How Effective is your Learning Strategy?

[Le5pau1]

Hi all, I am currently working on my dissertation for the University of Surrey. I am a music performance student specialising in classical guitar.

The title of my paper is:

"A Comparison of Teaching Styles, Which is the Most Effective for Learning Classical Guitar: The Suzuki Method, Dalcroze Eurhythmics or Gordon's Theory of Audiation.

You would all be helping me out MASSIVELY if you could complete this short questionnaire I have conducted. This will lead me closer to finding out my penultimate answer, and also I am very interested to hear your responses.

NAMES WILL NOT BE ASSOCIATED TO THE ANSWERS WITHOUT PERMISSION.

Thank you all so much in advance, I look forward to the responses

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar?
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition?
3. How long have you been playing?
4. What grade are you at guitar if any?
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three?
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start?
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand?
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect.
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar?


NOTE: It may be easier for you to copy and paste this list and and place your answer after each question.

P.S I'm new to this forum so if this post is in the wrong section then please tell me!

[riffmeister]

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 8
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? had teachers early on
3. How long have you been playing? 50+ years
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? unknown
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? all three, but most auditory
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? yes
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? early on, never. later in life, almost always
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect. sometimes, and I almost always employ my own fingering
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. weeks
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? music soothes the savage beast

[Red_Label]

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 16
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? Self taught, but did major in classical guitar later-on
3. How long have you been playing? 32 years
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? not sure... have performed difficult repetoire at weddings, churches, nightclubs, etc
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? auditory
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? learned to read as a CG major years after I started learning by ear
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? sometimes once or twice, sometimes many times
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect. yes
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. sometimes for a while, sometimes right to the next piece
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? it is my drug and my life's love... something that so engrosses me that all of my focus is on playing when I'm doing so

[LadysSolo]

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 11
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? self-taught
3. How long have you been playing? 50 years, off and on
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? advanced beginner
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? Kinaesthetic and visual
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? I already knew how to read music before I started guitar (played piano)
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? rarely
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches etc. Sometimes
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks etc. days
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? It relaxes me.

[dkstott]

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 11
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? lessons and self taught
3. How long have you been playing? 45+ years
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? Imtermediate
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? Mixture
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? 1st guitar lesson included reading music
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? numerous times
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect. Always add improvisation to make it my own
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. Days., weeks, months.. depends on the piece
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? it is relaxing

[MC5C]

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 12 years old
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? Tution for 15 years total
3. How long have you been playing? 46
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? None, didn't go that route
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? All three, but I learn new music from notation and listening. In a group session I learn from watching the other players.
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? Day one was learning how to read on the guitar, but I already knew how to read music (grade 5 recorder lessons in grade school)
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? Not a big part of my learning new pieces. I already tend to know the gist of the tune.
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect. Always. I never play a piece "straight" (Jazz, don't you know...)
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. Weeks. It takes me a very long time to learn a new piece.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? Honestly, the physicality of the instrument itself. I just like guitars.

[Jdansti]

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 13.
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? Self taught.
3. How long have you been playing? 40 years.
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? Intermediate.
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? All three.
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? I learned to read music at the age of 11 before I started playing guitar.
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? Several times.
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect. Occasionally.
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. Days.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? It's fun.

[Le5pau1]

Thanks everyone for the great responses if I could get a few more that would be perfect!

[LarryVe]

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? Around 18 or 19
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? Self
3. How long have you been playing? 15 years
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? Intermediate
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? Mixture
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? No. Never.
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? Like 3 or 4
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect. Yes, I try to add my own twist.
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. Around 10 to 15 times. Depending on the piece, few days after learning.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? It relaxes me and it helps others relax also.

[Paraclete]

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 13
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? handful of folk lessons, two years of blues guitar, self-taught on classical
3. How long have you been playing? on guitar, 29
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? no idea. Unconsciously competent on most all instruments I play.
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? all three in combination. Not sure I can separate those components, but classically probably lean more toward visual
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? classically trained on violin from age 6, so already proficient at music when I started guitar. Taught myself how to read as it related specifically to classical guitar
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? usually sightread through it. If it is a piece to be prepared for performance, I'll go back and listen to different versions of it.
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches etc. not on classical so much, as I primarily play it for the discipline. Fingerstyle acoustic and blues, absolutely.
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks etc. depends on the type of piece. I'll work on several different etudes, preludes, exercises at a time, usually only one sonata-type piece at a time. That is a throwback to violin training.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? Cant live without playing music. I've tried, and it made me depressed, angry, hopeless. Guitar, specifically, is a more encompassing instrument (kind of like piano) compared to violin or other solo-specific instruments


Best of luck on your paper!

[Mr. Scott]

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 14
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? Both.
3. How long have you been playing? 50+ years.
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? Unknown.
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? All three but mainly auditory.
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? Learned to read after 47 years.
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? That depends on its complexity and/or whether I'm reading the piece or not.
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches etc. That depends on the piece and the context in which I'm playing it.
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks etc. That depends on how long it takes me to learn the piece.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? It's fun, I enjoy it.

[oldtimeblues]

My father was a big band reed player and showed up in my bedroom with a clarinet when I was 5 years old and said, You have a lesson Tuesday. So I started right off reading music which helped quite a bit years later when I started studying classical. But I lost interest in the clarinet and everybody was playing guitars and my dad had a friend with a guitar studio and I quicly realized I don't like playing music adults like and before you know it I was Johnny B. Goode.

The rock and roll scene really strung me out so I got away and started studiying classical guitar. Got my head cleared and was all set up with a teacher in Spain, but it just wasn't my style. I like to improvise and hate playing anything which I could make a mistake.

My favorite way to practice is just to start with a scale. I studiedIndian music for a while so all the modes are pretty normal to me but I spend 99% in just one mode in one key. And I work that scale a rythmically sort of, In Indian music they call it an alap. Then I add rhythm for structure.

I don't like forcing children to play because it came so naturally to me, yet none of my children play. I play because my father made me and I fell in love with music when I listened to him at one of his gigs.

The way I practice and the best way to teach guitar improvisation is to make it a game with rules. In Indian music a student is forced to play nothing but scales all day and night long, and if they catch you improvising you get scolded. In African Blues, one of the rules is you can never play more than three consecutive notes in the scale (because the instruments are primative and once you play the whole scale in sequence it's like showing how to do a magic trick) so practicing scales does you little good.

well, you asked!

[creamburmese]

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? in my 50's
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? tuition- private lessons
3. How long have you been playing? 3y
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? Don't do grades, but at about grade V+
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? all 3 -
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? Already read music from piano
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? a couple of times and again as I start to refine it
8. Do you often embellish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches etc. I do alter tempo and rhythms, particularly in non classical pieces, but otherwise it's all in the interpretation
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks ect. Weeks. I usually have 3 pieces I'm working on - one that's being refined, onestart a new one when I'm at the stage on the last one that I've memorized it but it still needs a lot of work
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? I started it because it is a great way to escape from everyday troubles, and I have continued because I love being able to make music

[savagetofu]

Questionnaire

1. At what age did you start learning guitar? 15
2. Are you self taught or did you receive tuition? self taught first 3 years, then two years of Jazz lessons/learning the William Levitt method volume 1, followed by 2 years of classical lessons at a university. Currently, taking flamenco lessons for the last two years with no intention to stop. I'd like to go back to university and finish performance degree in guitar.
3. How long have you been playing? 22 years
4. What grade are you at guitar if any? E for effort
5. Are you a kinaesthetic, auditory, visual learner, or a mixture of the three? mostly auditory
6. Did you learn to read music straight away? If not, how many years into your playing did you start? No, although I took piano and saxophone lessons as a kid. I learned to read music for guitar during jazz lessons, about 3 or 4 years after playing guitar.
7. When learning a new piece, how often would you listen to it beforehand? often. I'll record myself to hear what I need to improve,also.
8. Do you often embell'ish a piece once you've learnt it? Improvise over it, alter rhythms, pitches ect.Depends, sometimes I want to play something exactly as intended. Other times, I do all thee above...
9. How often would you practice a piece before learning another? Days, weeks I practice more than one peice usually but, typically my focus is on one peice for weeks or even months. It's funny, because sometimes I find myself practicing anything else but the peice I am supposed to.
10. What do you enjoy most about playing guitar? Creativity. I like to write music. The feeling you get from creating something is akin to runners high. It is also challenging. Lifetime to master & probably I never will. It is mysteriously otherworldly, yet so grounding.

Good luck!