Hi Hudson!

Here is what to focus on this week.

Memorize the string names

  • Eat A Darn Good Breakfast Everyday ;)

Chords (like last week)

SP (Strumming Pattern): D UD UDU

  • Cycle this pattern. (Repeat it over and over.) Remember to start each cycle with a down-strum. — Pay attention to your RH when you do this. You’ve gotta make sure you start it with a down-strum. — Do this with each chord. So that’s 3 different chord exercises to do
  • You were great at being nice and brave with your playing today. That is, you were not shy. Keep that up!
  • Chords can be a great time to play without being shy
  • The down-strummed chords are usually gonna be the louder ones in a SP. Aim to make the down-strums louder than the up-strums

Em pentatonic scale

You played this scale pretty well today.

Em blues scale

Well done with this in class today. Keep doing it on your own.

  • Get comfortable with adding that fret 1 and that fret 3. — Play those extra 2 games I gave you. Start by playing those.  1  —  Play only the frets you can find on the A string in this scale and keep cycling them. 0 1 2, 0 1 2, 0 1 2…    2  —  Play only the frets you can find on the G string in this scale and keep cycling them. 0 2 3, 0 2 3, 0 2 3…
  • Then go up and down the whole scale. This is the 3rd game to play
  • The only difference between this and the above scale are those blue dots. (Fun fact: in blues, they really are called “blue notes”)
  • The 4th game for this scale: Once you’re comfortable with it (that is, you can play the scale without needing to see the picture), use these notes to play over the backing track above

Regarding picking

When picking in any scale, a good way to think about it is to push down with only the thumb.

  • Aim to pick down as well as up. In class, you were mostly picking upward for the scales. Try picking both directions for the scales

Thank you Hudson! I’ll see you in a week!