Originally Posted by: sb25Hi all,
I've actually had my Guitar Tricks subscription for a couple years but only finally recently decided to dive in. I'm making my way through Guitar Fundamentals 1, but was just curious to get some opinions on how best to work through the lessons.
Should I be repeating a particular lesson over and over until I am comfortable with the material before moving on? Or should I just go through each lesson as they come, gaining practice along the way?
For instance, I'm finding it difficult to switch between the first few chords that have been introduced, and feel I may get lost if I'm trying to keep up with the new material on top of trying to master switching chords.
Any advice on this topic is much apprecaited!
Thanks!
I'm stealing from myself in a different thread but I think it applies here. The difference here is that you're really just starting to get your 'legs' as a player and moving forward may take more time than you need. To your specific questions, don't go rushing ahead just to progress. Learning guitar is more about building blocks one on top of another. You will need to get those chords down but you do not need to perfect them. See below for what I said in that other thread:
I would go to the extent of not even worrying about the amount of time you should spend. The best measure is you level of mastery of the 'thing' you're learning. That's still not a specific answer so it doesn't answer your question. For that matter, does 'mastery' best explain it?
Any measure I've ever used in learning something is; 'I'm comfortable enough with that'. The problem with a time measure is that some things will be easier than others. Don't spend time on something that you got comfortable with pretty quickly.
The method I apply (that I made up for myself) is a 'Move Forward but Look Back' method. I didn't realize in all my years of playing that I did this. My practice now is not about learning how to play since I've been playing for decades, but I do now spend a good bit of time learning new styles and disciplines.
For instance, I was watching a video on jump blues and wanted to learns some of the moves/licks. Lots to learn in this video so I just started to dig in on the licks and get a 'chunk' down. Next time I picked up on learning those licks, I started by working on the next set of licks but I went back to those original licks I'd learned. So as I learned and built the chunks of licks I worked on something new and then pulled the old licks back in at the end. It's a review but is instructive on building knowledge.
For you, you may not want or need to go back to all the GF1 lessons all the time but, back to mastery, after a time of 'Move Forward but Look Back', you'll be comfortable enough with a 'thing' to not have to review it anymore because it's just a part of your skills.
