The virtues of playing along, even if you don't know what you're doing

When I went to my guitar lesson a few weekends ago, something I said to my instructor caught him off guard. I could tell he was surprised by it as he really didn't know what to say. Thinking about it later, I realized he was right and that I should start doing the thing I said I don't do.

What's this thing that I should do that I wasn't doing?

Playing along to songs.

I know what you're thinking - "What a dumbass." Or maybe that's just me. Either way, I was being a dumbass for not doing something so obvious.

I do play along to songs I know. I have a playlist on my iPod with all the songs that I've learned that I still remember. It's mostly Rush songs, but I do play along to it from time to time. What surprised my teacher was the fact that I didn't play along to songs I didn't know. He was showing me some chord progressions at the time and he asked me if I noticed them when I play along to songs. I then told him that I didn't play along to songs and he fell out of his chair.

Not really, but you get my point.

He was surprised that I didn't just put on some music and try to strum along. After going home and ruminating on it for a few weeks (I'm a little slow sometimes) I realized that he was right. So I loaded up one of my regular playlists, picked a song and tried to play along.

The song that I picked - or, to be more accurate, the song that started playing that I didn't skip over - was "I Am The Sun (Part One)" by The Flower Kings. Roine Stolt has become one of my favorite guitarists and I was excited to see if I could play along, at least a little bit, to one of his fairly technical compositions. Now for those who might not know where to start with this, my advice to you is to listen to the bass line. More often than not, the bass player is playing the root of whatever chord the guitarist or keyboardist is playing, even a bassist as good as Jonas Reingold. Turns out he was, and I was surprised to learn that much of the song is in a I-IV-V pattern in the key of D major, a common pattern in a common key. I was expecting some weird jazzy diminished scale or something. I know I'm just scratching the surface and there's a lot I'm not playing, but I never would've guessed the foundation was not only common but also something I know and can build upon.

And therein lies today's lesson. Play along to your favorite songs by your favorite guitarists, even if you have no idea what you're doing. You'll find out things that will help you with your playing and also help you when you're composing your own songs.