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Topic: About lack of motivation to practice............ |
Ray Montee
From:
Portland, Oregon (deceased)
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Posted 15 Nov 2013 10:44 am |
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Elsewhere in today's postings, one of our SGF Members asked about the occasion when one doesn't really feel like practicing........
I felt that taking a rest between practice sessions and/or sitting down to practice ONLY when the mood strikes you is my best solution. My greatest road block is moving across the room just to pick up the guitar case in order to play it....... Must be something to do with the aging process?
Mental diversions might include model building or model railroads. I've met a number of members that have model railroad pikes. Perhaps we should have a show and tell topic on model railroads, like they did some time back about flying and Harley Davidsons.
Just a tho't. |
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Ray Thomas
From:
Goldsboro North Carolina
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Posted 15 Nov 2013 11:18 am Practice
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I jump around to much, will hear a song and think, "I'v got to learn that one" will hear another one a day or two later and jump on it, hope I can settle down a little.
_________________
Ray Thomas
Livesteel Strings Dealer
Call 919-920-5482
Text rayssteel@gmail.com or email |
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Pete Burak
From:
Portland, OR USA
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Posted 15 Nov 2013 11:29 am
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Nothing like "a gig with a new band" breathin' down your neck, to motivate.
I'm re-learning "All of Me" in the Key of C on the 6th side of my Uni this morn (I coulda swore I used to know this song???... but my fingers seem to have forgotten  ), and the singer is coming over at 1pm to go over Intro's for 3 sets of music!
Thanks to Doug Jones for a packet with CD's, Set-Lists, and Charts for many songs!
Full band rehearsal next Wed.
Nice.  |
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Ray Montee
From:
Portland, Oregon (deceased)
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Posted 15 Nov 2013 12:10 pm Good points Pete!
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The pressure one feels/experiences in a band environment can be overwhelming and yet, serves as a great pacifier. A challenge.........
The 'fingers' experience you touch on Pete, has been encountered by myself. I attributed this to old age but in your case Pate, that couldn't possibly be the cause.
Maybe they've just been deleted from my "old guitars'? |
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Pete Burak
From:
Portland, OR USA
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Posted 15 Nov 2013 4:58 pm
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I've got it now.
I put together a few different pedal/lever positions to play each chord, picked out the melody in various places using chords and single notes, and built some fluency playing at tempo.
I was motivated to re-learn that one today.
I hope they're doing the Michael Buble' version!?!...(It's way slower than the Herby Wallace version  ). |
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Dale Rottacker
From:
Walla Walla Washington, USA
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Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 20 Nov 2013 4:30 pm Re: About lack of motivation to practice............
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| Ray Montee wrote: |
...Perhaps we should have a show and tell topic on model railroads, like they did some time back about flying and Harley Davidsons.
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I'll go with that. I have an extensive model railway in my sub-basement which goes under the whole length of the house and also intro the crawl space. I've thought of extending out into the garden.
Here's a platform ticket to allow the bearer access to the platform at Fudgers Junction station on my 1950s British Railways 00 layout. |
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Don R Brown
From:
Rochester, New York, USA
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Posted 20 Nov 2013 5:58 pm
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| Quote: |
| Perhaps we should have a show and tell topic on model railroads, |
Model railroads to escape the steel would not work for me, I went in the opposite direction. I took up the pedal steel after 44 years working with the real thing. I am amazed at the skill and detail work some modelers put into their layouts, but if I can't actually feel the rumble I can't get into it myself.
On the other hand, a career in railroading can give you almost as many "war stories" as a lifetime of playing steel. |
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Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 21 Nov 2013 5:17 pm
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| Don R Brown wrote: |
...but if I can't actually feel the rumble I can't get into it myself...
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That can be and has been done. Get yourself an old item of rolling stock, preferably a caboose, then mount it on a motor which will sway the car from side to side and up and dow, half a dozen big speakers with plenty of bass rumble installed under the floor and fed with recordings made in a real moving caboose from a big powerful amplifier, then project moving scenery onto the windows, which would be covered with rear-projection screen material. They have a similar set-up to that at the Sacramento State Railroad Museum, with a sleeping car. When you're in the car you really feel like you're moving, and they enhance it with the sounds, from time to time, of grade crossing bells ringing, which pass along the car as they move the sound from one speaker to the other. I could sit all day in that car. I believe the same thing has been done in several other museums, and at a few restaurants made from old dining cars.
Of course, this may be a bit beyond your budget...
...better stick to pedal steel.  |
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Roger Rettig
From:
Naples, FL
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Posted 21 Nov 2013 5:28 pm
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I have a few, but here is my favourite model loco - a 1/43 scale 'C&O' EM-1 made in brass. It's close to three feet long so there's no way I could find the space to run with any degree of realism. I just like looking at it.
The price-tag was similar to that of a new steel guitar.
_________________
Roger Rettig: Emmons D10, B-bender Teles, Martins, and a Gibson Super 400!
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Don R Brown
From:
Rochester, New York, USA
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Posted 21 Nov 2013 7:22 pm
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Roger, I can't imagine what one of those things like your model sounded and felt like for real, when they were working hard it must have been a portable earthquake!
Alan, I actually do own a caboose, a wooden one built in 1923. It needs work badly and I had great intentions of fixing it up when I retired. Then I went and got bit by this pedal steel bug, and....well, if I had put those hours in on the caboose instead of the steel she'd be looking pretty good by now. But somehow I'm not complaining. |
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Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 22 Nov 2013 1:01 pm
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| Don R Brown wrote: |
| ...Alan, I actually do own a caboose, a wooden one built in 1923. It needs work badly and I had great intentions of fixing it up when I retired. Then I went and got bit by this pedal steel bug, and....well, if I had put those hours in on the caboose instead of the steel she'd be looking pretty good by now. But somehow I'm not complaining. |
Don, I hope you're playing steel inside the caboose. 
Actually you're lucky to have one. A few years ago, when the rairoads were ending the practice of using cabooses, they were virtually giving them away. Nowadays there are none to be had. Of course, living in a big city as I do, having a caboose delivered and then using a crane to lift it over the house into the back garden, whilst still fulfilling the zoning laws, was never practicable. My mother-in-law lives on a ranch outside Atkinson, NE, and the "Cowboy Line" to Shadron ran right through her property. Before they tore the line up it would have been easy to have an old caboose delivered to her ranch. Oh well, it didn't happen. But her brother next door has a magnificent collection of several motorised track maintenance vehicles, which he takes out on a trailer and drives along the track from time to time.
Last edited by Alan Brookes on 24 Nov 2013 10:45 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Joachim Kettner
From:
Germany
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Posted 23 Nov 2013 8:14 am
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There are many reasons for me not to practice, lack of gigs, feeling uninspired and the most terrible thing is that in my sometimes depressive state of mind, when I blame my lifelong obsession with music for having neglected other things that are important in life. But I mostly beat the devil and practice at least 30 minutes a day, either steel or standard guitar. I feel slightly better afterwards.
_________________
Fender Kingman, Sierra Crown D-10, Evans Amplifier, Soup Cube. |
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chris ivey
From:
california (deceased)
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Posted 23 Nov 2013 10:04 am
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| ray, i'll almost never practice unless i have to learn a specific thing for a specic reason. i never will if i have to set up a steel. i find that if you have a steel all set up staring you in the face ready to go at all times it makes it a lot easier to sit at it for a minute when you get an idea. |
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Brett Day
From:
Pickens, SC
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Posted 23 Nov 2013 12:25 pm
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| There are days when I take little rests, and after the rests, I find myself ready to play some songs. When I'm not playing, my hobbies are classic cars, pets, playing Nintendo Wii sports games and Wii Wheel of Fortune. I used to play steel until five or five thirty in the afternoon, but now I like to start around five or five thirty in the afternoon, then watch a little Wheel of Fortune on TV at seven after playing steel, then I'll go back to the steel and play again. I'm tryin' so hard to convince myself to get away from the tv at seven and play steel, though. One afternoon, I must've played for three hours because by the time I finished, my left hand had gotten so tired after using the bar. |
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Don R Brown
From:
Rochester, New York, USA
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Posted 24 Nov 2013 7:52 am
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Alan, I got that caboose back in 1980 when they would still move them around for a reasonable fee. We're hoping to build on 13 acres we won and when that happens I'll hopefully move the caboose there. It actually would make a nice little practice studio for my steel, altho the wife claims it does not bother her when I play.
Those "speeders", the maintenance vehicles, are another item which used to be cheap and now have gone way up in price. |
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Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 24 Nov 2013 10:44 am
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Yes Don, there's a club for the "speedies" and they have regular meetings where they ride in procession along the rails. Of course, they had to get permission and notify the Dispatcher, or they could come up against a nasty shock meeting a train.
As I mentioned, my uncle-in-law's property is right next door to his sister's, (they used to be all one big ranch many years ago,) and he's thinking of laying some light rail about half a mile to her house, across open ground. It would be fun.
On the subject of practising steel, in the evenings I sit in an armchair watching the television, and I always have a lap steel close at hand. I find myself playing along with what's on the screen, even the adverts. |
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Fred Glave
From:
McHenry, Illinois, USA
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Posted 26 Nov 2013 9:27 am
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My biggest problem with practicing used to be that I hated setting up my steel back up after playing out. Now that I have two nice steels, I keep one set up all the time in my music room and the other is my grab and go. It's been a great help.
_________________
Zum Encore, Zum Stage One, Fender 2000, Harlan Bros., Multi-Kord, |
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Daniel Policarpo
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Posted 26 Nov 2013 11:25 am
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| Speaking to Ray Thomas' dilemma, being a newbie I have trouble staying away from the steel, which causes problem areas elsewhere, but I also jump around material more than I should. Getting on a weekly regimen with William Litaker's youtube group has helped quite a bit in that regard, but it's hard not be drawn to Mooney for a few days, then really dig into some Hughey for a few more the next week, oh man, now I gotta learn some Don Warden stuff! There are worse problems to have. |
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Brett Day
From:
Pickens, SC
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Posted 26 Nov 2013 3:55 pm
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| Lately, I've been playing along with female artists' songs that feature steel, like Chalee Tennison's song, "Just Because She Lives There", which Sonny Garrish played steel on, and then a lot of songs by Danni Leigh, which Steve Hinson played on. Chalee and Danni are two of my favorite artists, and Danni told me on Facebook that she's a huge steel fan, and so is Chalee |
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