When You Don’t Know What You Don’t Know
Most of the time you know when you’ve played wrong notes, chords, or rhythms. But that’s not always the case—and that presents a big problem! How can you know what you don’t know?
You can start by looking for the most common mistakes people make. Rhythmic mistakes are the biggest problem most students have. The most common rhythmic mistakes are adding or subtracting beats to one or more measures in a song or playing in the wrong time signature. Unfortunately, if you’re making one of these mistakes, it may sound fine to you, and the longer you practice the mistake, the more right it will sound! To avoid those problems, try isolating the rhythm and using a metronome. You’ll need to count out loud as you do this and be impeccable in your commitment, otherwise you’ll slip into old habits that may be incorrect.
In addition to checking the rhythm, go back to the tutorial, tabs, or sheet music you learned the song from and confirm that you’re playing all the right notes and chords and at the right time. I often see students play something correctly one week and return with a mistake the next. If you don’t have a teacher to notice those things and bring them to your attention, you’ll need to be more diligent about checking yourself.
What Else Can You Do?
Although those are common mistakes people have in playing their songs, they’re not the only ones. A good teacher can catch your mistakes, but if you’re teaching yourself, you may play songs incorrectly for months or even years, to the detriment of your rhythmic or pitch sense. For this reason, I’ve added another service to my lesson and coaching options: Single Song Support.
To take advantage of this service, record yourself playing the song you want me to check or correct and email the audio file to me. If you want me to check your technique or have questions about fingering, make a video and put it on Google Drive or in Dropbox and send me a link. Don’t get caught up in trying to make a perfect or high-quality recording—I just need to hear it clearly. The easiest way to do it is to record on your phone.
When you email your recording, include a link to the version you’re working from, if you have one. (For example, the version of the song on YouTube—no video necessary.) I will review your performance and send you back an email with my response in both text and video. If you’re playing everything correctly, I’ll let you know that, but I’ll include helpful suggestions anyway. (That’s my job!)
At only $25/song, this is an affordable and efficient way to clean up one or more of your songs and move your playing forward. Choose “Single Song Support” in the drop down menu below. Expect it to take up to 3 days from the time you send in the song until you receive my assessment.
