Wim VD1

This one is based on a Tommy Emmanual Travis picking lesson on TrueFire. I brought back in a bit of The Animals for the intro and tried to make my guitar sound like a mandolin in the end . It"s the first recording with my new Fender Paramount PM-2 Parlor Mahogany. It"s a nice small short scale fingerpicker with the neck joint at the 12th fret. Great guitar for fingerstyle blues. Wim.

Henk @Oldjock won the May Recording Challenge and could pick the subject for this month. He suggested to keep the format of Open Mic the same for June. So any song which you know or are practicing can be submitted. Looking forward to your renditions, Wim. 1. Wim playing "House of the rising sun": 2. @Nairon playing "Morning has broken":

For this month's challenge, I went through the Travis Picking Bootcamp lessons that Steve did some months back and learned the old tune "Freight Train". I am posting this quite late in the month, because it took me longer than expected to get it under my fingers and play it at a decent speed . Wim.

Well played, @Strings. You have a nice flow in your fingerpicking. Wim.

Strings, Let me invite you to the monthly recording challenge, where you can share your recordings with us 👍. I agree, beyond session 10 you will tackle the "intermediate+" materials and these lessons will take a bit longer. But it is also a real joy to discover all the styles and techniques explained there. Wim.

@Nairon Well played! The notes ring out loud and clean, and your timing is really good. Congrats on your progress. You're doing great. Wim.

@Oldjock Henk, thank you for your submission and for helping us keep the monthly challenge alive! Nice melody playing on this beatiful classic song. So you fell into the Reaper rabbit hole... I assume you are familiar with Keny Gioia's instructional videos by now 😀 Wim.

This month's challenge topic is chosen by myself and is "Open Mic". So you can record any song you like and post it here. The winner of the month is chosen by the "Random Picker" and gets to choose the next topic. Wim. 1. @Oldjock playing "Yesterday" 2. @Nairon playing "Für Elise": 3. @Strings playing a fingerstyle exercise from Session 10: 4. @Wim VD1 playing "Freight Train":

@arju, I appreciate everything already written here and can only share some of my own experiences. I am a married father of 2 teenagers and work full-time. My L&M journey started after I decided to stop training for marathons (and running them). For many years, I was used to fit my training sessions into my daily/weekly professional and family schedule, which required quite a bit of flexibility and discipline (spending less time watching TV was a good starting point 😀) When I started the L&M course, I replaced most of my running activities with guitar practice, still having to fit these into a busy life schedule. The L&M course took me 2.5 years to complete from start to finish. I realised early on that I wanted to learn more songs so I did the L&M Songbook in parallel. I also used additional materials on some other course topics, such as Jazz and Soloing. I don't recall everything in detail, but I remember that after 12 months, I had finished 12 sessions. The final 8 sessions took longer, about 1.5 years. Counting in hours of practice probably gives a better insight into what it took. In those years, I must have been practicing guitar about 7 to 10 hours per week. So in total, it must have taken anything between 1000 and 1200 hours of practice to complete the L&M course Hope this helps. Wim.

Elexir 80/20 Bronze Polyweb 11-52. I change them every 2 to 3 months.

@Nairon As Henk said, this is a great start recording with a DAW. Both chords and melody were played and recorded very well. I am sure you will learn a lot if you continue to record more songs. Wim.

Thanks Greg. I had this song on my "to learn" list for quite a while. This monthly challenge triggered me to finally put in the work. Wim.

Thanks, Randy!

Thanks Bryan, I didn't know "The Body Acoustic" album and I am listening to it right now. Sounds great. Wim

I was a teenager in the Eighties, when Cyndi Lauper scored a hit with this pop song which is pure nostalgia to me. It was originally played on keyboards. Eva Cassidy recorded a great guitar version. This is my short rendition. Chords and melody were played fingerstyle and recorded on separate tracks. Wim.

April's challenge comes from @Nairon, who won the March edition. The topic is "Nostalgia: Hits from a simpler time". As usual, the "winner" is selected randomly and the prize is that he or she gets to choose the topic for the next challenge. So let's grab our guitars and make some music. Wim. Wim playing True Colors: @Nairon playing "All I Have To Do Is Dream":

@Nairon, can you check the message I sent you please. Wim.

@MGood1 Marty, thanks for your great rendition of this beautiful Willie Nelson song! I really enjoyed your singing and playing. Wim.

Hello @MGood1, Unfortunately, I cannot open your file to listen to your song. The link you posted is not working. Could you post a Youtube, Soundcloud or DropBox link please. Wim.

@Nairon I'm with Neil and Doug. I think you did very well on this Waltz and your timing is indeed really good. Hope to hear more from you in the future. Wim.

Hey Hey, 3 Chord song challenge? Well, that calls for a blues in E if you ask me 😀 This is my laid back version of the Big Bill Broonzy song that was made famous by Eric Clapton. Wim.

It's a true joy to watch this video, @NeilES335. Wim.

That's a nice piece of work, Doug! Thanks for sharing. Wim.

Nice rendition, Neil. Moon river was also for me one of the first songs recorded. Wim.

Hi Neil, I have difficulties to play your song on both my iPad and iPhone. Could you post a SoundCloud link? Wim.