kawaii!!!

Like I had mentioned before I’m once again in a quest to learn Japanese, but this time its for real, I promise   Anyway I’ve been looking at the different resources and methods to train oneself in Japanese and found a couple of Firefox add-ons that can help you learn Japanese while surfing the net. These are the one’s I thought would be the most helpful but by no means its an exhaustive list. To see more options visit the Mozilla add-ons page.

1. Furigana Injector: “Looks up the readings for kanji words and inserts them as furigana.”
2. Kanji-li: “What the program does is simple. It replaces the first letter of a word with a kanji of similar meaning. For example, the word read might appear as 読ead.” Unfortunately this add-on is only available for older versions of Firefox.
3. FetchImi: “FetchImi is an English to Japanese pop-up translator. Read English web sites with pop-up translations just by moving the cursor over the word you want to lookup. ” This add-on is till “experimental”.
4. Ubiquity: Ubiquity is wonderful “do it all” tool for Firefox. It comes with a translation command that can be very handy.

This add-ons are definitely helpful for intermediate and advanced Japanese students but not so much for beginners like me.

Guitar

For those of you learning guitar (or those who want to pick up a guitar) but don’t have the time or money to pay for lessons, you now have no excuses! (that’s you Ryuujin)

Here is the best FREE site on learning guitar www.justinguitar.com

Justin is the best teacher you can find on the net, especially for beginners. He explains things very detailed with text and lots of videos, so you can see exactly how to do it. His beginners course is divided in “stages” which you don’t go into the “next stage” until you learn everything from the one you’re currently in. That makes sure that you don’t get gaps in your learning. Plus in each stage he teaches you songs which you can apply the knowledge gained. He is currently doing a new beginners course with High Definition videos in which he adds a stage every two weeks; but you can see the old course if you like (though the new one is a lot better). Plus, every lesson has a link to the forum in which you can get your questions answered by experts, or see other users questions (which may be similar to yours) already answered. If you already know everything from the beginners course… Congratulations! You’re already an intermediate player and there’s lots of lessons for intermediate players too. So go check it out!

Now on a personal note:

For beginners:

- If you prefer/want to have a book, I suggest these:

1) All About Guitar: A Fun and Simple Guide to Playing Guitar (click here)

I have this book, it explains really well all the basics and some intermediate things. It uses licks or parts from known songs as examples to explain many things. It has five full known songs in the end and explains in some detail how to learn them. This book gives you a good explanation for reading rhythm from a music staff (music notation), which is a very important skill.

(I still find Justin’s beginners course a lot better!)

- If you want to learn rock:

1) Total Rock Guitar: A Complete Guide to Learning Rock Guitar (click here)

This is not a newbie book, but still for beginners. I have only read the first two chapters (I been so busy studying other books, I’ve forgotten about this one). It seems like a good book, read the reviews on the link above.

If you are already an Intermediate player I recommend the following books (which you can buy on Amazon pretty cheap!):

-If you want to learn soloing:

1) Chord Tone Soloing: A Guitarist’s Guide to Melodic Improvising in Any Style (click here)

2) Guitar Fretboard Workbook (click here)

You should buy these two books together cause they complement each other!!! I can tell you from personal experience that these two books will help you A LOT!!! Chord Tone Soloing teaches you the theory and skills you need to make your solos sound awesome (check the reviews!). While Guitar Fretboard Workbook teaches you music theory, but specifically applied to the guitar (root notes patterns, making scales, making chords from the scales, etc) with lots of exercises; and you will learn all the notes on the fretboard with this book.

- If you want to play fast:

1) Speed Mechanics for Lead Guitar (click here)

Though this is a more advanced book, in the first chapters it teaches you the correct way of practicing if you want to gain speed. You should not use this book, apart from the first few chapters, until you learn theory and soloing (see books above) because, even if you learn the exercises, you wont be able to apply it to other keys without the necessary knowledge. But still, the first chapters teach you how to practice correctly with the purpose of gaining speed.

-If you want to learn more rhythm guitar:

1) Rhythm Guitar: The Complete Guide (click here)

2) Chord Progressions for Guitar: 101 Patterns for All Styles from Folk to Funk! (click here)

I have have first book. It progresses from very basic to very advanced (Very long, I think I’ve only studied about half of it). This is one of the books that I had to buy when I was taking lessons. It does not have a CD, so I recommend it only if you have a teacher that can explain/play the examples for you. I do not have the second book (I’m probably gonna buy it later this month), but I’ve read really good reviews and suggestions of using it as a compliment of the first. While the first is more theory, the second one teaches you how it is all used in different styles. (I’m probably gonna buy it later this month)

You can also check other books, if they have a lot of good reviews they’re probably alright. I’ve only posted here the ones that I have that are good. (I have other books, but they’re not good)

Personal Tips for Practicing:

1) ALWAYS WARM UP BEFORE PLAYING:

- You do not want to get a cramp or lesion in your hand and not be able to play for days or weeks (been there!) You can play random notes slowly, or scales, then chords, (but all slowly!) as a warm-up for about 5 minutes. If the temperature is cold where you live, run warm water on your hands for about a minute before doing the warm-up exercises.

2) DO NOT PRACTICE THINGS SLOPPILY:

- This means that you should not practice things badly and faster that you can really do, or you’ll develop bad habits! The body is learning everything you do, all the time, even if it’s not done correctly. If you practice things badly, you’ll learn things badly. First learn the part very slowly till you can do it correctly, then start using a metronome and gradually build speed. Think about it this way: “If you practice something fast and sloppy for 100 times, why should you expect that the 101 time will suddenly become clean and precise? However, if you practice something a hundred times perfectly, you can be sure that the next time will be perfect as well” -Troy Stetina

3) USE A METRONOME:

-This is the most important tool a guitarist can have in addition to his main weapon and his neighborhood alarm clock. If you don’t know what it is click here. Once you learn the exercise, lick, part of a song, etc; you should set the metronome to a comfortable speed and practice with it. When you feel that you can do the exercise without problems, start speeding things up but slowly; usually you can add five beats per minute first and when it starts getting like a workout add only three at a time. When it starts getting challenging use the following formula:

1. Add 2 beats per minute and practice till you can play the exercise four times in a row perfectly.
2. Reduce 1 beat and practice till you can play four times in a row perfectly.
3. Add 2 beats again and practice till you can play four times in a row perfectly.
4. Reduce 1 beat and practice till you can play four times in a row perfectly.
5. repeat…
6. ????????
7. PROFIT!!!

4) DO NOT OVER-PRACTICE:

- Beginners can probably do between 15-30 minutes before getting tired. Intermediate players can and should practice for at least an hour. But do not over-practice, this can lead to injury or you could have a sore hand the next day and not be able to practice well. If you feel that your hand is getting very tired and you did more time that you were supposed to… STOP!… Let your muscles heal, this is also part of practicing. (WARNING: If you do some movement that your hand actually hurts… STOP!!! You’re probably doing something wrong and could get a lesion. It is normal to get your hands tired but is not normal if they hurt. If they only start to hurt when you have been practicing for more that an hour you’re OVER PRACTICING! See above. If it hurts for days without even practicing, see a doctor.)

For beginners: your fingertips will hurt the first few weeks, this is normal. You will eventually grow calluses and the pain will stop. The warning above is if your hand or the wrist starts to hurt (like the connections inside the hand: tendons, ligaments, etc.)

5) TRY TO PRACTICE EVERYDAY:

-The key to getting good is consistent practice. Playing instruments is like any physical exercise. Think about it this way: If a guy does 30 min. of lifting weights everyday; and his friend does 2 hours but only one day of each week. Who is gonna have bigger muscles by the end of the month? It’s the same for guitar! You gotta practice everyday for a set amount of time according to your skill level (see practice tip 4). Don’t think that practicing one or two days a week for 2 hours will work (unless you want to progress very slowly).

So….. that’s it. I only have two and a half years of experience, but it is more like 1 and a half, cause I didn’t practice a lot at first, and I couldn’t practice for a whole semester when I changed universities, so… 1 and a half years of experience. I consider myself in a low intermediate level so do not expect me to know a lot. But since I was a beginner for a long time, I’ve had plenty of experience on HOW to practice things correctly and incorrectly (been there). SO… if you have any questions, please comment.

Oh, and if you want to play fast, here are the 3 commandments from God Himself.