Practice Partner

Hello everyone. I'm really enjoying this site. I live in a rural area and don't drive. Im looking for someone to be a practice partner. I had a stroke one year ago and I been playing the guitar since the fall. I'm still at the beginning of this course. The kind of music I want to play is acoustic, blues and anything that gets my foot tapping. I also play piano.

I would strongly encourage you to find that practice partner. You can learn on your own and GT can really help with this. But unless you are content to practice alone in your closet, having friends to jam with is SOLID GOLD FOR LEARNING GUITAR.

Friends can make, running over the same damn song again and again, great fun. It also, in my opinion, the direct route to competence. Leaning in private can seem a lot like work. Leaning by jamming can make that same work into FUN. You mind learns by listening and learning, your body learns by physical practice. Everone leans by physical practice and I see no way I would be able to play at the level I am at, without all those years getting together with my friends and making noise by banging on guitars with each other.

Remote living can be an obstical, but keep your eyes open. How long have you lived there and how remote are you talking? Musicians are pretty wide sperad around the country. Are there local open mics anywhere close? Maybe you can even talk one of your friends into taking up Guitar and the two of you can support each other. NO mater.... You are on the right track to look for fellow musicians. If you play guitar and piano you can be a real assest to any group. Hell add some singing skill... and you become a real a "Triple Threat" musician. I wish I had leaned piano as well as guitar. But you do what your life experienc allow you and piano was not in the mix for me. So you are even ahead of me interms of musical skill.

In the meantime... patient, persistant, practice, pays dividends to those who can keep it going. That is the foundation that everything is built upon. You can't make much music without endless practice. But then, keep you eye on the horizon for other musicans. Even if you can't find anyone to play guitar with right away, it will start you looking and asking about local musical tallent. There is great support, insight, comradarie, excitement, lessons, fun, and even artristic sadisfaction to be found playing with others. Real toe tapping fun is to be had in the company of other musicians.... go get it. Jamming is a lot more fun than woodsheding.

Originally Posted by: blajacl85

Hello everyone. I'm really enjoying this site. I live in a rural area and don't drive. Im looking for someone to be a practice partner. I had a stroke one year ago and I been playing the guitar since the fall. I'm still at the beginning of this course. The kind of music I want to play is acoustic, blues and anything that gets my foot tapping. I also play piano.

A great way to have 'someone' to jam with, when you have no one to jam with, is to use the Guitar Tricks Jam Station. There are a lot of useful base tracks that you can play along with. You do have to dig a bit in order to find a track you might want to play along with but it can be worth it. I've been playing a good long time and just want to let loose on some blue licks so I grab a basic track and just noodle away. Also, a number of Guitar Tricks song lessons have 'jam along' videos too.

To be honest, now that I'm in my 50's, it's not like a guitar player is around every corner as it was in my 20's, so even though I could jam with someone, their aren't that many around you can just bump in to like the days when I was young.

Hope that helps and good luck!

Thanks, Im ginna try Jam session. I think in my late 50' and a stroke survivor I'm to stubborn to give up even though it's slow for me. I appreciate the response.

Marketa

Dont let not having a practice partner stop you from enjoying playing guitar. Now you have jam tracks. Your computer is your partner.

Originally Posted by: snojones

I would strongly encourage you to find that practice partner. You can learn on your own and GT can really help with this. But unless you are content to practice alone in your closet, having friends to jam with is SOLID GOLD FOR LEARNING GUITAR.

Friends can make, running over the same damn song again and again, great fun. It also, in my opinion, the direct route to competence. Leaning in private can seem a lot like work. Leaning by jamming can make that same work into FUN. You mind learns by listening and learning, your body learns by physical practice. Everone leans by physical practice and I see no way I would be able to play at the level I am at, without all those years getting together with my friends and making noise by banging on guitars with each other.

@blajacl85, welcome to you.

I just can't describe better the benefits of jamming with other musicians better than snojones did. But......

Until the pandemic hit I jammed with a couple friends every Wednesday night and it was the greatest thing to happen to my playing/learning since I started to learn guitar. I fully realize it isn't the same as the jamming remotely that you are talking about, but I think there are some similarities.

Beyond the fact it was an incredible amount of fun, there were some factors that forced me to learn. I had to get the music and study the songs we were playing. It forced me to keep up and get the timing, especially the chord changes. And I actually played lead on a couple of the simpler songs! And I was especially fortunate in that the two other guys are way better than I am and they were really patient and helped me a lot.

I don't know anything about the Jam Station here that @JeffS65 mentioned. I have heard very mixed reviews ofJamkazam but it might be something else to look into.

Good luck to you in your learning. And btw, I'm a rural guy also. And will be for a couple more months. We have lived in the same house we built, on a farm, since 1980. On July 1 there will be a few tears shed. But it's that time for the next chapter.

Marketa,

All though playing with the computer is a good way to learn parts.... It is not the same as playing with real live people. It can be useful but it is not the same as having riffs pop up unexpectedly in a jam, or nailing a complex harmony part, or finally playing a finished piece of music together.

I practice to jam tracks... but I enter the magical relm of performance when I play with other people. Most of those people are good friends and adding this to our realationship really made both the music and the friendships better.

So I would submit that there is benifit to playing with jam tracks or recordings, but... Practice with the computer, but don't give up on finding people to jam with. Keep looking!! Music is supposed to be LIVE. The contrast between the two, is like the diffrence between masterbation and sex.