Develop YOUR Sound

[DenverSteve]

I responded to a thread recently that made me think of man vs. guitar. In decades past, musicians frequently had less money and toys. They (I would like to think we) had one guitar that they played and, I believe, that helped shape their signature sound. I see, what I believe, too many young players migrating from guitar to different guitar looking for a sound - instead of learning to make "their sound" with the instrument they have.

You/we likely purchased the instrument you have because you liked the way it played and/or sounded. So now, why not take the time (hours upon hours upon hours - hundreds of them not just today and tomorrow) getting the most out of that guitar? Take the time to set up, tweak, test dozens of strings, picks and techniques - to develop your sound with that instrument instead of (generally incorrectly) hoping that a different instrument will give you something you haven't yet earned - your signature sound.

You see, it's your/our job as a "musician" to get the most out of the instrument. It's not the instrument's job (because it can't) to make you/us a better musician. Someone recently asked what the difference between guitarist and a musician is - I believe that is it. A guitarist plays a guitar. A musician plays - any guitar.

[Toby Walker]

Originally Posted by PastorSteve

I responded to a thread recently that made me think of man vs. guitar. In decades past, musicians frequently had less money and toys. They (I would like to think we) had one guitar that they played and, I believe, that helped shape their signature sound. I see, what I believe, too many young players migrating from guitar to different guitar looking for a sound - instead of learning to make "their sound" with the instrument they have.

You/we likely purchased the instrument you have because you liked the way it played and/or sounded. So now, why not take the time (hours upon hours upon hours - hundreds of them not just today and tomorrow) getting the most out of that guitar? Take the time to set up, tweak, test dozens of strings, picks and techniques - to develop your sound with that instrument instead of (generally incorrectly) hoping that a different instrument will give you something you haven't yet earned - your signature sound.

You see, it's your/our job as a "musician" to get the most out of the instrument. It's not the instrument's job (because it can't) to make you/us a better musician. Someone recently asked what the difference between guitarist and a musician is - I believe that is it. A guitarist plays a guitar. A musician plays - any guitar.

Absolutely, positively agree 110%. Too many times I've heard players blame the guitar or the various bazillion components. If you want to sound good and develop your sound then you have to put in the time... thousands of hours over the years.

Chet Atkins said "There are no shortcuts."

Someone handed Dizzy Gillespie a new horn and told him it 'plays real easy' to which Dizzy replied - 'none of them play easy.'

In the book Outliers, author Malcolm Gladwell says that it takes roughly ten thousand hours of practice to achieve mastery in a field.

Anyone that tells you different is simply making up an excuse for their own lack of discipline. Hard truth but truth it is.

Of course this applies to those that truly want to master their instrument and develop their own sound in the process. For those of you that simply want to enjoy it as a hobby then that's fine.... but as Steve said...

[ukejon]

Originally Posted by Toby Walker

Absolutely, positively agree 110%. Too many times I've heard players blame the guitar or the various bazillion components. If you want to sound good and develop your sound then you have to put in the time... thousands of hours over the years.

Chet Atkins said "There are no shortcuts."

Someone handed Dizzy Gillespie a new horn and told him it 'plays real easy' to which Dizzy replied - 'none of them play easy.'

In the book Outliers, author Malcolm Gladwell says that it takes roughly ten thousand hours of practice to achieve mastery in a field.

Anyone that tells you different is simply making up an excuse for their own lack of discipline. Hard truth but truth it is.

Of course this applies to those that truly want to master their instrument and develop their own sound in the process. For those of you that simply want to enjoy it as a hobby then that's fine.... but as Steve said...

Yup, that's the ticket. I have a wonderful custom guitar....no way to blame the instrument in my case. Plus, the journey of truly getting to know an instrument--in other words, putting in the thousands of hours--teaches you so much more than bopping from one guitar to another.

[jpbat]

Originally Posted by PastorSteve

... migrating from guitar to different guitar looking for a sound

Actually, if you found your sound, you just can take any guitar and sound just like yourself. Funny that.

Originally Posted by PastorSteve

You/we likely purchased the instrument you have because you liked the way it played and/or sounded. So now, why not take the time (hours upon hours upon hours - hundreds of them not just today and tomorrow) getting the most out of that guitar? Take the time to set up, tweak, test dozens of strings, picks and techniques - to develop your sound with that instrument instead of (generally incorrectly) hoping that a different instrument will give you something you haven't yet earned - your signature sound.

You see, it's your/our job as a "musician" to get the most out of the instrument. It's not the instrument's job (because it can't) to make you/us a better musician. Someone recently asked what the difference between guitarist and a musician is - I believe that is it. A guitarist plays a guitar. A musician plays - any guitar.

The sound is not in the guitar.
The sound is actually in the music.

[softballbryan]

I completely agree. You need certain guitars for certain tasks, but after that.....

[MBE]

Absolutely. Many people look for a "quick fix". One of my favorites is when I see a post here about looking for a guitar with a wider/narrower/curvier/flatter/whatever fretboard followed by a statement like "because I just can't get that C chord to ring out cleanly on my current guitar."

Playing chords cleanly is a fundamental beginner skill, period. While I am guilty of having preferences for short scale and narrow nuts, I spent my first half decade as a guitarist playing a 2" wide, 650mm scale classical in the RCM curriculum - and it never occurred to me to blame the instrument if I had trouble, because I could invariably fix that trouble with more practice!

[Pitar]

Influence over originality is the first order of things to straighten out.

Genre has built in impediments to sounding original. The Blues, for one, does not allow for originality. It's a very narrow road guiding progressions of blue-print conventions. No matter how you attempt to reshape it, you sound like everyone else. Or, you develop a style based upon it and it's no longer The Blues. Like soft jazz, you'll water yourself down and lose your mainstream appeal unless your style strikes a popular nerve.

Rock, country, jazz, reggae, folk, bluegrass, etc, are what they are and they are either mutually embraced or repelled. If you choose the latter expect to be working hard at it. I'm in the latter camp only because I'm more at home as a rebel than a conformist, and have gagged down enough of each for a lifetime. Besides, breaking new ground places more of a musical challenge on me where the various genre have moved out of my entertainment cross-hairs.

Indy! That's where the musician dwells. Everyone else is chasing the Pied Piper and playing accordingly.

[RustyZombie]

Originally Posted by MBE

Absolutely. Many people look for a "quick fix". One of my favorites is when I see a post here about looking for a guitar with a wider/narrower/curvier/flatter/whatever fretboard followed by a statement like "because I just can't get that C chord to ring out cleanly on my current guitar."

Playing chords cleanly is a fundamental beginner skill, period. While I am guilty of having preferences for short scale and narrow nuts, I spent my first half decade as a guitarist playing a 2" wide, 650mm scale classical in the RCM curriculum - and it never occurred to me to blame the instrument if I had trouble, because I could invariably fix that trouble with more practice!

Agreed. I am still perplexed when, for example, some people won't use anything but Elixirs because of the string noise. I wonder why they won't just adjust their technique if string noise bothers them that much. I also wonder when being able to avoid learning proper technique became a selling point.

[Pheof]

Music, in general, has become a multi-billion dollar industry today. It rarely has much to do with talent. Think about what talent actually is to you: is it speed? Fluency? Influence? Emotion? Technical ability? The model of guitar you play? The clothes you wear and the image you portray? Something else? Because, let's face it, the industry doesn't employ highly skilled musicians at the age of 55. They only want the 20 yr. olds who can sell an image. Today everything's about Coke vs. Pepsi, Ford vs. Chevy, McDonalds vs. Burger King and Martin vs. Gibson. And if you don't fit the mould, you're not in the game.

Sadly, all the low-hanging fruit has already been picked, and all the styles have been covered numerous times before; there's no place for two or three or four James Taylors. You can fool yourself into believing that talent is a major factor, and to some extent it can be, but the fact is some of the most notable stars of today are built on so many other factors besides just talent, and the really good players are 60 yrs. old and relegated to studio work somewhere in Nashville. You have to practically be a virtuoso to even get recognized, and once you are you're confined to a box full of simplistic formulae in order to create a product that sells.

And so it is with all things today in America. Image is talent. And talent is an irrelevant pipe dream. Don't believe me? List 3 new highly skilled players over the age of 40 who are selling CDs and videos by the millions.

So why do we switch guitars so often? Because talent is useless and fantasies mean everything. If we have the right look, the right sound, use the most popular pick, strap, wear a blue jean jacket with ripped sleeves and can sound like Justin Beiber with his signature Gibson Hummingbird, we think we'll be in the game. it's no coincidence that Country players use Gibsons, Bluegrass players play Martins and modern players and church worship leaders almost always use Taylors.

[rbock]

One of the first questions I asked when I first started playing (and joined this forum) concerned whether it's better to play a variety of guitars or settle on one exclusively. I referred to Derek Trucks and his SG as an example of the latter. Many people responded to the contrary, not just as to one guitar, but also as to the advantages of being a multi-instrumentalist.

The OP makes me realize that seven years later I'm still wondering. Thanks, in part, to my time on AGF, I now own around a dozen guitars. Although I manage to play most of them at least once a week or so, I do find myself gravitating to one or two most of the time.

The choice of what interment to play is usually determined, somewhat, by the style of music being played. Early on in my learning, I was mainly focused on fingerstyle and divided my time, mainly between a Martin OO0-15S, an OM21, and a Gibson B-25. When I started learning slide, I picked up a wood, and later a metal resonator. I got my first electric about the same time.

The last couple of years, I've been more drawn to bluegrass and doing more flat picking. As that interest has grown, I've gone from a $169 Silver Creek D-160 to an Eastman E8D, and for the last year or so, a Martin D-18.

I have little doubt that if I'd started out with the D-18 and played nothing but bluegrass, I'd be a whole lot better than I am now with that kind of playing. On the other hand, I've learned a lot about different genres of music and the variey of instruments available. Most importantly, my interest in playing has never waned; in fact, playing music probably gives me more hours of pleasure each day than it ever has.

I do admire those people who, from the start, have a clear vision of where they're going as well as the good fortune to find the right vehicle to get them there.

[rogthefrog]

The instrument is broadly irrelevant. You are playing it, not the other way around. And there's no end to practice--when your fingers can nail a part 100% of the time, that's when you start to practice making it sound good, expressive, etc.

[Larry Pattis]

That said (the OP), playing the guitar (especially at an advanced level) is a physical activity.

Given that, for best performance (best musicality, that is) it's best have an instrument that is as ergonomically-correct for the player as possible. It's always a collaboration between player and guitar. Bothe elements of this collaboration are relevant.

The right instrument combined with the right efforts (over a looong period of time) make for what *I* consider an optimal experience.

[Toby Walker]

Originally Posted by Pitar

Influence over originality is the first order of things to straighten out.

Genre has built in impediments to sounding original. The Blues, for one, does not allow for originality. It's a very narrow road guiding progressions of blue-print conventions. No matter how you attempt to reshape it, you sound like everyone else. Or, you develop a style based upon it and it's no longer The Blues. Like soft jazz, you'll water yourself down and lose your mainstream appeal unless your style strikes a popular nerve.

Rock, country, jazz, reggae, folk, bluegrass, etc, are what they are and they are either mutually embraced or repelled. If you choose the latter expect to be working hard at it. I'm in the latter camp only because I'm more at home as a rebel than a conformist, and have gagged down enough of each for a lifetime. Besides, breaking new ground places more of a musical challenge on me where the various genre have moved out of my entertainment cross-hairs.

Indy! That's where the musician dwells. Everyone else is chasing the Pied Piper and playing accordingly.

Well I'm going to respectfully disagree with you on that one. There are so many original sounding musicians that have taken those genres and expanded upon them without turning it into something else. Grant you, most players that haven't taken the time, hard work and patience are going to sound like everyone else and there's plenty of them around. But to say what said my only guess is there's a STACK of musicians you probably never heard of before.

[Toby Walker]

Originally Posted by Larry Pattis

That said (the OP), playing the guitar (especially at an advanced level) is a physical activity.

Given that, for best performance (best musicality, that is) it's best have an instrument that is as ergonomically-correct for the player as possible. It's always a collaboration between player and guitar. Bothe elements of this collaboration are relevant.

The right instrument combined with the right efforts (over a looong period of time) make for what *I* consider an optimal experience.

Larry should know. He's a musician's musician.

[Bowie]

Originally Posted by jpbat

Actually, if you found your sound, you just can take any guitar and sound just like yourself. Funny that.



The sound is not in the guitar.
The sound is actually in the music.

I have to disagree with the dismissive comments. If my style involves are crisp attack and I'm playing something that dampens that, my style is not being communicated through the instrument. Just as I can drive a nail in with the butt of a screwdriver but it's not as good as using the right tool for the job.