By early October, I run out of metaphors to describe the Austin weather, and I'm down to just making personal, pejorative remarks. Although it was a refreshing 77 degrees Fahrenheit when I finally made it out the door for a run this morning, so while the end isn't actually in sight, it is, maybe, down the corner, around the block and a thousand leagues north as the crow flies.
I'm responsible for more than my usual amount of digital correspondence this week, so if you're at the point of making personal, pejorative remarks when you see my return address, I can dig it. That's what that little "unsubscribe" notification at the bottom of each email is for, and I'm perfectly happy to see people use it. More words for everyone else, is pretty much my feeling, so don't hesitate if you've had enough.
That said, I'm here with a couple of updates. First, all three lessons in my Fingerstyle Five series, including playback of the live Zoom session, are now posted on one easy-to-navigate page. In case you missed any of them, they include:
- The Horizontal 3-Step: How to get your thumb and fingers coordinated
- The Dominant Dozen: making a map of the fretboard using dominant 7th voicings up the neck
- What To Work On: breaking down solo instrumental fingerstyle blues into five clear steps: Groove, Voicings, Repertoire, Arranging and Improvisation.
When you get there, you'll also find links to downloadable pdfs with chord diagrams and the tab to fingerstyle arrangements of "Can't Be Satisfied," "Come On In My Kitchen" and two versions of "Trouble in Mind."
The Fingerstyle Five – All Three LessonsBetween various kinds of Facebook aversion and the code itself being somehow corrupted, the Comments section has been a little on the quiet side, but it is now, they tell me, er, up to code. I can't do anything about the Facebook aversion except to say next time around I will look harder for a more platform-neutral solution, because I really do love hearing what you've got to say about your practicing, your progress and your priorities.
Meanwhile, for all you single-note felines who've been standing by patiently the past few weeks: in mid-October I'll be offering a six-week, live-online small-group workshop on Playing The Changes. Enrollment is limited to twelve, so if you think you might be interested, mosey on over to my website, scroll down the homepage and put your name on the waitlist. You'll be the first to be notified with more details on the course and have the chance to register early as well.
More soon,
David
