{"id":6396,"date":"2014-10-31T05:17:17","date_gmt":"2014-10-31T05:17:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/?p=6396"},"modified":"2014-10-31T05:17:17","modified_gmt":"2014-10-31T05:17:17","slug":"blues-guitar-unleashed-turns-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/blues-guitar-unleashed-turns-6\/","title":{"rendered":"Blues Guitar Unleashed Turns 6!"},"content":{"rendered":"

What were you doing 6 years ago today?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Aside from getting ready for trick-or-treaters like any other Halloween, I was pretty stressed out hoping that my little Blues Guitar Unleashed course might actually sell a few copies so I might not have to be away from home every night and could actually be home to see my kids grow up \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

As much as I love playing and performing, I’ve always taught guitar ever since I was 15 years old…<\/p>\n

\"libertyI was walking home from school one day and I passed a building just a couple of blocks from my house and the sign was outside on it’s side and it said “Liberty Music.” I immediately went inside and asked the owner if I could work there and teach lessons and luckily he gave me the job on the spot! (it’s still there as of this post as you can see in the photo.)<\/p>\n

I’m sure I learned much more than I taught for those first couple of years, but I loved it.<\/p>\n

But let’s not talk about me… let’s talk about you and how you can play the blues better.<\/em><\/p>\n

Over these last 6 years I’ve been extremely blessed to have met many “BGU’ers” face to face and work with you in person. And because of that I’ve learned 5 things that are super important that you might be doing wrong (and of course, I’ll tell you how to fix it)<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Keep time first<\/strong> – I’m sure you’ve heard me say it but worry about the time first and the notes second. Most people get it the other way around. Play the wrong notes but in time and someone will still probably know what you are trying to play (watch this video<\/a> if you don’t believe me)<\/li>\n
  2. You probably have gaps<\/strong> – Most people have learned a little here and a little there from a buddy or a teacher or youtube videos over a long time. That means you’ve more than likely missed some things along the way. Out of the just over 27,500 copies of Blues Guitar Unleashed<\/a> that have been sold in the past 6 years, I would say that probably at least half of those people would have done well to start with Beginning Blues Guitar<\/a> to fill in some of those gaps. And these days I’m more likely to recommend the beginning course to more people simply to make sure those gaps get filled.<\/li>\n
  3. Your fingers move just fine<\/strong> – If you think you can’t play fast enough I almost guarantee that it has nothing to do with your fingers and everything to do with your ear and your ability to subdivide beats effectively. You would be amazed at how many people can play 1\/8th notes at 180 beats a minute but can’t play 1\/16th notes at 90 beats a minute – it’s the exact same speed but the subdivisions are different.<\/li>\n
  4. Memorize before you master<\/strong> – You can’t really practice something if you’re constantly going back and forth between your guitar and the video or the notation. Memorize a bit of music, then practice it. Then memorize more if there is more, and practice it. Small bites is how you eat the elephant.<\/li>\n
  5. Just don’t stop<\/strong> – I was never the guy in high school that could play the best… there were plenty of other guys that started earlier and picked it up faster. I’ve never been a natural and I haven’t seen many over the years. I never quit and you shouldn’t either. Guitar is fun and it’s one of the most enthralling things I’ve ever seen and as long as you can’t wait to pick it up again and try something else I can promise that you’ll always see some improvement.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    One last thing… thank you<\/em>.<\/p>\n

    When I mentioned that all I ever wanted was a little something on the side so I could maybe stay home a couple of nights a week? Well it turned out quite a bit better than we expected and not only do I get to spend more time with my family, but I have some of the best friends around the world a guy could ever ask for and my “BGU Family” has become\u00a0my 2nd home.<\/p>\n

    I’m excited to see what the next 6 years will bring and as always I’ll do my best to keep you motivated and moving forward.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    What were you doing 6 years ago today? Aside from getting ready for trick-or-treaters like any other Halloween, I was pretty stressed out hoping that my little Blues Guitar Unleashed course might actually sell a few copies so I might not have to be away from home every night and could actually be home to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6396"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6396"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6398,"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6396\/revisions\/6398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluesguitarunleashed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}