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Defeating the Scary Guitar Clown

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Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

If you are in my age range or better then you may remember IT. IT was a millennia-old creepy space alien featured in the 1986 Stephen King novel of the same name, and a TV miniseries in 1990. IT manifested itself to the neighborhood children in the form of a circus clown. IT would appear in a benevolent clown form and woo the neighborhood children with laughter and promises of balloons and parties, and then when he had their confidence would morph into a scary clown and steal them away to a creepy underground bunker.

In the novel and film the surviving neighborhood kids grew up and came home to band together and defeat IT once and for all … or so they thought. The fact is, in teaching guitar to beginners and up for some years now, I have found that IT is hanging around my studio. He pops up all over the place. For example, when providing feedback on technique refinements I often hear responses such as, “I’m trying, but IT (“my hand”) wants to do it this way,” or “IT wants to tense up when I try to move that fast,”, or “IT (the pick) shifts around when I try to hold IT this way.” “IT (my thumb) wants to hook ITself over the top of the neck.” “IT (my pinkie) wants to curl up into a popcorn shrimp when I make a fifth chord.”

Indeed. Creepy IT seems to be the number one barrier to progress for many students of guitar. This need not be so, because the fact is … there is no IT. There is only YOU. YOU are the Scary Guitar Clown. It is YOU who is permitting excess tension, allowing the fingers to fly and flop around chaotically, plowing the pick through the strings like a bulldozer, allowing mental focus to drift, and generally making the hands and fingers wrestle against the strings rather then dance with them.

If you like your IT you can keep IT! However, if you want maximum results in the shortest possible time then you will have to deal IT a crushing death blow sooner rather than later. The first step in conquering IT is to acknowledge that IT is YOU. If your fingers are doing anything at all other than totally relaxing, then YOU are doing it. Apart from direct physical manipulation by someone or something other than you, your fingers can not do anything except exactly what your brain tells them to do. Pinkies do not curl up into a tight ball on their own. Likewise, if you are locking up your wrist and clamping too firmly on the pick during rhythm strokes, it is YOU tightening up the forearm muscles that control the wrist. YOU are doing that, not IT! So take responsibility and avoid passing the blame to IT!

Now let us discuss for a minute why IT gets the blame for so much technique chaos. We come from the factory equipped with several levels of control over the muscular systems. Level 1 is the autopilot mode. The heart, for example, will continue to beat at the set tempo regardless of our consciousness of it or efforts to manipulate it through focused attention. Level 2 is the autopilot with manual override. The eyelids are a good example of this one. When we are awake they close and open without any conscious attention, and when we sleep they remain closed. However, we may at any time take full control of them, either blinking, holding open, or holding closed as we prefer, until we release them back into the control of the autopilot mode. Then we have the skeletal muscles on Level 3. They run mostly in manual mode with autopilot override for special circumstances, such as the knee jerk reaction when the leg responds to a strike to the knee joint.

Then we have the fingers. How do we label the control mode of the fingers? I think most entry level guitarists would say something like, “Manual mode until I try to play guitar, then Scary Guitar Clown mode,” by which they mean that it seems impossible to fully control the fingers when trying to manipulate them individually, when IT appears to take over. Is this really true? It is partially true and partially not true. The fingers run on a mix of all the above modes, but mostly on manual control. If you don’t think they have an autopilot override, try putting them on a hot stove burner and you will see how quick they go into autopilot override.

So how does this examination help us to defeat the Scary Clown Mode? We must understand four important things about the control of the fingers:

(1) The default control mode of the fingers is a hybrid of manual control of the fingers as a group, with autopilot control of the other fingers when trying to use one independently.  To illustrate, put the tips of all four fingers downward facing on the edge of a table and then use the other hand to curl the pinky until the tip touches the palm. It is quite easy, with no strain on the knuckles, muscles, or skin. Now try to do that same test with your fingers free from outside constraints, using only the control offered by your mind. You will observe that the ring finger follows along with the pinky, no matter how hard you try to separate the two. Why does this happen? Mechanically the two are completely independent. It is the default programming of the brain making the ring finger follow the pinky. The default program is to use the fingers as a group. This is great for grasping things firmly, but it is totally contrary to what we need to do as guitarists. This is the deadly IT of which we speak, and the one we must overcome in order to develop a great command over guitar technique.

(2) In addition to the limited degree of manual independent control we have over the fingers by default, we can cultivate greater individual finger control through focused repetition of specific movements. This is why scale practice should always be near the top of your guitar practice priorities. Scale practice is not simply a tool to remember note placement. Among other things, if done correctly it is the most powerful technique improvement tool available. With enough practice we can not only cultivate finger independence, but we can actually reprogram the autopilot portion of our finger control so that it does new things in autopilot mode, such as play through scales accurately and efficiently. This is the secret of mastering guitar technique. It is important to note here that we are reprogramming the autopilot every time we practice, regardless of whether we are practicing great technique, good technique, or slop. This is why it is important to pay attention to the details while practicing scales!

(3) Regarding the pick hand, it is very important to understand that you have already spent many years cultivating an alternate autopilot program that takes over when you attempt to exercise fine control over the pick hand – writing. Writing is similar to picking, but not the same, so when you allow the writing autopilot to take over when you go to pick, you will have poor control over the pick.

(4) Ultimately, we DO in fact have a great degree of control over individual fingers, but we must consciously choose to exert this control in defiance of the default programs. For example, I often see a tightly curled pinky when making fifth chords (power chords), and I always advise that this creates unnecessary tension, which further causes unnecessary levels of finger pressure and undue difficulties in changing from one fretboard location to another. I then advise to manual override the pinky popcorn shrimp of death while making the fifth chords. It is always a struggle at first, but I have yet to observe a student who can not eventually cultivate a new habit of keeping all the fingers straight and relaxed while executing fifth chords. Likewise, the pick hand technique always starts out with a sort of stabbing motion coming from pushing the index finger and thumb out from the side of the hand which is planted on the bridge, and then curling it back in to make the pick stroke – just like writing. With enough focused effort the student can defeat the writing program and develop a new autopilot mode of efficiently picking from the wrist, with the fingers immobile and the base of the hand planted on the guitar or strings. (See my pick technique video for in depth analysis)

Don’t let IT ruin your technique. IT is a formidable enemy at first, but by consciously choosing to control your fingers until they do what you want, you can send IT packing and make beautiful music instead. Get to work, and don’t stop until you get the desired results! 

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

Keys To Mastery: Attention To Detail

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By Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

Don’t sweat the small stuff! So goes the old saying, and within its sphere this is a sage piece of advice. When playing guitar the ability to cruise past mistakes without getting derailed is critical.  However, we need to keep in mind that playing guitar and practicing guitar are very different things. When practicing guitar we very much need to sweat the small stuff. Practice does not make perfect unless it is perfect practice! Repetition of slop guarantees playing slop. So when practicing we need to perform every detail of our technique as perfectly as possible. Of course “perfection” by its nature is not a realistic goal. The point is that we need to be continually striving to improve on the details of how we interact with the guitar. If we make “perfection” the target of our technique endeavors then our actual results will be far superior to those resulting from a vague goal like “doing the best I can”.

While doing our best is not a bad ideal, in practical application this kind of ambiguously defined goal leaves us a lot of room for actually not doing our best. If we measure doing our best solely by subjective criteria such as “this felt difficult so I must have been doing my best,” that is a well-intended but flawed yardstick by which to determine what is our best. Our best practice will result when we apply focused attention to the smallest details of our technique, measuring by objective criteria rather than by our perceptions of difficulty or success.

It is important to understand that people do not deliberately set out to practice in ways that are less than productive. Rather, focused concentration for extended periods is not our default mode of thinking, such that errors creep in just under our notice despite our general intent to “do our best”. So it is important to make a conscious effort to pay attention to the details!

Let us then look at some specific details of common technique flaws among students of guitar. Keep in mind, the goal of this discussion is constructive feedback toward the end of identifying problems and correcting them. Merely adopting the ideal that it is good to pay attention to detail will make no difference in your progress. You have to actually make the conscious effort to implement!

1 – Harsh Chord Changes: chord changes is one of toughest challenges for beginning guitar players. Just getting the fingers to work separately from one another at all is a full agenda. Once you get past this then the next step is to work on changing chords while keeping a rhythm pattern going. This is where the problem with attention to detail begins to show. Specifically, releasing tension on the last beat of the current chord in anticipation of the finger shifting for the next chord, such that the pick stroke yields a buzzy thud instead of a clear harmonious ringing. Most do not realize they are doing this until I point it out. Why? Because they have already shifted their focus off of the details of the current chord and onto the chord that is yet to happen. This is a perfect example of how lack of attention to detail results in undesirable results. If you want your chord rhythms to flow nicely so that they sound smooth then pay close attention to the last pick stroke of each chord and make sure you are retaining the fingering of the current chord until it is time to change. If this means you have to slow down to execute the chord change properly then do it. Speed up gradually as your muscle memory of the finger positioning allows it. 

2 – Choppy Scales: for scales to sound their best we need to play them with no time lapse between notes. This requires consistent finger pressure on each note until the precise moment of the change to the next note, and then a coordinated execution between the fret hand finger and the pick stroke as we shift to the new note. One common problem I observe is releasing pressure on the current note just as soon as the note is made. The cause is the same as the chord changing issue … preoccupation with the note ahead to the detriment of the one currently ringing. It is critical to pay attention to keeping the current note “live” while maneuvering both hands to set up the next note. Another common problem is lack of precise coordination between the two hands such that the pick strikes the string either before or after the placement of the fret hand finger on the upcoming note.  Again, both of these issues respond well to slowing down and paying attention to the details of your fingering and two hand synchronization, such that you execute notes well. Then after sufficient repetition to enforce the habits of hand, speed up gradually as your mastery allows while continuing to pay attention to these details. 

3 – Bends and Vibrato: bending along with its cousin vibrato are the most powerful, expressive techniques we have as guitarists – when they are executed well. They are also among the most difficult things to master since they are entirely under your control, unlike simply fingering a single note or chord where you have the frets to help you with pitch accuracy. The common problems I see with bending and vibrato are picking the string after the bend has started, bending up to an out of tune pitch, and then releasing the bend to a pitch other than the original unbent note. Again, these all respond well to slowing down and paying attention to the start, peak, and trough of the bend, then repeating until accurate bends become a habit while continuing to monitor the accuracy of peaks and troughs. Then speed up as improvements in muscle memory permit.

4 – Pick Hold & Orientation for Single Notes: the pick should be located between the pad of the thumb and the side of the forefinger, and the wrist should be relaxed such that the pick makes roughly a 30-45 degree angle to the strings. Then play with the base of the hand parallel to the strings, with a sharp but relaxed bump of the wrist to make the pick stroke. While this is physiologically the easiest, most comfortable way to hold and maneuver the pick, we tend to bring a lot of hangover from our handwriting habits into picking. This results in all manner of difficulties, such as bringing the middle finger into the pick hold, trying to pick from the far side of the hand (as with writing), and all manner of wasteful sweeping and swooshing motions where the job requires only a straightforward 1/4 inch arc of the pick. These handwriting habits are hard to break, but it is possible, and essential for fast and accurate picking. While practicing scales, pay attention to these details and force your pick hand to comply until it becomes a habit.

5 – Pick Hold & Orientation for Strumming: the pick hold is the same as for single notes. However, the pick stroke for strumming should come from the elbow, with the pick making a straight line across the strings. For the best tone we need light contact with the strings and a fast moving pick coming from a controlled flick of the wrist. Common problems with strumming are locking the wrist and then plowing harshly through the strings, trying to make an arc from the wrist rather then the elbow, and playing an arch or angle rather than a straight line parallel to the strings. Pay attention to these details for a smooth, chimey, shimmering tone from the strings while strumming.

6 – Excess Tension: this is a universal problem among beginner and even intermediate level guitarists. Playing with too much muscular power results in pressing fretted notes too hard, often bending them out of tune. A heavy handed pick attack results in notes and chords that sound harsh. Excessive muscular tension is an automatic nervous system response to physical challenge arising from our instinctive “fight or flight” mechanism. While this response is very useful when we encounter a bear in the woods, it is a disaster to our guitar technique. Playing guitar is a dance, not a fight. We must play with finesse, not power, if we want our guitars to yield up pleasing sounds in response to our manipulation. All of the problems above are at least partially a result of playing with excessive muscular tension. You can counter the fight or flight response with deliberate focused attention on the state of muscular tension in your hands, arms, and shoulders while practicing scales and chord rhythms. Make it a habit to play with as little muscular exertion as possible. 

Finally, be sure to practice as often as possible! Learning guitar is all about memory in terms of both mental recall and physical muscle control. Every day that you do not practice you lose a bit of recall and muscle memory. That is just the way the human machine functions and there is not much we can do about it. Therefore, it is best to practice every day. This is not feasible for many hobbyists. In this case, make it a point to practice more days than not … at least five days a week.

Pay attention to the details to ensure that your practice routine is leading to progress rather than frustration!

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

Keys to Creativity

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By Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

Among the challenges we face as developing guitar players, cultivating a sense of artistic creativity may seem among the most formidable. Many assume that creativity is a mysterious insight arising from the recesses of the fortunately gifted minds of a select few. In fact, creativity is not a mystery. As with all things musical it responds to focused effort to cultivate it.

So how do we get from having “no creativity” to the point of being able to write songs and play improvisational solos?

First let us address the occasional Mozart who shows up with tremendous innate musical ability. There is indeed a phenomenon of abundant natural talent, but for most musicians, other artists, engineers, inventors, writers, etc., natural talent is not in fact the key to creativity. So the Mozart’s are irrelevant in terms of understanding how a person of typical native ability can develop creative prowess. Forget about natural talent, and most importantly don’t fall for the common misconception that creativity is something that you either have or do not have by inheritance.

Now let us consider what creativity actually is. Is it really assembling something out of nothing in a mysterious seizure of inspiration from quarters unknown? No! Even Mozart had to sit with paper and pen and work his inspirations into orderly, flowing pitch and time relationships. Consider this quote from prolific inventor Thomas Edison, whose record on creativity speaks for itself: “Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration”.

Creativity is neither an unknowable mystery, an accident, nor a fleeting peek into the ethereal mists. It is rather a predictable result of a process involving mastery of the fundamental elements of an endeavor, and then applying those fundamentals in such a way as to generate beauty of function and form. Notice that I did not say anything about creating something from nothing, or even something totally new. Creativity does not mean creating something from nothing. It means assembling the known into that which effectively solves problems or manifests beauty. It is well within the reach of anyone willing to apply themselves to the process. 

Now let us consider how this applies to music, and specifically to guitar. Music is fundamentally two objective phenomenon: pitch relationships and time relationships. Musicians assemble these relationships in such a way as to create the more subjective phenomenon of an emotionally satisfying flow of tension and release. This does not require the creation of anything new, but rather a well developed awareness of how pitch and time relationships work together to create a satisfying flow of tension and release.

So let’s break it down now even more specifically to the things we need to have mastery over in order to make music that satisfies ourselves and our intended audiences.

1. Know the notes on the fretboard – everything we do as musicians involves assembling notes in melody (one after another) or harmony (in unison, such as a chord or double stop) with reference to a tonal center (key). If you do not know the notes then you are limited to playing by patterns or by ear. While playing by patterns and by ear are useful tools, if you wish to cultivate maximum creativity then you need to allow yourself as many options as possible.  If you can visualize the letter names of the notes you are playing then it is much easier to choose resolving notes for phrases, or make useful alterations to chords to achieve just the right shade of mood.

2. Know the names of the notes in the Major Keys – the Major Scale is the starting point for all we do. Everything else is an alteration of some sort to a Major Scale. If you know the names of the notes in the key you are playing, and can also see them as you play them on the fretboard, these together will give you a great deal of power to achieve a desired musical effect without having to always guess your way through things with experimentation.

3. Understand Intervals – intervals are the building blocks of the pitch aspect of music. A thorough understanding of intervals will allow you to know what effect a note is going to have before you play it. If you know your intervals then you will be able to create musical effects at will, alter scales and chords to create precise shades of emotion, and transfer musical ideas from one key to another with ease.

4. Understand the effects of the basic divisions of the beat – along with pitch relationships, relative timing between pitch events is one of the fundamental components of music. A good set of timing relationships by itself is very powerful (think of a powerful drum intro that sets the mood for a song).  If you understand the basic divisions of the beat and how to modify them to tastes then you can create strong shades of mood at will.

5. Understand scale harmonization – knowing how to translate a particular scale into chord sequences will enable you to assemble pleasing chord progressions in a matter of moments. Knowing the chords in the key and the notes in the chords will also give you a lot of useful options for resolving solo phrases.

6. Listen to a lot of music – musical inspiration is often a residual effect of exposure to other music. Saturate your creative muse with immersion into a wide variety of music, and pay attention to the individual details such as the vocals, drums, and bass. In doing so you will cultivate a deeper intuitive understanding of music, much as a child learns to speak by regular exposure to speech.

7. Start from the known – creativity is often a matter of slight alterations to common ideas. Learn the signature licks, chord types and sequences, and rhythmic ideas of the masters of your preferred style. Then experiment with alterations until you uncover ideas that express what you wish. 

8. Constantly refine technique – if you have ever wondered how an accomplished guitarist can play something very simple and yet have it sound very beautiful and powerful, the trick is often in the technique. What many experience as a “lack of creativity” is in fact a lack of technique refinement that will make an otherwise great idea sound lifeless or even just plain bad. Technique development is not just a matter of mere repetition. It is essential to pay attention to the quality of sound (a.k.a. “tone”) during technique development practice. Don’t rush through technique exercises with the goal of merely getting them over with as quickly as possible. Listen carefully to the small details. Strive to improve the quality of sound resulting from each pick stroke.

This may seem like a hopeless lot to get done along the path to creativity. Bear in mind that learning music, including the creative aspect of it, is a journey. It is not needful to be “finished” with all other aspects of musicianship before experimenting with creative application of known musical elements. The point of this article is that creativity is a predictable result of identifiable methods, and therefore is accessible to all who are willing to work for it. Cultivate the appropriate knowledge, technique, and persistence, and then you can be sure that your creative muse will show itself!

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

Measuring Progress Realistically

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By Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

Learning to play an instrument well is a process involving study, memorization, repetition, and refinement, all of which happen across time. It is not a matter of giant leaps but rather steady increments of progress. While a good program of instruction combined with a good practice routine yields inevitable results, at times the progress may seem very slow or non-existent. It is easy during these spells to become discouraged and possibly even give up altogether, so it is important to be able to make realistic evaluations of progress. The four steps below will help you to measure your progress realistically.

1. Avoid comparisons – it is not profitable in any way to compare your progress or your current skills to those of others, especially iconic professionals. Regardless of what you may have heard or read, no one achieves a high level of musicianship without sustained effort across a period of years. Aspiring guitarists have widely varying circumstances which lead to widely varying progress rates and skill levels. Additionally, every musician has strengths and weaknesses in various areas such that comparing your current weaknesses to another’s current strengths will leave you with a warped view of how you are doing. The only legitimate and relevant measure of progress is how you are doing today versus how you were doing last month, six months ago, and last year.

2. Excessive concern with mistakes – ideally we all want to play perfectly, and continual effort towards perfecting our music is advisable. However, while learning guitar be cautious about striking a realistic balance between continual progress and reasonable allowance for mistakes and imperfections. These are a perfectly normal part of the process. They key to dealing with them is to not let them completely derail your playing, such as stopping every time you make a mistake. Avoid the temptation to think that mistakes in your playing mean that your music is no good and that you are not making any progress. Even pros make mistakes.

3. Avoid measuring progress by “feel” – few would attempt to measure a distance of one foot by solely considering how they feel about how long one foot is. Rather, most would simply apply a tape measure to the job. Contrarily, many attempt to measure their progress as musicians by how they feel about their playing at the moment. This is of course completely unrealistic, but it is also a common human response to a long term process.  Preoccupation with results can be wearisome if we are working towards a wildly fluctuating target such as our feelings. If your feelings about your progress are at odds with objective measures of progress then recognize the feelings as irrelevant and put them aside.

4. Utilize objective measures of progress – It is an inevitable aspect of human nature that we tend toward looking at the negative side of things. This tendency is magnified when working our way through a long term endeavor such as learning music. Counter this by using an objective standard such as a practice schedule cataloging effort toward various knowledge and skills relevant to your playing goals. Then you will be able to see plainly, without the cloud of fickle feelings and negativity, when you are in fact making real progress.

So remember … the only real and relevant measure of progress is measuring your past knowledge and technique against your present knowledge and technique.

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

A Secret Of Success

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By Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

Catchy title, eh? Notice I said “A secret”, as opposed to “THE secret”. The truth is, there are many elements that contribute to success in any endeavor. They are not really secrets either, they just seem that way to people who have not perceived them yet. We are going to discuss one “secret” in this article that will be of great value to you as you strive to improve your guitar skills. This will also apply to about anything else you do in life.

I am going to guess that when you saw the title of the article you might have been expecting I was going to provide some kind of short cut that would make it easy to improve your guitar skills in a very short time. Well, sorry about that. No such luck. Unfortunately there are no easy ways to become a musician. There are only more effective and less effective methods.

If you want a straightforward bottom line about becoming a competent musician, the key concept is WORK. If you are one of these who has believed that it is all about “natural talent” I hope I can dissuade you of that view. I won’t go deep into that topic in this article, but if you want to check it out for yourself you can do some research on some of your favorite musicians and how they got to be great.

If you have been a human being long enough you have probably figured something out: we don’t like work much. Work is hard and boring. We would much rather play, right? As humans we all have an inherent aversion to work known as LAZINESS. If there is any one thing that is most likely to derail your musical aspirations it is laziness. Laziness manifests in many forms, some very obvious and some not so obvious. The obvious ones are such as this, “I would rather watch TV than practice guitar exercises”.  The more insidious ones might be along these lines, “I need to practice my harmonic minor scales, but it is more gratifying to just blast away on the Pentatonic Minor I already know, so I will do that for 30 minutes and practice Harmonic Minor for 2 minutes.” Or maybe this, “I know I need to follow my practice schedule but I will ‘warm up’ with my favorite songs first and then work on my practice schedule.” 45 minutes later … you know the routine. Another one, “It seems to me that I can get this piece played easier using my ‘natural’ technique rather than following my evil teacher’s more challenging technique recommendation which requires me to concentrate.” Yet again, “I know I am supposed to repeat this slowly and methodically, but I am going to disregard that and play it as fast as possible and hope that this will work better today, even though I know it never has worked better.” The biggest killer of all, “I’m really busy today and one practice session won’t make a difference anyway.” Or how about this, “I really need to practice, but I will instead waste two hours having supper and spending quality time with my family”.

Ok, maybe that last one is a bit too extreme for you who are not REALLY committed just yet! Don’t worry, you don’t have to be that radical to get pretty good on the guitar. The point is that laziness is a deadly enemy to progress. It comes out in many ways and is always on your shoulder, whispering to you – take it easy, go the easier route, find a less challenging way to do this, take a short cut, if I had any talent this would not be hard so I might as well give up, etc.. We must overcome this if we are to succeed. So, you might be thinking the answer is discipline, right? Well, yes. However, laziness is a powerful and deceptive internal adversary and the truth is that most of us do not have the wits or the kind of internal discipline we need to overcome it – by ourselves.

And there in that last phrase is an age-old, very powerful secret of success, utilized by nations, armies, corporate leaders, athletic coaches, and other kinds of team leaders across times, places, and cultures. It is powerful enough to squash the roaring demon of laziness into a pile of goo.

Do you see it yet?

Imagine this. You are on the football team and the coach passes out a sheet at the beginning of the week. On the sheet is the list of all the agonizing physical torture he wants you to inflict on yourself this week. Since he knows you have self-discipline he trusts you to see to this, meeting adjourned, see you next week. You go home and look over the list while you are watching TV and eating donuts. If you are especially self-disciplined you might even memorize the contents of the list. You may even go out and run a half mile until you get winded and it starts hurting your legs. Then you give up. After all it is 90 degrees outside and this is boring, and besides who will know or care if you cheat?

Do you think a football team would get very far with this approach to preparation?  No, of course not. That is why you are going to stay at the field with all the rest of the team and torture yourself under the observation of the coach and the peer pressure of the rest of the team.

Hopefully by now you are seeing the principle that I am getting at, but if not, I will spell it out plainly here. The “secret” I am speaking of is COMMUNITY. You may hear it called teamwork or work group or network or some other name, but the basic concept is the same – the most effective way to combat laziness is to be part of a social network where you are inherently held accountable for the results of your work. Inclusion in a social network will provide negative feedback in the form of embarrassment if you fail to perform, and positive feedback in the form of praise and respect when you do perform. In addition, we all tend to have a competitive instinct such that we will almost automatically try to out do the people around us. Furthermore, we have an internal mechanism that feels obligation to meet the expectations of our friends. And again, it is built into us to derive great satisfaction from being part of a special group defined by our unique successes. So we have all these very powerful motivators sitting inside us, ready to do battle on our behalf against our arch-enemy laziness. These are the same motivators that have brought victory to armies, athletic teams, companies, the list goes on and on. These motivators are inert until exposed to a group environment, then they rise up and start kicking down walls!

So you have something to do here. You have all this potential power inside but it is up to you to get it activated. How do you do this? Well, you need to get involved with other musicians. Taking lessons is a great step in the right direction. Tell your family and friends that you are learning to play guitar and you are serious about it and you will not accept less of yourself than success. Try to get a friendly hobby band together if possible, or just hang out and jam as much as you can with other friends who are musicians. If you are in church you can see if they will let you join as a future back-up musician while you are learning, then you sit in on the weekly practice and try to play along. Get involved with a local musical fellowship through MeetUp.com. There are a hundred ways, but you need to do something to get yourself involved in some kind of group setting.

For my actively enrolled students I offer group classes. Get involved! You have to get known in an environment where people are doing the same thing you are doing. You must engage in friendly competition with people at your same level (you do not have to state this, it will happen automatically. I do not recommend telling people you want to compete with them unless you know them really well!) You have to let people know what your goals are and what you are doing to get there. You must show interest in their goals and progress and thus build mutual respect and goodwill. It will come back to you many times over.

This attachment to a group is CRITICAL, I can not over-emphasize this. It will keep you going through the many times when the path of progress takes you through spots that are tedious and frustrating. If you decline to get involved socially this way then your chances of succeeding are greatly reduced. Contrarily, when you do connect with a group of musical peers you will not only achieve more but will also enjoy music much more. After all, music is a form of communication. It is rather pointless if you do not share it with others!

How to Become a Great Guitar Player in 9 Not-So-Easy Steps

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By Chad Crawford PMI Guitar Instructor

1. Identify your goals – It is important at the outset of your musical endeavors, or if you are an intermediate player who has hit “the wall” then right now is the time for you, to determine exactly what it is you wish to accomplish. If you look around at the community of guitar players you will observe that most of the iconic players are known for one particular narrow range of musical style. By focusing on one narrow specialty they were able to develop the technique and knowledge pertinent to that specialty to a very high level. It is not necessary and not wise to attempt to master all styles of music, especially so for a hobbyist who is necessarily under time constraints. Determine what kind of music you most want to play and identify the technique and knowledge you need for that style. Then don’t squander precious time on things that do not apply to your goal. You can branch out later, but trying to tackle the whole field of musical endeavor from the outset is a sure plan for catastrophic frustration.

2. Listen to the music you enjoy – For some rare, unusually gifted musicians most of their musical inspiration seems to come from some secret well-spring within themselves. If you are one of these you would have known it before you were able to read, so if you are reading this then odds are you should not waste time trying to bypass the route most of us have to take to musical creativity: learning from those who have gone before. Identify those guitarists who you most enjoy listening to and wish to sound similar to, and spend plenty of time just listening to their songs. This will inspire you to practice, awaken your own creativity, and sharpen your discernment of pitch and time relationships.

3. Work with a good teacher – people who do not know much about making music commonly believe that music is simply an outgrowth of the personality, such that polluting the muse with organization and technical ideas is a sort of poison. That sort of thinking is why these people are not musicians, or not very good ones. For maximum results in the shortest possible time work with an expert coach who knows how to help you refine your goals, steer you toward the appropriate tools, and eliminate common useless side roads and pitfalls.

4. Master the basics – we all covet advanced playing skills and the accompanying freedom of expression. However, we don’t climb mountains by jumping from the valley straight to the peak. Rather we climb up one step at a time until we reach the peak. Trying to start out with guitar by tackling advanced songs from master guitarists is a sure path to overwhelming frustration and poor overall skills. Start with the basics, and practice them to the point that they come automatically. Then start working on the advanced stuff.

5. Practice well – We have all heard that the key to musical mastery is, “Practice, practice, practice.” While that apt cliche is indeed as true with music as it is with any realm of human endeavor, it fails to answer some very important questions: what to practice and how to practice. If you wish to become a great or even just a good musician, you should approach practice as a labor of love, with emphasis on labor. Practice should be an organized effort to achieve clearly defined goals, rather than another session of doodling with the same bits and pieces of songs from yesterday’s practice session. Random doodling is playing, not productive practice.

Here are some keys to effective practice:

–Assemble a practice schedule that addresses knowledge and technique relevant to your goals

–Follow the instructions – “playing by feel” is the shortest path to going in circles of self-sabotage with your practice routine. It may carry you for a while, but eventually it will lead to a dead end. Whatever manner of instructional materials you are using, practice according to the instructions. When you have mastered the piece of knowledge or technique at hand you will then be able to incorporate it into that body of things which you can effectively apply by feel.

–Cultivate good habits – habit is powerful either on your behalf or to your detriment. Habit will respond to whatever you put into it, either great things or mediocre ones. Utilize good technique, proven methods, and pay attention to details during practice. Make it a habit to push your mind and hands for an increment of improvement during every practice session, rather than habitually accepting yesterday’s routine as today’s standard.

–Memorization – memory, both physical and mental, responds best to focus, repetition, relation to the already known, and consistency. This is why it is very important to have an organized practice routine and to practice as often as possible. Shorter daily practices will yield better results than weekend marathon sessions. 

6. Creativity – self-expression is impossible when one is utterly distracted by managing the basic facets of musicianship. Beyond that, creativity in music is rarely a matter of coming up with something that no one has ever thought of. That is not possible at this time in history. Creativity is more a matter of taking what is already known and putting a new spin on it, or assembling it in some novel way. Every human being is creative. What most folks consider a lack of creativity is really more a lack of technical skills distracting the attention away from what the internal creative muse is trying to deliver. If you want to experience the fullest of what your internal muse has to offer then get past stumbling over the basics as soon as possible.  

7. Managing Frustration – mastering music is a complex long term endeavor, and some frustration with the process is inevitable. Don’t let it become a bigger thing in your mind that it is in reality. Feeling frustrated can not stop your progress in any way, unless you choose let it stop you from practicing. Avoid comparisons to other players. That has no bearing at all on your progress and so it is an utterly useless waste of time. Don’t allow perfectionism to creep into your thinking. Even pros make mistakes, and the music is still quite good despite the occasional mistake. Be sure you are following the instructions. Much undue frustration arises from trying to play by feel rather following the instructions. Allow yourself due credit for what you have accomplished, and measure your progress by objective standards rather than how you feel about your progress. Such feelings are typically unrealistically harsh and often adopt the feeling of frustration itself as a measure of progress, or lack thereof. Feeling frustrated has no bearing whatsoever on the objective reality of your progress, so don’t let your mind sabotage you with such tricks. 

8. Managing Stage Fright – psychologists identify a phenomenon that occurs when we are trying to perform any kind of challenging task under direct observation. They call it “performance anxiety”. We musicians usually refer to it as “stage fright”. It is one of the most challenging aspects of music, but like all things musical it will respond to strategic efforts to bring it under control. Stage fright is a lower-level instinctive response to stress such that our bodies gear up to respond with vigorous action. Since we need to be relaxed and focused to perform music well, it is detrimental and even crippling to our musical abilities. However, as powerful as this instinct is we can learn to suppress it with practice. And that brings us to step 9 …

9. Play with others – music is ultimately a means of communication, and as such it is rather pointless to do it at all if we are not going to share it with others, kind of like learning a second language with no intent other than continually practicing it alone in front of a mirror. Playing with others is not only fulfilling but also helps identify weaknesses in our knowledge and technique for further study, allows us an opportunity to learn from others, and gives us experience in managing stage fright. It is also important in a general sense to include a social aspect to our experience of learning music, both in regards to celebrating our successes and sharing the burdens of the process. As soon as you can play basic chord rhythms you should seek opportunities to play with other musicians. If you have no musically inclined friends and are not involved in a good program of instruction including opportunities for group playing, then look online into the local fellowship communities such as Meetup where you can find amateur jam sessions that allow for folks with moderate skills to participate in a group setting.

Mastering music is not easy, but it is possible even for the hobbyist with time constraints. Take note of this “secret” of mastery – it is a path rather than a destination. Practice wisely and well, be patient, and never give up!

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

Nature vs. Nurture: The Secret to Overcoming Fatal Guitar Technique Flaws

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By Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

After a couple of decades of teaching guitar and interacting with other teachers and many clients, I can make a number of predictions on what any aspiring guitarist will struggle with and how the various responses to these stumbling blocks will either help or hinder progress.  The guitar is a challenging instrument, and there are any number of areas where one might encounter a temporary roadblock. Of these typical areas, there is one that stands out above all others as the number one barrier to progress: not following the instructions.

Allow me to clarify this concept since the phrase alone may seem too broad and actually contrary to your experience. I doubt you have ever openly refused to learn a particular chord, for example, or a basic scale pattern. This is not the sort of thing I mean when I suggest that a significant percentage of guitar students often stumble in implementing course recommendations. It is not a matter of people intentionally side-stepping the instructions. Rather it is that certain aspects of optimum physical technique run contrary to our instincts. Most students tackling a challenge in physical technique tend to unconsciously default back to instincts rather than consistently apply good technique recommendations. For the record, I am guilty of this as much as anyone, although I have improved significantly over the years in applying what the guitarist community has found to be the most effective technique development methods. 

Now let me narrow this down to the specifics items that I see over and over. If any of these seem to apply to you, keep in mind that I am not writing about any specific person or experience, but rather my collective experience as a guitar student and teacher. I assure you that although some of these may apply to you, they are universal themes in the guitar community, so don’t feel like I’m singling you out to give you a hard time!

  1. Tickle the strings rather than tackle them.
  2. For playing chord rhythms, use a wide, fast, and light-contact pick stroke.
  3. For playing individual notes or two-string intervals (fifth chords, double stops) keep the pick hand palm turned into the guitar so that the pick moves parallel to the plane of the strings with a mere flick of the wrist.
  4. Apply no more pressure to the strings/frets than necessary to sound out a clear note.
  5. Avoid grasping the guitar neck with the palm and thumb as if it were a baseball bat.
  6. Use your elbow to change the working range of your pick – not your wrist or your shoulder.
  7. When changing to an upcoming chord, avoid chopping off the last beat of the previous chord by releasing pressure too early.
  8. Unless you are practicing certain exercises specifically intended to develop speed, do not practice at a tempo faster than you can play with good note articulation and two-hand synchronization.
  9. When learning a new rhythm pattern, go slow and consciously count the beats and divisions of the beats, rather than trying to play the rhythm by “feel”. Once you have conscious mastery of the pattern only then should you work on keeping time by feel. 

If you have taken lessons with me for any length of time, you will know that I teach these things routinely, so you may wonder why I am taking up a Newsletter column with this routine lesson fare. There is a reason I am emphasizing these things for you:  between knowing good technique and doing good technique, there is a subconscious barrier that we all struggle with: instinct. As your teacher, one of the most significant challenges I face in helping you develop your skills is your own instincts. Your basic instincts tend toward moving the fingers as a unit, favoring the index finger, using much more strength than is necessary, and handling the pick as if it is a plow. Your secondary instinct is to do just the opposite of this. For example, when attempting to play scales for the first time, you will note that your fingers want to stay together and mute the string you are trying to pick, so you will then pull your other fingers way back from the fretboard. Then you have to slam the next finger down like a dive bomber in order to stay in time on the next note. This causes subtle delays that cap your top speed at limits far below your potential.

 The first step in conquering this barrier is to be aware of these instinctive actions and over-reactions, so that you can be ready to spot them and counter with deliberate focused repetition of a balanced, optimum technique method that cooperates as far as possible with your natural physiology.  Then, apply focused attention to repetitions of good technique. Repetition of good technique results in habits, such that good technique becomes increasingly automatic, enabling to you to move between chords and notes accurately with little conscious effort.

Here is where the process breaks down: the focused repetition of good technique, and namely, the focus part. Your hands will constantly try to resort back to instinctive positions and motions, even though your conscious mind is well aware of these issues. You must pay close attention to these details of technique when you practice. This can be tedious at times, but the pay off is more than worth the effort!

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

Keys to Mastery: Focus

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By Chad Crawford

Among the challenges we face as developing guitar players, retention of knowledge and technique is certainly high on the list. As with any long-term complex undertaking, we can take shorter or longer paths to the same end. While common sense dictates that we take the shorter path, there a number of ways to step off the shortest path without realizing it. For maximum results in the shortest possible time we need to be aware of these potential pitfalls and make every effort to avoid them.

A prevalent obstacle to maximum progress among developing guitarists is lack of deliberate maximum focus during lessons and practice. Repetition is a potentially powerful aid to recall and technique, but repetition without deliberate focus can actually cultivate less than optimal mental and physical habits and thus hinder progress. Contrarily, repetition combined with deliberate focus will enable your mind and hands to progress at their maximum rates.

It is important to understand that deliberate focus is not the default mode of the human mind. Our tendency is to let the attention wander around to different things, and thus sustained focus on one thing requires some conscious effort. Additionally there may be no feeling of increased progress while making the extra effort to stay focused, and so there may be no immediate sense of reward in exchange for the extra effort. However, both science and common sense reveal that all types of memory, including muscle memory, achieve their peak power in response to sustained focused attention.

So let’s look at some specific applications of deliberate focus in overcoming common pitfalls. It is not practical to attempt to cover every conceivable situation in which lack of focus will hinder progress, but looking at a few examples will paint a clear picture of how this works. You will then need to use good judgment in applying the general idea toward finding specific tasks where lack of focus is holding you back.

1. Paying attention to instructions – it is very easy to allow the mind to wander off in the middle of an explanation, then practice something wrong all week. In some cases I have seen students so excited about learning something new that in the middle of my demonstration they take off trying to figure out what I am playing by ear rather than concentrating on the demo, which of course defeats the purpose of the demo. While I commend the passion about learning new things, this is an obvious example of not paying attention to the instructions, and the results are predictable – we have to go over it again. Whether the instruction method be a book, video, or personal one-on-one lessons, be assured that you will get better results by controlling the impulse to take off playing as soon as you have the first hint of where to put your fingers, and instead work on getting your mind around the full explanation before attempting to apply it.

2. Following the instructions – assuming you have paid attention to the instructions and thus have a sufficient understanding of what to do, the next step is to apply the instructions. Certain details of optimum physical technique are often at conflict with our natural inclination toward doing what feels physically easiest for us at the moment. While few would argue whether or not following the instructions is important, some aspects of our motor skills operate at a subconscious level. While attempting scale exercises for instance, we must manage a number of things simultaneously such as note location, timing, and coordination of the picking and fretting hands. It is very easy in this kind of multi-tasking situation to allow the fingers to revert to auto-pilot while we monitor other details, and then we slip into repeating poor physical technique and allow it to become a self-defeating habit. It is very hard to break ingrained poor physical technique habits. Do not allow this to happen. Follow the instructions!

3. Frustration – nothing will derail your focus faster than allowing the feeling of frustration to take over your consciousness. This is a certain path to lagging progress, which leads to more frustration, and so it becomes a cycle of self-sabotage. Don’t let it happen. Assuming you are following a good program of instruction and are actually following the instructions accurately, indulging frustration is a waste of your time and effort. Do not allow frustration to become your measuring line of how well you are doing. Frustration is a typical human response to any complex endeavor and it does not necessarily mean you are doing things wrong. If you know you are working on what you are supposed to be working on to reach your goals, then when you feel frustrated you should put it aside and stay focused on what you are working on instead.

4. Timing – while learning to apply new scales or develop efficient chord changes, it is common to focus on simply getting the finger motions done to neglect of the critical timing details that make these things sound clear and smooth so that you achieve a good sense of musical flow. Pay attention that each note of a solo gets a clear pick stroke and “air time”. Stay focused on matching your notes up to the underlying beat. Make sure that you are continually pushing yourself for faster chord changing so that each pick stroke of your chords is clear, rather than chopping off the last pick stroke of a chord just before the chord change. That is a lot to manage simultaneously, but it will get easier with time and repetition until you can do it automatically. In the interim, stay focused on timing!

5. Speed/overplaying – beginner to intermediate level guitar players often show a tendency during solos toward filling every perception of space with as many notes as possible. While an intelligently executed run of sixteenth note triplets can add a lot of intensity to a solo, this is not the same phenomenon as simply blasting every bit of space with a battery of memorized scale patterns. While soloing you should be focused on timing, note articulation, and creating a sense of tension and release that complements the song. Do not allow yourself to fall into mindless ripping of scale patterns. Blasting scale patterns at top speed is practice, not playing. While playing focus on the flow of tension and release so that you are saying something with your music rather than simply showing off your mastery of scale patterns.

Keep in mind … focus is a choice rather than a “talent”. You will never develop a mental habit of deliberate focus without determined effort to make it so. It does get easier with time and repetition, so get started today looking for deficiencies in your level of focus. The results will be worth the effort!

Managing Musical Frustration

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By Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

If you have been learning guitar for any length of time then you know that musical mastery is a journey rather than a destination. As with any significant endeavor, the process involves working on individual elements of knowledge and skill and then assembling these pieces toward a finished product over time. Given a good course of instruction, this is a systematic process with predictable results. However, for best results we must also take into account the human elements of dealing with elaborate long term processes.

We find that the human psyche does not always respond favorably to study and repetition in the absence of immediate satisfaction from desired results. As guitarists we must retain a sizeable amount of information and master physical tasks such as chords, chord changing, scales, and phrasing. Both the mental and physical aspects require repetition, repetition, and more repetition to the point of making them second nature. Alongside this process arises the predictable human response to delayed gratification: frustration.

Frustration is a feeling of dissatisfaction arising in response to not having what we want in the present moment. It is an inevitable aspect of any long term complex endeavor, and so you can be sure that you are not the only one suffering from it, nor does its presence have any bearing on whether or not you have “talent” for music.  Although it is not a pleasant feeling, like all feelings it can be an asset or a hindrance depending on how we respond to it.

First let us consider the less problematic level of frustration. In my lessons I have made analogy to the angry baker hovering outside the oven door with the light on and watching the bread rise ever so slowly. Although he has done everything he is supposed to do and the results are inevitable, while watching the bread rise in its normal course of process he laments that he does not already have some bread, questions whether he is a competent chef with culinary talent since he has no bread in hand at present, and throws the recipe book across the room while screaming at the stove for not having already delivered the bread he has labored for. Silly baker! The problem for this frustrated chef is that he is indulging unrealistic expectations about how long it takes to have the satisfaction of freshly baked bread. The solution for the baker is to refer back to the recipe and get a realistic idea of how long it takes for the bread to bake.

So how long does it take to learn to play guitar to the point that you can express yourself freely? Well, that is not so straightforward to answer as the bread analogy. It is going to vary a great deal from person to person due to a number of factors, but what you should understand is that it is going to happen over a period of months and years rather than weeks, so be realistic. If you are allowing yourself to become overwhelmed with frustration over some new song, skill, or technique that you started working on two weeks ago, that is not realistic and it does not help you in any way. So stop it!

Now let’s consider the more troublesome deeper level of frustration that arises after you have in fact been doing all the right things that you know to do for a long time and it still seems that you are not getting anywhere. This is the kind of frustration that can ruin your experience of guitar and often leads to reluctance to practice, long periods away from the guitar, or giving up altogether. Therefore, we must have strategies to deal with this kind of frustration in order to prevent it from derailing our musical endeavors.

1. Acceptance – just as every rose comes with thorns, every long term endeavor has its frustrations. Frustration through the process of long term endeavors is an inevitable aspect of the human experience. It is not unique to you. It is perfectly normal, and it does not mean that you have no “talent” for guitar. Even if you have the best practice routine ever conceived, bucket loads of native ability, the best teacher in the galaxy, and six hours a day to practice, you are still going to experience some frustration, as has every musician who has ever trod this path.

2.   Short term goals – one way we can mitigate frustration is to allow ourselves an occasional victory by setting up short term goals regarding various specific aspects of our skill set. If your only goal is “to play guitar” then you are setting yourself up for massive, crippling frustration because you are never going to be finished learning to play guitar. Your goals should be specific, relevant to your overall playing goals, and appropriate to your current skill set. If you are new to guitar then appropriate goals might be along the lines of getting control of changes between common open position chords such that you can execute them without losing time, and more times than not. That is achievable within a matter of months, providing you some sense of progress and accomplishment. For an intermediate level player the goal might be more along the lines of being able to move between the pentatonic scale shapes without getting lost or out of time. Write your goals down so that you can have a record of your progress.

3. Avoid comparisons – while it is useful to analyze what others are doing well and incorporate those skills into our own, it does no good whatsoever to evaluate your overall competence as a musician by making comparisons of your current skill set to that of others. For instance, some of my clients already had a good skill set and previous lessons when starting with me, so if you started as a beginner and compare your skills after six months to those of some of my other six month clients, you will of course come up short. You have no way to know what advantages any other player may have compared to you, and even if you did this sort of comparison still does not help you in any way. As for comparisons to pros, bear in mind that you are setting yourself up to compete with people who have practiced for hours per day for many years, and their recordings (even the “live” ones) are multiple takes, and further doctored to edit out mistakes. The only comparison you can make that has any value toward increasing your skills is the comparison to what you were doing last week, six months ago, a year ago, and so forth.

4. Follow the instructions – it is often the case that students of guitar do not make the most of practice time because they do not fully follow the instructions. This is particularly noticeable in regards to details of technique. Do not allow yourself to mindlessly crank out repetitions of exercises with little attention to the details of your technique. This will rob you of the full benefit of the repetitions and will in fact reinforce counterproductive technique habits. Technique is the primary barrier to self-expression for intermediate guitarists, and it is the result of poor habits during the beginning stages. While it can seem overwhelming to manage technique details on top of just getting the exercises played, it really only takes a little bit of extra effort to pay attention to technique. Unless you are specifically working on speed itself, always practice at speeds that allow you to execute well so that you develop efficient technique over time. If you are struggling just to get the exercise played at all and have no attention left for technique, this means you are playing too fast. Slow down. Exercising patience and self-control regarding development of your technique will save you a lot of frustration later.

5. Give yourself due credit – the primary problem with frustration is that we tend to allow it to fill up our view of how we are doing with guitar, and thus it can ruin our enjoyment of learning music. Bear in mind that as a guitarist you will always be focused on learning something new, and thus there will always be some level of frustration before you. Do not allow your view of your guitar endeavors to focus on nothing other than this frustration. If you have got far enough with guitar to be wrestling with frustration then you have already learned to do some things well. Give yourself credit for those things, include them in your practice routine, and enjoy them while you wait for new things to fall into place through repetition. If all you are experiencing with guitar is frustration it is because you are choosing to see only what you can’t do yet and ignoring what you are doing well. It is a mind trap that we can all fall prey to, and you will do best to avoid it.

6. Use it – even though frustration is an uncomfortable feeling, it does have an upside in that it can provide helpful clues as to what we need to do next to improve our skills. If you are working on an exercise or song and you keep falling apart at one spot, this is a clue that you need to isolate that one spot for extra attention. If you feel frustration that you have ceased to make any progress with guitar this may be a clue that you are not practicing enough, not following the instructions, do not have clearly defined goals, suffer technique deficiencies, or in some other way need to make adjustments to your practice routine. When you run up against a barrier that provokes frustration, use this as an indicator that you need to look around and uncover the source of the problem that is holding you back. Rather than give up in frustration, discuss this with your instructor.

7. Avoid perfectionism – if you are inclined to want to do everything to perfection, you will do best to drop that ideal now. Of course we want to have perfection as the ultimate ideological standard, but we need to balance that with reality. You are never going to play guitar to the point that you never make any mistakes. Even pros with years of training and experience make mistakes, although you rarely hear them because either you haven’t yet the ear for pitch and time to hear them, or else audio engineers edit them out of the recordings. Do everything you do as well as you can and strive for excellence of course, but do not feel like you have to perfect every detail of every exercise or song before you move on to new material. It is a balancing act, and you will develop increasingly good judgment as to where the balance is as you progress in music.

8. Employ Objective standards – progress does not always feel like progress. If you are practicing the right things, in the right way, in the right order, then you ARE making progress even if you do not feel like it at times. If you are judging your progress solely by how you feel about your playing then you are setting yourself up for a guaranteed case of catastrophic frustration. Look back to how you were doing with the same material six months ago, follow a practice schedule with clearly defined goals, and use a metronome to objectively measure your timing.

Practice patience. Learning to express yourself freely with the guitar is a complex endeavor, the result of a process that you realize success with in stages over time. Do not expect short term success regarding long term goals. Break it down into manageable pieces and work on short term success with these realistic goals. If you want to win at guitar or anything else then remember and implement this – never give up!

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.

Progress Pitfalls: Practicing vs. Playing

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Chad Crawford, PMI Guitar Instructor

Practicing guitar and playing guitar are not the same thing, and it is important to understand the difference if we want to maximize our progress.  While playing guitar is the end game of practicing, and we need to spend plenty of time playing, practicing is the means to the end of playing. It is essential to practice well and not allow playing to take over during what should be practice time. Although this may seem obvious on the surface, it is very easy to drift over into playing while trying to practice. Here we will look at the differences and consider how to avoid this pitfall.  

So let us consider the differences between the two and how to avoid mixing them up. Playing guitar is the broad application of all our knowledge and technique skills into making music. Practicing guitar is deliberate focus on a narrow range of knowledge and technique skills with the specific goal of cultivating improvement in those specific areas. While playing, we focus on all that we can do. While practicing we focus on what we can not yet do, or do as well as we would prefer.

Here are some measures to avoid getting stuck in a rut by playing through practice time:

1. Consider where you are, where you need to be, and how to get there – if you have no master plan for reaching your musical goals then you can be sure that your practice time will consist of merely playing what you already know rather than making specific improvements in those things that will allow you access to the next musical level. To devise a master plan you should look to the music you wish to play and find out what kinds of chords, rhythms, scales/arpeggios, and techniques arise in that music. Focus on those things in order to play that kind of music.

2. Define goals for every practice session – if you practice with no particular goal in mind then you will get exactly where you planned to get – nowhere. In every practice session have a plan to work on improving specific aspects of knowledge and technique according to your overall master plan. Committing your plan to paper will aid greatly in keeping it in view during practice.

3. Focus on specific aspects of knowledge and technique during practice – when you are for instance practicing the scales you need for your preferred musical style, focus specifically on timing, note articulation, resolving notes, technique (relaxed fingers!), two hand synchronization, and eventually speed. You may have to break these goals down across several practice sessions per week so that you can devote adequate time and attention to each. Playing licks that you already know, or mindlessly wandering up and down through scales, is not practice. That is playing and it will not help you improve nearly as much as practicing. 

4. Push yourself to do better than yesterday – profitable practice does not come from merely repeating what you did yesterday. It comes from making it a point to do better than you did yesterday. Doing better than you did yesterday does not come from merely accepting the vague proposition that you will try do better today then you did yesterday. It comes from focused attention to the minute details of your playing, such as striving for better note articulation of scales, faster chord changes, or deliberately playing with less overall muscular tension than yesterday.

5. Maintain your attention on the details – it is very easy to allow the attention to wander off during doing repetitive aspects of a practice routine. Focus yields much greater results, and focus is an ongoing choice because the mind tends strongly toward wandering off from one thing to another. Choose to keep your mind focused on the details of what you are working on!

6. Include some playing time in your musical endeavors – it is pointless to pursue music if it is going to mean nothing but practice. Allow yourself some time within each practice session, or a few times a week if that works better for you, to just play without being overly concerned about the perfection of the details. Perfect the details during practice, and then relax and let your hands do their thing when you play. During playing time, do whatever is the best you can do and don’t allow mistakes to rob your enjoyment of it. Just play and enjoy what comes out well. As you progress through diligent practice, you will find that your playing includes increasingly fewer mistakes and more enjoyment. It is a process. Give it time.

Copyright © 2005 Palmetto Music Institute. All Rights Reserved.