Thanks for the encouragement Devin but I still have a long way to go. My picking isn't yet clean and precise enough although it is slowly improving. I use a Prodipe GL21 Lanen guitar mic attached to the soundhole and plugged into a Roland AC33 amp with just a little reverb but no other ambience effects. This mic reproduces the acoustic sound really well I think, even at higher volumes (the neighbours haven't complained yet...)

Just stumbled upon the forum and this thread and, incidentally, found a vid I recorded by chance just over a week ago. It's just a quick attempt at Wildwood Flower, CGO-style. Here's the link:

I don't usually record myself playing, but I really wish I'd recorded all my hours and hours of crappy attempts (and driving my girlfriend crazy) for a comparison because hearing this back, it doesn't sound all that bad — though I definitely need to work on phrasing and making sure every note is clear and properly sustained. That's my goal for the next few months — improving clarity and phrasing (and speed, of course...).

goandrius you sure have achieved a respectable level of Wildwood Flower ( with the CGO style ).   That was very good.   Keep 'em coming.  It's motivation for many of us "wannabees" that dream of someday reaching the "CGO style" summit.

I have older recordings of some of my attempts at "CGO style" and while it seems I make progress, it is like "picking the white off the rice" to get to the next plateau.   I keep telling myself "never give up".

Looking forward to your future updates on your progress.

Yeah, that's how I feel as well and how I felt almost exclusively for the first 7 or so years of my guitar-playing life. It's only in the last 2 or 3 years that I've been able to listen back to recordings without cringing at bum notes and expressionless playing, but I've also put in many more hours of practice than probably ever before by keeping to a pretty regular schedule of an hour or two every few days during the week and often more than that during the weekends. Still, one plateau always leads to another — I've recently joined a bluegrass trio and I want to be able to improvise lead stuff but it's my first band and seamlessly switching from rhythm to lead is giving me quite a lot of trouble. I think this feeling of plateau after plateau is almost a rite of passage for every hobbyist guitar player. What helps me the most is focusing on my next goal, whether it's memorizing a certain song, achieving a certain target speed, or learning some aspect of music theory — that's what helps me to never give up (most of the time).

Nice one Andrius! That sounds great. The intermediate version isn't easy...you played that nice line over the F chord perfectly and I think that's one of the trickiest parts. I'll stumble on that section sometimes...and the chromatic bass walk up the 6th and 5th strings is always tough. Really nice job. I'd love to hear more of your stuff too, and let us know if you upload any videos of your new trio. Thanks for posting -

Very nice Andrius! Sounds really good. What guitar is that by the way? It has an interestingly bright sound. I think you banged the nail on the head when you mentioned the many hours practice required to attain a decent level of competence with your picking. I am not practicing enough, I never did. In the evenings I’m tired after driving an hour back from work and cooking, ironing etc, and then during the weekend, well, it’s the weekend! Visiting friends and family, house chores, diy, gardening, writing a book, you name it! There’s always an excuse not to practice enough! Grrrrr!

Thanks for the positive feedback guys, it honestly made my day — and made me want to practice even more... That take came after warming up for a good hour or so, I definitely can't play it that well at that speed 100% of the time, probably not even 50% of the time. Still, I hope that after a few more months of working on my crosspicking, I'll be able to play with that kind of speed and accuracy consistently and maybe with a little more clarity. Goals, goals, goals...

The guitar is a Taylor 214ce (solid Sitka spruce top and layered koa back and sides) and I honestly love it. I bought it about 8 months ago and it's my first half-decent guitar, so that may be part of the reason why I'm so enamoured with it. That vid was recorded with a laptop mic, so I think that's exaggerating the already fairly bright tone. Plus, the strings are 80/20 bronze for that old-school feel and I generally prefer them lighter because I also quite like fingerpicking. Here's a quick recording I made using my phone of one of the Worried Blues melodies, which I think sounds more like what the guitar sounds like in real life: https://clyp.it/wqmchquu?token=6e8a8ea0fd84b714b80cb62b2893268c

Hi Andriushi andrius, I am sure you’ll get there with perseverance and determination. Very few musicians manage to play perfect pieces every single time they perform. To their ears, there is always room to improve no matter how good the audience thinks the music is. That guitar of yours sounds pretty sweet, I have never owned a Taylor but they’re obviouly worth their buck judging by the reviews, I was expecting to find another 6 videos of yours by now, so what are you waiting for...? Good stuuff,

And apologies fir the bead spelling above, I am having issues with the ipad so I can’t see half of the screen and what I am typing,..!

No worries re. the spelling! I'm working on East Tennessee Blues right now (what an awesome tune) but I want the performance to be a little better than Wildwood Flower, so I might give it another week or so of extra practice before releasing my attempt out into the wild...

Alright, here's that East Tennessee Blues attempt:

It's not quite a perfect try in terms of missed notes and definitely not perfect in terms of timing and note length (it gets a little choppy in places), but I'm trying to play it fairly cleanly and confidently at around 200 BPM. And it doesn't look like it, but my concentration here is pretty much at maximum levels, so it would be nice to play this at this speed while being much more relaxed. 😀

Nice! You've got that one down. It's a tough one at 200 BPM and your pick strokes are nice and clean. Really great job. I still think my favorite part of that arrangement is the bluesy bend on the B string. I always try to work that in over the F chord when I'm jamming in C. Fun stuff. Keep the videos coming! It's nice seeing your progress each time...picking is getting cleaner and faster.

Wahey, thanks for taking the time to reply again! Yeah, I feel like I've made some nice progress since the last video, so I guess I'll see if I can keep it going. I also love the bends in this arrangement — the D# to E bend with the middle finger is deceptively difficult at that speed. I pretty much missed it in the video because I wasn't reinforcing it with my index finger, which was rushing to the first fret. But now that I've spotted why I'm missing it, I'll try to clean it up...

That’s superb Andrius. Really nice, confident picking. Well done indeed. And yes, the bluesy end sounds awesome. I have started ‘whisky before breakfast’ but I’m nowhere near ready to post it. I’m really glad that a few of us are now posting videos and enjoying it. The ice is indeed broken!

Haven't had much time to practice this week... But that's only because I just got myself a banjo and have spent my free evenings on that! I'm from Lithuania and there aren't really any music shops that sell them, so I had to order online and get it delivered. Got myself a Deering Goodtime 2. And I just learn my first tune, as well — Cripple Creek: