What are these kids taking to get so advanced so soon?

[slayer32390]

I've found that even the tiniest bit of 'classical' training helped me immensely, and now that I am in college majoring in classical guitar and Music Education the amount of knowledge I am gaining is incredible. My ear has gotten better from learning how to sing classsically, all my guitar technique has improved vastly from my classical guitar lessons, plus I have music theory classes and rhythm classes in addition to wind ensemble rehearsals where I play percussion. Everything is related and comes together if someone really wants to improve their playing they should definitely, definitely, DEFINITELY try to get at least some classical training. Vibrato and bends will come with time no matter what but they come faster and better if you know what goes into it theoretically and if you can sing it then immitate what you sing with your guitar.

[Floating Seeds]

hey well there are some technically impressive players but they all play this nintendo style metal which is just super gay and it all sounds the same. Mega-gay, as bad as techno. Give me sabbath, kyuss, acid bath, acid kings not this gay nintendo shred.

[Endrik]

If I'd want to become insanely technical player with strong sense of melody, feel and rhythm I'd got to Andalusia and study from the local flamenco gurus.

[slayer32390]

Yeah. Flamenco players are absolutely insane. However fast you can strum a chord with a pick they can do it twice as fast and probably with just their pinky finger...but this all goes back to my point which is: technical/fast playing doesnt neccessarily have to come from learning dragonforce and other "weedly-weedly" type music. Classical guitar and flamenco guitar styles could give them all a run for their money IMO.

[Endrik]

but this all goes back to my point which is: technical/fast playing doesnt neccessarily have to come from learning dragonforce and other "weedly-weedly" type music. Classical guitar and flamenco guitar styles could give them all a run for their money IMO.

nah, they would just piss rings around the weedly weedly stuff... much more musical and at the same time a lot more harder to play

[slayer32390]

nah, they would just piss rings around the weedly weedly stuff... much more musical and at the same time a lot more harder to play

Exactly!

[Floating Seeds]

I think computers really makes the difference, you can get a sequencer and record tracks with a super powerful PC that costs nothing now, to play over or cut and loop samples, slow things down and stuff. Looping, sampling, ez drum software, guitar pro tabs they didn't have this stuff 10 years ago forget about the 80s. Plus so many shred guitars available now and cheap even low end korean and chinese guitars are better than some hondo crap from 1982.

[Ben...]

I hope I'm not what you guys are talking about. I'm 16, started guitar at 13. I can play songs but also some technical stuff. The last tune I worked on was Sworn in the Metal Wind (We're figuring it out by ear). I'm good at 5 and 6 string sweeps (Up to about 80BPM) and no bad at 4's. 3-stringers still escape me. You need so much control for those. I don't use tabs, I have a good guitar teacher and a sizable knowledge of music theory along with an insane ear(this is what others tell me) I can tune a guitar to E standard but I'm always 4 cents off. you know, the measurement of how in tune something is. I don't know why but everyone says I excel at music.

[slayer32390]

.....That statement is just overflowing with humility. (Just in case the sarcasm didn't come through, I was being sarcastic)

And being able to do all that is great, but can you walk on stage in front of an auditorium filled with music professors and music majors with nothing but a classical guitar and play a sonata and make it truly musical? Sweeping is all well and good but its not that hard to do and you won't be impressing anyone in a college music program by doing that especially when just about every wind and string player can do arpeggios and scale runs much faster than you can. Also there isn't much expression in sweeping and shredding, as much as I love playing and listening to it, its true. With classical playing the way things sound is completely up to your finger tips, literally your finger tips as that is all you have, no amp, no effects, no nothing, just your right hand and your fingernails to pick and your left hand to fret. Playing any classical guitar piece and making it musical is much more challenging than any sweeps or fast runs I've ever learned. I have much more respect as a player for any classical guitar player who can play well or even decently than I ever will for a young player that can shred and sweep.

[Ben...]

.....That statement is just overflowing with humility. (Just in case the sarcasm didn't come through, I was being sarcastic)

And being able to do all that is great, but can you walk on stage in front of an auditorium filled with music professors and music majors with nothing but a classical guitar and play a sonata and make it truly musical? Sweeping is all well and good but its not that hard to do and you won't be impressing anyone in a college music program by doing that especially when just about every wind and string player can do arpeggios and scale runs much faster than you can. Also there isn't much expression in sweeping and shredding, as much as I love playing and listening to it, its true. With classical playing the way things sound is completely up to your finger tips, literally your finger tips as that is all you have, no amp, no effects, no nothing, just your right hand and your fingernails to pick and your left hand to fret. Playing any classical guitar piece and making it musical is much more challenging than any sweeps or fast runs I've ever learned. I have much more respect as a player for any classical guitar player who can play well or even decently than I ever will for a young player that can shred and sweep.

Oh I admit that did come off as arrogant. Sorry!

I used to play a bit of classical style stuff when I started but I haven't for a while now. My guitar teacher is an avid classical player and has been bugging me to get a true classical guitar for ages. I've been considering it for a while now (Maybe I should trade in my second bass for one?). We had these super-cheap ones at school when I took guitar class (98%, I got an award for it and shop. Essentially I won awards for the highest marks in the 2 biggest slacker classes). I quite liked playing them and by the time that was done I had improved finger-style about 400%(Coming from basically the worst technique you could have). I liked how you weren't allowed to use a pick. All the other students were angry about that and tried to use one anyways but I just felt I didn't need to. It added challenge and made me think differently about the instrument. I also enjoyed actually having to read sheet music. It didn't necessarily provide a challenge for me due to my background in piano, saxophone and bass among other things but it was a change from the same boring old tabs, scales and chord progressions. That class was kind of a joke for me, it was essentially beginner guitar class and my guitar teacher told me that it'd be hilarious if I got below 95% in it.

The teacher wanted me to teach some of the class (Barre-chords and things like that) but she never ended up getting me to. I found it strange how she asked me when there was a much better player than I was. He wasn't the "shredder" type but he knew basically every chord and how to make really neat progressions. He currently has a rather cleverly named band that has a really neat sound to them. We were the only people who had played guitar before that class so she relied on us for everything. I thought this was weird because being the teacher, isn't she supposed to know all of the material instead of getting students to teach it for her? She didn't seem to put much effort into the class so I ended up finishing the final in 7 minutes 50 seconds(I timed myself). I'm pretty sure she took the test off of the internet. I spent the rest of the final running errands(taking all the broken foot pedals to the shop, bringing chairs down from upstairs, changing a string or two on some of the guitars).

I kinda wish that class had continued on because I think I would have improved even more. Now that I think about it I kinda miss that class. I met a few good friends there and managed to teach a lot of people about this wonderful thing called guitar.

I think I'm gonna go buy a new classical this weekend.

[phill_up]

well I'm headed off to google classical guitars now...

[Ben...]

Oh, I know. As soon as I wrote that I went looking on Musician's Fiend to get ideas.

[phill_up]

can you walk on stage in front of an auditorium filled with music professors and music majors with nothing but a classical guitar and play a sonata and make it truly musical? Sweeping is all well and good but its not that hard to do and you won't be impressing anyone in a college music program by doing that especially when just about every wind and string player can do arpeggios and scale runs much faster than you can. Also there isn't much expression in sweeping and shredding, as much as I love playing and listening to it, its true. With classical playing the way things sound is completely up to your finger tips, literally your finger tips as that is all you have, no amp, no effects, no nothing, just your right hand and your fingernails to pick and your left hand to fret. Playing any classical guitar piece and making it musical is much more challenging than any sweeps or fast runs I've ever learned. I have much more respect as a player for any classical guitar player who can play well or even decently than I ever will for a young player that can shred and sweep.

You are comparing apples to oranges though. What if you take these guys

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89zM9pZzt0U

And put them in front of this crowd

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqK_0BbZGJY

The results would be way more horrifying than the embarrassment you have illustrated.

[horns666]

..

[slayer32390]

yes from a non musician stand point it would be however any musician in that crowd would be a bit more appreciative of whats going on musically. Also there is no such thing as apples vs. oranges in music everything, and i mean everything, is related and relative to each other.

Also When I took guitar class back in high school it was classical guitar class and the teacher was a percussionist...go figure...long story short I taught the class for about 3/4 of the semester and I didnt have to take the final because the teacher showed it to me and I laughed at him and he had known me for four years at that point and just didnt even bother and I ended up with like a 99 or something because I saved his ass with that class. And I strongly encourage any guitar player to at least give classical playing a shot, even a basic knowledge will go a long way towards improving your playing.