Greetings from Zoersel in Belgium

[Madu]

Hi everyone,

As many before me, I'd like to introduce myself on this forum. I'm 65 years young, and enjoying every minute of my retirement, living close to Antwerp in a village called Zoersel. My native language is Flemish but I'll try to express myself as possible in English.

My musical taste varies from Bruce Springsteen, Creedence Clearwater Revival, over the Rolling stones, Pink Floyd, Eric Clapton, Santana, AC/DC, Led Zeppelin, J.J. Cale, Tony Joe White, Mark Knopfler, the Fabulous Thunderbird's, Bonnie Rait, Emmylou Harris, Neil Young and lately I discovered The War on Drugs, Greta Van Fleet and Khruangbin.

 

Due to, to much work and other obligation in life I did not have the time to start playing a guitar myself. As I retired from work I finally found the time to begin with it three years ago. To start of I bought myself a Hudson acoustic, a fine instrument to go to school with. Since last month I'm the proud owner of an Epiphone EJ200 SCE, which is a grate upgrade to the other guitar. After three years of learning the so called cowboy chords we are now starting to get grips of the bare chords. (and yes this is really hard to cope with!) but I'm persistent and sure I will succeed. One of the questions I have at this moment is what is the best way to practice? Is a metronome a must or can I better try to follow a drum backing track. The teacher in school is not so fond of a metronome and urges me to play with the songs he is presenting as an mp3. But after all the time I'm studying now I feel I'm not making any progress.

 

Thanks in advance for your reactions.GreetingsMarc

[Doheuvel]

Welcome / Welkom Marc,

 

From a fellow retiree living in the center of Flanders.

[tx-ogre]

Welcome aboard Madu. Enjoy your stay.

[Twang Gang]

Playing along with a recording of a song is not the best way to learn.  The correct notes/chords are always there in time on the recording so no matter how poorly you play the song is still intact.  This could be why you don't feel like you are making much progress.  You would be better served to play the songs just by yourself and make them stand on your performance alone.  They will not sound the same as the recording, but if you can play it from beginning to end on your own and keep at it you will improve much faster rather than letting the recording sort of bail you out each time you make a mistake.  As to metronome or backing track - again I feel you are better off without either.  You need to learn to listen to yourself as you play.  If it sounds too slow then speed up, if it sounds too fast slow down.  After three years you should be playing quite a few songs successfully - if you are not, it may be the teaching method that is holding you back.