What else do you/did you play?

[Breakinyx]

AUTO-ADMIN: Non-MP3, WAV, OGG, SoundCloud, YouTube, Vimeo, Twitter and Facebook links in this post have been protected automatically. Once the member reaches 5 posts the links will function as normal.

Personally, I love the flexibility that online music lessons offer. No more wrestling with rush hour traffic to squeeze in a clarinet session after work. With online music lessons (https://www.artmaster.com), you can learn from fantastic teachers around the world in your pajamas if you want! Plus, the ability to rewind and replay trickier sections is a game-changer for us less-than-virtuoso musicians.

However, there's something irreplaceable about the in-person experience. The energy you get from bouncing ideas off a live instructor, the camaraderie of fellow musicians in a group class – those are things you can't quite replicate online. Maybe the ideal scenario is a hybrid approach – a mix of online lessons for the convenience and in-person sessions for that special something.

[Magic Russ]

My Advice.

Don't waste your time with courseware like Yousician or Melodics. What you get is an endless series of drills that have limited real life use.

I think I got some intro lessons for how to become a pad drummer included with my PreSonus Atom. I didn't follow through but those looked helpful.

Instead follow this gal.
https://www.youtube.com/@pianoly

Get primary chords under your belt. Learn progressions, arpeggios and patterns mostly reading chord charts.
Stick to primary root position chords at first till you can play progressions with ease.
Then fake songs you already know using Chord Charts. It doesn't have to be perfect as recorded but you should try to get through the entire song(part by part easily.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG6qnkhMWWg&t=702s

Skip to 702s mark if not automatic

Only after getting a solid footing move on to 1st and second inversions. Playing a musical instrument should have an easy fun side and a serious side. They work together. The better you get the more fun it becomes.

There are a couple of similar courses on Udemy. I can't say whose are better but I agree with the approach of learning common chords and progressions over the etudes in the books I had when I was going to lessons.

[tapper mike]

I think I'm a hypocrite.

I very much tell people starting out if they really want to be good stay in their lane. And there is great truth to this. If you are constantly bouncing between different styles you'll only get fair at one or two. However if you listen to musicians who are in it for the long haul either the music finds them or they find the music and they stay the course. Usually there is about ten years of experimenting cross genre's and by the end of that they have a locked in sense of self on the instrument. Something that is intrinsic to their personality.

Me I'm always trying to switch things up. As an example I really want to get into classical type film scoring. Just got EWHO opus edition and Cubase to explore it to the fullest. If you happen to watch any of the YT guys like this one
https://www.youtube.com/@RyanLeach

Or
https://www.youtube.com/@composingacademy8270

They aren't playing the keys most of the time. Instead they enter by standard notation or piano roll. It saves a lot of time. The score not your performance is the goal. If you spend too much of your energies trying to master a specific phrase it takes away from the time you have to score. All this time leads to loss of interest.

And yet I'm still practicing my brain out at nearly everything I can get my hands on simply because I want to be the best linnstrumentalist I can. So my usual routine is working out three or four octave scales and arpeggios in all 12 keys. As well I have a mock ups of common chord progressions in band in a box where I'll work out common piano patterns against chord progressions. All dedicated to make me as comfortable on the LS as I am on the guitar. Not all best suited for scoring.

I practice some classical too but nothing before 1900. I also practice sight reading via YT etudes. All of that to ready myself for technique for something which really isn't about physical technique. Yes I'm enjoying it most days and if I take more than two days off I struggle.

I may actually suck when it comes to a finished score. But I'd rather have a crappy finished score than none at all.

Wish me luck

[Bombadil]

It's the journey. Have fun, and don't let your inner perfectionist whisper in your ear too much.
I've thought of giving writing by notation a go, myself.
I know my brain works differently with a keyboard than a guitar. I can come up with melodies much easier on a keyboard.

[tapper mike]

It's the journey. Have fun, and don't let your inner perfectionist whisper in your ear too much.
I've thought of giving writing by notation a go, myself.
I know my brain works differently with a keyboard than a guitar. I can come up with melodies much easier on a keyboard.

My notation reading skills were good at best in my 20's atrophy has set in. I tried one of those youcisian type courses for learning basic piano through notation. Got really frustrated as all it would do is shove Brother John and On top of old Smokey down my throat.

It drives me even more nuts these days as I try to advance my reading skills. I only have a very small amount of time to actively do anything learning time and it's not dispersed properly through out the week. I'll hear/see something I want to try and then I'm either using keyboard or guitar view to follow along. The linnstrument is neither and trying to setup the score properly in Guitar Pro is also very very time consuming. I'd rather just jump from score to fingers.

The classical composers I see online usually just record live into notation software.
Like this one
https://www.youtube.com/@RyanLeach

[maganez]

I know my brain works differently with a keyboard than a guitar. I can come up with melodies much easier on a keyboard.

that's so true.

Even with my limited keyboard skills I often come up with very different melodies than with my guitar... probably because I haven't learnt pentatonic scales on the keyboard