guitar

I said that I would write about my female owner’s guitar practicing efforts.

She was scheduled to play again today. Actually the worship coordinator had scheduled her to play ALONE after the first time but she threw up a mini-fit (I’m exaggerating here) about it. So he ended up having to play with her again. Poor guy coz he ended up being on duty three weeks in a row.

My female owner first learnt to play the guitar when she was about 13 or 14 years old. Someone from her first church put together a basic guitar course booklet and many gals from her group joined the class. The main thing my female owner struggled with was figuring out the chords to play in a song and help came in the form of a compilation of songs in a chords book. Hence, her repertoire of songs was restricted to the contents of that chords book and ad-hoc chord sheets that people passed around.

For many reasons, my female owner stopped playing the guitar after a few years.

Fast forward to today. By “no choice” (that’s another story in itself), she picked up the guitar again. Rusty and laden with a sense of responsibility (that since she agreed to help out with being a musician, she better pull up her socks), she agreed to meet the worship coordinator on a Saturday in preparation for her first slot. She never expected that session to morph into a weekly guitar class with other students.

She was amazed at how things, in terms of learning things, have changed over 10 years. The internet now holds the keys to self-improvement. Chords for songs and chord charts are now freely available online. There are even instructional videos teaching you how to play specific songs, in accordance to the original sound tracks. In terms of individualised coaching, the coordinator started at her current skills level and erm…. must have lowered his standards considerably as he modified the strumming patterns and chords while balancing the technical aspects to maintain a decent standard. His patience and example helped my female owner to develop a wider repertoire of techniques and to sandpaper off the rust that had accumulated.

My female owner was encouraged (actually, she was more relieved and shocked) today when he suddenly turned to her to say that she had improved greatly since the last time they played. Well, there’s certainly more room for improvement (which at this point I must say that I am glad she is not in Singapore coz we turtles have suffered a good 3.5 years when she was trying to master the flute!) and the real acid test would be when she plays alone in future. She is NOT looking forward to it.