrument was purchased for me by my father about sixteen years ago. He started to teach me then, but our lessons got interrupted by little things like moving and, oh, his death (corpses, in my experience, make lousy teachers). So for the next decade and a half it lived with the other guitars in our household, more or less neglected by me- the exception being the times when I would take it out and sigh that I didn't know how to play. I did, of course, date several musicians throughout my teenage years, and they'd take it upon themselves to teach me, but it was always a project swiftly abandoned (teenage boys who cannot really play anyway also make lousy teachers).
But then came the summer of 2006, and a visit to my Mom's house. Once again, I pulled out my old guitar, but this time I decided that I was actually going to learn to play the damn thing. So I brought it back with me on the plane, and then it got neglected in my house for about a year (with the exception of the one time the Bavarian taught me to re-string it.) And then my brother came to visit this past May, and showed me a few finger exercises. And after he left I practiced diligently. For about a week.
And then things with Paladin got rolling.
Now, Paladin not only doesn't suck, he's actually Really Fucking Good. And (more importantly for the advancement of my own agenda) he's a good teacher. He explains theory to me (which I desperately need or my brain just rebels at too much non-related information) and is way more patient than I probably have any right to (especially when you consider my tendency to say impatiently, “Don’t fix me! I know it’s wrong- let me remember how to do it right!”). And he taught me chords, and I started actually practicing, and now it's been almost three months and I'm to a point where I'm clumsily trying to piece together things that might have been songs in their previous lives.
I got still more practice in this "song"-playing endeavor earlier this evening, when I was over at my brother’s house “playing” guitar with him. ovidad was showing me how to do "Wonderwall" (because that's a song that has long been in our brother/sister-playing/singing shtick) and I was fucking it up horribly.
Now, as a gifted child, I’m used to learning things (on average) seven times faster than the typical person. Moreover, I’m used to getting shit right the first time. This has not so much been the case with my guitar-playing, and (needless to say) the fact that I am not some sort of prodigy has kind of been getting under my skin. In fact, lately I’ve been so mortified at how unskilled I am that I’ve been snappish whenever Paladin tries to teach me, and (for the most part) will not practice if he’s in the house and can hear me.
So really, what made this evening with my brother so amazing was that, instead of getting pissed off and quitting as I flubbed every other note, I just kept plugging along, trying to match my fingers to his. And eventually it didn't sound half bad. And I was filled with this warm glow that there I was- playing guitar with my brother. Who the hell would ever have thought that would happen? It was the best part of this entire weekend, and that includes the part where I got to play in the snow. For the first time I really felt the joyful thing that I thought being able to play guitar would bring me. And no, it's not the joy being being able to play (not just yet- not by a long shot) but it is the joy of making some fucking progress.
So yes- my progress with the guitar.
Being able to play the classical guitar has long been a goal of mine, and one that I have made very slow (and in fact up until this past year pretty much imperceptible) progress toward, especially when you consider the fact that my instrument was purchased for me by my father about sixteen years ago. He started to teach me then, but our lessons got interrupted by little things like moving and, oh, his death (corpses, in my experience, make lousy teachers). So for the next decade and a half it lived with the other guitars in our household, more or less neglected by me- the exception being the times when I would take it out and sigh that I didn't know how to play. I did, of course, date several musicians throughout my teenage years, and they'd take it upon themselves to teach me, but it was always a project swiftly abandoned (teenage boys who cannot really play anyway also make lousy teachers).
But then came the summer of 2006, and a visit to my Mom's house. Once again, I pulled out my old guitar, but this time I decided that I was actually going to learn to play the damn thing. So I brought it back with me on the plane, and then it got neglected in my house for about a year (with the exception of the one time the Bavarian taught me to re-string it.) And then my brother came to visit this past May, and showed me a few finger exercises. And after he left I practiced diligently. For about a week.
And then things with Paladin got rolling.
Now, Paladin not only doesn't suck, he's actually Really Fucking Good. And (more importantly for the advancement of my own agenda) he's a good teacher. He explains theory to me (which I desperately need or my brain just rebels at too much non-related information) and is way more patient than I probably have any right to (especially when you consider my tendency to say impatiently, “Don’t fix me! I know it’s wrong- let me remember how to do it right!”). And he taught me chords, and I started actually practicing, and now it's been almost three months and I'm to a point where I'm clumsily trying to piece together things that might have been songs in their previous lives.
I got still more practice in this "song"-playing endeavor earlier this evening, when I was over at my brother’s house “playing” guitar with him. ovidad was showing me how to do "Wonderwall" (because that's a song that has long been in our brother/sister-playing/singing shtick) and I was fucking it up horribly.
Now, as a gifted child, I’m used to learning things (on average) seven times faster than the typical person. Moreover, I’m used to getting shit right the first time. This has not so much been the case with my guitar-playing, and (needless to say) the fact that I am not some sort of prodigy has kind of been getting under my skin. In fact, lately I’ve been so mortified at how unskilled I am that I’ve been snappish whenever Paladin tries to teach me, and (for the most part) will not practice if he’s in the house and can hear me.
So really, what made this evening with my brother so amazing was that, instead of getting pissed off and quitting as I flubbed every other note, I just kept plugging along, trying to match my fingers to his. And eventually it didn't sound half bad. And I was filled with this warm glow that there I was- playing guitar with my brother. Who the hell would ever have thought that would happen? It was the best part of this entire weekend, and that includes the part where I got to play in the snow. For the first time I really felt the joyful thing that I thought being able to play guitar would bring me. And no, it's not the joy being being able to play (not just yet- not by a long shot) but it is the joy of making some fucking progress.