Originally Posted By: Notes Norton
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A good teacher always learns from his/her students.

I still suck at songwriting, all the lyrics I write sound terrible to me. Probably because I don't really listen to lyrics when I hear music. Until the rest of the song is fully assimilated, the words are just meaningless articulations.

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I agree about teachers learning from their students and I am also terrible with lyrics.

I haven't taught since Covid struck but I hope to get a couple of students in the near future.

One of my students ended up playing with Barbara Streisand. Another won a national songwriting contest.

When I started teaching at a local music store another guitar teacher had the majority of students. He taught by song while I taught the fundamentals, i.e. reading music. When the store closed I had the majority of students as the owner was also old school.

Because each student is different and the lessons were one on one a good teacher has to respond differently to each student. If a student was doing OK I would throw in some fun stuff. Things like taking a song they liked, arranging it to their level, and breaking away from the regular method books to teach them. That would include things that would come later in the method book; things like 1/6th notes and syncopation. I found it was easier to teach the fundamentals when they were playing something that they liked. I always kept on track with the method books: It would be half the lesson from the book and half from the song. This worked the best for me.

That also is where BiaB comes into play. I made backing tracks for the songs, both in the method book and the fun stuff. The fun stuff would be at a few tempos so the student could start slow. I also made backing tracks for jams when they were advanced enough to learn some scales.

I got banned from Weight Watchers for dropping a bag of M&Ms on the floor.
It was the best game of Hungry Hippos I've ever seen!


64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware