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...I linked the interview, maybe that helps :-) and I also tried somehow reason in my own words. Of course this does not mean that this point of view is right.
Originally Posted by James W
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04-19-2022 10:40 AM
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I guess these things boil down to language games. Take the Schiff excerpts you posted, practising mechanically - by which I assume he meant repeating something over and over again - is not the same thing as practising mechanics. Originally Posted by Gabor
Anyway, I can't be bothered arguing over semantics - I've got a guitar that needs practising.
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Here is the full quote from that interview:
Fidelio: So, you do exactly what Pablo Casals did? He also played Bach every day.
Schiff: Yes, I've indirectly learned, or ascribe that to Casals. To be sure, you have to have an urge for it, too. A spiritual, but above all an intellectual—yes, even a physical urge. I do it instead of pianistic exercises and scales, which bore me to death.
Fidelio: Bach thought so too.
Schiff: Surely. I'm very much against it, when people drum into a young musician's head, to play études. Most young musicians exercise incorrectly, and stupidly—and hence, lose a lot of time. Moreover, it's not efficient when people sit for ten to twelve hours at an instrument. That must not be, and is lost time. If we work daily, say, three, four hours, very concentrated and intelligently, then people achieve much more! Never permit a person to exercise mechanically! Mechanization of musicians is unworthy of human beings! When you walk through the corridors of music schools, you very often hear how people will play a passage taken from a piano piece mechanically, fifty times in succession, rapidly and loudly—it's frightful to witness how idiotically people practice.
I think the context is important here. He specifically mentions "walking through the corridors of music schools." The mechanical practice he's decrying is occurring in conservatories, mindless repetitions of certain pieces or passages for hours a day. I completely agree that 3-4 hours of concentrated practice on Bach, or other actual music, is going to be more beneficial.
But the fact that he's talking about conservatory students means he's already talking about players of a certain skill level. A typical pre-audition for a high level classical piano program will typically be something like a Chopin etude, a non-easy Beethoven sonata, and a substantial work by Liszt or someone of comparable difficulty. And that's not even to get in, that's to get an in-person audition!
At that level, they do not need to work on basic mechanics anymore. But if someone like me, who has little experience with serious keyboard playing, decided they wanted to learn a Chopin etude, I almost certainly would need to work on some basic mechanics. And if I really wanted to, the pedagogy is out there. I'd never be as good as a virtuoso who's been practicing seriously since childhood. But if I really wanted to, I could eventually, with enough time and dedication, learn to play a Chopin etude. Same with violin.
But plectrum guitar is a different story. There is no long-established pedagogical tradition like there is for piano. I believe the analogy that Troy Grady used to play was something like a major scale. Playing two-handed major scales on a piano is an intermediate warmup, and any piano of any reasonable skill can play them flawlessly at a good speed. How many guitarists can do that using perfect alternate picking? A shockingly small number. Far, far more guitarists are closer to "me on a piano" than "Juilliard student on a piano" (never mind Andras Schiff on a piano).
Once guitarists reach a certain level of basic proficiency, then I totally agree: playing bebop heads and transcribed jazz solos or lines is a much better use of your time than running scales for 8 hours a day. A ton of jazz guitarists have talked about how the Bach Sonatas and Partitas for violin have been hugely helpful for them.
And yes, I completely agree, the 2003 ECM recording of Well-Tempered Clavier is astounding.
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Indeed. Mike Stern and Adam Rogers have spoken about the Bach violin sonatas and partitas, and it was seeing Stern on one of his My Music Masterclass videos play some of the presto from the first solo violin sonata that inspired me to learn it. I play that in the morning for about 10 minutes - following Grady's advice, I always play it above a speed I feel comfortable with (which is not very fast!) to get away from the string-hopping which becomes more likely when trying to alternate pick something like a Bach piece. Of course, Rogers uses economy picking... Originally Posted by dasein
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i also tend to prefer actual music.
Nothing wrong with a nice scale pattern though. Or you could take a Bach thing and turn it into a pattern. Or transcribed lines.
Mechanical, thoughtless practice is the problem. Not scales. Scales are raw music materials for people like us, not simply practice exercises. The onus is not on us simply to perform music but to create and transform material.
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Here's an example from practice today. Listening to Monk. Monk, pretty creative, right brain out there, right? Nothing mechanical about his music! Furthermore, revisiting Round Midnight, obviously a ballad. Nice and tasteful, right, no room for wanky chops there, right?
Thing is though, if you want to play Monk the way he does, there's quite a few very fast scales. For instance that whole tone run he always liked to do.
Hard to get those clean. Peter Bernstein can do it. But Pete has great chops (which you might not realise as he doesn't tend to 'flex' as the kids would call it)
Not sure if there's a point or argument here in particular, that's just how I tend to encounter and work on things.
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I do no know why instantly Schiff's attitude catched me about mechanic vs technique decade ago, the only thing I can think his authenticity of expressiveness. That gave me a possible answer why so intensive and suggestive some artist, their performance, I can not find better word than expressiveness what I looking for when listening, of course this is a personal preference.
We often talk about rhythm vs melody stressing that how important is rhythm, not only the notes. Maybe there is a similar duality about "making the sound". Not only the "capability" matters (quantity) but also the "how" (quality) I mean, how it sounds, how it starts, ends, what is the relative volume compared to the context, how mellow or harsh it is.
Recently in an other thread we saw Rick Beato s Scofield interview. Scofield on his legato mentioned Joe Pass Virtuoso, and said laughing (about himself), "...this not going to happen". So he created a unique extremly *expressive* technique for himself. (I know Joe Pass is also heavily use legato on Virtuoso, but this was Scofield example)
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Lol, yeah Scofield is very self-deprecating about his technique. I was watching an old clip of him playing with Miles, and I was not thinking about sub-par picking. I was thinking how boring the modal thing they were playing through could have been, if not for Sco playing outside the key center so creatively.
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Modal could be very exciting without outside playing, with superimposition. (one can argue that superimposition is also a form to go outside, and also one can state that playing lines with complete harmonic movement over a modal tune's chord is maybe like iron ring made of wood), anyway I always enyjoy it.
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I'm feeling positive about how my plectrum technique is coming on.
The word I keep returning to is 'coax' because that's what I've been doing with my right-hand wrist - coaxing it into doing the little back-and-forth that is alternate picking. And because this is a relaxed movement I can spend long times doing it, without getting any hint of RSI. Sometimes it's true I still feel like I might be wasting my time, that I might simply be physiologically incapable of this wrist motion. But just now, I executed a call-and-response funk lick at 120 BPM which features alternate picking and chordal stabs quite easily, and about a week ago I would have struggled with it at that tempo. Sometimes I got a bit preoccupied with wrist-motion alternate-picking and it has eaten into other parts of my practice schedule, but now I think it will come - that it is coming - so there's no need to try to rush the process, it's healthier to work on other areas of a jazz guitarist's musicianship.
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At risk of this thread becoming my own personal blog or whatever ... Originally Posted by James W
Well, contrary to a lot of what I say in this post of mine I've quoted, today I feel like I am just not naturally inclined to use a plectrum or play jazz, and so I've played through BWV 998 over the past hour. When I decided to return to jazz guitar at the end of February I did actually manage a few weeks where I'd spend about half an hour playing through 998, so I haven't entirely neglected it. I think the only way around this predicament is to allot half my time to classical guitar and half to jazz guitar, and see where it takes me after about a year; then I might actually pick one to be exclusively devoted to.
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Big secret - jazz is more than 50% about the left hand
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I took my time, and reviewed Troy's material.
- The most useful thesis he say is to eliminate string hopping. (via the angle to be short). This is not new, we heard and knew it zillion times.
Here are my doubts:
- In many of his methods he uses and (recommends) wrist on the bridge.
* This probably against many jazz guitarist tone ideal, where the pick should be 2-8 cm closer to the neck compared his wrist on the bridge position. *
- He states guitar not like piano or sax, where there is no need to the two hands synchronized, here (guitar) there is a need. Besides it is misleading (we know what he means), the main problem, then completely forgets this "difficulty" for almost the entire course. * He do not emphasizes, the key is to focus on the execution quality, the slowness, I mean practice so slow, that the execution (for example the sync of the two hands, and many other factors) should be correct, never practice higher speed. The speed will be a side product (or not :-) * Actually he directs the student exactly the opposite direction, priorizing the speed. (I know, stamina, but stamina could be achieved special exercises not by via doing usual exercise with higher speed)
- In his recommended position his hand (pinky, ring and middle( fingers are very tense, to keep then not touching the strings.
* This is against a common experience, to be relaxed both muscle wise and mental *
So here are three doubts, not particular order.
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Yeah lol, Troy's site sometimes gets that question...why nothing about the left hand, dude?? That's why I take a stand against picking styles that rely on pre-engineering the left hand to make life easier on the right. No can do in jazz improv, IMO. Originally Posted by Christian Miller
Ironically, the modern legato style makes the right hand even less important. I'm amazed at what Tom Quayle, for instance, can do with it. Personally though I find it a bit lacking in dynamics if used exclusively. Kind of how I felt about listening to Stanley Jordan's tapping stuff. After the novelty wears off, it starts to sound a bit boring.
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Yes, the dynamic range one can get from using a plectrum is one of its advantages, I think of the intro to this song, which is truly beautiful, as a paragon of that:
As for me, I have concluded that it simply does not feel good to use a plectrum for me. So it's fingerstyle for now, might work on a few solo arrangements of standards...
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That classic busy Rhodes stuff from Chick works well with it too.
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Well apart from all those great jazz guitarists who did exactly that…. Django, Wes, Joe Pass, George Benson etc etc anyone who uses a dwps style picking strategy and theres been a lot of these players over the history. Originally Posted by timmer
However you pick, improvisation doesn’t happen note by note at the tempos where this stuff is an issue.
People are way too purist about improvisation imo - as Adam Rogers said ‘if you play something fast you’ve played it before’. Fast improvised lines are invariably combinations of pre prepared modules for any player I can think of. How that can be done is a conversation in itself.
Thats is the disadvantage of the technique. Most of the players I like use a combination of right and left hand articulation to achieve a flowing horn like legato. This is true of Wes actually, as much as it is of Mike Moreno. Learning how to do this in a swinging and idiomatic way is necessary for it to come off right.Ironically, the modern legato style makes the right hand even less important. I'm amazed at what Tom Quayle, for instance, can do with it. Personally though I find it a bit lacking in dynamics if used exclusively. Kind of how I felt about listening to Stanley Jordan's tapping stuff. After the novelty wears off, it starts to sound a bit boring.
There are plenty of players who pick every note, but even then the left hand needs to be synchronised with the right obviously, even if you are picking every note. The left hand can also solve problems for the right, which for bop heads etc is very helpful.
Left hand technique can function in different ways - from the three fingered to the highly classical - but it’s very different from the classical thing. In classical we often want to maximise resonance and over-ring (within what’s appropriate for the harmony/polyphony). In jazz it’s much more about connecting the notes without over-ring, which has implications for the way the left hand functions.
I find that these things take up much more of my time than thinking about picking. I have a good right hand but a lot of work is done by the left and that would be true regardless of what picking style I used.
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Hey James.... I would add....whatever you decide to do or use etc, The trick is to put in enough time to reach a level of proficiency so that you can actually play the style or technique.
That generally implies..... you don't need to practice or work out what your playing. You naturally perform and don't need to stare at your fretboard etc... at performance tempos. All this within reason.
Generally the left hand, (fretboard) should have more problems. The picking should become almost mechanical, your choices should be about articulations and phrasing etc...
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I've worked on getting adept at that one stuck crosser motion in DWPS, going from downstroke to upstroke on lower (pitched) string, in order to be able to "pick anything". But admittedly, at high tempos, this motion will never be as smooth or error-free as the unstuck motions and economy sweeps. So yeah, just fooling myself really. What Grady says about each style having its own vocabulary from which to choose atomic units to piece together into phrases doable for that style, makes sense. Originally Posted by Christian Miller
Right, it's a bit much to think you're creating all unique phrases out of whole cloth on the spot, especially at speed. This also reminds me of the John Mehegan (jazz piano books) line about the trade-off in complexity between harmony, melody and rhythm. At fast tempos, the other two tend to simplify. Originally Posted by Christian Miller
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Continuing in the direction Christian was bring up.... the material you play etc.
Personally and with many of the pros I have and still do work with... Most use or have targets, both melodic and harmonic, that we either choose or feel...depending on how you work etc... targets that are the rhythmically organized most important locations of larger sections of space. The space between those targets generally imply the style and harmonic movement. You can just say melodic figures that have relationships, musical relationships to each other and imply those Targets. This is not just spelling the changes... it's the next step, spelling changes is just a learning process, becoming aware of whats going on harmonically.
It can incorporate the use of licks that imply style and harmonic movement... but generally it's just like using single notes.... but each note implies much more musically. Complex notes LOL.
James maybe this not what your dealing with yet, but not being aware of where you want to go or get, usually leads to walls, bad choices of what to work on. Picking need to be decided on what method your going to use as your Reference... where you always start from, your internal Reference. This doesn't mean that's all you do, but it's your default system. Without having to think about it and being able to play at tempo...
I'm a firm believer and have been pushing for over a decade on this forum.... You need fairly advanced technique before you can even attempt to play at the speed of jazz. It won't happen accidentally...
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Yeah, it’s really hard. I have two strategies Originally Posted by timmer
1) cheeky legato
2) use edge picking (benson style) which seems to make things more flexible.
Increasingly I’m adjusting my pick angle to facilitate some difficult string crossing like descending triad arpeggios and so on. This is not a mega speed thing though atm
Unless you are Bud Powell or Charlie Parker of course.Right, it's a bit much to think you're creating all unique phrases out of whole cloth on the spot, especially at speed. This also reminds me of the John Mehegan (jazz piano books) line about the trade-off in complexity between harmony, melody and rhythm. At fast tempos, the other two tend to simplify.
It tbh there no one on guitar who has come up to that level in terms of rhythmic and melodic expression on fast tempos, and few on any instrument. (Pasquale Grasso is certainly trying to push the envelope in that direction, but bear in mind it took 80 years haha.)
The main thing that simplifies for guitarists, at least to my ears is rhythm, followed by intervallic content. The first is I suspect in part to the mechanics of synchronising the hands. At speed this is most commonly done with a downstroke, and this often ends up being on the beat. Hence guitarists often end up ‘squaring off’ the feel at tempos above around 280 (economy and legato players tend to sound more floaty otoh, and less rhythmically defined)
the second is obviously down to the fact that it’s easier to play scales than arpeggios and interval jumps. The Holdsworth solution is to utilise string skips and so on, which is a very guitaristic approach and certainly not one that is directly rooted in the jazz practice of other instruments but can be musically very effective. In his case obviously the picking is simplified by using the left hand more. A few players seem to shift into a more legato mode for fast playing. Adam Rogers seems to do this, as does Gilad Heckselman?Last edited by Christian Miller; 05-01-2022 at 02:36 AM.
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No piece of cake playing Bird-like horn lines with the right hand on the piano either! Originally Posted by Christian Miller
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haha sure Originally Posted by timmer
but my theory is there’s something about the ‘press the key have the note’ which makes piano basically easier to handle at fast tempos. At least that’s my pet theory as to why even the legendary straight ahead guitar masters lack the incredible rhythmic freedom and swing that players like Oscar Peterson have on even the fastest tunes. It’s not about playing fast - plenty of guitarists can do that - it’s about the musical content those piano masters can still achieve even in the 300+ range
Obviously that’s the top of the mountain; most pianists are not Oscar Peterson; but I can’t think of a guitarist to match him, or Bud, at that kind of tempo. The closest may be Benson…
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Yeah I feel like few pianists have Oscar's ability to accent any note, anywhere, while maintaining the rhythmic drive. Maybe pianists are so preoccupied with all those notes, intervals and chord voicings they can play, they tend to pay less attention to rhythmic aspects. Originally Posted by Christian Miller
But point taken. No hand synchro to worry about. No string crossing.
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One night performing, a guitarist in the audience ask me how I was picking because from more than a few feet way it appeared as if there was no movement of my right hand. I was to discover after decades of playing that my picking technique was in the family of Chuck Wayne economy circle picking - flexing of thumb and index to move the pick relative to the hand, and the hand moving only to position the pick over the intended strings. I orient my index finger on its side and point to my navel and lay the pick on top and hold it there with the tip of my thumb... I am not using the pad of either my finger or thumb. To play a string I either push down with my thumb or pull up with my index, flexing both.
My right hand plays some series of pitches alternating, some economy (both inner and outer versions), and some down strokes only, hybrid, octaves, etc. Because the pick is moving relative to the hand (not just up stroke down stroke but also in all other dimensions) there is no issue with string hopping (which is really about "hand hopping"). My fingers do any necessary hopping as flexing, just another dimension of movement underneath the hand as it maintains a steady elevation from the string plane.
My right hand's picking technique was not learned from me, it was learned from my left hand. Shortly after I began playing the guitar fifty years ago, I adopted one strict rule: the left hand uses all four fingers, all the time, for all styles of music, everywhere on the finger board, no exceptions. I never gave the right hand any thought of how to play; I let the right hand figure out for itself how to hold the pick, move the pick on strings and across strings, and figure out for itself how to interpret and coordinate what to do with respect to the left hand. I never thought about whether a line started with an up or down stroke, or how many notes would be played on a string, etc.
This has turned out to work very well. Since the one rule for the left hand is that anything and everything I execute is systematic at the fingering level, so I don't have any regard for positions, patterns, or other emergent mechanical structures - I never think about them. This systematic left hand rigor presents the right hand with a clarity of scope and consistency which enables it to reliably develop its own means of doing what needs done.
All the mechanical variables have been figured out by my right hand all by itself, including the expressive variables - all I do is select and request my ideas to the left hand where they are made manifest through one strict consistent fingering principle. In doing so, the left hand compiles my request with respect to its fingering principle, and so every left hand solution includes and presents a picking schema to the right hand, which executes an instance of the solution selecting its own micro-mechanics invented and developed on its own.
So in playing, what I am doing is directing my musical ideas to the left hand which informs my right hand what is needed.
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