OnMilwaukee.com's guitar project: Lesson No. 3
Studies show that most New Year's resolutions last about a month.
We've reached the one-month mark in our guitar lessons and our students are still going strong.
In cooperation with the folks from GuitarInstructor.com and Hal Leonard Corp., OnMilwaukee.com is offering a series of free online guitar lessons in an effort to get people jamming.
We know a lot of people out there have guitars sitting at home, the cases caked in dust -- perhaps a string or two is missing and was never replaced -- because they bought them on a whim or received them as a gift and became frustrated trying to learn the basics.
In order to make this endeavor more fun and interactive, we asked for some beginning-level players to join the effort and provide us with weekly updates on their progress to help keep everyone motivated.
Our first couple lessons were basic, but they've been getting more difficult. Before Doug Boduch begins Lesson Four, here is what our panelists thought of the third lesson in our series:
KRIS
Lesson Three brings more chords, more work and, thankfully, the ability to play more songs. This lesson also introduced the power chord, which, when you add distortion, amplifier and the Pete Townshend "windmill," makes you think you can really rock.
Like last week, getting my fingers to move the way I want them to can be difficult, but, with practice, I'm getting better. I find that I really look forward to the 45 minutes or so every night when I shut the door, get the guitar out and practice.
Bring on Lesson No. 4!
SETH
Lesson Three really got me frustrated at first because Doug seemed to go way too fast for me to keep up. Going from Lesson Two to Lesson Three was like going from "Slow Ride" on easy to "Evenflow" on hard on Guitar Hero.
The first song wasn't too bad, but I had a hard time with the B7 and G chords and strumming the lowest note first before each chord. I had to watch the video a bunch of times, but kept trying and finally got it.
The second song was the hardest for me and I totally did not like the arpeggio stuff. The song kind of made me think of "House of the Rising Sun." It was a whole lot of work. Me and my dad argued about how you play the chords and stuff like that. The third song I really enjoyed. The power chords were easier because I learned a few songs using power chords and really like them. I hope the next lesson will use more power chords.
MIKE & (son) MICKEY
Mickey and Dad definitely found Lesson 3 to be the toughest so far. We enjoyed playing the variety of chord progressions with both strumming and picking. We also found some of the chords, especially the B7 and the barre chord, to be pretty challenging, but eventually figured them out. We also thought the songs sounded a bit familiar to a couple classic rock standards, but we'll have to work on that one a little more. We're enjoying this and looking forward to more lessons.
JOE
Yes! Power chords! Yeah, they are easy, but they are fun! Every Metallica song is based on these. I still need a lot of practice on the open position chords. And I'm going to be working on these continually.
I'm finding that the finger dexterity is something that these chords require. In all of my years of playing, I never really played these. After about half an hour of watching and rewatching the GuitarInstructor.com video, my fingers feel like they have been twisted into knots and my fingertips run through a cheese grater.
I'm going to make a chord chart so I can record all of the finger positions and chord names. The video isn't allowing me to retain all of this quite yet and if I have something in front of me to refer to, it will help me implant the information.
I think the best piece of advice that Doug gave in the video is practicing (almost, for some of us) every day for no more than an hour. At this stage I certainly don't have the attention span or fingertip stamina to go much longer.
After the power chord lesson, my wife pointed out that I was actually playing a Nirvana song. I had to fight back the urge to smash my American-made Stratocaster into the computer.
Rock on.
