I've started to learn to fingerpick melodies on the guitar using the Homespun Video DVD Easy Steps to Guitar Fingerpicking by Happy Traum. I already know how to play alternate bass notes and have the basics of Travis Picking, so it's handy to have those skills already, but my playing is still pretty methodical. My current goal is to "have the music flow with variations that sound pleasing to the ear. I'm working on the first song on the DVD, which is "Skip to My Lou." (You can hear Pete Seeger sing and play the song on the banjo here.) It's only two chords, and I'm reminded of how I felt when I first started out. I needed to take lots of breaks to let my brain and fingers absorb the new information. I got tired of the song. Every time I returned to the song, I found that I had remembered a little bit more than I had before.
I think I'll have "Skip to My Lou" underway by the end of next week. After that, "Spike Driver's Blues" is next (link is to a YouTube video with a Mississippi John Hurt recording).
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