Something New?

[.Sphinkta]

Hey all. I've been playing for a while now and learned a fair few songs and a few different techinques and what not. After a while, it is sometimes hard to keep motivated to continue playing, and because i'm not so motivated I don't thrive to learn new songs and stuff, so I just don't find as much playing time. I figure that a good way to get back into it heavily is to do something completely new. I did it once and learned finger picking, it was great. I was thinking this time of dabbling in alternate tunings or slide. I saw a friends band play, and the sounds he was getting with a slide on his maton acoustic were amazing. But I think that alternate tunings will be the next thing for me.

So, the reason for the post. Has anyone on here ever dabbled in alternate tunings? Or has anyone tried using a slide? Tell us some of your stories.

[fretdancer]

My experiences in motivation are very similar to yours, I find that once I learn something, I get bored with it and am always looking for something new to maintain my interest. I find that going back to try a song that previously I found to demanding is a good test of how well your learing. I remember trying stairway to heaven a few times and always finding it too hard. This was very frustrating as its supposed to be an easy beginner song !! - ha ha ....anyway I recently tried it again and persevered for a couple of days and now I can play it easily - in fact amazingly even though at first I could not play up to speed, now I can play it, only 2 weeks later I know I could "embelish" it a little by fitting more notes in....its amazing how easy it becomes when you do learn it.
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As for alternate tunings, I recently tried open G tuning which means that barring any fret gives a chord - playing "dock of the bay" suddenly became reall easy and sounds great with a slide - have not experimented much with it but I intend to.

Pete

[Fried]

I usually try to play what I can with standard tuning, but I have often had to use alternate tuning to make a certain song sound correct. The problem with alternate tunned songs is that you really should have a second guitar. If you think it is annoying to see a guitarist retune his/her guitar on stage, try waiting for them to detune and retune.