Where Do I Go From Here?

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We have covered a lot of ground together in this book. In fact, there is enough information laid out here to keep you busy for a couple of years but the question I am always asked by my banjo and guitar students is, "Where do I go from here? What do I learn next?"

The answer to that question really depends on you. Some folks learn a couple of chords and leave it at that. That's cool. After all, Woody Guthrie wasn't exactly a technically brilliant guitar player but he went on to change the world with his songs.

Some folks go on to develop amazing techniques, and that's cool too as long as you don't get so wrapped up in technical perfection that you stop having fun.

There is a story about a martial arts student who went to his sensei saying, "I am devoted to mastering this style of karate. How long will it take me to master it?" The sensei replied casually, "Ten years." The student said impatiently, "But I want to master it faster than that. If I work day and night and focus only on becoming a master, how long will it take then?" The sensei smiled and said, "Twenty years. Right now you are in too much of a hurry for me to teach you anything so it may take longer than that."

It's going to take you a while to work through everything in this book, but it's going to take even longer if you don't get out and have some adventures. Don't get too wrapped up in how many hours a day you practice or how fast you are progressing. Just take some time to go out on the front porch to sing some songs. Go to jam sessions and festivals. Have some fun making music with other people.

When you go to your first jam you're going to feel like the most useless person who ever lived. Everybody goes through that. It's one thing to play a song at home alone, but it's another thing entirely to play in time with a group of people. Everything is going to be going by so fast that it will seem impossible to join in, but if you keep going and relax you'll start rolling with the music and after a while you will be wondering how you ever thought it was hard.

When you go on to The How and the Tao of Folk Guitar Volume Two: Getting Good you will learn more about bass runs in country, blues and rock music as well as a lot of cool stuff like playing Reggae rhythms, advanced fingerstyle and flatpick techniques and a lot more about scales and music theory. Everything in Volume Two will be built on the core skills that you have picked up here.

Volume Two is going to cover a lot of neat stuff, but don't be in too much of a rush to move on to advanced guitar techniques. Take some time to enjoy and really learn how to use the skills presented here. Trust me, you don't have to be an expert musician or have a ton of music theory knowledge or fancy guitar gear to go out and have some fun making music. I think a big part of developing as a musician and as a person involves learning about what you don't need. For example, when I first went into business I spent a lot of money on fancy computers, software and other high-tech equipment only to find that the best tool I had was between my ears. None of the stuff I bought really did the business a lot of good because it turned out that all I needed was a word processor. It's hard to learn things that way, but I can't complain because it's been a great ride up to this point. As you progress and grow into a guitar player you will find that the simple answers we tend to brush off are usually the answers we come back to later on in our journey.

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