Eblues (AKA - Herm)
Herm
This is it, my formal introduction... Bio... Video Story... Question of "Can You Relate?".... Quest for Motivation... Cry for Help... all rolled into one excessively long post.
Some things I like about my guitar playing:
I can be persistent, and given enough time I've managed to figure out how to play some fairly difficult stuff fairly well
I have a pretty good feel for music in general
I've been able to grasp the basic principles of music theory
Some things I don't like, would like to improve:
In a live setting, I'm a shell of the player you see in my videos
I seem to forget well over half the things I've worked on, once I stop working on them
I don't like how long I seem to need to spend learning something new
I never seem to achieve reaching the point of being mistake-free, or at least nearly so
I lack pick control when strumming full chords (a small, but currently very annoying issue)
I don't have a clear vision of what I should focus my practice time on
I don't have enough songs committed to memory
My over-active affliction of performance anxiety
I initially expected that once I learned a specific solo, I'd have all those licks at my beck and call at any time.
Did not like at all discovering this is absolutely not true.
Here's how I got where I am:
Early In 2010, at the age of 57 and nearly 30 years after buying my first guitar, I decided I would finally dust it off and make a determined effort to learn to play. After noodling around aimlessly for a few months, I decide to pick a song and commit to learning something note for note all the way through. The song I chose was as a cover of "Strange Things" by New York blues player John Earl Walker. In May of 2011, 8 or 9 months later (yes... 8-9 MONTHS!), I was finally ready to record this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQEKm8jDnVk
I was pleased with the result, but 8 months is a ridiculously long time to spend on one song, agreed? I went on to focus intently on learning and recording a handful of classic rock songs with attempts at note for note solos, this one being my last and I feel best accomplishment of this phase, which I recorded in October of the same year:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVzIFTzOpEw
I was using a TonePort during this period, anybody remember those? (And yes, back then, I played everything with that much distortion - which I think is one reason I've been slow to developed a good touch). Anyway, during this time I also became involved with a guitar site called Vanderbilly (deceased). This was a lesson site with a lot of interactive activity, and I participated in a few collaborative jams. Turns out, given enough time, and with enough focused cramming, I can manage something I feel is pretty decent and get it on tape.
"So, what's the problem, Herm?", you might be asking? Well, take me out of my private home environment, and put me in mixed company with a guitar in hand, and I am a completely different person... shy, reserve, intimidated. I forget half of what I know, and I'm suddenly physically only half as good at playing the half I remember. I'm basically useless in a "just show up and jam" situation. I'd do OK if given a list of 8-10 songs and a few weeks to prepare, but I lack the courage to play off the cuff live, and just won't do it. Even with time to practice, I haven't typically enjoyed playing with others. I want to enjoy it, but stress and anxiety get in the way.
To try to over come this crippling performance anxiety issue, I started participating in a series of guitar workshops, where we'd practice a set of songs for 8 weeks, then have a little performance for family and friends. The first one is linked below. It's 23 minutes long, but song beginnings are time-linked in the description (click "show more"), so you can quickly hit a couple spots to get the gist. I thought my best moments were the opening Walking Blues instrumental, Sunshine of Your Love, and Red House:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghF10CTAvIw
Now, you can't tell in the video, but I was an absolute nervous wreck the entire time. There are minor mistakes throughout, and I reacted internally to each one as though it was disaster. There were times when my legs were uncontrollably shaking (I did disguise all this angst well tho, didn't I?). When it was finally over, I *swore* I would never, ever put myself in that situation ever again. However, in viewing the replay, I found my playing to be not nearly as horrendous as the perceptions I had during the performance. So I signed up for 6 more workshops. The other guys kept telling me I was doing fine, and that eventually I'd get used to playing to people and start to enjoy it. Never happened. Each performance was just as stressful as the last. And then, THIS happened....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0e0xkjP0l8
That was the end of my workshop participation!
After this I spent a couple years distracted with a new hobby... collecting vintage organs. Most were free or dirt cheap, which is how I go sucked in. All in all, I think I drug 14 or 15 of them home. At the height of the frenzy, I had five of them in the house at one time. It was my first exposure to keyboards. Eventually, I grew weary of hauling 250-300 pound organs home and the space they occupied, and got out of the organ hobby, opting instead for digital piano. I kept only one organ, a well used 1960 Hammond A100, which is not currently working.
Well, we've just about caught up to the present. I've got the bug to get back into guitar in a serious way, but so far, mostly just talk, not much playing. My current routine is 30 minutes of finger picking the same half dozen songs, while laying on the sofa watching TV. At least I have taken steps to get myself a better setup. I have a Boss GT8 Multi-effects unit, and messed with it a lot. I found it complex, cumbersome, and time consuming, but at the same time limiting. So I bought a pedal board to mount all the bargain pedals I've bought over the years but never used, and thought I'd try that route:
The G3 and Trio are new additions. The G3 inexpensively adds delay, chorus, reverb to my "rig", and gives me access to a multitude of other effects, should the need arise (not likely). Haven't messed with the Trio much at all as yet. And I've only scratched the surface as far as figuring out how to stack the OD pedals, I only know that I want to try that.
As far as playing goes (once I get started in earnest), I can't settle on the best path. Sometimes I think I should just focus on learning very basic, easy to remember versions of a bunch of popular classic rock tunes, so that I could better survive playing out with others. Other times I think what I might need is a structured lesson plan to improve my technique and confidence. A while ago, I signed up for lessons under Paul Gilbert, through the Artist Works website. No, not blues, but come on, he's famous! I do like his playing, and his enthusiasm is infectious. Went well for about 6 lessons, then came a lesson teaching an advanced technique I had a very difficult time with (hitting all 6 strings, while muting all but one). Next thing you know, I'm not logging on to ArtistWorks any more. My year of lessons expired mostly unused.
So I next landed here, to see if perhaps I can ride another wave of motivation to the next level.
I told you this would be long. I usually gain a reputation for long posts wherever I go. I'm trying to cut back, but it's been a hard habit to break. I probably should have gone into writing for a career.
Some things I like about my guitar playing:
I can be persistent, and given enough time I've managed to figure out how to play some fairly difficult stuff fairly well
I have a pretty good feel for music in general
I've been able to grasp the basic principles of music theory
Some things I don't like, would like to improve:
In a live setting, I'm a shell of the player you see in my videos
I seem to forget well over half the things I've worked on, once I stop working on them
I don't like how long I seem to need to spend learning something new
I never seem to achieve reaching the point of being mistake-free, or at least nearly so
I lack pick control when strumming full chords (a small, but currently very annoying issue)
I don't have a clear vision of what I should focus my practice time on
I don't have enough songs committed to memory
My over-active affliction of performance anxiety
I initially expected that once I learned a specific solo, I'd have all those licks at my beck and call at any time.
Did not like at all discovering this is absolutely not true.
Here's how I got where I am:
Early In 2010, at the age of 57 and nearly 30 years after buying my first guitar, I decided I would finally dust it off and make a determined effort to learn to play. After noodling around aimlessly for a few months, I decide to pick a song and commit to learning something note for note all the way through. The song I chose was as a cover of "Strange Things" by New York blues player John Earl Walker. In May of 2011, 8 or 9 months later (yes... 8-9 MONTHS!), I was finally ready to record this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQEKm8jDnVk
I was pleased with the result, but 8 months is a ridiculously long time to spend on one song, agreed? I went on to focus intently on learning and recording a handful of classic rock songs with attempts at note for note solos, this one being my last and I feel best accomplishment of this phase, which I recorded in October of the same year:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVzIFTzOpEw
I was using a TonePort during this period, anybody remember those? (And yes, back then, I played everything with that much distortion - which I think is one reason I've been slow to developed a good touch). Anyway, during this time I also became involved with a guitar site called Vanderbilly (deceased). This was a lesson site with a lot of interactive activity, and I participated in a few collaborative jams. Turns out, given enough time, and with enough focused cramming, I can manage something I feel is pretty decent and get it on tape.
"So, what's the problem, Herm?", you might be asking? Well, take me out of my private home environment, and put me in mixed company with a guitar in hand, and I am a completely different person... shy, reserve, intimidated. I forget half of what I know, and I'm suddenly physically only half as good at playing the half I remember. I'm basically useless in a "just show up and jam" situation. I'd do OK if given a list of 8-10 songs and a few weeks to prepare, but I lack the courage to play off the cuff live, and just won't do it. Even with time to practice, I haven't typically enjoyed playing with others. I want to enjoy it, but stress and anxiety get in the way.
To try to over come this crippling performance anxiety issue, I started participating in a series of guitar workshops, where we'd practice a set of songs for 8 weeks, then have a little performance for family and friends. The first one is linked below. It's 23 minutes long, but song beginnings are time-linked in the description (click "show more"), so you can quickly hit a couple spots to get the gist. I thought my best moments were the opening Walking Blues instrumental, Sunshine of Your Love, and Red House:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghF10CTAvIw
Now, you can't tell in the video, but I was an absolute nervous wreck the entire time. There are minor mistakes throughout, and I reacted internally to each one as though it was disaster. There were times when my legs were uncontrollably shaking (I did disguise all this angst well tho, didn't I?). When it was finally over, I *swore* I would never, ever put myself in that situation ever again. However, in viewing the replay, I found my playing to be not nearly as horrendous as the perceptions I had during the performance. So I signed up for 6 more workshops. The other guys kept telling me I was doing fine, and that eventually I'd get used to playing to people and start to enjoy it. Never happened. Each performance was just as stressful as the last. And then, THIS happened....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0e0xkjP0l8
That was the end of my workshop participation!
After this I spent a couple years distracted with a new hobby... collecting vintage organs. Most were free or dirt cheap, which is how I go sucked in. All in all, I think I drug 14 or 15 of them home. At the height of the frenzy, I had five of them in the house at one time. It was my first exposure to keyboards. Eventually, I grew weary of hauling 250-300 pound organs home and the space they occupied, and got out of the organ hobby, opting instead for digital piano. I kept only one organ, a well used 1960 Hammond A100, which is not currently working.
Well, we've just about caught up to the present. I've got the bug to get back into guitar in a serious way, but so far, mostly just talk, not much playing. My current routine is 30 minutes of finger picking the same half dozen songs, while laying on the sofa watching TV. At least I have taken steps to get myself a better setup. I have a Boss GT8 Multi-effects unit, and messed with it a lot. I found it complex, cumbersome, and time consuming, but at the same time limiting. So I bought a pedal board to mount all the bargain pedals I've bought over the years but never used, and thought I'd try that route:
The G3 and Trio are new additions. The G3 inexpensively adds delay, chorus, reverb to my "rig", and gives me access to a multitude of other effects, should the need arise (not likely). Haven't messed with the Trio much at all as yet. And I've only scratched the surface as far as figuring out how to stack the OD pedals, I only know that I want to try that.
As far as playing goes (once I get started in earnest), I can't settle on the best path. Sometimes I think I should just focus on learning very basic, easy to remember versions of a bunch of popular classic rock tunes, so that I could better survive playing out with others. Other times I think what I might need is a structured lesson plan to improve my technique and confidence. A while ago, I signed up for lessons under Paul Gilbert, through the Artist Works website. No, not blues, but come on, he's famous! I do like his playing, and his enthusiasm is infectious. Went well for about 6 lessons, then came a lesson teaching an advanced technique I had a very difficult time with (hitting all 6 strings, while muting all but one). Next thing you know, I'm not logging on to ArtistWorks any more. My year of lessons expired mostly unused.
So I next landed here, to see if perhaps I can ride another wave of motivation to the next level.
I told you this would be long. I usually gain a reputation for long posts wherever I go. I'm trying to cut back, but it's been a hard habit to break. I probably should have gone into writing for a career.
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