Wrapping up the week

Hi all,

Another great week over here in Christchurch, it’s been snowing for a second time this winter.

I’m just waiting for it to clear up a little before I take my son out tobogganing.

When you’ve got snow, you don’t need much else to be having a good time.

Somebody said to me, ‘But the Beatles were anti-materialistic.’ That’s a huge myth. John and I literally used to sit down and say, ‘Now, let’s write a swimming pool.’
- Paul McCartney

Here’s some weekend reading to queue up on your iPad

Learn Minor Pentatonic Scale Patterns Fast – 5 patterns of the A minor pentatonic scale.

Practice Tips for Beginner Guitarists – Purpose, consistency, warming up, working hard and finishing with a bang.

The I-IV-V Chord Progression – What is it? Why does it sound so good? Get this theory under your belt now so you’re not stuck learning it 3 years from now.

Losing my Religion – Easy guitar song for you to learn over the weekend, it’s easy to play and is distinctive enough so that even if you hit a few dead notes people will easily pick up on what you’re trying to play them :)

Easy Guitar Songs – Losing my Religion

As a beginning guitarist, it’s easy to get overwhelmed with talk of scales, chords, progressions and so on. We could talk theory until your eyes glaze over. But while some basic theory knowledge is necessary to get you going as a beginning guitarist, the best way to get better is to actually play your guitar (revolutionary concept, isn’t it, haha).

So with that in mind, I want to give you some examples of songs to play that are easy enough for a beginner to manage with a little practice so you can feel like you’ve had some fun and accomplished something.

The I-IV-V Chord Progression

Songwriting is all about choosing the right chords to make your song sound just the way you want it. But you might be surprised to learn that choosing chords at random is not the best way to make a tune sound good. There are standard and not so standard chord progressions that you can use as you write a song and harmonize it.

The single most common chord progression you can learn is the I, IV, V progression. You can hear this progression all over the place in songs of just about any style.

Practice Tips for Beginner Guitarists

Becoming a better guitarist is a goal that we all share, whether we’ve been playing for 2 years or 20. The key to getting better is to practice as regularly and consistently as possible.

But unfortunately , many guitarists don’t get very good, value for their practice time. They noodle their way through a couple of songs they know well, maybe practice a scale or two and then call it a day.