Unit 7 - Specialist Study Preperation
Target Schedule - https://prezi.com/p/vfbprgyvxi4e/
Chosen Instrument - Electric Guitar
Skills Audit
1. Which technical skills can you currently perform confidently?
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Natural and pinch harmonics.
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Minor pentatonic scales.
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Major and Minor arpeggios.
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Minor blues scales.
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Hammer ons and pull offs.
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Bends, slides and vibrato.
2. Grade yourself on the following areas - 1 being not confident and 5 being very confident.
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Technical ability - 4
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Musical ability - 4
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Stage presence - 3
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Confidence - 3
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Challenging yourself - 4
3. What are you good at?
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I'm very good at learning songs by ear.
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Keeping in time.
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Learning chords and song structures.
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Playing along with others or a backing track.
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Making interesting strumming styles.
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Improvising over a chord progression.
4. Make a list of things you would like to improve.
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Improvisation - learning different positions of the same scale on the fret board and different scale shapes.
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Dexterity/speed with solos.
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Chromatic runs.
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Bends - getting used to bending more than half of a tone or a tone, especially higher up on the fret board.
Chosen Pieces - Umbrella by Rihanna and Are You Gonna Go My Way by Lenny Kravitz
11/03/19
Targets:
1. Use bends instead of hammer ons/pull offs - read the notation wrong as it's supposed to be tone bends instead of just using a hammer on or pull off.
2. Check the chords for the chorus to make sure I'm playing the same as what's written in the book.
Targets:
1. Practise the little riffs in the chorus to make sure that I can play them easily and they sound more clear.
2. Check the strumming for the B section/chords so that it matches the one used on the Rockschool audio track.
18/03/19
Targets:
1. Now that I have the notation correct, I need to practise the verse sections to make sure that the bends are all in the right pitch and there are no (or very few) bends that are off pitch (especially the bend at 0:25).
2. Practise the bends after the chord change (0:15 to 0:20) so they sound as clean as the ones at the start.
Targets:
1. Keep practising the f section so it sounds smoother.
2. Try going into the e section from the d section to make sure that the transition into it is smooth and I don't get thrown off by it.
25/03/19
Targets:
1. Try going up to 84 bpm and then full speed (87) from the tempo used in the video (80 bpm).
2. Practise the transition from the d section to the e section so I can go from that through to the end of the piece.
Technical Exercises
01/04/19
Targets:
1. Practise the tone and a half bends so I get the pitch right the first time instead of having to go back over it (around 0:16 is where this went wrong).
2. Go through bars 38 and 39 (0:06 to 0:10) to make sure the slide and the acciaccatura are clear and that I'm not missing any notes out.
08/04/19
Targets:
1. Go through the E section again - there were a few botched notes and the beginning of the sweep picking section, one of the other strings was accidentally hit which made it sound messy (1:44 - 2:04).
2. Keep practising the palm muted riff used in the chorus so that I don't accidentally play the same note twice or miss notes out.
Targets:
1. Keep practising the verse sections so the bends sound better pitch-wise (especially the intro).
2. Practise the transition from the solo back into the verse (2:54 - 2:57) so I don't mess up the first bend.
3. Go through the stab section before the solo (2:05) so that all of the repeats sound strong/I don't accidentally mess up one of the stabs.
15/04/19
Targets:
1. Practise the speed for the sweep picking section with a metronome to make sure it's all in time.
2. Make sure that I hit the first part of the E section correctly when I first run through the song - I'm still struggling slightly with it but it sounds a lot better than it did when I first learned it.
Targets:
1. Go through the end of the solo to make sure that it's in time and you can hear the notes clearly.
2. Keep practising the chord change in the verses so that the bends are correct in terms of pitch.
16/04/19 - Final Performance
Theory Test
