Classical with pick

[grahambop]

So, G,
One last time for everyone. You cannot play Classical Music without utilizing Classical Technique since you're incapable of playing a piece as was written/intended by the composer (with the exception of linear pieces). For example, a CG composition that contains four note chords which are intended to be played in unison ,as written in the music, cannot be played faithfully with a pick. If they are always played arpeggiated, the composition will not be played properly as the composer intended. This requires Classical technique using your right hand (p-i-m-a) to play the four notes in unison-- something, for which, a musician playing with a pick cannot logically/technically execute. Ergo, the performance will always be flawed although, perhaps, played well technically.
Finally, there are some here who have studied CG and ,for them, this discussion should be most clear. And, it should also be noted that this has nothing to do with an artist's personal interpretation of the music where he alters some aspects of a composition to reflect his/her personal style but rather the ability of a musician to play a faithful reproduction of the music in a clearly defined genre. Here's Edson Lopes with Tarrega's beautiful arrangement of Chopin's Prelude (Opus 28 No.7) which has a combination of block and arpeggiated chords(for effect and not written in the music)--something impossible to be played correctly with a pick. Enjoy.

For the record, I'm done with the dead horse. M

No need to write an essay, I was just being pedantic for the hell of it. What you actually said was “classical music is not played with a pick” so I found some classical music that is supposed to be played with a pick. That’s all.

[docsteve]

There IS a thing called Classical Music that has a defined tradition, including repertoire, technique, and a set of standards how to execute the music. Within that tradition, there is a lot of room for variation, including new and better or louder instruments, new compositions and styles, and even whole epochs.

Example: Neue Musik doesn't sound like anything that came before. Yet it is firm in the Classical tradition because it explicitly rejects the Classical tradition (well, parts of it). Stockhausen didn't set out to revolutionise the Delta Blues. Neue Musik is now an established branch of Classical Music because that has always been its frame of reference.

And both the Bach Cello Suite on a resonator and the Alhambra are awful. They use Classical warhorses to display their technique, but that doesn't make it Classical Music, any more than Keef is a Flamenco guitarist just because he can play Malaguena.

[RJVB]

And both the Bach Cello Suite on a resonator and the Alhambra are awful. They use Classical warhorses to display their technique, but that doesn't make it Classical Music.

I can't agree with that. What you play music on doesn't change what music it is. Would you claim that Bach's music is no longer baroque or early music if played on a Steinway or any other kind of classical instrument that didn't exist in his days? It's no longer performed properly as such, wry remarks like "such beautiful, indestructible music" can be made, but as long as you don't actually "recompose" the music in Gounod fashion it's just that. Inproperly performed baroque music, which is what some peope seem to prefer.

And I'll repeat it: I prefer to hear a musician trying to interpret a composition from a former time through actual contemporary conventions (and instruments) than through a more or less living fossile from the 19th century. In some cases I might even prefer that over a proper classical or even period performance (much of the later 19th century stuff is just not my thing, even if it already sounds better in period performance practice).

[docsteve]

I'm afraid you missed my point. My point is that Classical music (or any kind of music) is not defined by repertoire alone. Jazz standards started their lives as show tunes, in their case it is the way they were played that eventually made them into something else, and made them at home in two genres. Johnny Smith playing Debussy isn't really Classical, either. It's great, but he puts the music into a different context/genre.

Concerning the two performances: I have nothing against playing Bach on a Dobro, but you could at least make an attempt to play it like a serious Classical musician. That Alhambra sounds like a sewing machine. As I said, it's not just the repertoire but also the way it is played. To return to the initial topic, you can play Classical guitar with a pick but then you should prove the validity of your approach by making it sound like a piece of Classical music and not like a Bluegrass picker who happened to learn a Bach prelude. (This is not against Mirkko.)

And you can play awfully in any genre. Ever been to a school concert?

[RJVB]

Maybe I'm indeed missing your point, but if so , so must you be mine (missing, that is).

For me, if you want to play classical repertoire on a contemporary instrument and/or with a contemporary technique that is/are not part of the usual classical musician's toolbox, don't try to make it sound like one, or like classical music (esp. not with a capital C). Try to make it sound like you think it should on that instrument and/or with that technique.

Think Stéphane Grappelli playing Bach's concerto for 2 violins. He sounds like Grappelli playing Bach (and convinces a lot more than Menuhin playing the other part, IMHO). You can still hear he's playing classical music, baroque even, because he doesn't alter the notes (except maybe for the ornamental ones, it's been a while since I heard it). Granted, he could have been playing an homage piece composed in the style of, and then I probably wouldn't have called it classical.

You make it seem like Pavarotti singing some pop hit turns that into classical music even if just a bit. Not for me ... Similarly, having classical violinists playing the things synthesizers probably couldn't yet on so many Motown hits or Dan Hartman's Relight My Fire doesn't make those the tiniest bit classical music.
The London Somethingarmonic playing Alan Parson's Project hits is a bit different: those are transcribed and thus not so different from, say, Haydn transcribing Celtic folk music.

I do agree about the sewing machine nature of the Recuerdos interpretation, and have a similar issue with almost anything this person records. He appears to adhere to what seems to me to be a style among jazz guitarists of just playing lots of notes for the heck of it. At least here I can recognise the music (and the different voices) through the stitches. To me it doesn't sound any more or less wrong than a similarly technically perfect but clinical interpretation using "proper" classical music tools.

[docsteve]

Two excellent people, two excellent opinions


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[RJVB]

Someone's gotta say it, right?

[MarkInLA]

In case you don't know, Berklee College of Music has a book "Classical Studies for Pick Style Guitar" by William Leavitt...
Google: Berklee Coll.Mus. publications. Scroll way down..It's there..Carcassi, Sor.....flat picked...Try ebay, too...

I like your composition...Wish you showed your right hand / picking....