This is my first public writing in quite a while. My most recent effort was the pre-blog electronic newsletter Woodsheddin', a journal of what I hoped would be "best practices for practicing". I was writing the newsletter partly as an effort to promote sales of my software, SlowGold andSlowBlast!, but also just to share the results of the transcription work I was doing and the my observations of the learning processes I was going through as part of my continual musical evolution. Some of you may also know me from my various articles and columns in Guitar Player magazine and other publications.

My contributions to Woodsheddin' were greatly disrupted when my family and I moved across the country from Oregon to NY in early 2001 for various personal reasons. We spent two years in Brooklyn, and are now happily settled in a rural exurb of NYC.

In the past few years, I have often been tempted to reactivate Woodsheddin', but the effort involved in publishing a full-blown "issue" has seemed daunting, with all the other demands on my time (you don't want to know...) Now, it seems that blogging and RSS feeds will allow me to put out such nuggets of wisdom and entertainment as I can manage in smaller, more casual "chunks", and maybe even get some feedback happening. So I'm going to give it a shot. I've accumulated a few bits of extremely condensed wisdom, particularly about jazz guitar and also some general improvising and practice principles, over the last few years, and I'm going to try to convey some of that wisdom, along, with some useful Web-based practice tools and utilities, as I develop them. I always welcome your comments.

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