Some are a lot tougher than ohers

[JiminRussia]

Some songs just fall right into place and I can get them down prettry much after just a couple of hours. Others, I work and work on and they just don't come to me. I can hear the song clearly in my head, I know where the fingering is supposed to be but when I try to play them, my fingers go to places that just don't exist in that song. I sloooooow wayyyyyy downnn, and I get it back after about half an hour or so, but the next time I pick up the mando and try that song, it all goes in the toilet again. And it usually isn't in the same place. At the moment I'm haveing this problem with "Blackbery Blossom", but I have had it happen to me before on other songs. I will eventually get it, but why does it take ten or twele times as long to learn? Do y'all have the same problems sometimes?

[doanepoole]

Sometimes songs are just tougher than others. I wouldn't say that Blackberry Blossom is a particularly easy tune on mando, so don't sweat it.

I'd put the tune away for a while, and come back to it later down the road. Sometimes I just can't seem to work up a tune, and I'll try it a couple months later and it clicks.

[mandodebbie]

I'm just beginning to learn the mando, so I can relate to your problem. I agree with donanpoole. Some songs really are harder than others. Play something else for awhile. There are days when I can pick out "Your Cheatin' Heart" like a pro. (At least, pretty well.) Other days I'm all fingers and thumbs. After a tough day working at the ice cream shop, my mighty brain and my teeny-tiny hands do not always co-ordinate during practice. I will not even attempt "Santa Lucia" . Stress, poor sleep and diet can affect a musician's performance as easily as an athlete's. There should be special vitamins for mando players somewhere out there. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/coffee.gif

[Chris Baird]

I think some songs like blackberry have a very intricate chord structure and the melody moves through those cord changes rapidly. Some songs are just more complicated in structure than others and it is hard for the ear and the mind to "get it". You can take a song with a lot of notes but with an easy i iv v progression and it will come easily, but take a strange chord progression; something you aren't used to hearing, and give it a simple melody and it could prove difficult. I think a lot of it has to do with how well your mind can intuitively put together how the song is built.

[patsites]

I have this problem a lot as well. I typically get so frustrated that I drop the tune all together and move onto something else that comes more easily.

In most cases, a few months later, or even a year later, I come back around to the tune and it just comes together. Just this weekend I learned a break to Deep River Blues from tab at co-mando, it came real easy this time around, but last year at this time I couldn't get it at all.

I think that I just sometimes get ahead of myself learning a tune that is beyond my ability because I really like it.

Another consideration is that if you have learner 4 or 5 tunes in a row all in a particluar key, when you try and learn a song in a different key, it may seem particularly hard. Try to mix and match different keys, or better yet, move a tune that you already know well into a key that gives you problems. You'll probably never ever get to play it with someone else in a weird key, but this is a tremendous learning activity.

If you get stuck for too long on Blackberry, try a little easier tune in G like Leather Britches or Flowers of Edinborough, they may help you unlock Blackberry a little easier.

[twaaang]

Sometimes "what the fingering is supposed to be", according to somebody else, just doesn't work for you. You might want to toy with altering some of the passages to find a way that is more logical or consistent for you (of course hanging onto the basic descending scale which the tune is "about" -- at least that's how I've always understood it -- great, I've tried to lead you away from "according to somebody else", and gave you an "according to me"!).

Listen to your "mistakes", they may be your hands' way of telling you another way to do it. One of my most liberating moments was hearing a "mistake", liking it, and seeing why it worked for me. -- PDW

[jimbob]

it took me more than 10 or 12 times to learn "Twinkle, twinkle Little Star".....
Practice, Practice, Practice....

[Bluebird]

I agree Practice. Don't give up! The hard parts are what you need to strengthen your technical ability. It's those parts you need to work on the hardest. Struggle through. Don't lay it down. If you stop learning that particular song now. It's where you stop technically. It's easy to stay at the same spot thats why we do it! You can even convence yourself it sounds good. GO GO Go!

[John Flynn]

I agree with the patience and practice that has been recommended. The other hint is to find an easier version of the tune to start off on, if you can. Many tunes are published and/or taught in an embellished form, with more notes in them than just the basic melody. I prefer to learn the most basic version first, and then learn the embellishments. A book I have started working on is "Developing Melodic Variations on Fiddle Tunes" by John McGann. It teaches five different versions of each of 11 different standard tunes, each successive version more complicated than the last. The first versions are pretty easy. Like you, I have also had a long time problem with "Blackberry Blossom," but even I can play the basic version in that book. Once I have the basic version nailed, then I have something that will work at a jam and I have the foundation to start learning the more complex versions.

[AmosMoses]

Whiskey Before Breakfast was one of the first songs i (learned?)
3 years later and it's still one of my sloppiest fiddle tunes. I know I'm getting better at it (slowly)

As was mentioned sometimes substituting your own fingering/arrangement for a particular passage may help. Also don't be afraid to mix and match different tabs or notation.

[twaaang]

Another thought along the "substitution" line: when a tune transcript of something like "Blackberry Blossoms" goes relentlessly on-and-on with uninterrupted 8-to-the-bar measures, do yourself a favor and stick in a quarter-note somewhere. It can be amazing how much you can pull yourself back together with just that little bit of respite, plus in all likelihood you'll make the passage somewhat more interesting. -- PDW

[elenbrandt]

Should I wax esoterically philisophical here?

Every song has a certain "zen" to it...sometimes it just takes a while to trip over the thing that makes it accessible....

For example, I had never been able to read James Joyce's "Ulysses" -- for some reason it never clicked in my brain. Then one night/morning, 3:00 a.m. in Dublin, Ireland, while four sheets to the wind on Guiness Stout, I started to read that damned book. It flowed over me like water and made all the sense in the world.

Never assume you are incapable, just assume you have not yet found the right time or mind set to do a certain piece. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif

[Chris Baird]

Ah yes and what shape does one have to be in to read "Finnegan's Wake"? Certainly, every song, book, painting is an expression and if you can't empathize with the expression it is lost to you.

[twaaang]

In a tiny pub on the West Side of heaven, Mr. Joyce is smiling. Yes. -- PDW

[mandodebbie]

Now, if you are three sheets to the wind in Dublin, could you play the song Finnegin's Wake? And sing the 50 or so stanzas of lyrics - on key? Something to think about. http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/rock.gif

[Chris Baird]

Some songs, particularly those which come from county Cork, can't be sung properly without a "drop of the dew".