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First of all, I would like to thank the teachers who have given me so much
inspiration and ideas about how to approach the daunting task of learning
the guitar. The jazz guitarist Mike Gari gave me my first inkling of how to
play jazz harmony and set me on the path. John Damian imbued his lessons
with a zany presence, teaching very advanced concepts with such humor and
zeal that it didn't feel difficult at all. I'm indebted to John for opening
up my intervallic ear. Mick Goodrick opened my first lesson with ten minutes
of silence, then he asked "any questions?" I chose his "They Shoot Horses
Don't They" approach to organizing materials and still work daily on the
science of the Unitar. I think I'm gradually nearing the Electric Rink,
which is what he called the stage at which you can combine the materials
you've studied and play with all of them. Both Damian and Goodrick have
published guitar books, which I highly recommend. Finally, Edward "Eetu"
Vesala kicked my butt and woke me up to many weaknesses in my
concept/execution. He once told me: "If you sounded the way you look when
you play, you'd be a great musician". He made great demands on me and
everyone in his band, forcing us to dig deeper for more meaning, more color,
more expression. His passing away several years ago was a shock to all of
us, and left a vacuum that can't possibly be filled by anyone else.
I have taught guitarists for twenty years now, many of them at the Sibelius
Academy, most of them at my home in Helsinki. It's been quite a voyage of
mutual education, many concepts crystallizing before my own eyes in the
midst of my explaining them to someone. The discipline needed for teaching
is very healthy; it keeps the basic, important rudiments in sight at all
times, even when venturing into some very advanced territory. I feel lots of
empathy for my pupils as I remember how confusing it was when nobody would
answer my questions. Like, it took years before I realized that Rhythm
changes was a string of chords, not some advanced way of changing tempo. So
I know how it feels to ask questions, it's something I strive to do every
day in my ongoing self-education. And that makes me accessible for answering
your questions, too!
The stuff I teach is mostly very conceptual, ways of understanding the
fretboard, harmony, rhythm. I've designed my own method FOR MYSELF, and give
students the tools and ideas so that they can make THEIR OWN. I'm well
acquainted with many styles and techniques, ranging from the open tunings
and slide mastery of Robert Johnson to the dramaturgical moments in the
music at which Hendrix switches from bridge to the neck pickup, from the
joyful polyphonic fingerstyle of D'Gary to the intricate picking of Brij
Narayan on his Sarod, from the elegant gentle rhythms of Jobim to the
two-handed tapping of Van Halen...there's a lot of ideas to draw from. The
choice is up to your spirit. The main thing is to know your way around your
instrument, to be able to hear what you want to play before you play it, and
to have a solid understanding of how to use the "hardware" and how to set it
up. Once you take care of those seemingly simple tasks, the rest is "just"
honing your style to fit your desire.
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Knowing your way around the instrument
Basic knowledge of the fingerboard is usually taught by learning loads of
fingering patterns for scales or chord fingerings drawn on diagrams. This is
an effective way of getting exercise for those fingers, an important part of
getting the body used to the guitar. The catch is that it's easy to forget
to listen to those scales as they're so graphic, and soon the mere mechanics
take over. Working on one string at a time, up and down the neck (Goodrick
calls it the Unitar) is a good way of keeping the ear in the game, and
discovering what amazing things you can do with your left hand alone. Then
by playing on two strings at a time, next on three and so on, you REALLY
learn those fingerings. On the other hand (literally), you have to work on
picking or/and fingerpicking, on skipping over strings, of keeping an
accompaniment really poppin' by judiciously dampening the strings with your
palm, on playing melodies with a mandolin-like tremolo…At the same time,
you're concentrating on coordinating both of your hands so that they're in
perfect synch. Going on from these rudiments, there are the colorful effects
produced by using harmonics and flageolets (artificial harmonics), turning
your picking hand into another fretting hand, hammer-ons and pull-offs as
blessed relief from dogmatically picking every note, chord structures in
thirds, fourths, fifths, seconds, counterpoint on the guitar...well, it just
goes on and on. None of the above means anything without extensive work on
the next subject area.
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Hearing what you want to play BEFORE you play it!
An Indian classical musician spends many years learning melodies and rhythms
with his/her voice before doing it on an instrument. To me, this concept of
learning the music first, THEN the instrument, seems to make beautiful
sense. Once you KNOW what you want to play, then finding it on your
instrument is a focused act. The "western" way of teaching is quite the
opposite, all music starting out as written symbols on a page that the
student must first learn to decode; with all the effort needed for such a
task, it's no wonder most students never get around to "hearing" what they
play. Don't get me wrong, knowing how to read music can certainly put a
wealth of material at your fingertips. But I feel that it's much more
important, ESPECIALLY for anyone with any ambitions of improvising, to zoom
in on that elusive contact between ear and hand. To see how good your
hearing is, try this little exercise:
a. Sing your favorite melody, keeping in tune (play the chords or something)
b. Close your eyes and visualize how you'd play it on your guitar, which
finger, which fret etc.
c. Play it!
If you wind up using a very familiar fingering (it IS your favorite melody,
after all!), just transpose it to another key, play it in a different
octave, move it around. The simplicity of this task is misleading; doing a
bit of this every day can do wonders for your confidence and musicality. I
do all sorts of exercises with my students aimed at reinforcing this
all-important link, combining them with tasks aimed at improving knowledge
of the fretboard.
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Knowing how to use the hardware and setting it up.
Even if you play on one acoustic guitar alone, there's already some
"hardware to think about. Choosing the right strings for the guitar (right
material, right gauge etc.), fine-tuning the bridge so your octaves are
accurate, learning to tune the guitar, choosing good tuning pegs, ensuring
that a string glides smoothly through the grooves in the saddle when you
bend it, adjusting the truss rod for best action without buzzing, deciding
on what pick to use (heavy, medium, pearl-shaped, large triangle-shaped
etc.). If you play an electric guitar…well, the list grows logarithmically.
Starting from choice of pickups and guitar type, the chain continues with
which patch cord you use, which effects pedals and what order you set them
up in, which amp for which use, which multi-effects units you put through
the effects loop, which speaker type you use, how many, open-backed or
closed cabinet, which microphone into the P.A., how close and at what angle.
I've spent years trying out different combinations, and learnt how to
combine amp types with the speakers that work best. Once you start
concerning yourself with tone, you'll be hooked for life. And when you're on
stage with that tone you've worked so hard to find, it'll make your playing
incandescent and you'll leave the listeners in a better space than they were
before hearing you!
In conclusion, I just want to remind you that the above three categories are
merely the mandatory stepping-stones to getting a basic grip on the guitar.
They are subjects, which I have a lot of experience teaching and studying
myself. However, making music also entails making choices about tone
(instrumentation), harmony (diatonic, modal, free-tonal, pan-modal,
poly-modal, serial), rhythmic continuity and development, form. Music is a
vast resource, and once you take the leap and start discovering the sounds
of the music from all over the globe, there should be no lack of
inspiration, nor lack of models for you to emulate on your road to
self-discovery. I always spend time with my students exposing them to music
that they've never dreamed of as a way of giving them new energy and
especially of dispelling the often-repeated notion that "everything's been
done!" There's no boring music, only boring minds!
If you want to come for a lesson at my place in Lower Manhattan, send me an e-mail or call me at (917) 4591519. I charge 40$ for 60 minutes, or 50$ for 90 minutes.
lessons@raoulbjorkenheim.com
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