Quote:
Originally Posted by JonPR
IMO that's the wrong angle to start with. The prime aim should be to play music you enjoy, perhaps with a goal of performing with or to others. "Bettering guitar skills" are just a means to the end.
The only good reason to want to improve your skills is if there is music you want to play but are currently unable to play it. Just improving skills for the sake of it is likely to lead to boredom, and wondering what it's all for.
(Sorry if you take all this for granted - I'm being pedantic!)
|
Jon, you're exactly right. I appreciate your perspective on this. You kinda hit the nail on the head with part of the issue that's keeping me stuck where I'm at without getting where I want to be. I have this fuzzy idea in my head of what I want to sound more like ("playing music I enjoy")...and that is the reason I want to "better my guitar skills." I absolutely don't want to "better my guitar skills" simply for the boring sake of improving them...that would definitely bore me and cause me to peter out...BUT I just don't have a clear idea of how to improve so I'm playing like I want to play.
Maybe part of the issue is my inability to even really put-to-words what I want to sound more like to improve what I enjoy now about playing. The best way I can think of how to explain what I want to improve is just to list specific areas: I love finding new chord voicings, I love chords up high on the neck that work with some open strings, I love the sound of acoustic blues with a pick and then soloing around that, I love blues and jazz chord progressions. And I know that sometimes I just have to try things to find what I like.
I know, too, that there's still a lot of music in these genres out there that I haven't heard, more than just the usual "greats" everyone knows like Hendrix, Clapton, Page, etc.
Like I answered another post on this thread, I do enjoy playing songs I've worked hard on to learn...very much so...and I do learn many things I can carry over into my own style. But I get to a point where I want to learn more HOW they came to create these songs (the theory, scales, etc), rather than just learning to be a parrot and cover their songs...which is a ton of fun too, in its own way. For instance, like when I play the Rain Song by Led Zeppelin...I love it, play it a lot...but it doesn't really carry over a lot into teaching me more things I can use when I'm just messing around. But maybe that's also because I don't mess around a lot with alternate tunings.
Or maybe, like you suggested, I just need to keep moving on to new songs I enjoy if my usual things get a little boring to me. Good point. And maybe part of my difficulty with this is that as a player, I love playing acoustic...but so much of what I listen to is moreso electric guitar. I mean, as long as its playable on acoustic, it doesn't bother me...but I can't do any wild Jimmy Page solos on an acoustic.
Anyway, I appreciate you sharing your thoughts. I do think I need to moreso orient my focus on the music I love, rather than developing skills in isolation. Very good point. But at the same time...if anything I've said above makes sense...I also kinda want to learn the theory/background/techniques that led many great guitarists to create their own songs and styles. And thank you, too, for that emphasis that music is a SOCIAL art, not just a private pursuit - very true, and that's a good point. Thanks again.