Happy Thanksgiving - Thank You For Your Support

Hello. Hello everyone. Welcome. I'm not opening a beer, I'm opening a spin drift. If you heard that can open in the beginning. I wanted to pop on and say hello. I was doing some traveling this morning. I'm actually up in Vermont. You can see some old school snowshoes behind me. I got a little cabin here in Vermont. We're visiting the in laws up here. I'm almost in Canada at this point. Very, very interesting. And I think it's supposed to snow here this weekend. So we are not this weekend. It's the middle of the week. Happy Thanksgiving. I wanted to pop on and, and just say thank you to everyone you know who supported me over the years. I was thinking today about how far, about how far I've come. You know, I started uploading officially to YouTube. It was 2017. The very tail end of March 2017 was when I uploaded my first real, like I'm gonna do guitar stuff on YouTube. And it was the song Hound Dog by Elvis. Okay. And then I think the second video was Horse with no Name. Okay. Which I know many, many of you have done. Yes, Rob, please go buy the Black Friday deals. I did put a link in the chat and there's a link in the description below if you want to see what the Black Friday deal is. It was something that's been sent out to the mailing list, but you guys are my YouTubers and I love you all too. So I wanted you to have access to that. It's not on my website. You can only get it if you're on the email list and you can only get it, I guess now through this, through this live. So the links there. It's Lauren batemanguitar.com forward/BF. It is a special offer on my seven level. I never put the seven level on sale, but there are some cool extra little bonuses you can get for Black Friday. And you know, if you already have the seven level or you're not an app, you know, not someone who's a beginner. There are the sales on the website, Lauren bateman.com forward/sales. Go over there. They're good through Friday evening. It's 30% off. A lot of my really great courses, my strumming courses, blues guitar course, the finger picking course, Lots and lots of cool stuff. Happy Thanksgiving. Thank you, Nina. Thank you guys for supporting me, you know, and that's what Thanksgiving's about here is, you know, reflecting on the things that you are very, very thankful for. And I'm thankful, you know, for all you being here. All you showing up wherever you are. I got Mark Gordon. Hello. David Horn. Rob Russell. Hello. Hello. Madeline Ramos. Hello. And Carl, everyone. Who's on here? Nina, John. Jerry. Hi, Jerry. I know. Jerry Stillwell. I remember that name.

So. And it's cool because, like, I come on here and I get to see the names and I'm like, oh, I know these people. Like, I've met Mark, you know, in person. He came to my event in August. And we do have another event that's going to be going on. I think we have the tickets live on the website laurenbatement.com forward/event or events. You can go check that out. We are doing another one this coming summer. But I just want to say thank you. Thank you so much for supporting me because, you know, I have some students of mine who've been with me since, gosh, 2017, 2018, live to fly. Hello. Hello. And, yeah, we just, you know, I just really want to say thank you because I would not be where I am today without the love and support of amazing students like all of you. Seriously. And I know some of you have been with me for years, and, you know, some of you start with me and then you move on to other teachers when you get to that point. And, you know, that doesn't offend me at all. I love you all and I'm here to help on the journey where I can. And my goal. You know, when I was growing up, I got told no so many times. I actually, I don't know if I've told this story maybe to my people in my email list, but, you know, long time ago, I tried out for a talent show and I really wanted to sing. I hadn't taken any singing lessons yet. So granted, I probably did not have the greatest voice, but I wanted to sing. And there was a mother there. I think I was about 11 or 12 years old, and there was a mother who was like, you know, I just, I don't think you're good enough. Do you have a different talent? And at the time, I was taking piano lessons, which I absolutely hated. So I ended up playing the piano for the talent show and I ended up, like, crashing and burning. I tried to do it without my music in front of me. Like, I memorized the piece and halfway through, I totally forgot it. I couldn't remember the piece and I had to stop halfway through. And you think that would make you give up on music? And, you know, I've tried out for all the shows. I've tried out for, you know, America's Got Talent, American Idol, the Voice, all those shows. And was constantly told that I was just not good enough to. To be, you know, a musician. And, you know, I'm. I guess I'm somewhat glad. The silver lining is that I get. I didn't get to be there and I get to be here with you and I get to help so many people in ways that are just absolutely amazing. And thank you. I'm seeing all your messages here, Matthew. Lauren helped me so much with smoother chord changes. I'm happy. Yes, that's C to G is a pain in the butt. Norwegian guitar and Zelda fan. Yes, I love Zelda. I do love my. My video games. Thank you, Michael. Thank you. Happy Thanksgiving. I wish you taught electric guitar well, Rob. I do, unfortunately on the channel. My channel is mostly focused on acoustic, but I do have some courses. Like my lead guitar 101, I play electric guitar. That's all electric guitar. My Blues Guitar 101 course, that's all electric guitar. I think I play an acoustic maybe for one or two lessons. Thank you so much. Thank you. Live to fly. Thank you for your little chat donation. I appreciate that. Learn basic chords from Lauren years ago. Lol. Awesome. Thank you so much. But yeah, you know, I forget what I was saying. I just got distracted by this little. This little thing. So Daniel asked, what is the seven level system? So the seven level system, we're talking about electric guitar and acoustic guitar. You can do the. The seven level system whether you're on acoustic or electric. The seven level system is basically seven steps. I almost think of it like a karate belt where you start from the. You know, basically level zero is the foundation items. How to hold a guitar, how to tune a guitar. Because I do have some people who come to me who are absolute beginners and they don't know that stuff or there's things they haven't been told that they should have been told. Like, you know, how to hold your guitar, how to set up your guitar strap so that you are holding the guitar correctly. Different wrist posture and stuff. So different background items that I feel are necessary to learn to play the guitar. And then in level one, it's really the basics of getting your hands moving. Okay. Learning your first chords. Okay. I work you through that. Learning chords, different finger picking and dexterity exercises. There's a lot of play alongs. So something students tell me that they appreciate a lot in the seven level system is I have videos for like all the chord changes and there's chord change practice and you get to play along with me practicing your chords. Because I found, you know, in my lessons particularly, people don't realize how long you have to practice these chord changes. So people will do like a C and a G chord change and they'll do it like three or four times and they're like, great. I practice it enough and I'm like, no, no, no, you need to do this for like two minutes straight. You need to just keep going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. And it's a lot of repetition. So people really appreciate that. And the seven level system is really the structure in my method of teaching people from how to go from like an absolute beginner to kind of more of that late beginner, early intermediate stage. So when you finish the seven level, you'll be ready to go into, you know, finger picking. You'll be ready to dive into, to power chords, expressive rhythm and strumming, like percussive rhythms, 16th note rhythms, syncopated rhythms, Things that sound really, really cool on the guitar. But yeah, the seven level is basically the solid foundation for being a good guitar player, whether it's acoustic or electric, Because a C chord is a C chord on an electric guitar. It's the same on an acoustic guitar. So you need that foundational stuff whether you're playing acoustic or you're playing electric. And I do have a number of students who go through the course on an electric guitar. But if you are looking for something electric specific League Guitar 101, Blues Guitar 101, those are two courses that are on sale the next couple days. Everything goes away after Black Friday, so you get 30 off. So Lauren batemanguitar.com forward/sales is that one. But we also have the special Black Friday sale. And I pinned that in the chat and I also put it in the description below. For those of you who don't see this live, it's something I've only really promoted to my email list. And I just wanted to come here on YouTube and let you know that that that does exist. And I know a lot of people, you know, you're already starting about your New Year's resolutions and what you're gonna do in January. And January is a great time to start to do something new and pick up something and be like, okay, fine, finally, this is the year I'm gonna do it. I have so many students. You know, I was in my private community this morning and I had so many people are like, I tried this so many times. Or, you know, I've wanted to do this for the last 30 years. But obviously life got in the way and now was the best time. So I always tell people the best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The next best time is today, it's right now. And I don't know who said that quote, but it's one of my favorite quotes. And it just reminds us that, yeah, there's lots of things even I could have done years ago that would have been better if I did them a decade ago or two decades ago. Seven for luck. Thank you more for your, your donation. I appreciate that. But yes, there's lots of things I could have done 20 years ago, but I can do them right now. Okay. Like, I really, really, really want to get back into learning my Italian. I used to be decent in Italian. I, I don't want to say I lived in Italy, I spent a few summers in Italy and the last time I was there I actually stayed in Pompeii. I was doing archeology in Pompeii and I stayed in the modern city in a campsite there. And I actually got, you know, I had to use my Italian a lot. And whenever I would be on the train I would ask people, you know, they could work on their English with me, can I work on my Italian with them. And I actually got decently well at Italian. Probably I could talk like a 10 year old maybe, but. But I could have full on conversations with people in Ital. And you know, since my great uncle passed away many moons ago, probably 10 years ago, I haven't really used it and I'm losing it and that's something that I want to get back into. And could I have kept up with it the last 10 years? Absolutely. I didn't. But the next best time is now. So I went and downloaded, you know, Rosetta Stone and I'm going to work on it myself as a student and keep doing that. So Matthew asked, what are your thoughts when to start learning Caged, beginner or intermediate? So, you know, in terms of Cage, it's a mixed bag and I don't have an opinion on it only because I never learned Cage. Now, someone I work with who's an electric guitar teacher or most of the electric guitar teachers I have worked with don't teach Caged. And I understand, you know, it's around the chords, you know, C, A minor, G, E minor and D. It's all around chord shapes, which are some people that might make the fretboard click for them. But I've talked to a lot of lead guitar people, people that I Respect and who are very, very good lead guitar players. And for them, they felt it was very limited. But I. I personally do not have an opinion because I never learned it myself. But when you're talking about Cage, you're talking about expanding your knowledge of the fretboard. And I would say that's definitely like a late beginner, early intermediate skill, because you're going to start getting into some theory concepts and not that you can't do that at the beginner level. And the other thing is, I think some of it evolves around bar chords and bar chord shapes, which I really consider an intermediate skill. So those are just a few things for me on the Cage system. But I don't want to say, like, don't do it. I'm. I'm never that person. I'm. I want you to explore it and see if it works for you. Because just because one person doesn't teach it, you might find a teacher out there who explains it very well. And you have that aha moment. I get that with people all the time. Like, you know, the two finger cords, people like, oh, my goodness, I didn't know you could do that. Or there's things, you know, different ways I teach things. And they're like, you know, I've watched a number of YouTube teachers, and for some reason, the way you explain it just clicks for me. So I don't want to knock the Cage system because I don't know enough about it myself, but I firmly believe there's a teacher out there who can explain this method very clearly and precisely, that you will have those aha moments. You just have to find who they are, because I don't know who they are, unfortunately. So hopefully that helps answer that question. But it's a great question and it's one I get asked very, very often. And I personally, I honestly do not have a good answer for you other than I go explore it yourself and form your own opinion about it. I've mentioned this in a couple of your YouTube videos that your guitar instructions, hands down, the most concise and clear. Thank you, David. That's very, very kind to you. Oh, thank you. Donating for Joseph Jacopell. Did I say that right? Thank you. Thank you so much, you guys, with your donations. This is very nice. I'm on here saying thank you to you guys. And you guys are, like, doing all these. These little donations. Thank you so much. I'm Italian. Love your videos. Connie says, awesome. Yeah, My grandfather was from Avellino. He was from Castel Baranillo. Which is a little province In Avellino, about 30 minutes, I think, from the city of Abelino. And I. I stayed there with him an entire summer. So it's. It's like a legit villa in Italy. So I basically lived in a little villa in a hill. My grandfather had a little apartment there. You know, the olive farms were out back. I used to walk to the butcher to get the meat. I'd walk to the bread place to get the bread. And this was. Oh, my God, how. I'm 40. So this was 30 years ago. All right? So I. Because I went when I was 12, so almost 30 years ago. And it was a really, really great experience. And I'm very, very, very fortunate that I was able to have that experience. What am I doing? So, Joseph, thank you again for your donation. I appreciate that. I am here in Vermont for Thanksgiving. It's Thanksgiving week here in the US and again, I came on to, once again just say thank you to everyone for being here and supporting me. Because it really does. It really does mean a lot to someone who doesn't have a degree in music. Okay. I always tell you, I'm just like you, okay? Unlike a lot of the teachers here, I don't have a degree in music. I don't have a degree in education. I just really, really love music. And I really loved playing the guitar. And when I was growing up, you know, we couldn't really afford music lessons. You know, my grandfather paid for my piano lessons, and, you know, I hated the piano. And once that got wasted, my sister bought me a guitar when I was 16. And my mom was like, don't do it. Don't buy it for her. She's not going to use it. She's not going to do anything. She's going to waste it, just like she did the piano lessons. And I kind of had to teach myself. I had a little VHS cassette tape and I had a Hal Leonard book. But even when I was learning, because I learned through the How Leonard book, which had me sight reading kind of like what I was doing in piano. And for me, even in piano, sight, sight reading really held me back because I just didn't understand how it worked. And then I learned chords, which was towards the end of Hal Leonard book one, and I learned chords, and I realized that if you put chords together, you can play songs. And once I did that, I never sight read music again. That's. And. And other than rhythm, I sight read rhythm. And I think rhythm is very, very important to read. I don't sight read Music anymore because I just don't think you need it. Okay? You really don't. If you, if you know chords and you can read tab, you're in good hands. Okay. And you know, thanks for all you. Your videos you make. You made me first as you're so clear and this makes it easy. So happy to help you. My family's from Montreal and Palermo. Sicily. Okay. Yeah. I don't know if I've ever. No. Sicily is one place I've never been Sicily. I do need to go there. My aunt's family is from. Is from Sicily and my cousins, they're Sicilian. But yeah, I, I've never been to, to Sicily. I've been to lots of parts of Italy. I've been kind of all over. I've been in the north, I've been in the south.

Not super far south, though. I think Naples, maybe a little south of Naples is, is the furthest I've gone. But yeah, I love Italy. Close to my family's there. Have any of your videos touch upon daily warm up exercises? The best warmup exercises would be the, the fastest. If you search Lauren Bateman faster fingers. I'm sure it will come up. That's a great warmup exercise. And you know, spider exercises. And you know, everyone talks about the spider exercise and I don't have a guitar with me here today, unfortunately, everyone thinks the spider exercise, where you just go 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4,. 1, 2, 3, 4. But there's lots of different ways you can go about doing those spider exercises. So you don't just have to go 1, 2, 3, 4. You could go 1, 2, 4, 3, or 1, 3, 2, 4, or 1, 3, 2', 4. Okay, you can, you can mix it up or go 4, 2, 3, 1. Okay. Using your fingers in different ways. Another great way to warm up and this becomes a little bit more intermediate is when you start learning scales. You can, you know, most people practice scales if you have like, say, you know, a major scale and you were doing three notes per string and you know, you do, you know, you know, you know, root set, your first root, second, third, fourth, fifth, seventh, you know, and you go through and you're just playing do, re, mi faso lati do. Once you really understand that you would do it in thirds, so you would go, you know, first, third, second, fourth, third, fifth. Okay. And you would, you would do it in thirds, and then you do it in fourths and you do it in fifths. All right? And I've done that stuff in the past, so it's A way of always extra expanding your knowledge and understanding and also expanding your ear. Okay. Because a lot of people don't understand when you practice, if you practice things that are musical, like scales, you're also working on your ear so that those are great warm ups that you can do on the guitar. And like I said, look up fat Lauren Bateman, faster fingers. That's kind of like my main warm up. I give a lot of people. And a spider exercise. Really, really good for just warming up in general. Picture IT Italy, 19. Was it 1925? I grew up on the Golden Girls. We used to watch that. That was like our family show. Was, was the Golden Girls. Estelle, wasn't it? Estelle, Was that the mother's name? She was funny. Picture it Sicily, 1925. That was a good one. Thank you, Lauren, for all you do. Completed your seven level course. Thank you, Steve. And highly recommended. I purchased your platinum bundle. I was going to say, Steve, you just purchased platinum and started the expressive strumming course. That's a good one. Expressive is one of my favorite courses. And it's because I'm biased because I'm a rhythm guitar player. But I really love strumming. Okay. I really love getting into rhythm and, and trying to make your guitar playing come to life. Because most people, you know, we get stuck on the down, down, up, up, down, up, down, down, up, up, down, up. Which works great. It works great for a lot of songs. But to get out of that habit because I get a lot of students, they're not beginners but and they're a little bit beyond the seven level guitar system. And they're like, Lauren, you know, I get my chords, I'm strumming, I'm playing songs, but I'm stuck doing the same strumming pattern over and over again. What do you recommend? And I say, I recommend going to expressive rhythm and strumming because in order to do that, in order to get out of that habit, you have to force yourself to play different strumming patterns and you have to force yourself to learn songs that depend on a strumming pattern. I think of songs like a song like Wonderwall comes to Mind or the intro to Proud Mary, you know, stuff like that where the strumming pattern really, really makes the song. So just playing a down, down, up, up, down, up, it might work, but it wouldn't. So getting yourself into playing songs that are a little bit more difficult and use different rhythms and depend on those rhythms to really make the song come to life. And I do have a playlist on YouTube. If you go to my channel homepage, there is a playlist of some more intermediate level songs. I don't have a ton of them because I primarily focus on beginner stuff, but there are a number of intermediate level songs that have some intermediate strumming, so definitely go and check those out. Happy Thanksgiving to you, Navy. Mark. Thank you so much for your service. I'm guessing you're, you were in the Navy or are in the Navy. Thank you so much. Where are you guys from? So I live in the Boston area, but I'm up in Vermont right now because my in laws live in Vermont and we're almost in Canada. Like, we're so close to Canada that my phone sometimes thinks I'm in Canada. That's how. That's how close I am to Canada. I think I'm like a half hour from the border of Canada at this point. So we're way up in Vermont and we came up early because, you know, traffic here gets pretty crazy for Thanksgiving. So I said I'll come up here early and I'll just work in, in the cabin and I'll go live and say hello to everyone and, and again, just genuinely thank you for all your support over the years. I truly, truly do appreciate it. I'm so blessed. I feel so, you know, loved by you guys too. And I've met so many of you and I've made connections with so many of you. And you know, as a teacher, that's kind of like, I guess your, your greatest honor, you know, is, is seeing a student do well. I've have, I have some students who are better guitar players than me now. And, and that makes me so happy because it means I got you started on the path and, and you develop that love for the instrument and, and you love it so much that you continued to pursue it and pursue things even beyond that than what I may have even pursued things. So that makes me, me very, very, very happy. Those snowshoes on the wall could be mistaken for a guitar. We could probably string those up, make those, make those, make some sounds. I don't know if the Airbnb person would be happy if I took those off the wall. Syracuse, New York. Anchors away, sailor. There you go. Yeah. Edmonton, Canada. Okay. Yep. So I don't. Edmonton's more in the middle. I think I'm closer. I'm on the east coast, so I'd be closer to like, Montreal. And I've never been to Canada. Believe it or not, one place I've never been. I've been to Niagara Falls and I've looked over, you know, the river and I've seen Canada, but I've never been to Canada. I think when we were driving down, there was this beautiful mountain as we were coming through New Hampshire, there's a place called Franconia Notch. And you kind of come down and you can see into the valley. And as we were coming out, we saw this white peaked mountain. And it wasn't Mount Washington because Mount Washington wasn't that way. And I was like, what is that mountain? Because typically in Vermont it's the Green Mountain state because the mountains are a little bit shorter because they've been worn down by the wind. So in New Hampshire you get the White Mountains. So usually they're snow capped mountains. But we were, I think past the Notch now and in Vermont and I'm like, what is that mountain? I'm like, that has to be Canada because I don't know what mountain that would be in Vermont. And maybe there is a mountain in Vermont that has a white cap, but I don't know, maybe Jay's Peak where they do some snow. But I think, I don't think it was Jay's Peak. So I'm like, it has to be Canada. At this point, we're so far up, it has to be Canada. Alan, thank you. I love your channel and the way you teach and thank you. Have a great Thanksgiving. Oh, thank you so much, J.B. lauren, you're great. Thank you. Lebanon, Missouri. In the house. Yes. The home of Ethan Allen. Not sure about the furniture. Vermont autumns are breathtaking. Yes. Although we've had kind of crappy autumns recently. I think it's because of the changes in the rain and the droughts. Like in Massachusetts, where I'm from, a lot of. I was basically, it was like basically a campfire outside my house for almost the past month. We've had so many forest fires, which is not something you typically hear about on the east coast of the United States. Usually we're getting for you. You know, in California you hear about the, the wildfires. Colorado hear about wildfires. You don't hear about wildfires in Massachusetts, but we have a, where I live, there is a reservation that's about 2,000 acres and we just lost about 400 acres of forest because it was, it was burning and we got no rain at all. So they couldn't put the fire out. So it just kept burning. So it's been, it's been a rough fall for New Englanders, I think because of all these changes. In the rain patterns. But, you know, it's still a beautiful time of year. I love seeing the leaves changing. And I think that's a great thing about being from New England is it's the reminder of the change and that we can make change and that, you know, sometimes, you know, things. Things die and stuff happens and life gets kind of crappy sometimes. But then there's always this rebirth. Okay, I was just talking to a gentleman in the community and welcoming him. His wife passed away in January earlier this year, which is a very dark moment. And he was like, I'm here, and I'm learning the guitar because I'm hoping it will help me heal. And I think that's the great thing about guitar, in learning guitar. And I know for me, the guitar has helped me get through a lot of dark times in my life. And I think music just. Just helps with that rebirth. And you. You learn something new about yourself and. And you get a new friend who's always there from you for you to listen. They don't talk back. I mean, they sing. But. But, you know, the guitar really, really helps you. So, you know, if you're someone who's been on the fence or you're just getting started, I know it's tough in the beginning. Okay? It can be very, very hard to learn the guitar. It's not an easy instrument. But again, if you have a structure, Structure is super important in learning. And most people who purchase my course, the seven level system, like, I've been on YouTube, and YouTube's great. It's fun. I'm here on YouTube. I get to be here with all of you, and I get to, you know, see all your wonderful chats and your names and your comments and everything else, and I get to meet you through my lessons. But the downside of YouTube is everything's kind of jumbled. It's out of order. If you're an absolute beginner, you don't know if you're learning the right things in the right order. So the majority of people who sign up for my seven level system are people who come from YouTube. They're like, Lauren, I've seen you. I really, really enjoy your lessons, But I've been learning for the last year or the last three months or the last two years, and I've been going at this in such a haphazard way. I decided that I finally wanted to get some structure in my learning. And structure is so important. Okay, you can follow, you know, a bad system, but as long as you're following a system, you will do better than someone who's not following a system. All right? So if you could put someone inside a system, that's, that's probably the worst system in the world. But if they follow that system to a T, they will be better on the other side because they have a system versus haphazardly learning. Now, I think we've had Almost somewhere over 6,000 students now who've gone through my seven level guitar system or who are currently enrolled in the seventh level guitar system. So there's people in there, there's people in this chat who you've seen and said, hey, I have Lauren's, I have Lauren seven level guitar system. I just graduated. You know, there's lots of people who are going through the system. It does work. If you work the system, okay, because that's why it's seven levels. You learn level one, okay? You graduate from level one, you move to level two. You graduate from level two, you move to level three, all the way through to level seven. And by the time you get through level seven, you're actually a pretty good guitar player. Or, you know, you might not be, you know, Steve Vai or Stevie Ray Vaughan, but you're feeling good, you're playing songs and you're like, wow, I've accomplished a lot. I can do this. And inspires you to keep going. Really, really does. So, you know, thank you for each lesson. Fit for 60 plus beginner. Yeah. And, and that's the thing, you know, I do specialize in working with beginners, particularly older adults. I do have students who are in their 30s and 40s and I, and I love you guys too, too. But the majority of my students are in their 50s, 60s and 70s. I even have some students in their 80s and 90s. I've actually noticed that in the community there's a lot more 80 year olds popping in being like, hey, I'm giving this a go. And I love that. I think that's awesome. So it just goes to show you, you're never ever too old to get started. Can you answer this? Why do people use inverted chords? Great question.

So an inverted chord in music is what we call almost a different voicing. So a lot of times like the standard C chord, okay, that, that you learn the three fingered C chord, the root note, the C. Okay. The C, which is the note that gives the name to the chord is on the bottom. So this is a little bit of theory. So if you don't know theory, you might get a little confused. Don't worry, I'll Come back to it. But the root note is C. And in most chords, the lowest note, the bass note, is the root note, the C. Or if it's a G chord, it's a G. If it's an E chord, it's an E. If it's an A chord, it's an A. Well, with an inverted chord, there's different types of inversions. The root note can be on the bottom of the chord. All right, so now instead of the root note, the C being the lowest note, it could be the third or the fifth, fifth. So maybe it's an E or a G. Okay. And by doing that, by changing the order of the notes. So in order to play a C chord, you need three notes. You need a C note, an E note, and a G note. And then you can repeat those. Okay, so if you play a C chord, it is C, E, G, C, E. Okay? Those are the notes of a C chord. If you play them from top to bottom. Okay. But you could play them in a different order. You might play them higher up on the neck, which that's also what inverted chords can help you do. Can help you play higher up on the neck. And you just get. Will get a different sound, a different tone, because the order of the chords is different. So it will have a different sound to it. And you'll find inversions a lot, especially with. Oh, Kevin, thank you so much. I'll say. Thank you. Two seconds with the inverted chords. You'll see that a lot in electric guitar. Well, they'll do three notes on the bottom string. Think of something like Dream on the intro to Dream On. You can play that as all inverted chords. They're just chord triads, three notes on the bottom three strings. And that's a great example of where you would use inverted chords and different chord triads. So one gives you different sound. Two allows you to play chords in various places all over the guitar outside of the standard open chords that you would learn. So Chris, or sorry Kevin, says, my kids are calling my newfound desire to play the guitar my midlife cry. So be it. Thanks, Lauren, for making this midlife crisis so much fun. Oh, Kevin, you are so welcome. This is it says, let's celebrate their first super on live stream. Well, Kevin, thank you so much. I really appreciate that. I appreciate the donation. You guys are so kind, and I really, you know, really, truly am blessed. I'm so happy that I seem to have found my calling in life, which is teaching. I started at a pharmaceutical company. If you don't know that, I Actually worked in cancer research for a number of years. My aunt, she passed away at 51 of cancer. I had cancer when I was 16, and I was 26 years old at the time. And I was like. I was like, what am I doing with my life? I worked. I was a histologist. If you don't know what that is, I made slides in a lab for pathologists to look at. And I was sitting there, and, you know, the work was very rewarding. You know, you're working to cure cancer. What's. What's better than that? But my aunt died, and it kind of made the light bulb go off because I had already had cancer. And I knew how precious time and life was. And I sat down, you know, I met my cubicle, and I'm like, is this what I want to do with the rest of my life? And as I was sitting there looking at the computer screen, I said, no. So I said, okay, well, that's that, but what am I going to do? And I went on this cruise. I took a break. I went on a. This is just before my aunt died. I went on a cruise. And it was. It was called KO. It was a music cruise. I met Brandy Carlisle. I played at open mics, and it was the most fun I had had in my life in a very long time. And I said, I need to do more of this. So when I got home from that cruise, I went to Google and I said, how? I typed into Google search how to phase out your job to do music. And that's what I did. So when I was 27 years old, I quit my job at the pharmaceutical company and I started performing, and I also started teaching. Now, I had never had guitar lessons in my life, so I was nervous. I had a couple. I had a few lessons with an acoustic guitar teacher who taught me how to do finger picking. But outside of that, I had never had guitar lessons. And I didn't really know a lot of songs. I really only knew my songs because I learned to play the guitar, to write my own music. And I quit my job, and I'm like, I'll start teaching. And I will fully admit I was not very good in the beginning. And that's how the seven level system evolves, because I learned from trial and error. Unfortunately, you know, my first students were my test subjects. So fortunately for you guys, I tested this all on people in live lessons. And I noticed something in my teaching, and I. This was about two or three years in. I had a lot of students, my favorite students to teach were over the age of 50. Now the downside is I noticed that it took these students a little bit longer sometimes, particularly with the chords and the chord changes that I noticed that they were having a little bit more trouble and a lot of them were quitting in frustration. And I said, gee, I said, I'm not, I'm not really doing my job here. If people are coming to me and they're giving up, like, that's like guitar is supposed to be fun. Obviously it's hard, it's not easy, but I'm like, there has to be a better way to do this just to make people have fun faster. Because, you know, I was teaching everyone just like everyone else, three fingered C chord, three fingered D chord. And I'm like, what if I can simplify this? What if I can use some inversions? Someone earlier mentioned inversions. What if I can use some inversions or different chord voicings to help people learn to play the guitar faster? And that's what I did. So I said, I'm, instead of jumping people right onto three fingered chords, I'm going to take them back one step. Okay? You could literally teach someone one finger chords. And I've had students who were much older that came into my studio and I'm like, I'm going to start them with one finger chords, okay? Because that's where they were at and that's what they needed. But I found that most people, if I started them on two finger chords, they were actually able to play music within a few weeks. Usually at the end of the first lesson, I had them playing a song and that was it. They just needed to believe in themselves that this could be done, it was possible, and that it could be fun. And, and that evolved into the seven level guitar system. Okay? That's what the seven level system became. And I had this binder. I think I found the binder at one of the music schools, my old binder. And it was a binder of just all my lesson materials that I would teach beginners. And I took that binder and I organized it into what is the seven level system. That's all my teaching materials from the years of me teaching people in person. And I did a lot of trial and error being like, this works. This doesn't work. Okay. People seem to really like this. They don't seem to like this. And I would put things in different orders and, and that's how that came, that came about for me, experimenting, because I'm a scientist. So I, I had a hypothesis, I experimented with It. I saw what worked and I got rid of the things that didn't work. And that's why a lot of students like my seven level system, because there is a logical progression to it, okay? It's not like YouTube where you're jumping all over the place. And that's why if you're someone who's been on the fence about, like, really taking this seriously, get the Black Friday deal, okay? I pinned it here. It's in the link in the description below. If you want that structure, if you're someone who thrives on structure, okay? And here's a big hint. Most people do, okay? Most people really thrive on a good structure. So if you're someone who feels like you're kind of all over the place or you're not making the progress you wanted to, get the structure, get the system. Even if it's not my system, get a system and follow it. And if you follow through and you practice and you work a system, I will guarantee you, I will guarantee you that you will make progress, you will be a better guitar player, and you will have more fun with your instrument. But you need to get a system and you need to work it, okay? I highly recommend the 7 level guitar system, okay? It's my system. But again, even if it's not my system, find someone who resonates with you, okay? Get a lot of people. Like I watched a bunch of people. I found you. And if my teaching style resonates with you, awesome, go with it, okay? If it doesn't, that's okay. There's going to be another teacher out there that's going to be able to connect with you and communicate with you better than I can. And my goal as a teacher to is. Is not to have you just work with me, okay? If I'm not the right teacher for you, I want you to go find the right teacher. Because for me, the goal is for you to win. It doesn't have to be with me, but my goal is for you to win. And you win by having fun and learning this instrument, okay? And again, if it's with me, awesome. I would be honored. I would be happy to have you. That would make me so happy. But if it's another teacher, that's perfectly fine with me, too. I want you to do what's best for you, not what's best for me, okay? Your seven level course is my system. Thank you, Rob. I thoroughly enjoy it. Jess Sundays so. I'm 65. I want to learn more on my guitar. But I was told you had to be really smart to play your thoughts. What do you mean by. What do you mean by smart? Huh? No, I don't think you have to be a genius to. To play guitar. I've worked with students from all walks of life. I've worked with engineers. I've worked with janitors. I've worked with, you know, teachers, nurses, doctors. I've worked with carpenters. I've worked with electricians. I've worked with plumbers. So I don't think you need to be smart. Okay, in terms of, like, I don't think you need to be book smart to. To learn to play the guitar. What you need is the desire to learn. That is more important than being book smart. I don't think you need to be book smart to learn the guitar. But again, I do think you need a good system to go about doing it. And, you know, when you're going through something by yourself and you don't know much about it, it's hard to know if you're doing the right things or, you know, what's the next step? Okay, be like me. I'm looking at this kitchen. It would be like I'm a contractor's daughter. I've seen my dad build kitchens. I've helped my dad build kitchens. I don't really know how to build a kit. Like, I wouldn't be able to build this kitchen. I could do it and I could try it on my own. Okay. And it would probably come out really, really crappy and things would be out of plum and. But if I did it with my dad, if I had my dad, who's the master carpenter, if I built a kitchen with my dad, I could guarantee you it would be done right because he's a master carpenter. If I did it on my own, God only know I. I do things in the wrong order. I, I put things the. I probably, you know, screw things, have to unscrew it. Re. Screw it again. So the system saves you time. Okay? That's what you're paying for sometimes is you're paying to save time so that you don't have to go and learn all these things by yourself. But I don't think you have to be a genius to learn the guitar. You just have to have a really burning desire to want to learn the guitar. And that's. Janitors are just as important as doctors. Amen. Someone has to keep the floor clean in the surgery room. Yep. How do I get your seven level course, Jeff? Go to laurenbatemanguitar.com forward/BF. I. I pinned comment here. Go get the Black Friday offer. That's the best way to get it right now. Lauren batemanguitar.com forward/b, f for the Black Friday deal. And yes, you know, my. My wife, she's a nurse, and she always makes friends with the janitors because they're the people who have her back. She's like, you know, I. I love the nurses. I love the doctors. She's like, but. But the janitors are the ones that really keep things running on the floor. They're very, very important people. So, you know, everyone in life has a purpose, okay? So you don't just have to be a doctor to learn guitar. Okay, you can be a janitor, you can be a landscaper. Okay, you can be a garbage man. I don't care. As long as you love guitar and you want to learn, I will teach you. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter to me. So I love structure. Getting this some spot with other programs, and they're okay, now you decide what to study. But I don't know what I don't know. Yeah, and that's a big thing. You know, I went to a business conference, and they're like, it's not, you know, the things you don't know. It's the things you don't know. You don't know. I was like, that's a very interesting way to put it. Like, there's things I know I don't know. But it's like, no, it's the things you don't know that you don't like. You have an idea of the certain thing. And yes, I'm from Boston. My ideas have Rs on the end. You kind of have a thought about things you don't know. Like, I don't know how to tune a guitar. I don't know how to. But the things you don't know, you don't like. How important wrist position is, your thumb position, your guitar strap, how important those things are, the size of your guitar, all these different things, your guitar setup, the size of your strings, things you don't know that you would have, no idea would have an impact on your playing. And you're like, oh, what pick to use when you're a beginner? What guitar pick? What happens if your pick keeps falling out of your hands? What pick do you use? Okay, yes, you know, you need a guitar pick. But if you don't know which guitar pick is right for you, at what stage of the learning process, you know, I can make your guitar playing sound a million Times better just by telling you to use a different pick. Really, I can. And it's usually a light pick. If you want to know the answer to that. Using a very, very thin pick when you're just getting started can take a lot of the curse out of the bad, the harshness of the instrument. Because a lot of times our strumming hand, our picking hand is very tense because it's a new. It's a new mechanic, a new process. So you're usually too tense. So a very thin pick. 0.43, 0.5 millimeters are very good in the beginning. Eventually, you'll want to graduate to a slightly thicker pick because you'll get a lot of pick noise, a lot of pick flapping in your playing. And some people like that. And they keep with the skinny pick. I like a slightly thicker pick because they don't break as easy either. So. Good things to have. I just figured out you're not a guitar elitist, unlike some other online teachers who shall remain nameless. Well, thank you. You know, I'm definitely not a purist, I will tell you that much. Hello, Adelaide, Australia. I'm definitely not a music purist. I don't think you need theory.

It's useful, fun to have. Okay. I'm not going to say it's not useful. You don't need to sight read. I can sort of sight read music. I could take my time with it and figure it out, but I can't really sight read music. I can sight read rhythm, but I can't sight read melody. I can't do that. And there's some people who are like, you need to do that or you're not a guitar player. There's people out there who say if you use a guitar capo, it's cheating. And it's like, well, I know Johnny Cash used a capo. I know Paul Simon used a capo. I know Tommy Emanuel uses capo. These guys are pretty. I don't know. I would consider all them guitar players. So for me, it's more important that you have fun. It's more important that you have fun and appreciate the instrument. And if you get inquisitive about the deeper meanings, why, then you get into music theory. Music theory is the philosophy behind music. If you want to get into that, awesome. I've had students who never even wanted to talk about theory, and we never did. And they played guitar for five years with me. We took lessons, they played in bands. They had so much fun. And guess what? They might not be able to tell you what key the song is in, but they can play the song. And to me, that's more important. Okay, that's more important. Now, if you really want to get super technical, there are guitar teachers out there who are very technical. They're so technical that it even goes over my head. And we won't say any names, but there's a few of them out there if you really want to get to that level. They're just. They're just at a higher pay grade in terms of theory than I am. But Gordon Lightfoot swears by capo. Yeah, Gordon Lightfoot's another great one. Great songwriter, great songs. He had some hits and, you know, he's great. I would consider him a good guitar player. Okay? So, you know, don't let someone tell you what the standard is for playing guitar. Have fun. Enjoy the instrument. Learn to love it, appreciate it. Play songs. Share memories with your family and friends. Okay. We're coming up on the holidays and I have so many students. Like, I just played Christmas carols with my kids and we sang along. Or I brought my guitar over to a friend's party and we played songs together. Like, that's what music is. Music is about creating memories, having experiences. And I always say music is like time travel. It's the only form of legitimate time travel because music is one of the. In. Smell does this too. Smells. You'll. You'll smell something and it'll bring you back immediately to the time or the person that reminds you of that smell. And music is like that because you can hear a song and you can remember exactly where you were when you first heard it. Okay. Particularly, you know, if you grew up in the album Ever era, Because you can remember the album. You can remember what it smelled like. Okay? You can remember where you were when you put that album on for the first time. And you have such strong memories that are tied to music. So I think it's very, very important that people learn music and that you just have fun with it. Now, here's my biggest issue. This will be the last one question I'll take, because then I get a. I gotta run. But thank you for being here. I love you guys. You're awesome. Now here's a big issue. When playing my elect, the calluses on my finger get caught under the string. Should I wear finger cots or band aids? No, that's normal. It happens. I mean, my. My calluses are a little thing, so I haven't played much, but when I was playing a lot, I used to busk in the subways here in Cambridge. And I would play for three hours straight so my fingers would get. And I was playing an acoustic guitar so my fingers would get really ripped out to the point that the skin was just peeling off. Sometimes it does get stuck and that's just, that's just part of the callus in playing guitar. I used to bite mine off. I don't recommend doing that. Some people, you can file them down, but having the callus is good. You don't want to get rid of the callus because that helps you push the string in. When you don't have a callus, your. Your flesh just wraps around the string. And that's part of why people mute cords in the beginning because they don't have a thick enough cat callous to push the string. The finger is going around the string instead of pushing it. So, you know, I used to bite the calluses off. I had a very bad finger biting habit. I fixed my teeth and I stopped biting my nails. So now I have to use. Now I use a. What is it? The fingernail clipper. I hate using fingernail clippers. They feel so weird. But back in the day, I had a very bad nail biting habit and I used to just bite my calluses off. So I don't recommend doing that. But I have some students who will file them off or clip off the extra skin. You can do that too. But it's just a natural thing that's going to happen because it's just, it's dead skin that's peeling. But I wouldn't put cream on it because again, if you put cream, you're softening up the tissue. It's just, I guess we call it an occupational hazard of being a guitar player. Make sure if you're interested, go grab the Black Friday offer. Like I said, it's only been open to email people, people on my email list. You cannot get this offer. It's not on the website. It is not publicized on the website. We do have the sale on the other courses that's on the website, but for the seven level system. Lauren Bateman guitar.com forward/bf which is stands for Black Friday. It's only good today, tomorrow and then Friday it goes away. Okay, so if you see this on Saturday, I'm sorry, it's. It's not going to be available anymore. So if you're here, please take advantage of it right now. I never put the seven level on sale. So if you're looking for a discount, it's not discounted, but it comes with some really, really amazing bonuses that I don't offer any other time of the year. So definitely, if you've been on the fence, this is the time to do it. I really want to help you learn guitar in the new year, because I think it is so important, and I would be absolutely honored to be your teacher. And if You've watched my YouTube videos and you find them helpful and you're finally looking for that system, this is it. This is it. And I want to help you get there. So I hope you all have a wonderful Happy Thanksgiving. Thank you for all your support. I really appreciate y'. All, and I'll see you in a lesson video real soon. Bye.