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Posts: 2120
Location: Chicago | What is the MOST important lesson or insight (or one of...) regarding playing the guitar that you ever got? In person, the pages of GP, online, in a vision from on high (or just "high")?
I'll never forget when I was about 13 I unconsciously was picking everything with down-strokes. I read a column on "circular picking" in GP that blew my mind (Vishnu-era JM). Essentially had to start from scratch and sucked (again) for a good year! |
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March 2002
Posts: 14842
Location: NJ | Matt Smith "de-Mystifying Modes" in Amelia . . . |
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January 2006
Posts: 2120
Location: Chicago | Wow. That jogs my Cozmik lesson #2 memory: Emily Remler's lesson on "are you tired of old A minor leads?" She then revealed the secrets of the "melodic minor": It's easy, she explained. You take any major scale and flatten the third. Then learn the fingering and play MODES of that monster (So if you're working with C major, you have an Eb instead of a regular E natch. Then you check out how that row of notes sounds when played from F to F and B to B). She was right when she said "sounds like Heaven!" |
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March 2007
Posts: 665
Location: Tychy, Poland | "don't sit on guitar!"
My father, when i was 5. |
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January 2006
Posts: 2120
Location: Chicago | So why did you disobey? :) |
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Posts: 2985
Location: Sydney, Australia | "Never close the case without doing up the latches"
Experience |
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May 2005
Posts: 486
Location: North Carolina | Never had formal lessons. But the most important tip I ever got was from observation, when an acoustic guitarist/singer (folksinger for lack of a better term) did "I Get a Kick Out of You" by Cole Porter.
Huh? You mean I DON'T have to do songs that sound like they're a hundred years old? I started to learn and adapt any and everything I heard, with more challenging vocal and guitar parts, making me a more skilled singer and player.
It was the best lesson I ever learned. |
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March 2002
Posts: 15682
Location: SoCal | "Don't waste your money buying a lot of guitars" --
my father.
"Listen to what's being played around you and try to find your own spot." I don't know who told me that, but that and "you don't have to fill every hole in the music" were two of the best things ever told to me... |
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January 2006
Posts: 2120
Location: Chicago | "Listen to what's being played around you... you don't have to fill every hole in the music"
That's fantastic. Miles Davis was famous for laying similar ideas on his players (usually in 1.5 words and a grunt [or a blow upside the head]). |
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September 2003
Posts: 9301
Location: south east Michigan | Like a complicated beef stew simmering on the stove, bits and pieces from the Amelia-Matt clinic are boiling up to the surface.
For instance... last night I remembered Matt's advise to do a little "chair dancing" to help me sound less like I'm playing at a 5th grade recital.
Matt Smith "de-Mystifying Modes" in Amelia Matt showed how the modes attach to eachother up an down the fretboard. When diagramed out that way it shows that there are only a small percentage of notes that won't fit. You are much more apt to hit a note that fits just by dumb luck.
For me, rather than "de-Mystifying the Modes" I've come away with a "Screw The Modes" frame of mind. I'm not going to be intimidated by all those fancy greek names anymore!! Like Matt said, "You're always just one fret away from the right note". Perhaps it's not the intended result of the lesson but from what I've experimented with it seems to work for me. No doubt I'll have to delve into more theory someday but I need something to get me over the hump. The old way was not working. I'm going to try to let my ear control where my fingers go rather than some dots diagrammed on 6 lines.
Hopefully I'll have something to show for it at the next clinic. |
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March 2002
Posts: 14842
Location: NJ | "SING along with wht you're playing" - Matt |
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January 2002
Posts: 14127
Location: 6 String Ranch | Less is more
Make the notes mean something |
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February 2005
Posts: 11840
Location: closely held secret | Don't be 'that guy'.
...like I could... :rolleyes: |
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March 2005
Posts: 12761
Location: Boise, Idaho | Never had a lesson. You can tell if you see me play.
The biggest advance I had in guitar playing was when my daughter showed me what tabs were and how I could download them off the computer. |
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June 2006
Posts: 7307
Location: South of most, North of few | "You can only play one at a time"
My wife. |
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November 2005
Posts: 4833
Location: Campbell River, British Columbia | "Music is the space in between the notes"
My inspirational music teacher Johnnie Johnson(not the terrorist, or the disciplinarian, or the drug addict-rocker) who had us face the wall. He then played a note and had us all grab that note, without playing, and turn around. Karl & I both had the same place on the neck as him, without looking.
The body knows what to do, get out of the way. |
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December 2001
Posts: 10583
Location: NJ | sometime when I was a teenager I read somewhere that you were only one fret away from a good note and that changed my life.
along with
when I was in college I read a woody guthrie bio at one point he said "if there were 75 guitar pickers in a room playing the same tune you need to come in listen and figure out the 76th part" |
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December 2001
Posts: 7247
Location: The Great Pacific Northwest | There have been a couple...
Playing...
1. It's supposed to be fun, that's why the call it "PLAYING" music.
Technique...
2. If your guitar is in tune, and intonated properly yet ONE (or more) chords seem to be "out of tune"... stop putting a death grip on the neck and relax... This one came about because as my fingers got stronger, I was pressing harder on some strings without realizing it and actually pulling the notes sharp. Un-noticed when I was the only guitar, but a bear to trace when there were two guitars playing the same chord and we were both "in tune."
On Wisdom...
2. A corollary to always insuring the latches are latched when the case is closed... Never leave an empty case open, especially if there is a pet within the same zip code. |
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July 2005
Posts: 3411
Location: GA USA | Richard P, you stole mine. I was teaching guitar class last Saturday, and stopped to tell them that if I caught any of them putting their guitar in the case without closing at least one latch, it was an automatic F for the course. |
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Posts: 4833
Location: Campbell River, British Columbia | Then where is the cat supposed to listen from?
The CHEAP seats!?!
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March 2008
Posts: 2683
Location: Hot Springs, S.D. | I used to think my music was serious and important. Then one day, I think I was playing "Over the Rainbow", and there's one part where my fingers go "WHEE!!!!". Suddenly I realized that THAT is why I play. Not because it's important, but for the "Whee!" Once I lightened up, I found myself playing better, and I also stopped offending my friends with "That's not right, it should be A minor" and the like.
And about theory...it's like you've been watching black and white TV all your life, then suddenly someone turns on the color. Theory makes everything richer and more beautiful, and once you open your mind, it's not that difficult. |
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October 2007
Posts: 2711
Location: Vernon CT | I think the best advise for me was when I was told to "play thru your mistakes". I used to just stop and go back to "fix" what I screwed up.
I'm getting much better at just playing thru and it is amazing how when I'm done with the song and I bring up that I made "3 mistakes", I'm asked "You made a Mistake??" Most of the time no one hears them. |
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December 2006
Posts: 6996
Location: Jet City | When I bought my first electric (Preacher), I decided I should probably take a few lessons. They lasted all of a couple of weeks, but the main thing I learned was how to properly hold a guitar (fret hand) and that on an electric, you didn't need to push down so hard to fret a note. |
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November 2006
Posts: 3969
| Originally posted by BT717:
I think the best advise for me was when I was told to "play thru your mistakes". I used to just stop and go back to "fix" what I screwed up.
I'm getting much better at just playing thru and it is amazing how when I'm done with the song and I bring up that I made "3 mistakes", I'm asked "You made a Mistake??" Most of the time no one hears them. The flip side of that - when you're performing, as opposed to just practicing by yourself, yes it's true that you just soldier on and pretend like there was no mistake. Concentrating on it just causes more f-ups and leads to a train wreck.
One of the most important things my current instructor emphasizes, and it's supported by a lot of research into learning theory, is that when you're learning a new piece/phrase/passage/lick you need to play it slowly enough (to a metronome) that you don't make any mistakes. If you do flub, stop immediately, slow down the tempo, and play it again without a mistake. Once you can play the particular passage through several times without an error then increase the tempo.
The idea (again supported by extensive research) is that early in the learning process (short-term memory) if you allow a mistake your brain considers that mistake acceptable, and you're likely to keep making that same mistake each time you play that particular passage, until the mistake itself becomes hard-wired into long-term memory.
Of course all that goes out the window if you're improvising! |
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December 2004
Posts: 2150
Location: Orlando, FL | This is a great thread! A few revelations for me at different points in my life:
It's more important to have a little soul than a bunch of chops.
You are always one note away from the right note, but you are two notes away from a bunch of ones that still suck.
I am never going play like Tommy Emmanuel, Steve Morse, BB King or Django Reinhardt and thats OK. I still love to play.
Playing guitar with others is not a competition, it's supposed to be fun.
There are always people who play better than you and worse than you. You can learn from both types.
If you jump around and look really cool while you play, a small percentage of people won't notice you suck. |
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Your MOST important guitar lesson (?)
