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The ranking concept is great, But I think it might be pertinent to also say this is a guide. For example you rate Classical Gas very high yet I find very little difficulty with it but some of the lower ranked songs hmmm I don't find so straight forward. By saying it is a guide some members might just be tempted to try something a little more adventurous and move out from their comfort zone.

Still I guess its difficult to keep everyone happy, and you do need a starting point

Hey Neil will you be addind the new songs to this topic as its really working for me to work on songs in this order. I'm getting to do some finger picking some ryhthm playing and I'm always getting a bit better with each song.

Cheers...Rod.

Any chance this could be updated with the new songs.

I am the complete opposite. I learned to fingerpick many years ago and songs like Landslide would probably be a 2 for me. Strumming songs with bar chords would probably be in the 5-7 range like Harvest Moon or Ventura Highway ( I would love to learn to play them).

Hi

Another beginner song that Neil covers in his beginner lessons #5 is "Brown Eyed Girl".
He also covers the leads and licks in a Target short lesson.
I have noticed it's not on the song order difficulty list and it's a great beginner song to learn.
I know I missed it as a beginner song and only just found it although I have been a member of Target for 3 Months.
If Neil is going to update the list it's a must to be added.

Chacho

musicdoc522 wrote:

I am the complete opposite. I learned to fingerpick many years ago and songs like Landslide would probably be a 2 for me. Strumming songs with bar chords would probably be in the 5-7 range like Harvest Moon or Ventura Highway ( I would love to learn to play them).

Same here. Blackbird - Stairway to Heaven - Landslide - and Iron and Wine's cover of Such Great Heights all got me into finger picking before anything else.

So I am much better at finger picking - but I suck at using an actual pick (over my thumb) for strumming. With a real pick, I tend to completely miss the strings sometimes. :woohoo:

Hi Chacho, Brown eyed girl (and quite a few other ones)was recently added to target but the list of song order /difficulty have not been updated for a while. Neil or Matt said they would, in near future.

Marc

Just a quick thought - would it not be nice to add an option to sort the song lessons based on difficulty? Thanks

This is the first that I saw the difficulty ratings. It would help if there was an average amount of time it takes to learn each rating. I have been working on Dust in the Wind for about 3 weeks now and just got to the chorus where there are new chords. I would like to know if I am going to be able to play this soon, or just go back to basics?

karatejohn wrote:

This is the first that I saw the difficulty ratings. It would help if there was an average amount of time it takes to learn each rating. I have been working on Dust in the Wind for about 3 weeks now and just got to the chorus where there are new chords. I would like to know if I am going to be able to play this soon, or just go back to basics?

Hey John- Welcome to the forum! Glad to have you with us! Please tell us about yourself in the Please Introduce Yourself thread.

As far as length of time to learn a song it is completely up to the person. What is your skill level, how much do you practice the song, even how do you practice? How familiar are you with Travis picking like Dust in the Wind? If you are just learning to Travis pick then you have to learn and get comfortable with that first before you learn the song.

These questions can't be answered by anyone except you. Just too many variables. Three weeks on Dust in the Wind doesn't seem like a long time to me. You could play that song off and on for several months before you really get smooth with it. I can't remember songs to save my life so it takes me a long time to "get it" but once I do I don't seem to forget it ever.

Anyway, welcome and have fun learning that song. I just heard Kerry Livgren on the radio yesterday. He doesn't tour with Kansas anymore but does still write music for them! :cheer: