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Old 12-13-2017, 08:32 AM
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SprintBob SprintBob is offline
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Default The most challenging plateau (?)

I think most serious musicians would agree that our journey is a sequence of steps where we can advance our skill level to a point where we plateau and then we have to work fairly hard at "moving the ball down the field" (thanks Eric Skye for that one) to the next level we set for ourselves.

I've been playing almost 5 years and I love it, I try to play 3-4 hours a day. I spend most of my playing time (probably 60%) working on solo fingerstyle songs (I'm not a singer so I need a melody!) and the remainder working on my flatpicking skills. I recently committed to recording my playing on a regular basis. Recording and listening to your playing is the true test of whether your presentation is pleasing and musical. And to make sure you are honest, get someone else to listen to it. My wife can be brutally honest for me! I'm finding sounding musical in my playing has become my biggest challenge so far. This is something my teacher and I discuss frequently on every song we work on together.

So I've been giving a lot of thought to how make progress in this area and I've come up with what I think are the areas I need to improve or have more awareness.

Focus - Maintaining focus on the music I am playing and eliminating distractions and the "chatty monkey" inside your head that can intrude and take you away from it.

Finding the "groove" of the song - I can do a pretty good job of staying in time to the beat but to sound musical you have to know when it can be desirable to play slightly ahead of or behind the beat to make the music more appealing to the listener.

String balance - Making sure the picking hand plays the strings with proper balance for the song (i.e. I have a common issue with keeping my thumb from playing the bass notes over the treble notes volume wise such that it is hard to pull out the melody in the presentation).

Dynamics - Knowing when to play softly and when to play with more volume.

Visualization - May not be the right term but being in the song with a technique like humming the melody in your head as you play through the song.

Commitment - Always try to sound musical in your play/practice time even when you are working on woodshed exercises that are mechanical in nature.

Most of the above is mental. I think we all reach a point if we are dedicated to the craft where we have decent mechanical skills to pick and fret the music but we have to develop the skill to get into the song completely and I have found that it is much easier said than done. I am also finding it beneficial to make time to watch video of my favorite fingerstylists to not only hear the music but to watch how their body language engages what they are playing. As a good example, I think Tommy Emmanuel is one of the most visual artists in how much he is inside the music he is playing.

Thought this might be a good discussion to start and share experiences and advice.
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Last edited by SprintBob; 12-13-2017 at 08:58 AM.
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Old 12-13-2017, 08:45 AM
Wrighty Wrighty is offline
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Thanks for sharing this - I can totally relate to all of these and face them daily right now. As an example I have been working on this version of The water is wide;

https://youtu.be/Q-fpX4MzjtU

I feel this really captures the flow and dynamics of this wonderful piece. I don’t think I have worked harder on a piece ever and am still struggling to achieve the flow and the melody balance that he has achieved here (whilst not fluffing any of the notes) - it’s not a particularly complex piece by any means but for me it has captured and demonstrated my weaknesses in timing, flow, dynamics and tone...

Looking forwards to this discussion..
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Old 12-13-2017, 09:05 AM
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Great example Wrighty. I would love to emulate Ed Gerhard's style as he does not play fast and really presents each note he is playing. I just bought one of his songbooks to explore.

Another interesting aspect for me is that I am going back to a lot of the easier and simpler fingerstyle songs I learned early on and finding that I can really make them sound more appealing and interesting by applying what I am currently trying to master. Mark Hanson's Canyon Canon is a good example of a fairly easy fingerstyle arrangement that really works well with dynamics and playing slightly ahead of or behind the beat to make it sound very appealing.
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Froggy Bottom H-12 (Adi/EIR)
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Rainsong APSE 12 Fret (Carbon Fiber)
Taylor 812ce-N 12 fret (Sitka/EIR Nylon)
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Old 12-13-2017, 09:12 AM
6L6 6L6 is offline
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For me the biggest challenge was learning to play fingerstyle while wearing a plastic thumbpick and metal fingerpicks. My college roommate wouldn't teach me unless I wore them!

Once I got it down, there was no going back.
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Old 12-13-2017, 09:40 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 6L6 View Post
For me the biggest challenge was learning to play fingerstyle while wearing a plastic thumbpick and metal fingerpicks. My college roommate wouldn't teach me unless I wore them!

Once I got it down, there was no going back.
I can relate to that. I caught on to the thumbpick fairly quickly and the day I began to get comfortable with fingerpicks (Alaska Piks) was a big improvement in terms of volume and balance.
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Froggy Bottom H-12 (Adi/EIR)
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Rainsong APSE 12 Fret (Carbon Fiber)
Taylor 812ce-N 12 fret (Sitka/EIR Nylon)
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Old 12-13-2017, 10:09 AM
Wrighty Wrighty is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SprintBob View Post
Great example Wrighty. I would love to emulate Ed Gerhard's style as he does not play fast and really presents each note he is playing. I just bought one of his songbooks to explore.



Another interesting aspect for me is that I am going back to a lot of the easier and simpler fingerstyle songs I learned early on and finding that I can really make them sound more appealing and interesting by applying what I am currently trying to master. Mark Hanson's Canyon Canon is a good example of a fairly easy fingerstyle arrangement that really works well with dynamics and playing slightly ahead of or behind the beat to make it sound very appealing.


Me too - just starting on Sehandoah by Doug Young which I feel is a great tune to get that tone / dynamics going on without being too complex.
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Old 12-13-2017, 10:19 AM
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rick-slo rick-slo is offline
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All of the things listed are part of playing with musicality though I don't think you need to sweat doing all of it each time you play something.
Much time is going to be spent in overcoming technical playing issues and in memorization issues (things more analytical than emotive). When
you free yourself of those issues you can then while playing plan and hear ahead of where you are at the moment and therefore anticipate where
you are going (phrasing for musical synthesis).

"Plateaus" are elusive, especially the higher ones where maintenance takes constant work. You can easily fall back off of them.
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Old 12-13-2017, 11:33 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rick-slo View Post
All of the things listed are part of playing with musicality though I don't think you need to sweat doing all of it each time you play something.
Much time is going to be spent in overcoming technical playing issues and in memorization issues (things more analytical than emotive). When
you free yourself of those issues you can then while playing plan and hear ahead of where you are at the moment and therefore anticipate where
you are going (phrasing for musical synthesis).

"Plateaus" are elusive, especially the higher ones where maintenance takes constant work. You can easily fall back off of them.
I agree with your observations. The challenge(s) once you have the song memorized and the mechanics worked out is learning to be consistent with being in the song or to "own" it as many say every time you choose to play it. If I put consideration of the dynamics or experimenting with the groove of the song lower in priority, I believe I need to work on improving focus and relaxation which in tandem could seem to be somewhat opposed to each other. Releasing tension could be another descriptive term that is applicable.
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Doerr Trinity 12 Fret 00 (Lutz/Maple)
Edwinson Zephyr 13 Fret 00 (Adi/Coco)
Froggy Bottom H-12 (Adi/EIR)
Kostal 12 Fret OMC (German Spruce/Koa)
Rainsong APSE 12 Fret (Carbon Fiber)
Taylor 812ce-N 12 fret (Sitka/EIR Nylon)
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