Can an Old Guy make it to 10,000 Hours? A rhetorical question

[Rick Beauregard]

I just use the sheet for notes above or below the staff or higher on the fretboard, where my recall is sketchy. I also use it to help find alternate fingerings. Yes I could learn the alphabet and where they’re placed and do the math. All of that gets in the way for me. An analogy is a typewriter: I could try to learn where everything is but hunt and peck has worked for me. It’s become automatic for 90% of the keyboard. The rest of the letters I don’t use that much. And there’s only one letter per key in this case. Guitar is more complicated.

[LarryShone]

Well I am learning piano and guitar at the same time. Both involve reading music. Oh I do like to complicate things...

[ashepps]

I just use the sheet for notes above or below the staff or higher on the fretboard, where my recall is sketchy. I also use it to help find alternate fingerings. Yes I could learn the alphabet and where they’re placed and do the math. All of that gets in the way for me. An analogy is a typewriter: I could try to learn where everything is but hunt and peck has worked for me. It’s become automatic for 90% of the keyboard. The rest of the letters I don’t use that much. And there’s only one letter per key in this case. Guitar is more complicated.

Hey Rick!

I started back at the guitar approximately 5 years ago and I was fully engaged to relearn what little sight reading I had and more! I paid a few dollars on apps and tried my best to relearn some of my old pieces, which it did. But I wanted to be a better sight reader than I ever before, but that just did not happen.

For me, it was horrible, yes up to the 5th fret was not too bad, beyond that forget it. Too much time and too much trouble with much time lost to just practicing/playing!

I don't have enough time left in my life to go any further with pure sight reading. I still have a couple of old pieces that I have not gotten back to, but that will come eventually, with a learning curve, but I do know once I get into these few some muscle memory will kick in and now your "cheat sheet" will help!

Now, if I can't get the music in tabs and notes I usually don't bother with it. I still am not a good guitarist, but I am spending far more time playing than I would counting notes up the keyboard to find the right fret or to see how or where to play one massive CHORD!

I hope you don't mind, but have copied your "cheat sheet" as it can help in the case of need. I have not given up altogether and as I have said I do have those pieces yet to be relearned.

Thanks and keep up the good work!

Alan

[Solista]

Hi Rick,

Never give up!

[gm66]

Many of us older folk have the privilege of being able to do things purely for the pleasure they bring. Hopefully I'll live long enough to get 10,000 hours in.

Music has always interested me but it wasn't until later in my life that I started to study and practice. As well as classical guitar I am learning piano, and I also make music with DAWs. I'll never be particularly good, but it is always a wonder to be able to create sounds that make me smile.

[skipintro]

Trying again at 73, making progress!
4 years in and concentrated on sight reading above all else. The main trick is to spend a lot of time in your safety zone and only push the boundaries a bit at a time. 2nd is to give in on things which aren't coming easily - 2 years later and you will amaze yourself. I think a lot of people spend a lot of time on stuff which is just too difficult and will get them nowhere
But there are simple sight reading learning tricks - learn all the notes on high/low E string, then A - only 3 to go! The learn all the Cs all over, then all the Gs, Fs, and so on.
Then ditto on the stave without touching the instrument. Memorise FACEGBD repeated Say "Face, geebeedee") = consecutive lines/spaces, basic triads. Above the stave, lines are ACE - easy to remember, than add GBD
Gradually it comes and gradually there is a vast repertoire of music accessible!
Next trick is immersion - dip in to a lot of stuff, don't struggle too long with just a few items.

[Rick Beauregard]

Great advice skip. I have found the Delcamp repertoire for the lessons D01-D07 (so far) to be a well graded and just enough of a challenge taken in their turn to stretch your abilities but not too much. Pick a level that seems modestly challenging and follow along. There some great music in there. And if you follow or join the lessons you have the added advantage of commiserating with others struggling through like you from around the world. I started at D03 cause I had a couple years of lessons and many years of playing. I’m in D07 now and it is a struggle.

[skipintro]

For an example - poor old Lagrima has probably suffered more millions of hours than any other tune, being played badly by over-ambitious learners. My feeling is, if you can't play it well after say a couple of weeks practice you are wasting your time and not enjoying it. Put it back on the shelf for a year or two then give yourself a pleasant surprise!
In a group of learners recently and it was somebody's birthday. It transpired that nobody could pick out the happy birthday tune if they hadn't already learned it. Ditto "baa baa black sheep". Something wrong here! If you can't work out simple tunes like these, without music or instruction, then perhaps you haven't really begun at all.
Baa baa BS is particularly good ear training as it leaps up and down the whole major scale.
This lead to my Baa baa black sheep theory of learning: get into picking out, note by note, all the simple tunes you know from as far back as you can remember, by ear alone, on any string and eventually from any fret. Nursery rhymes, hymns and carols, anything. No looking at sheet music but listening to recordings is OK!

[Rick Beauregard]

Although I had lots of distractions the last couple of months (my Red Sox in he World Series, the Patriots season beginning with the usual heightened expectations being dashed, then ignited again, then dashed again then...), I managed to eke out my 100 hours over a couple months. There’s 6200 hours to go, nominally. I am still struggling through lessons of level D07 on the Spanish forum. The challenge of the lessons this year doesn’t leave a lot of time to learn anything else new or to try to keep a decent repertoire fresh. I look forward to finishing the grind and working on things on my “someday list”. Then again, I’ll miss the discipline of the monthly goals and will have to replace that with something else.

I’m thinking, though, that I should prepare a recital to celebrate when I reach the midpoint of my 10,000 hour goal in a couple years or so. Not that I would wait till then to perform, but a special deal. It’s too soon to think about it too much now, but maybe down the road.

[Rick Beauregard]

Well, my Patriots have ground out another conference playoff position. Just as I have ground through D07 to more than halfway through. I’ve reached another 100 hour milestone with 6100 hours to go.

I feel I’m just skimming the surface with the lessons at this point and will have to go back to many pieces and relearn and refine. I’m learning Sor Etude XI Opus 6 right now and it’s a killer. I can do only about 25 minutes at a time before having to rest due to the barre and stretches and fast arpeggios. But what seemed impossible a couple weeks ago is taking shape. Also learning Dedicatorio by Granados. I handn’t heard this piece before the Delcamp lessons and it’s a gem.

Looking back on this past year, I’ve been consistent with practice time and I think there’s progress. However as you get closer and closer to the goal, and reaching that asymptotic line, progress is hard to discern. That’s why having a consistent goal and objectives is so important. Just keep plugging through plateaus and valleys.

[Christopher Langley]

That's why a consistent goal and objectives is so important. Just keep plugging through plateaus and valleys.

PREACH!

Classical guitar in a nutshell.

[Rick Beauregard]

That's why a consistent goal and objectives is so important. Just keep plugging through plateaus and valleys.

PREACH!

Classical guitar in a nutshell.

My my so snarky.

[Christopher Langley]

That's why a consistent goal and objectives is so important. Just keep plugging through plateaus and valleys.

PREACH!

Classical guitar in a nutshell.

My my so snarky.

I had to look up the definition of snarky, I hope I'm not being that. lol.

I just found a lot of truth in what you said, it's all plateaus and valleys man. Not just guitar, pretty much applies to everything else too. Very well put.

[Rick Beauregard]

PREACH!

Classical guitar in a nutshell.

My my so snarky.

I had to look up the definition of snarky, I hope I'm not being that. lol.

I just found a lot of truth in what you said, it's all plateaus and valleys man. Not just guitar, pretty much applies to everything else too. Very well put.

Ok. Another case of misinterpretation. I retract.

[Christopher Langley]

My my so snarky.

I had to look up the definition of snarky, I hope I'm not being that. lol.

I just found a lot of truth in what you said, it's all plateaus and valleys man. Not just guitar, pretty much applies to everything else too. Very well put.

Ok. Another case of misinterpretation. I retract.

On the internet? Impossible

Cheers Rick