The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #26

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    Is it important? Depends on what you're trying to achieve on the guitar.

    And, what happens if you can't do it, no matter how much you work on it? That can happen. Your nervous system is involved and there's no guarantee that you'll be able to play as fast as another player.

    OTOH, lots of great guitarists were not chops-monsters.

    If the idea is to build chops, then I'd think a well planned and executed strategy would make more sense than working on a particular exercise repeatedly.

    And, as I noted before, that kind of strategy begins for most players, I think, with considering picking technique.

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    The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
     
  3. #27

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    Quote Originally Posted by RJVB
    Just back from my weekly lesson (I'm doing one of Bay's nocturnes), and I have to ask something that would surely come up if I were to take this kind of exercise to work on: how do you play this in proper legato (if that's the intention!), at the indicated (breakneck) tempo, and esp. when using a pick?

    Do you lift fingers when notes should end, or place a free finger on open string(s) that stop or be prevented from sounding? Or do you just let everything ring?

    I note this doesn't come from a method for learning a particular style so that aspect doesn't enter into the equation.
    Seems to me that the faster you can play it, the more legato (connected) it will be. And practicing it staccato will actually help to play it legato. Most of us who play pit, theater, studio and big band gigs should be able to play this at sight at 120 bpm. If you check out the Troy Grady stuff, you'll hear players executing 16th notes at 150-160 fairly often. Not that it's easy, but it's reachable if you work on the mechanics of picking rather than try to beat it onto submission. As mentioned above, guitar-playing is accumulative: everything you practice contributes to every other thing. Fast scales improve your arpeggios, and vice-versa. Speed takes time to develop, and the exercise shown is probably mastered more easily a bar or a phrase at a time.

  4. #28

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    Quote Originally Posted by ronjazz
    Seems to me that the faster you can play it, the more legato (connected) it will be. And practicing it staccato will actually help to play it legato.
    Ah, but I didn't mean legato vs. staccato, I meant a proper legato. One where each note sounds its intended duration and doesn't keep ringing (but also isn't cut short). Or even, in this kind of single-note runs, where at any time only the written note sounds, ideally not even due to sympathetic resonance (that's actually the -frustrating- exercise I've been given for this week...)

  5. #29

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    When left hand is properly relaxed most of the muting sort of takes care of itself -- relaxed fingers dampen the strings at the very last moment.
    Regarding sympathetic overtones - I'm not sure I've seen examples of fast alternate picking when all unused strings are muted all the time, you need to keep the palm or the side of the thumb on the strings and it inhibits right hand movement, the faster you play the more taxing it becomes.

  6. #30

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    Quote Originally Posted by RJVB
    Ah, but I didn't mean legato vs. staccato, I meant a proper legato. One where each note sounds its intended duration and doesn't keep ringing (but also isn't cut short). Or even, in this kind of single-note runs, where at any time only the written note sounds, ideally not even due to sympathetic resonance (that's actually the -frustrating- exercise I've been given for this week...)

    Irrelevant, until you reach the speed you're attempting. This is jazz, not classical music. Once you've reached the technical level of playing that particular exercise at the speed required, if you've practiced mindfully, those problems will have been solved.

  7. #31

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    Yea... if you can't play something... you either don't know what your trying to play or you don't have the technical skills.... so,
    1) technical skills... (don't have the physical abilities)
    2) performance skills... ( don't know or understand what your playing)

    They are different and require different types of practice.

    If you can't perform something within a few times trying.... it's not complicated, you don't have the physical skills yet.

    Rehearsing something a million times etc... doesn't work. You develop lousy skills. Jazz isn't in slow motion.

    The Mel Bay books are great for beginners and generally are not for learning how to play in a jazz style. But if your not that organized and really don't know how to put together your own.... long range plan, or have access to a jazz teacher etc... they are what they are.

  8. #32
    Quote Originally Posted by Reg
    Yea... if you can't play something... you either don't know what your trying to play or you don't have the technical skills.... so,
    1) technical skills... (don't have the physical abilities)
    2) performance skills... ( don't know or understand what your playing)

    They are different and require different types of practice.

    If you can't perform something within a few times trying.... it's not complicated, you don't have the physical skills yet.

    Rehearsing something a million times etc... doesn't work. You develop lousy skills. Jazz isn't in slow motion.

    The Mel Bay books are great for beginners and generally are not for learning how to play in a jazz style. But if your not that organized and really don't know how to put together your own.... long range plan, or have access to a jazz teacher etc... they are what they are.
    Reg, you've probably already answered this but you have fantastic technical chops so I would appreciate your advice.

    What would you recommend someone to work on to increase their technical proficiency for someone at my level who is struggling to play the associated Mel Bay exercise at tempo.

  9. #33

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    Quote Originally Posted by ronjazz
    Irrelevant, until you reach the speed you're attempting. This is jazz, not classical music. Once you've reached the technical level of playing that particular exercise at the speed required, if you've practiced mindfully, those problems will have been solved.
    It's written nowhere that this is jazz, the method is for learning "modern guitar" (or it's a modern method for learning guitar). Did I say that "this is classical music"?

    And while I can see Danil's argument that relaxing your fingers at exactly the right time when the note they played should stop sounding (and in such a way you don't get a buzz!) will solve the problem for those notes, that doesn't help with open strings and sympathetic resonance. Also, that minimal lifting of every finger almost has to slow you down compared to just leaving them in place (esp. if you're going to be playing that same note again), which I think must mean you do need to be mindful of muting from the start, i.e. when practising at a much slower tempo.

    I'm not a big believer of the idea that you can only learn to play something fast by learning it slow first and then speeding it up gradually, but I do think it unlikely that you can play something fast if you can't play it slow. Other than by accident, that is.

  10. #34

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    Quote Originally Posted by charlieparker
    Reg, you've probably already answered this but you have fantastic technical chops so I would appreciate your advice.

    What would you recommend someone to work on to increase their technical proficiency for someone at my level who is struggling to play the associated Mel Bay exercise at tempo.
    hey Mr parker.... I'll put up a practice plan for technical skills tomorrow. I've been off the the main land for a couple of weeks and I'm booked today and tonight... but have time tomorrow and Sun. mornings.

    Reg

  11. #35

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    Quote Originally Posted by charlieparker
    What would you recommend someone to work on to increase their technical proficiency for someone at my level who is struggling to play the associated Mel Bay exercise at tempo.
    Switch to keys. No joke lol. It's easy to play 16th notes on piano. All you do is roll your right hand over a shape. While on guitar you need super epic technique and hand sync. That was one of the reasons why I decided to focus on keys full time. I'm not a shredder, but I do like rhythm and being able to run 16th notes and even 16th note triplets and 32nd notes without traumatizing my hands.

  12. #36

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    Quote Originally Posted by Reg
    Yea... if you can't play something... you either don't know what your trying to play or you don't have the technical skills.... so,
    If at first you don't suceed...give up...y'know what I mean...it's not that difficult...unless you can't do it...in which case....

  13. #37

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    I like what Bryan Baker says about speed. He's got some of the most remarkable toolset of chops of players today.


    Make of it what you will. But he admits that scale obsession and speed slavery was, ultimately, not a wise priority in of itself. He sees it as the result of being young, not knowing the productive perspective and in a way, misplaced priorities.
    Big takeaway, everyone's got a lot of work to do and you choose the course that's right for YOU. Sometimes not understanding why or what you really need can cause you to waste a lot of time, or worse yet, damaging your hands or internalizing non musical propensities.

  14. #38

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    yea Mr Parker... sorry, just getting back to Forum, I'll start loading some technical skills material today.

    Nice vid, Jimmy. It is interesting to always hear great players always say.... yea don't waste your time on getting scales , or technical skills together etc... While they almost always have already gone through the process. Like I've always pushed.... it's all going on all the time. And if you don't have technical skills you'll never get a chance to be able to hear let alone use rhythm, melody, harmony etc...

  15. #39

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    If you don't have the skills nobody's interested in playing with you either. You need it all, but you can't get it all at once.

  16. #40

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy blue note
    I like what Bryan Baker says about speed. He's got some of the most remarkable toolset of chops of players today.

    Make of it what you will. But he admits that scale obsession and speed slavery was, ultimately, not a wise priority in of itself. He sees it as the result of being young, not knowing the productive perspective and in a way, misplaced priorities.
    Big takeaway, everyone's got a lot of work to do and you choose the course that's right for YOU. Sometimes not understanding why or what you really need can cause you to waste a lot of time, or worse yet, damaging your hands or internalizing non musical propensities.
    That wasn't how I interpreted the interview. I haven't heard of the guy, and I skipped through the clip, but was very impressed with him. Basically I share his same viewpoint. I thought he said how he practiced his scales and mechanics ad nauseam because he wanted to achieve technical mastery of his instrument - and then use that to be musical. And listening to him play, I thought he achieved that. All people say is that if you run theory, you'll by definition only be able to play that. Uh no, it's not that complex of a process to tell yourself, these are raw building blocks, you must use them creatively and not mechanically.

  17. #41

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jimmy Smith
    That wasn't how I interpreted the interview. I haven't heard of the guy, and I skipped through the clip, but was very impressed with him. Basically I share his same viewpoint. I thought he said how he practiced his scales and mechanics ad nauseam because he wanted to achieve technical mastery of his instrument - and then use that to be musical. And listening to him play, I thought he achieved that. All people say is that if you run theory, you'll by definition only be able to play that. Uh no, it's not that complex of a process to tell yourself, these are raw building blocks, you must use them creatively and not mechanically.
    Yeah you're right. I was referring to the beginning of the interview where he says it was an obsession, way beyond necessity, to run scales to the degree he did early in his life.
    An interesting story: I have a friend who is also a very skilled guitar player. We were talking and he said "You know Bryan Baker? I'm just listening to him and his playing is amazing."
    I told him 'Yeah, Mick told me about him. He said he doesn't often see this level of ability on the instrument.'
    "You don't see this level because it comes from a LOT of practicing. For a very long time."
    'You should come to Berklee and tell the students that, give them that message, Ben'.
    And he says to me "No, at that stage in their lives, if they haven't gotten that message, it's too late."

    There's undeniable necessity to master the proficiency of the fingers. And the ear. And fretboard knowledge and navigation. And the ear. And imaginative conceptual options. And the ear. And mastery of space, rhythm and syncopation. And phrasing. And the ear.

    All that's a lot to have, and it all takes time. If Bryan had assumed it was primarily about speed proficiency in scales, stopped there, he would not be any more than an awesome scale runner. He's not your average guitar monster; he's got it all.

  18. #42

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    Quote Originally Posted by Reg
    It is interesting to always hear great players always say....
    Is working on a piece until you can play it at tempo important?-screen-shot-2022-03-05-9-48-13-pm-png