It's that time of year again...

Even though I often feel like I'm standing still in my guitar playing (or worse, going backwards!) looking back over a longer period, I can see that progress is actually being made. 

Last year I made the list of the 10 most useful things I learned - I think they bear repeating (see end) but this year I'm going to do a round up of the 5 things I accomplished this year (and what got me there)

1. I got to play in public.  This was a big deal.  Before then I rarely managed to play for anyone without collapsing with nerves.   It took a series of steps, the initial one (I would never have thought of) suggested by my teacher - ie practicing playing a piece through in lessons very, very slowly.  Over several weeks I was able to ramp up the speed until I was actually playing it at tempo in lessons, then in online masterclasses and finally in an open mic.  It's still not great, but the most useful thing is I really did get used to making mistakes and continuing to play - and not getting too bent out of shape about it.
2. I passed my level 3 certificate (grade 6).  This involved working on pieces for months not weeks, and running the entire set every day for weeks before recording it.
3. I got really comfortable using the phone as a practice tool.   Record - listen - did I actually get the tempo steady or am I still speeding up? Can anyone else apart from me hear the dynamics?
4. I started to play duets  - first with my teacher, then with other players.  I played a duet at the open mic at 2 summer camps, and recently got asked by others, so I'll be working on this in the coming year.  I enjoy duets, it is a change from solo practice, it's not quite so stressful to play in public (though it's stressful enough) and the final result can be more complex than a solo at my level would be.
5. I signed up for music classes at our local university.   This involved getting over the feeling that I wouldn't be good enough, and just giving it a try - they say turning up is 90% of the battle, so I'm showing up in January 😄 - just theory at this point, but you never know...

And here is last year's list of the most useful things I learned with a few tweaks...

1.  Sometimes the best only way to keep in time is to count along with yourself.  
2.  Work out the fingering and write it in.  
3. Playing super slowly really helps with memorization AND errors.  
4. Don't ignore the score after you've memorized the piece
5. Practicing things 4x in a row correctly before moving on
6. If you can't seem to 'get' the LH fingering, check the RH!   
7. Start learning the dynamics and articulation sooner
8. If it's not working after a number of iterations, rework it.
9. Recording yourself is really really really useful. YEP!
10. Work up pieces until they are solid enough that they don't  fall apart under performance pressure - that means playing them super slowly without getting lost, playing them with eyes closed, visualizing, whatever it takes.   

How many ways are there to damp a string?

This is my current nightmare.  Other people might lie awake pondering car problems or how to avoid having to deal with the leaky roof but me, I try to wrap my head around how to damp guitar strings.  (Actually I worry about leaky roofs and strange noises in my car too, but that's beside the point).
I've been familiar with damping bass strings for a while - but now I'm looking at damping any open string, which means treble strings too.  It's proving something of a challenge, so I thought I'd sit down and list all the ways I know currently.

Bass strings thumb
- if the thumb is moving to the next highest string, then its pretty easy to touch the ringing string with the  thumb while playing the next  note.
- and if not adjacent, you can still use the side of the thumb to damp the bass strings though it involves moving your hand
- you can put your thumb back down on the note you just  played
- if you’re moving the other way, from eg D to E string, you can go back and damp with the thumb after playing the next note

Fingers
- If moving to the next lowest string, eg E to B string as you play the B string note  you can flatten the left hand finger so it touches the higher string
- with the right hand you can drop another finger onto the string, e.g. play B string note with m and simultaneously drop a onto the E...
- you can use fretted notes instead of open strings -
- you can place a left hand finger early onto a fret you will soon be playing
- I guess you could reach  over and stop a bass string with the left hand

I’m still experimenting with this stuff so I’m sure there are more ways to learn - and all I can say is that it makes it exponentially  harder to figure out which fingers to use! And that doesn’t even begin to address  the question of which notes - really- need to be stopped and which can  inoffensively ring over😳

What has Marilyn Monroe to do with my guitar playing?

She starred in a movie called 'The 7 Year Itch'! 
Whaaaat? - Patience!  All will be revealed in due course -

 When I started learning guitar I had a simple goal - to play some tunes on the guitar.  Although I started with a steel string, within a few months I switched to nylon, partly because I was taking group lessons with a classical teacher and partly because I found myself attracted to the beautiful sound of the classical guitar.   My goals, however, were still pretty much the same - play some tunes (and enjoy getting there).   But as time went on a funny thing happened - the more I learned, the more problems I started to hear. [Here I have to note that I'm surprised professionals don't wince the whole time they are listening students play -- on second thoughts, perhaps they do!]   So pretty early on my goals morphed into not only learning more difficult 'tunes' but also refining my playing so that it was less wince-worthy.    And I wondered to myself - as an older learner - how far could I get before my body let me down?   Yep - Type A personality here.   I finally settled on aiming to reach a playing standard of grade 8.  It seemed a sufficiently distant, though arbitrary, goal at the time.  Of course I didn't actually tell anyone (it was after all, rather a lofty goal given my age and lack of natural aptitude).

So I've held onto this "goal" over the last few years, but it might be time to reassess. Why?  A number of reasons:  I've been learning CG for 5 years, and if past history is anything to go by I will need to give my playing a new direction within the next couple of years.  I'm still just as addicted to learning CG (OK maybe now I sometimes give myself the occasional day off) but 7 years tends to be the length of my attention span for hobbies -gardening, flying small planes, speed skating...   (See, I did eventually get around to telling you what the title had to do with the subject, if only distantly 😂) Also I'm going to be working on grade 7 material this winter, which means my glorified and distant goal might actually be attainable.  I love to play the guitar.  It still provides me with entertainment, stress relief, new friends, and a sense of satisfaction/achievement so I really don't want it to succumb, either to the '7 year itch', or to a sense of being 'done' if and when I get to grade 8.

Is it enough just to 'stay on the path' and ditch goals altogether?  Perhaps, but realistically I'm not good at standing still: I need something to aim for.  For now, grade 8 fits the bill,  however it may in fact be at or beyond the limit of my physical ability.  So I'm thinking about new directions and possibilities to take my hobby.  At least one goal is certain: not to succumb to the 7 year itch!