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Charlize Porter
Past Notes
March 13th, 2020
We started by reviewing all the chords we've been learning, and she's made definite and obvious improvement. Keep going!
We then added Red Bone, Come and Get Your Love
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bc0KhhjJP98&ab_channel=RedboneVEVO
I wrote out the intro of the song with notes, and tab. Charlize played through it a few times before we went on to the chords.
The chords are Em, A, D, and Bminor. Bm is new to Charlize so I put it in her book.
She was pretty chatty, and I had a hard time getting her to focus.
By the end, we had the intro done, and she only makes a mistake on the last two notes. We didn't do too much on the chorded parts.
March 6th, 2020
We reviewed the chords she was having trouble with last week, and she did well to remember them.
However, she didn't remember the other chords, D, Am Em, C, and F.
I'd asked her to put a list of songs together that she' like to learn, but she didn't remember to do that, so I picked a song that she loved by Katie Perry Called This is How We Do.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGi2Zg2DK0Q&ab_channel=TaylorSwiftOfficialArtistChannel
Unfortunately, it only has chords intermittently in the song, and mostly is drums. So I wrote them out for her and we went through them, but it's not enough to do as a song to practice.
She said she liked Billie Eilish, so I randomly picked Billie Eilish, No Time to Die:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB_S2qFh5lU&ab_channel=BillieEilishVEVO
It's in E minor, which makes it easy to learn, but we spent all of the lesson just reviewing the chords. If she could spend some more time learning the chords, that'd be great. We didn't really get a chance to go through the song at all before we ran out of time.
February 28th, 2020
It's been a while since Charlize was here, between sick days and teacher strikes, so she had forgotten a lot of stuff... we tried to play through the simplified Photograph song, but she didn't remember any of the chords (E, A, B7) in that song.
She said she hadn't been practicing it, since mom made her practice Circles only, so we reviewed that song, and it wasn't too bad, though maybe she had slipped somewhat in her accuracy of the chords since last time.
After that we then went over the chords she has learned so far, and she couldn't remember any of them except C from Circles - though she didn't remember it's name.
We reviewed D, Am, Em, B7, E, A, G, C, and F.
She said her dad doesn't let her practice the stuff I'm teaching her, but only makes her learn scales - I'm assuming this is a bit of a tall tale, but if not, please encourage her to learn chords as well as scales. I usually think of scales as something to learn later in the process of learning guitar, but if dad would rather I focus on that at the start, please let me know.
Thanks!! :)
February 14th, 2020
CHarlize did well today - she nailed Circles, and had the C and F down... I even saw her using her pinky in the C and sometimes in the F, which is great.
We spent a bit too much time trying to find a song that was easy enough for her - a lot of her faves were in harder keys for guitar... especially without a capo. If she has a capo, send it along next time.
We added a simplified version of Ed Sheeran' Photograph, in E, and without a C#minor. Also, used a B7 instead of a Bsus.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgmXPCX4VzU&ab_channel=DopeLyrics
See you next time!
January 24th, 2020
Charlize is hope sick today.
January 17th, 2020
Today we added Post Malone, Circles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sca9FP6zl8&ab_channel=PopularMusic
It has two chords, C and C Major 7.
Keep working on the other chords, get them down to 2 seconds to switch.
January 10th, 2020
Today Charlize brought in a guitar, and knew G already - we covered the names of the parts of the guitar, and she knew those already.
We then added E minor, D, and then A minor.
We did three strum patterns, 1, all down, 2 down down down up down, and 3 down, down up, down, down up.
Great job!
December 20th, 2019
Charlize didn't come very prepared this week - she said she forgot to practice. I told her I'd like her to commit to practicing over the holidays, so that she's got this song down smoothly.
She had lots of excuses about going to grandmas, or Liam studying downstairs. I like Charlize, and I would love to keep teaching her. Please help her to make the time to go over the songs everyday so she can memorize the melody, and feel more comfortable with challenging parts.
December 13th, 2019
Charlize did really well on Jingle Bells today! She played it through with both hands, and made very few mistakes.
We added "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" today, but spent most of the lesson on working out the melody. I noticed that she struggled a little bit with reading a b or a d (confusing the lowercase letters).
We added the chords after working on the melody, and she played through them for me while I played the melody. She is doing that quite well.
Her homework to practice this week is putting both hands together, and getting it as smooth as she has Jingle Bells.
December 6th, 2019
Charlize did a great job today, she had the Billie Eilish song Eyes down very smoothly - we even played it with the recording, and she got out of sync a few times, but over all it was a big improvement.
We added a Christmas Song, "Jingle Bells" and went through it a number of times. She's so funny, she loves to "It's So HAARD," and I just keep going, and count her in - she wants to distract me and slow the process down, but if I don't let her, and keep pushing her, so really picks things up well. She just has to stop saying it's too hard, and keep at it! :)
She's a very nice girl.
November 22nd, 2019
Charlize said she didn't get a lot of practice in because her brother gets mad when she's playing and he's on video games. LOL! (Sounds like an excuse to me - I have four kids, and have heard it all before).
I made the lesson a practice time - I made her do the left hand, 8 bars, 20 times, and then the right hand with it for most of the rest of the time. She said her hand was hurting, but I made her push through (I hope you're okay with that). She tried to distract me with stories, but I kept her on task.
In the last few minutes we talked about a Christmas performance - which she said she didn't want to. She said she gets too nervous in front of people. I understand that, but it can be a good way to grow as a musician, because of the pressure of not embarrassing oneself.
Please let me know if there's anything you think I can do to encourage her to practice and work hard on her music.
November 15th, 2019
Charlize said she hadn't really practiced this week... we went over Happy Birthday again, a bit like learning it fresh - she had the melody nearly memorized, but not the left hand, and she struggled with putting both hands together.
After that we went through the Ocean Eyes song, and I had her re-learn it with both hands - I think she had forgotten much of what we learned last week, but that can be normal when a lot is going on.
We didn't talk about a Christmas performance for the school (I forgot to bring it up,) so please ask her if she'd like to do a Christmas song in front of the school, and get back to me.
Thanks!
November 8th, 2019
Charlize has really picked up the speed for Dark Horse! Great job!! We went through it a couple of times and decided to move on to keep it fresh.
We then played happy birthday a few times - the second line especially needed work, so we focused on that a while. We did the melody alone until she had it down well, and then added left hand. She's really doing quite well on it, though it should still be practiced this week. We'll play it again next Friday.
Finally we took the lats few minutes to add a Billie Eilish song, Ocean Eyes. It's quite easy, and we ran out of time before we had a chance to really perfect it.
I received $30, thanks.
October 25th, 2019
Charlize said she was just practicing the intro and hadn't been practicing the verse at all, so I had her play through the 2 bar phrase of the verse 20 times, and then we tried going through the intro again, and she said that now her fingers were "messed up," and couldn't play the intro anymore.
I had her keep trying, and had to keep pressuring her to not stop, but keep focused on it.
We tried doing it with the recording at 80% , but she couldn't keep up, so we slowed it back down to 70%
We went through Happy Birthday at the end of the lesson for Liam, but I want her to practice Dark Horse more - she should be able to play it faster, at least 80% of the original recording's speed.
October 18th, 2019
Charlize and i started by playing through Dark Horse. She's coming along, she said she practices every day, but likes to practice other songs from the past, and maybe isn't spending as much time as I'd like her to working on this song.
It hurts her hand to do it, and part of the reason is that she's letting her fingers fly around. She should really work on holding her hand in a rounded shape, as if there's an orange under her fingers.
We spent most of the lesson going over that, and trying to figure out a strategy to help her practice more regularly.
October 11th, 2019
I missed Charlize this week, the class said she was away today.
October 4th, 2019
Charlize forgot her book this week, so we couldn't continue work on her song.
Instead, we learned about inversions, and practiced the inversions of C.
After that we learned the proper fingering for playing a C scale so that you don't "run out of fingers" We did it with the left hand after the right hand, and then with both hands in opposite directions.
If she's feeling courageous, she should practice this with both hands in the SAME direction.
Please bring the book next time so we can work on Dark Horse again.
September 20th, 2019
Today we learned Katy Perry, Dark Horse - I wrote out the chords and the right hand for her.
Katy Perry, Dark Horse
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQAKD__j4gM
We transposed it down half a step to make it easier to play.
Charlize should try to remember to keep her eyes on her music as much as possible and try to memorize where her hands go (rather than memorize the notes and watch her hands). There will come a time when memorizing the notes is way harder, and more 'random' than the hands, and the notes under the hands never change.
Work on this song every day, for at least 10 minutes each day.
September 13th, 2019
Charlize did a great job for me today! She started by playing a song she did for recital last year, and then we reviewed some basics like note names. She said she has a hard time remembering B and A so I gave her a ittlle story to help her remember.
We then talked about flats and sharps, and how to remember which way they go (sharp poking someone makes them jump up, flat makes people lower).
We then talked about minor and major chords (there are three of each in every key). We learned C, F, and G, and Dminor, Eminor, and Aminor.
We wrote a little song and practicced it together, with me on the guitar.
She should trransfer everything on the paper to her book, and remember to bring it next time.
Practice the B and A notes and the chords we learned.
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