Instrument playing

[earthshine]

Hi! Just finished reading the expanded version of 4hhw, and I'm really impressed by it. Step by step, I'm trying to use the advice in the book in my own life. So here's a thing that intrests me- how can you learn to play an instrument more effective, using the 4HWW methods (or any other tricks to make it easier)? I'm currently playing guitar for about 2 months, and I'm looking for a way to learn quicker and better.

[kamakiri]

Justin Sandercore http://www.justinguitar.com/

His site and lessons are awesome.

[obue]

Most musicians are pretty lousy teachers, which is probably because it's hard to observe yourself and figure out exactly how you do the things you do. High skill is acquired through practice, because there are so many details that you must get a feel for, that can't be accurately described in text.

Your hands must "know" how to move and be positioned to achieve the desired action as economically and accurately as possible. They must figure out exactly how to strike the strings, how to hold the grip firmly while also being relaxed, just how far it is between the frets, between the strings, and so on, and all without you looking and actively thinking about it. I can't think of any other way to get this right other than to practice regularly, because it doesn't help too much to look at someone else doing it - they don't have your hands, so they must do it slightly differently (just think of Django Reinhardt). I've played guitar casually for many years, and even though I've made a lot of progress, I'm still frustrated about not always being able to accurately control dynamics, mute strings, play fast but accurately, and so on.

Those are the types of things you need to learn pretty much from scratch for every instrument. Then there are of course a lot of general music knowledge that you only need to learn once. You need to get a feeling for how scales work, how chords work, how rhythm works and so on. Once again, this is hard to do by simply reading a book on theory - theory is a great starting point, but you need to "think" the scale. You need to be able to instantly translate the intervals you hear in your head to the exact correct number of semitones, much like you have learned to instantly spell a word by just thinking about it. Chords are harder, because they can't really be reduced to individual notes - they only feel like a chord when they are a group. To figure out what chord you're thinking of, you also need to consider the key and the melody and what chords come before and after the current one. These are "translations" that your brain must be able to do with zero hesitation, which once again takes practice. Best method is without doubt to improvise. Through improvisation you learn to understand music much more thoroughly.

[82Benedetto]

Rubbish. Music theory and scales are absolutely useless for guitar; they are a contrived substitute for a proficient ear.

Cut out the garbage and mindless hours of practice (learning scales, practicing them, learning useless theory, chord forms, etc,) and train your ear and practicing putting what you hear to your fingers. That's all that matters.

Most musicians are pretty lousy teachers, which is probably because it's hard to observe yourself and figure out exactly how you do the things you do. High skill is acquired through practice, because there are so many details that you must get a feel for, that can't be accurately described in text.

Your hands must "know" how to move and be positioned to achieve the desired action as economically and accurately as possible. They must figure out exactly how to strike the strings, how to hold the grip firmly while also being relaxed, just how far it is between the frets, between the strings, and so on, and all without you looking and actively thinking about it. I can't think of any other way to get this right other than to practice regularly, because it doesn't help too much to look at someone else doing it - they don't have your hands, so they must do it slightly differently (just think of Django Reinhardt). I've played guitar casually for many years, and even though I've made a lot of progress, I'm still frustrated about not always being able to accurately control dynamics, mute strings, play fast but accurately, and so on.

Those are the types of things you need to learn pretty much from scratch for every instrument. Then there are of course a lot of general music knowledge that you only need to learn once. You need to get a feeling for how scales work, how chords work, how rhythm works and so on. Once again, this is hard to do by simply reading a book on theory - theory is a great starting point, but you need to "think" the scale. You need to be able to instantly translate the intervals you hear in your head to the exact correct number of semitones, much like you have learned to instantly spell a word by just thinking about it. Chords are harder, because they can't really be reduced to individual notes - they only feel like a chord when they are a group. To figure out what chord you're thinking of, you also need to consider the key and the melody and what chords come before and after the current one. These are "translations" that your brain must be able to do with zero hesitation, which once again takes practice. Best method is without doubt to improvise. Through improvisation you learn to understand music much more thoroughly.

[obue]

Rubbish. Music theory and scales are absolutely useless for guitar; they are a contrived substitute for a proficient ear.

Cut out the garbage and mindless hours of practice (learning scales, practicing them, learning useless theory, chord forms, etc,) and train your ear and practicing putting what you hear to your fingers. That's all that matters.

Hey, no reason to be impolite. I respectfully disagree with you, I think a knowledge of music theory helps in all music activities, and an intrinsic feel for scales is also very important to feel that you understand what you're doing. Maybe this is what you mean with a "proficient ear", but remember that EVERY human being has amazing abilities to percieve and understand music and harmony. It takes practice to also be able to express yourself freely with it.

I guess it all depends on what you want to do. It's pretty easy to memorize a few common chords and a few simple songs that you can play with them, but that's not how you become a good guitarist. Compare it to learning to speak a language, vis-a-vis memorizing a few phrases.

[kamakiri]

I would have to jump in and say you are way off base Bene.

The only way you are going to get better at the guitar is by practice. The muscle memory in your hand needs to be there. Learning things like music theory, scales and chord forms are all tools to help that process, and they all pay off in terms of compound interest.

[Tetsuo73]

Rubbish. Music theory and scales are absolutely useless for guitar; they are a contrived substitute for a proficient ear.


I know where you're coming from with the above statement, but absolutely useless is a rather extreme description and far from factual. Ive been playing guitar and bass for more than 20 years. Music theory (including scales) contains the building blocks of music and as such it is essential for being good or at least decent in any instrument (unless you just want to play in your room instead of playing with other musicians who really know their stuff). It took a lot of embarrassments to learn that lesson. A good ear can never be hindered by music theory, so aspiring musicians take several steps backward when they see those as exclusive terms. Your ear can still figure out what's going on without theory eventually, but it will take longer to understand and internalize and (even worse) it will take you much more time to share and communicate solid musical ideas with serious musicians. So my advice, use both the theory and your ear training and use them wisely. Yes, you shouldn't get lost in a sea of scales that you never take time to listen to the music itself. But don't dismiss theory as useless when it makes it easier to understand and reproduce what you listen to.

[fro88z]

Tetsuo73,

Here is a tip I learned from the shredder Michael Angelo.

It is warm up for the fret board hand. The pinky ring and middle fingers tend to be weakest so use those first and you are ready to play.

Do a single step chromatic scale with each finger picking on the descent to from the low E to high E with pick then hammer, then reverse using pick then pulling off. Difficult for me to explain perhaps there is a U-tube video of it.

Using this my warm-up time has shortened by 80%

Eugene

[Tetsuo73]

Fro88z,

Don't worry, you explained yourself perfectly. Interesting exercise. I would love to hear more about ways people use to reduce the technical and learning gap when it comes to music.

Damn, that Michael Angelo is fast along with guys like Impelliteri. An exercise like that could result in hand injury if overdone precisely because of the lack of strength in those 2 fingers, but I can also see its benefit if applied sporadically. Thanks for that.