Conversations with the Roomie: Take 1

I think from reading this blog, some of you may have realized that my Roomie is a smartass. It comes with the territory when you have a comedian in the house. He has something to say about everything. So, I thought I’d take a minute to share some of the more entertaining moments we’ve had since I started teaching myself to play.

1.  Amazing Grace

Me: ‘O Sole Mio’ is really hard!

Roomie: ‘I thought that was Amazing Grace.’

Result: I now tell the Roomie what I’m working on, to save my battered pride.

Context: I was working on the lead part for ‘O Sole Mio’ on Yousician at 50% speed in practice mode. Missing half the notes? Yes. Doing poorly, yes. But, I refuse to believe poorly enough to sound like a completely different song. Just saying.

2.  Inappropriate Movie Soundtracks

Roomie: *looks between me and the TV a few times*  I don’t understand this compulsion you have to make your own soundtracks to all the movies you’re watching. They’re always really inappropriate to what’s on screen.

Me:  “I’m working on ‘Stand By Me!’ Trying to read subtitles while playing ukulele is really good practice.”

Context: I was watching ‘Shall We Dance’ (the original, Japanese version.) I’ve never seen either, so actually did think it would be really good practice to see if I could play/read/absorb information simultaneously.  During a particularly dramatic scene, I was playing the progression uptempo to see how fast I could make the chord changes, which, was in fact, far too peppy for the scene I was watching.

Result: I understood the movie, and while I did screw up playing the progression a bit, it went pretty well. I lost track of my down and up strokes a few times – maybe missed a down, or an up, So might go DUUDDU or DDUDUD or DUDU instead of DDUUDU here and there. For the most part I did it right, but it’s not fully automatic yet, clearly.

3. I remember that one, it was a big hit!

Roomie: I don’t know what song that is, but it sounds good. (aw, look how cute, he’s being all motivational after the Amazing Grace pride-bashing. lol)

Me: It’s called “Shelby Practices her Barre Chords.”

Roomie: Ah, I remember that one! It was a big hit! All over the radio in, what, the late 80s?

Context: I was in my room with the ukulele, practicing switching between C and D7 on the ukulele, applying the good ol’ DDUUDU strum pattern.

Result: …absolutely nothing has changed, but at least it sounds like music! 🙂

Until Next Time, playing through Roomie’s wit.


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