well hey everybody it is the Shug here and today I want to
do a little video just talking about my mandolin and this is my Gibson F5-G
mandolin that I bought in 1996. Man I love that sound on the mandolin that low
G sound. What this little thing is right here people often ask...
that's a tuner because when you're playing music with people it's very
important that you're in tune. I paid about $2,000 for this mandolin in 1996.
This is my mandolin journey is I bought this mandolin because at the time I was
coming out here into my studio to do my juggling practice and I would just hear
myself let out this sigh... sort of bend over and go... I hadn't even thought of a
musical instrument yet but I was on a journey to find something because that's
I with my juggling practice it ends up that it was me trying to be creative
with every practice
I thought I wanted a banjo went to a music store just got up one day like a
zombie. I was out here in my studio Bela Fleck was on the radio I went to
Guitar Center and I said I'm gonna buy a banjo pick the banjo up it was really
heavy kind of long said yeah maybe it saw mandolin on the wall mount wasn't
this one my first mandolin was like an $89 cheapo mandolin I picked it up put
it on and I said man this thing is wound up tight like me and I bought the
mandolin bought a little beginner mandolin book there and I started
learning how to make those first chords and I was literally taking my fingers
putting them on the strings and I was getting a sound like this everything was
everything was muted actually
and if you see you pretty much got a song all right
and then in bluegrass music the mandolin is kind of the snare drum so I had to
learn a set of these two finger chords open chords and to learn these when you
use four fingers so you can get that chopped people still call it a ukulele
people don't know what a mandolin is even if you go into a school you'll see
uh an oboe a glockenspiel an English horn but you won't see a mandolin
they don't really use them in the orchestra classes I don't know why
because the mandolin is such a cool instrument to learn to play and that's
what I'm working on called the Fischer hornpipe anybody can learn to play a
musical instrument the trick is to not try to take one day of the week like a
Saturday and try to play five hours on Saturday only that one day a week you'll
never progress what you got to do is twenty minutes every day at least 20
minutes of just sitting down and getting your fingers to those chords
you know learning scales like that like a G scale I started going downstairs
every morning with my coffee bring a cup of coffee down set the timer use your
phone or buy a kitchen timer and set it for 20 minutes and just start putting
your fingers on the string now there's great lessons out there
YouTube type in the search box mandolin beginner lessons or just put mandolin
lessons and you'll get all kind of online free stuff to get you started
just learning the G let's say than P which if you can do G C and D you pretty
much have most songs
that's just kind of the basic of all songs but here's the lesson by sitting
down there doing my timer for 20 minutes now I never set that timer for an hour
or for an hour and a half because then I would have spent more time looking at
the timer and not pick it if you said it for 20 minutes 20 minutes goes by really
fast and it'll cook and you end up resetting it so I would reset that thing
four or five times so end up doing a nice long practice but do at least 20
minutes every day seven days of the week and not just five hours on one day and
you will learn an instrument you could at least get into a beginner Jam so
doing these scales this process I had a an epiphany and as I was doing the
scales on the mandolin learning my scales I went you know what I gotta do I
gotta bring these scales to my juggling and it helps so much because to this day
when I come out and do my juggling practice I always start my practice with
100 throws just with three balls making really nice clean throws with three
balls if I drop one that because what'll happen I'll get to about 85 and I'll go
man I'm pretty good and then I'll drop but I have to do 100 throws without
moving my feet good body position just high and low throws keeps me locked in I
sort of just drill the elements of my show and if I get creative then that's
that's fine I go with it but if not I've done 45 minutes to an hour of focused
practice and then I go onstage confident and then I'm able to riff but the
instrument I got the rest of my life to learn this and get proficient at it so
it's added what I call in life you know you have like the custodians keychain
remember he'd whip that keychain out to be like 42 keys on it whenever you take
up something new like an instrument you've got another key on your keychain
it'll give you a new perspective on your life this is driving the train the pick
and the right hand we all think it's up here with the left and you've got to
learn all this but what you're trying to do is connect this right hand with your
heart and your soul and you're feeling in your groove with
this left hand that's hitting the notes you know so it's just a continual
journey it's something I do for fun it keeps my life exciting and I'm doing
these online classes with Mike Marshall right now and you send in these videos
to him and in a couple of weeks he gets back he looks at your technique
gives you great notes and Mike's played with David Grisman all kinds of people
he's one of Christie Lee's heroes so he is a legit professional I'll put all the
links to these places to learn below remember search YouTube I really use
homespun a lot homespun you can download lessons and a particular type of music
by one of your favorite artists and have it at your disposal any time or the one
I'm doing now it's called artists work and there's sort of a lesson plan and
you do a video exchange with your teacher and and learn stuff so this was
me sending in a song called Kentucky mandolin all right everybody take care
all secure and set to 7:00
whoo the herringbone stack with the old cigar boxes I must place them macarius
Lee all right
whoa never played that song doing this trick do not try this with your mandolin
at home whoo