Last night I went home and practiced Simple Man with a metronome. First I tried to figure out the beat so I could set the metronome and then tried playing the arpeggiation. I tried it first by just playing the C pattern (and Am pattern) without fretting the chord, over and over again. Sometimes I’d get one or two in and flub it, others I’d get quite a bit in before messing it up. I switched to the G pattern as well. Then tried the C pattern to G pattern to Am pattern twice then C pattern, over and over. That was a bit harder. I will need to try and get that Am7 chord down though.
At the store, we went through all songs and did pretty well. I did a lot better with Simple Man, about 50% playing the proper pattern for the first three and making it up for the fourth as long as I hit that G on the e string at the right time. 🙂
C ------------------------- -------------1----------- ------0--------0---0----- --------2--------2------- ----3-----3-------------- ------------------------- G ------------------------- ------------------------- -------------0----------- ------0--------0---0----- --------2--------2------- ----3-----3-------------- Am ------------------------- -------------1----------- ------2--------2---2----- --------2--------2------- ----0-----0-------------- ------------------------- Am7 -------------3----------- ------1--------1--------- --------2---------------- ----------2-------------- ----0------------0-2----- -------------------------
Tuesday night I was basically just hitting the first three or four notes of the C and G chords and totally off by a string on the Am. Last night I was hitting all 8 notes on C and G most of the time and the Am some of the time. I basically played the first four of the Am7 and then G *ping* before starting over. If I tried to play all 8 notes, I’d flub the C and maybe the G chords.
Since I’m not hitting anything on the B or e strings for the G chord, I’m just leaving my index finger on the C as an anchor and moving my 2nd and 3rd fingers up one string, then down to Am, then moving my 3rd finger up to C. So CEG to CBG to CEA. Just need to work on that last arpeggiation.