Peter, actually this is a permathread; it's a continuation of "Help For Pickers". What I'd like to see is more of the technique threads brought up again and expanded, but I'm reluctant to gratuitously refresh them without an excuse to add to them. There is so much good stuff on old threads that have slipped out of the common sight and memory - I often find digging around the archives to be more interesting than looking through the current threads.

There's another advantage to playing along to recordings that hasn't been mentioned yet - unlike real live jam buddies, recordings don't get annoyed or thrown off no matter how badly you play. So you feel less self conscious and more free to mess around trying to find chords or improvise, or at least I do.

Random tip:

If you take a pee break in the middle of a practice session, and wash your hands in cold water, you need to do whatever you do for a warmup again before proceeding.

Marion