How To Choose A Guitar

Today we discussed how to choose a new instrument. It seems like an easy thing to do, because pretty much every wannabe musician picks their guitar on the finish. But there are so many more things to take into consideration.

The hardware, for example, is probably one of the most important things to choose by. If you pick a guitar by the finish then when you get it home and slam it into an amp and it buzzes, you would be mad. Because you don't buy a guitar for finish. Steve said: 'Why would you pick a guitar for the finish? Music is heard, not seen.' This is so true.

Also, it's highly recommended that you try before you buy. It would be ridiculous to buy a guitar if you hate playing it. I've done this myself. In my experience, I saw a beautiful low brand telecaster on Amazon for £200. I judged it on the finish, and the fact it had an f-hole. So I bought it. It came in about a week later, and although it's not the worst guitar I've played, it's still not comfortable. And the pickups buzz.

We then got onto the subject of budget guitars and high end guitars. According to Andy and Steve, who have experience with companies, there is no difference. It's all the same, except the high end guitars have been more thoroughly checked over. So you're paying £300 more for some guy to stare at it for 20 minutes.

So don't buy a guitar because it's your favourite colour. Buy it for:
-Playability
-Hardware (Even though it's upgradable)
-Suitability
-Maybe a little bit of finish

Moulin Rouge Rehearsal

Today, I've been with the guys rehearsing the scores for the next college musical 'Moulin Rouge'. I'm finding it okay, because I've had a lot of experience sight readying for shows before.

I'm going to be on the floor with the cast. This has brought up the challenge of not being able to have the music in front of me. I'm going to have to memorize all the parts I play, which may be quite difficult. Nevertheless, I'm working hard on it and I'm about 75% of the way there.

It's rather a weird feeling playing the guitar I am for this show. I'm used to playing a strat or some other electric, but for this I'm using a nylon string classical guitar. I chose this so that it would give more of a twangy, Spanish/French kind of sound. It's working well! And it's a really nice sound!

Being a classical guitar, it's meant for finger picking and playing through classical pieces. It's still hard for me to finge rpick, but it's coming along nicely. I've found a lot of things online that help and talk you through the process of different pattern to play.

A bit of subject, but my favourite PlayStation game is called The Last Of Us. The game is about being one of a few survivors left in a world overrun with zombies. The music matches this exactly, as it has such a spacey, desolate feel to it. The composer was Gustavo Santaolalla, who composes for a lot of games. Here's a link to the soundtrack, I think it's beautiful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y97u-U0nvJM

New Practice Regime

I've recently had a complete rethink of my practice regime, and decided I need more structure. So I researched some other guitarists practice regimes, such as John Petrucci and Steve Vai, and came up with this. I'm going to write 2 or 3 sheets and cycle them each week.

On my first time running through this, I'm going to see what works and what doesn't. That way I can filter out the non-useful things and make it perfect.

Until I have a refined version, I've made this an hour long. Once I have more definite things I need to practice, I'm going to extend it.

3 Note Per String Sextuplet Exercize - Video Two

After my last video, I've been practicing this. I only managed to get it 5bpm faster, but it does feel a lot more natural than it did on the first video.

At the end I try it out of my comfort zone at 85bpm, which isn't much faster but it's still enough to throw me. I'm going to keep going at this pace, and once I get it to 100bpm, I'll upload a new video!

Fingerpicking Practice

Seeing as I was put on the acoustic band for Moulin Rouge, I decided it would be a good time to start practicing to fingerpick. I've never been able to do it properly, but I put some practice time aside to focus on it, and learned Ode To Joy.

It's nowhere near fluent yet, but it should be up to a standard in no time!

3 Note Per String Sextuplets Exercise - Video One

Here's a video of me playing the sextuplet exercise I transcribed a few days ago. This is when I really started to incorporate it into my practice regime. As well as this being a good thing to practice anyway, I mainly use it to focus on my picking technique.

I set the metronome to 75bpm, which isn't too fast and isn't too slow. It also seems the right kind of tempo to be able to clearly distinguish between the sextuplets and the 16ths.

Some of you may be able to hear that I seem to have it cleaner when descending. I think this is because of how I'm used to picking. I used to economy pick when ascending, but alternate when descending. I'm not too used to alternate picking while going up the scale, so that's my main area of focus.

I'm going to work on this and hopefully have it up to a better standard in the next few days. I'll try and get it faster too!

Writing in the sun!

Seeing as it is lovely out, I thought I'd grab my guitar and transcribe some new Fenton tracks.

Good plan!

Practice Exercise

This is an exercise I've been using to get my alternate picking up to speed. Using a metronome is extremely useful, and it helps get your ears used to the difference of sextuplets and sixteenths.

You can also vary it, by maybe going up the A major scale in sixteenths, then down the B Dorian in sextuplets. You could also string skip to add even more saucy flavour.

The fun part is whacking on a metronome and seeing how fast you can get it!

Picking Technique

For a while now, I've been practicing my 3 note per string modes to get them up to a decent speed so I feel comfortable using them to improvise. I've managed to get them to a certain level, but I noticed I was hitting a barrier of some kind. After a very eye opening technique lesson from Phi, I found out what this barrier was.

Almost every guitarist is taught to Alternative Pick. This is when you keep your pick going in a constant up/down/up/down motion. It's probably one of the most important things you learn, because it unlocks being able to play note denominations easier. For example, if you were to use nothing but down picks to play 16th notes at a high BPM, you would struggle. Although, punk guitarists are known for only playing down picks, but I'm guessing it took a lot of practice to get down picks that fast. Being able to alternative pick will save stress on your hand and wrist, because it seems to flow better.

During my technique lesson, I was asked to play an A Ionian in sextuplets, slide up to the high E and descend the B Dorian in 16ths. I had no trouble descending, but the fast major runs were throwing me. I struggled keeping up, because of the aforementioned 'barrier'. Phi told me to slow down and really think about my picking, which is when we discovered I wasn't alternative picking, I was Economy Picking.

Economy picking is a weird technique. If you were to play an A Ionian in 3 note per string form, the normal way to pick it would be:




A-B-C#-D-E-F#-G#-A

V ^  V   ^  V  ^     V   ^

What I was doing is this:

 A-B-C#-D-E-F#-G#-A
 V ^   V  V  ^  V  V    ^

(V= Down, ^= Up) 

This means that when I was changing string, I would start the picking system again. This gave me trouble to keep in time, as with alternative picking you can tell that a down pick would be a beat, and an up pick would be the 'And'. Economy picking doesn't follow this system, making it difficult.

I'm currently working on rewiring my brain to make alternative picking my standard technique. It's weird, because I'm so used to my way that it seems alien. It's going to take a lot of focus.

Lazarus Video

I was given this piece to learn for a college assessment. It's originally meant for clarinet, but Phi arranged it for guitar.

I really struggled learning this piece, as the sheet music looked really intimidating. But I eventually learned it and got it up to a performable standard, and here it is.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akrP-Gjgt68&feature=youtu.be

What Makes A Good Musician?

Some people are classed as 'amazing' musicians, even though they aren't as talented on an instrument as others. We were discussing what kind of attributes gives people this kind of name.

One word that came up was 'Innovator'. There are some musicians in the world that have pushed their instrument further than other before. Jaco Pastorius is said to be one of, if not THE, greatest bassist of all time. This is because he took what bass was originally, and completely changed it. He put his own flare on it, and people started using his techniques, meaning he changed the instrument.

'Feel' comes in to play a lot as well. You could be the most technical player, but without having a feel for the music and having your own sound, you would just be shredding notes over some chords (which no one really wants to hear). This ties in nicely with Phrasing. Again, if you were to fill in every single note with licks, it would sound too busy and people would loose interest. Instead, if you pick the perfect spots and notes in a bar, you will gain a lot more than playing 100 notes a second. Although it's much better to pick perfect spots for a solo, there still has to be some technical ability. Putting in little parts of shredding or fast playing can be really effective, to add some flavour.

Probably the most important thing to have is charisma. Having an out there personality will gain you a lot of respect. People love hearing stories of rock stars trashing hotel rooms or something, which gives them more of an opinion. If someone was plain, they would be rated only on their playing. In some cases, like Alan Holdsworth, he is rated only on this. This is a good attribute, because that way that's all that's focused on.

Echo Song Video

Here is the video of me performing Paul Gilbert's 'Echo Song'. I've known this track for a while, and I was asked at college to choose a track to play. I figured this would be the best one to do.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDxR-Q4dTJ4&feature=youtu.be

Lazarus Sheet Music

This is the sheet music for Lazarus. As you can see, I've had to annotate this as it's insane to sight read.

Practice Regime

If you want to get 'good' at your instrument, you're only going to get there with practice. There's good and bad things to practice. As long as you have a decent plan on what you want, you'll be able to structure your practice time effectively to get results.

I tend not to have a plan when I practice. I just go in blind and do the standard exercizes. It's worked for me so far, but now I've noticed that my fingers have only memorized the patters, and learning new shapes would be a better thing to do. I also only play with a click occasionally, which I should do more often.

I think the best plan of action for me would to choose a technique and focus on it for a certain amount of time. Once I have it to a standard, I could then move on to another and so on and so forth. I would like to video a short video when I begin to practice it, then one at the end of the time to see if I have progressed. 

Tears In The Rain Sheet Music

This is what I've been working on for a while. I've been asked to record a video of me playing it, so that will follow shortly.

Tears In The Rain Video

This is me playing Tears In The Rain by Joe Satriani. I was given the sheet music and given some time to play it, and here it is.

I enjoyed playing this piece, as it's not really in my style. It's quite slow and soft. I also added some chorus to it to give it a spacey feel, as playing it with no effects left it quite plain.

I made a few mistakes in this, but I'm hoping to record a better take later this week. I'm going to write a post after I've uploaded some more videos about me being a musical perfectionist.

Here's the link to the video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BT9YxB82xA0&feature=youtu.be