Guest JackButler Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Guitar As A Lifestyle(Observations, Rants and Ramblings gathered from the last 30 Years.) I've been spending a lot of time (as usual) playing the guitar and just as much time with music on my mind...not just scales and runs and licks and what not; but thinking about music and how its intertwined into the fabric of my life, my very being and by default..the lives of my children and those around me. I've also been thinking about things I've observed and read.. from things heard from other guitarist and students..to things on the internet boards and music press... I actually lose sleep some nights because I can't turn all the music swirling around in my head off! LOL! First off..I think one needs to do frequent self-analysis..HONEST..self evaluations...for starters how about "what kind of guitarist/player/musician do I want to be?" or "At my current stage in life, what are my musical aspirations or goals?" To be honest with yourself..brutally honest..isn't always easy. "What kind of player am I/do I want to be?" Are you wanting to be a fulltime professional or a hobbyist? Do you want to practice and study music, technique and devote a life to mastery of your chosen instrument or am I content to know just a few basic chords and a few licks and play only for my own enjoyment?***Note: there are no right or wrong choices..only what's right for you...I see all kinds in my "day to day" as a teacher... I see people who want to learn something new everyday..some devour the information..some take nibbles.. I see those content with merely owning an instrument rather than devoting time to study/practice..I see some that revel in learning songs from their childhood or teen years..and I even have a few students that are little more than glorified babysitting....I see some who are content to come in and show me the next piece that they'll buy and add to their collection and I've seen some come in and wrestle with the same guitar for years, week in and week out and never want anymore. I will say that many times I see someone always looking for the magic whatever...that new axe or amp or stomp box or pickup that will give them THE tone or unlock the mysteries of the musical universe to them..they buy and collect in lieu of spending time slumped over an instrument and putting some time in. Sometimes the problem for us is distinguishing the difference between "jamming" and "practice". "Jamming" is noodling.. running through the same things that you've had in your trick bag for forever..the things that you can recycle over and over in mindless combination..in any key..whenever you choose...its not wrong or bad.. in fact, out of this you can stumble across new things and new ideas. Often I'll pick a day to noodle. I'll get my hands somewhat warmed up and then just start to noodle for a few hours on end. Eventually I'll get to a point where I know I've exhausted the entire trick bag...turned it upside down and emptied it completely out..and then I'll sit and stare at the neck and think to myself.."now..what else can I do?...where else can I go?"***Think of it like this....all the music that has ever been written or that ever will be created, written or played..from the beginning or time until the end of it..its all right there on the neck in front of you..just waiting for you to find it. Practice is regimented study to accomplish a specific goal.. whether its just to better your musicianship in general or to work on a specific technique, mechanic or maybe learn a new song to add to a set. I find that most feel that they don't get enough out of their practice time on any given day. Learning to budget your practice time, whether its an hour or more or even less; is usually why most feel that they're practice sessions aren't productive enough. An example of budgeting out this time would be like this...let's say you have an hour.. pick four things you want to work on and devote a good hard 15 minutes to each..if you do this for four days..that's an hour's worth of time (and hopefully progress) spent in each of the four areas you want to improve! This is far more productive than shedding time on one thing for an hour and then another thing the next day and then on and on.. By budgeting your practice out, you'll make progress in many different areas and stay well rounded. Technique...there I said it..the "dirty" word...the amount of time spent on the internet arguing the pros and cons of technique is phenomenal! The bickering and bashing between the "haves" and "have nots".. between the "wants" and "want nots"...WOW!... It is my opinion that knowing chords, scales and theory...those are like adding words to your vocabulary...hopefully as we get older, we express ourselves better than when we were small children.. Techinique or the physical mastery over one's instrument would be like learning how to link those words into sentences, phrases and paragraphs in better ways... again, for me.. the better my hands respond..the more knowledge of music and of my instrument..the easier it is to get the sounds I hear in my head to become reality.. The argument or slam against "schooled" musicians/guitarists has almost always been .."they all sound the same".. for me..the blame wouldn't fall on these schools, but on the players.. for lack of imagination... knowing all the theory in the world or possessing great technique IS NOT a pre-requesite for being OR making a great musician. To quote Matt Smith, "Virtuosity isn't required." But you can't blame someone's lack of imagination on anything or anyone, BUT themselves. Truth of all of this is... some use it as an excuse to NOT practice and work on technique and others use technique as a CRUTCH and hide behind it to make up for a lack of originality. Some of this lack of originality comes from bad listening habits... we all have our favorites and seldom stray from form or genre to sample other styles or stylist. A lot of this comes from imitation of our heroes to the point where we only listen to just a handful of musicians and become carbon copies or at the worst..parodies. Maybe try listening to vocalists or saxophonists to pick up little phrasing and slurring things...the way they pause or stop to take a breath before the next phrease or their vibrato...or listen to drummers to pick different ways to accent, synchopate, subdivide or break up the beat or rhythm. This being said..NO ONE is truly original..EVERYONE has taken something from someone. If you do choose the life of a professional musician..constantly assess yourself and your situation.. and then do something and everything to set yourself apart from the rest of the pack..being "original" in this day and age is truly hard to pull off..but think and observe and attack from every angle possible.. If you want to be a studio musician or hired gun or sideman type of player..you may want to consider the market in which you live and possibly moving to a bigger market/town/area. One with lots of recording activity or media happenings..but lets say you're wanting to be a singer/songwriter type or just push your own original material..then maybe bigger isn't better..maybe you'd get lost in the shuffle and so maybe staying where you're at and just slugging away is better..doing your best to make your star shine and be noticed where ever you are...do you want to be rich or do you want to be famous?..do you want to make a living doing music?...or would it suck all of the fun out of it for you?...So what is the point to all of this? I'm not completely sure..lol.. maybe to start some conversation amongst the different styles, genres, sides and viewpoints..intelligent conversation..understanding and tolerance..self analysis..self assessment and self inventory...understanding of one's own honest musical self.
SteveB Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Great post Kevin. I'm been going through that process of "what is it I want out of music" quite a bit lately, and at least have decided that no matter what the thing I need to do is improve my playing and ear. So, everytime I get GAS, I ask myself how the new guitar or amp will improve my playing. The answer is pretty much "well, it won't because the gear I have now is fine, especially for woodshedding". Its too easy to think "Well, I can't practice that until I have this particular guitar", which is BS of course. You just gotta slap the inner gearhead around sometimes. And the truth is there are way better places to put my money than into music gear. Like Lessons for example. I'm planning to hookup with both a swing/gypsy teacher and a flamenco guy here in town shortly, move into some new directions. I wonder what Gypsy swing sounds like through cranked Mesas?
MCChris Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Guitar As A Lifestyle(Observations, Rants and Ramblings gathered from the last 30 Years.) I've been spending a lot of time (as usual) playing the guitar and just as much time with music on my mind...not just scales and runs and licks and what not; but thinking about music and how its intertwined into the fabric of my life, my very being and by default..the lives of my children and those around me. I've also been thinking about things I've observed and read.. from things heard from other guitarist and students..to things on the internet boards and music press... I actually lose sleep some nights because I can't turn all the music swirling around in my head off! LOL! First off..I think one needs to do frequent self-analysis..HONEST..self evaluations...for starters how about "what kind of guitarist/player/musician do I want to be?" or "At my current stage in life, what are my musical aspirations or goals?" To be honest with yourself..brutally honest..isn't always easy. "What kind of player am I/do I want to be?" Are you wanting to be a fulltime professional or a hobbyist? Do you want to practice and study music, technique and devote a life to mastery of your chosen instrument or am I content to know just a few basic chords and a few licks and play only for my own enjoyment?***Note: there are no right or wrong choices..only what's right for you...I see all kinds in my "day to day" as a teacher... I see people who want to learn something new everyday..some devour the information..some take nibbles.. I see those content with merely owning an instrument rather than devoting time to study/practice..I see some that revel in learning songs from their childhood or teen years..and I even have a few students that are little more than glorified babysitting....I see some who are content to come in and show me the next piece that they'll buy and add to their collection and I've seen some come in and wrestle with the same guitar for years, week in and week out and never want anymore. I will say that many times I see someone always looking for the magic whatever...that new axe or amp or stomp box or pickup that will give them THE tone or unlock the mysteries of the musical universe to them..they buy and collect in lieu of spending time slumped over an instrument and putting some time in. Sometimes the problem for us is distinguishing the difference between "jamming" and "practice". "Jamming" is noodling.. running through the same things that you've had in your trick bag for forever..the things that you can recycle over and over in mindless combination..in any key..whenever you choose...its not wrong or bad.. in fact, out of this you can stumble across new things and new ideas. Often I'll pick a day to noodle. I'll get my hands somewhat warmed up and then just start to noodle for a few hours on end. Eventually I'll get to a point where I know I've exhausted the entire trick bag...turned it upside down and emptied it completely out..and then I'll sit and stare at the neck and think to myself.."now..what else can I do?...where else can I go?"***Think of it like this....all the music that has ever been written or that ever will be created, written or played..from the beginning or time until the end of it..its all right there on the neck in front of you..just waiting for you to find it. Practice is regimented study to accomplish a specific goal.. whether its just to better your musicianship in general or to work on a specific technique, mechanic or maybe learn a new song to add to a set. I find that most feel that they don't get enough out of their practice time on any given day. Learning to budget your practice time, whether its an hour or more or even less; is usually why most feel that they're practice sessions aren't productive enough. An example of budgeting out this time would be like this...let's say you have an hour.. pick four things you want to work on and devote a good hard 15 minutes to each..if you do this for four days..that's an hour's worth of time (and hopefully progress) spent in each of the four areas you want to improve! This is far more productive than shedding time on one thing for an hour and then another thing the next day and then on and on.. By budgeting your practice out, you'll make progress in many different areas and stay well rounded. Technique...there I said it..the "dirty" word...the amount of time spent on the internet arguing the pros and cons of technique is phenomenal! The bickering and bashing between the "haves" and "have nots".. between the "wants" and "want nots"...WOW!... It is my opinion that knowing chords, scales and theory...those are like adding words to your vocabulary...hopefully as we get older, we express ourselves better than when we were small children.. Techinique or the physical mastery over one's instrument would be like learning how to link those words into sentences, phrases and paragraphs in better ways... again, for me.. the better my hands respond..the more knowledge of music and of my instrument..the easier it is to get the sounds I hear in my head to become reality.. The argument or slam against "schooled" musicians/guitarists has almost always been .."they all sound the same".. for me..the blame wouldn't fall on these schools, but on the players.. for lack of imagination... knowing all the theory in the world or possessing great technique IS NOT a pre-requesite for being OR making a great musician. To quote Matt Smith, "Virtuosity isn't required." But you can't blame someone's lack of imagination on anything or anyone, BUT themselves. Truth of all of this is... some use it as an excuse to NOT practice and work on technique and others use technique as a CRUTCH and hide behind it to make up for a lack of originality. Some of this lack of originality comes from bad listening habits... we all have our favorites and seldom stray from form or genre to sample other styles or stylist. A lot of this comes from imitation of our heroes to the point where we only listen to just a handful of musicians and become carbon copies or at the worst..parodies. Maybe try listening to vocalists or saxophonists to pick up little phrasing and slurring things...the way they pause or stop to take a breath before the next phrease or their vibrato...or listen to drummers to pick different ways to accent, synchopate, subdivide or break up the beat or rhythm. This being said..NO ONE is truly original..EVERYONE has taken something from someone. If you do choose the life of a professional musician..constantly assess yourself and your situation.. and then do something and everything to set yourself apart from the rest of the pack..being "original" in this day and age is truly hard to pull off..but think and observe and attack from every angle possible.. If you want to be a studio musician or hired gun or sideman type of player..you may want to consider the market in which you live and possibly moving to a bigger market/town/area. One with lots of recording activity or media happenings..but lets say you're wanting to be a singer/songwriter type or just push your own original material..then maybe bigger isn't better..maybe you'd get lost in the shuffle and so maybe staying where you're at and just slugging away is better..doing your best to make your star shine and be noticed where ever you are...do you want to be rich or do you want to be famous?..do you want to make a living doing music?...or would it suck all of the fun out of it for you?...So what is the point to all of this? I'm not completely sure..lol.. maybe to start some conversation amongst the different styles, genres, sides and viewpoints..intelligent conversation..understanding and tolerance..self analysis..self assessment and self inventory...understanding of one's own honest musical self.I just like to get stoned and play my guitar.
kizanski Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 You don't know how much I needed to read that today.Well said, ZR.Hey dickhead....thats what I FRIGGIN SAID!!!!ROTFLMAO!!!I never feel any love....Who the f*kk listens to a f*kkin' word YOU say?Honestly.Who?Name someone.I got your love right here.
Nuclear Wessel Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 My Jackson and some of my Hamers make me play better than I really do, so I've learned to buy guitars to compensate for deficiencies in musicianship.
ZR Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Kevin, Uh...thats what I FRIGGIN SAID!!!!ROTFLMAO!!!I never feel any love....
Guest JackButler Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Kevin, Uh...thats what I FRIGGIN SAID!!!! ROTFLMAO!!! I never feel any love.... ZR, I got mad love fo' you dawg!
edgar_allan_poe Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHKevin, it was Intellishred that made me want to get lessons. Thanks bro...
Bruiser Brody Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Well said Kev. I like the 'imagination' comment! So true!! I like the parodying yer fave players comment too! I'm guilty of that..just ask Brookshire! Reminds me of a Tommy E (oh no..not again!ha) clinic I was at a few years back and he was talking about about meeting Chet Atkins face to face for the first time and he played abuncha of Atkins tunes to Chet. Chet told him not to be a cheap imitation of him..do yer own thing. For me right now, I've run outta tunes I want to learn by other artists and have been focusing on my own stuff. It's nice to have a sack fulla great players tunes under yer fingers and get at least some of that technique down but for me, I'm using what I've learned woodshedding that stuff for my own material. There's no money in acoustic playing to speak of. I do it cause I love it. Some folks just want to play out and never strive to be a better player, write songs or even practice and that's cool too. For some, it's a "Look at me! I rawk!" chest-pounding ego thing. That's what music is about..do whatever ya want with it the best it suits you. My goal is to become the best player that I can be. It still turns me on to come up with a new melody, chord progression whatever and I still get the same high from that as I did when I was a kid. I guess when you lose that, well..it's over!
shredmeister Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 Can you say "THE NEVER ENDING MORPHING THREAD" HEHEHEHEHEHEHE!
ZR Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 The same feeling as when I was a kid Bruiser? That would be me playing some basic chords plugged straight into my Superscope (subsidiary of Marantz) cassette tape deck while paused in the record mode. With the Tape Monitor of the Marantz receiver engaged it became my Marshall stack (sort of). This was even better though because you could look at the recording level controls on "10" and see yourself playing by watching the needles peg themselves mercilessly against the far right of the lighted VU meters!! My friend had a Pioneer deck and of course they were known for having a more tube-like tone. I wonder what it would sound like now? I have the same guitar (my first electric) and the same cassette deck and same receiver in the closet...hmmmm....time to RAWK!!!!
Bruiser Brody Posted March 7, 2007 Posted March 7, 2007 The same feeling as when I was a kid Bruiser? HA! Yeah..for me it was a BC Rich Platinum series cheap guitar, Peavey Butcher full stack recording riffs to some no-name Japanese jambox and soloing over 'em. I know...wayyyyy too much wattage but fukk, I had fun.
black magic Posted March 7, 2007 Author Posted March 7, 2007 Jack, Gregs comment is actually right on the money. I am taking lessons from a great guy who lives in Swissvale. He makes his living teaching guitar, and he is fantastic. He charges $20 a lesson which IMHO is very reasonable. He is a graduate of Duquesne music school and really knows his shit. Right now we are working on technique, and improvisation. I couldn't be happier and he has really taken my playing to new levels.http://www.chadbecks.com/Take this comment the way it is intended Jack. You know I am your friend.The problem isn't the guitar. It is your technique. Until you solve the technique problem, there is really no way to tell what guitar best suits your playing. IMHO that is where your problem lies. Trust me bro, I had absolutely no idea how terrible I was before I started taking lessons. It is an eye opening and humbling experience, but worth every penny. I also know that you are bothered by CTS, this will help.You have been to my house when it was packed with 20+ guitars. I now own a grand total of 2 electrics, and I couldn't be happier. Just my 2 cents.Well said Rob. I totally agree with you and others on here. As for being brutally honest, I just want to be a decent home player or maybe jam in private with a few buds. Jack.
MCChris Posted March 8, 2007 Posted March 8, 2007 On to the next topic.OK. How about this one?The public posting of private messages by anyone for any reason is incredibly bad form. The next time it happens, that person's message board privileges will be suspended.Anybody have issue with that?
ZR Posted March 8, 2007 Posted March 8, 2007 THREAD ABORT! THREAD ABORT! MAYDAY, MAYDAY!!Wow, Jack, I think you're over reacting here. I don't think what Greg wrote originally was meant to be taken so extremely. All this talk about kickin' ass and stuff is childish. You've brought some of this on yourself by all this custom guitar talk all the time. Every guitar that comes up for sale is your new dream guitar. Even after ordering your dream Jackson it was up for sale in short order on this board. Sorry, that's not really my business anyway but I'm just trying to point out what you might not know. You can do whatever you want and that's fine. It's your money and your life. What you do with guitars is fine. But, just know that your actions can make a difference in how people perceive you. The way you're talking right now isn't helping either.
cmatthes Posted March 8, 2007 Posted March 8, 2007 On to the next topic.OK. How about this one?The public posting of private messages by anyone for any reason is incredibly bad form. The next time it happens, that person's message board privileges will be suspended.Anybody have issue with that?Agreed 100%.There will be none of that crap. You know better that that - be nice or go away.
BCR Greg Posted March 9, 2007 Posted March 9, 2007 Jack, I got your message and I still love you.Get a hold of me for a priceout and well get you a guitar!
Brooks Posted March 9, 2007 Posted March 9, 2007 Well said Kev. I like the 'imagination' comment! So true!! I like the parodying yer fave players comment too! I'm guilty of that..just ask Brookshire!There's no money in acoustic playing to speak of. I do it cause I love it. That's what music is about..do whatever ya want with it the best it suits you.steve, i am really impressed w/ your fingerstyle playing. i bust balls, but usually its just returning fire, as you are the ball buster extrordinare!kevins comments, esp this one; ... some use it as an excuse to NOT practice and work on technique and others use technique as a CRUTCH and hide behind it to make up for a lack of originality.i think this is right on the money. steve, "guilty" or not of studying TE's music in the last few years, ya did it because you love it. it's not a crutch in your case, you've written & recorded a buncha originals in the past. its all good! do what you love. i love playing out locally. my chops stopped developing years ago. thats ok, i love to play. do what you love.
Bruiser Brody Posted March 9, 2007 Posted March 9, 2007 do what you love. i love playing out locally. my chops stopped developing years ago. thats ok, i love to play. do what you love. All you need is love.
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