The Guitar Study Newsletter for 7/03/2002

By Darrin Koltow

Greetings once again from MaximumMusician.com. This is Darrin Koltow, webmaster, choirboy, music adventurer and amateur pickler, bringing you more tips to enhance your guitar playing. First, I want to thank you again for signing up for the Guitar Study newsletter at www.MaximumMusician.com. You can unsubscribe any time using instructions at the end of this email.

Get a buddy to sign up for the Guitar Study newsletter, at www.MaximumMusician.com . He's not doing anything important anyway.

In this issue:

== Take care of your hands ==
== The write stuff ==
== More triad stuff ==

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== Take care of your hands ==

Okay, gang. Here's a letter from a reader who is going through a true trauma. To me, it seems like a living nightmare, and I think this would be true for many guitarists. What follows is the letter and my response to it.

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Hi. My question is a peculiar type. (Is there any other kind?)

I am having surgery on my wrist (left hand first, then my right) and I am scared about having to hang up the guitar forever, thus throwing away the years I have invested in it. I am not a professional, but it is part of my daily life. My question is this:

Do you know where I can learn theory front to back as it applies to the guitar? I want to complete my musical theory training, as I have only picked up pieces here and there from learning the guitar.

I can spend the time reading and or studying while I am on the mend, which will be two months for each hand, when I find out if I will ever play again. I can't really bear the thought. I wish I could say I was a tough guy and I am. But let me tell you it doesn't matter how tough you are when you can't feel your fingers and or control them due to Carpal Tunnel and or some other nerve damage. It is a *drag*. Take car of your hands.

- C.O.

Hi, C.O. Your letter was truly sobering and thought provoking. Although we've never met, I feel quite strongly that I want you to find some way of keeping guitar playing in your life. (Even if you never read another of my articles!) I want to answer your questions and maybe offer related tips to help you keep the guitar flame inside you burning.

First, some book recommendations. The best book I've ever found for learning theory -- on guitar or any instrument -- is Mark Levine's Jazz Theory. I know, I know, the title has "Jazz" in it, but the theory inside is truly for any style. I had a decent amount of theory to begin with before I read this book, but this book covers the very rudiments of theory, all the way up to reharmonization. It makes theory understandable and enjoyable, if you can believe it.

Another book, focused on guitar technique specifically: Fretboard Logic SE (Volumes I and II combined). To be totally honest, the book hasn't done much for me (yet), mostly because I learned most of its content from other sources. However, so many guitarists have praised it, and its message is important: the fretboard has a method to its madness, and once you learn this method, you'll have a solid foundation on which to build any other guitar skill. Specifically, the book teaches the CAGED scale and chord forms, which every serious guitarist must know. If you don't know what I mean by CAGED, drop whatever you're doing and learn about it now. A good source for this is the articles on WholeNote.com or GuitarNoise.

Next book, perfect for your situation: Mental Practice and Imagery for Musicians by Malva Freymuth. This book shows you how to practice effectively in your mind. Freymuth gave herself severe tendonitis from over practicing the violin, but used mental practicing to continue to build her skills. There are lots of case studies of people greatly increasing a certain physical skill through conscious, focused mental practice. This book is a good start. Another is Effortless Mastery by Kenny Werner.

Other books considered excellent: Principles of Correct Practice for the Guitar by Jamie Andreas. Check out related articles on Guitarprinciples.com. Jamie stresses *de*stressing: learning to channel the body's energy away from stress and into making great guitar music. Inner Game of Music will give you ideas on getting past mental blocks, and motivate you. So will Making Music for the Joy of It, by Stephanie Judy.

Those books will get you started with theory and related topics. I want to recommend another resource, based on your particular situation with your hands. Read about Django Reinhardt, considered one of the greatest guitarists of all time. His hands were burned in a fire, and yet he made fabulous music with only two fingers. Amazing, inspiring stuff. I don't have any specific titles at hand to learn more about him from, but you'll find plenty of info if you do a bit of searching.

Keep in mind this last thing: playing guitar is only one out of a zillion ways to learn about music -- and that's where the real joy is. If you can produce a coherent pitch with your voice, you can make music. And if you can hear the difference between acid rock and a classical symphony, your ears are good enough to understand and appreciate music better. To improve your ears, you might investigate ear training software, for starters.

I hope these ideas help you, and I especially hope you make a full recovery. Whatever happens, I hope you stick with making music, in one way or another.

Darrin Koltow

== The write stuff ==

I want to illustrate the importance of writing by giving you a glimpse of something I write in my guitar journal. Let's say I'm working on a solo. I work out a difficult measure, and I'm feeling pretty good about it. I want to remember this moment.

So, I write in my journal something like, "Well done! You took the time to work through that 3rd bar in the first phrase. Remember when you thought you'd never get it? Now, it's done. On to the next phrase. BPM: 110"

Let's break some of these components down, so you can see how effective writing in a music journal is in advancing your playing.

- Encouragement -

First and foremost is the encouragement factor. When I write stuff in my journal, it's as though I'm no longer a student, but a teacher for the moment.

I become the Ideal Teacher: Wes Montgomery combined with Joseph Campbell, Shinichi Suzuki, the great violin teacher, mashed together with Django Reinhardt, all in one person. When I become this teacher and write a message to my student, I know that student will pay close attention. And the most important thing I can do as a teacher is to say, "You did well on this. You have what it takes to make music well. I hope you'll keep doing what you're doing."

What's going to happen to your mood if you've had a bad day, and then you open up your journal and see such an entry? The journal entry, the encouragement you preserve through writing, is there for you the next time you pick up the guitar. Writing, in this sense, is like canning food: it locks in the juices of your playing. (I gotta quit using these food metaphors. I'm gaining weight.)

I go a step further with writing encouraging words in my journal. When I reach a goal or milestone, such as when I finish a solo or can perform a complete tune in time with a metronome, I'll put one of those adhesive, colored stars in the journal entry. Do you think this is corny? Fine. It's corny. And it's an effective motivator. Try it.

- Specific -

Another aspect of the music journal entry is that it's *specific*. I didn't just write, "Good job. You really hit it that time!" It's important to be specific when you praise or criticize, so the person you're talking to has no chance to misinterpret what you're saying. So, I wrote the specific BPM (beats per minute) to play at next, and I specified exactly which measure my "student" kicked butt on. My student will now know exactly what he did right and what he needs to do next.

- What to do next -

That brings up another important aspect of the journal entry: what the student should do next. Without a plan for where you're going, you'll have a tough time getting there. Whenever you complete *any* task, don't walk away from the table, bandstand, workbench or other site where you do work, until you've written a specific direction showing where you need to pick up the work when you return. How many times have you given up on doing something because you didn't know where to begin?

Isn't it much easier to start something new if it felt like you were just continuing something you'd already started? Writing down what you should do next is a way of getting your mind to stop thinking, "Ack! New...scary...bad...want chocolate instead" to "Um! Have done this before...easy...me like...chocolate not as tasty as this." When you finish that scale or chord, etude or solo, write in your journal -- or *some*where -- exactly what you'll do next.

- What doesn't go into journals -

What doesn't go into journals is anything not related to guitar. Your journal is not for shopping lists. It's not for taking notes from a chemistry class. It's not for making paper airplanes or writing down the starting times of movies. In fact, I wouldn't even use blank sheets of paper, pulled out of my guitar journal, for something else. I see the guitar journal as a kind of organism that's helping me grow my skills. Wacko thoughts like this can do wonders for your music journal writing, which can do wonders for your playing, trust me.

- Other journal ideas -

When you're having a tough time with a particular exercise or song, notate it in your journal. "Can play measures 8 through 12 of Stella by Starlight smoothly. But my fingers turn into all thumbs when I hit measure 13. Where am I tensing up? How do I turn my thumbs back into fingers? Would it help if I just skipped to bar 14, and *then* played bar 13? WWCD? (What would Clapton do?)"

Can you see what's happening as this person writes this problem down? You get ideas to solve the problem when you write them down, ideas you wouldn't get without writing. I don't understand how or why this works, exactly, and I'm not sure I want to. But it amazes me every time I put pen to paper (or finger to computer key) how a problem suddenly turns from Godzilla-size to cockroach-size when you write it down.

Another cool thing about recording problems you're having is looking back on these problems weeks, months or years after you've solved them. Without writing, you'd likely forget how good it felt to play through that bar 13 of Stella. But write it down, and highlight it if it's real toughie; come back six weeks later, after you can play bar 13 and have moved on to another tune; read the entry from six weeks ago and smile wide.

- You don't need to be a writer -

People get nervous when you ask them to write. I'm not sure why this is exactly. Maybe it has to do with a bad experience in school. Maybe they don't like the surprising and fantastic thoughts that spring up when they write. Maybe they're allergic to ink. Whatever the case is, *beginning* to write can be uncomfortable for some. Notice the *beginning* here. It's tough to *begin* lots of things. But, after you've started and are gliding along, what seemed tough now seems like easy, and even fun.

How to approach music journal writing? What do you do to get past that initial block, to get the musical ideas flowing? How can you make writing in a music journal fun?

Each musician answers these questions for him or herself. The key thing to remember, when you want to keep a music journal but don't like the thought of writing, is the benefits of writing, which we've talked about. Don't think of writing; think of your pen as having a mind of its own. Or, think of the pen as a kind of antenna for musical ideas or solutions to problems. From this point of view, you don't have to do any work yourself. The ideas come from the air around you, and the antenna picks 'em up, just as a radio antenna picks up radio signals.

Here's another way to view music journal writing, to help you get started. Rather than think of writing, think of speaking to a good friend, confidant, guitar teacher, stuffed animal, pet, bowl of Jell-O, or anything you feel you can open your heart and mind to. Put the pen in your hand and imagine what you would say if this person were right there in front of you. You could even imagine what this person might say to you. They could ask you questions, which will produce even more ideas in you.

Another way to get started writing is to simply notice when your mind is the most prone to thinking creative thoughts. I've done this with myself pretty successfully. I noticed that on Saturday evenings, beginning at the time when it starts to get dark, my mind became super busy thinking so-called "negative" thoughts. I would think about all kinds of catastrophes involving my house, my relationships, my health, and other areas.

I got fed up with this occurring *every* Saturday, and asked, how can I channel all this dark, creative energy into a productive force to help me play guitar better? Once I asked that question, and committed to writing *something*, no matter how ridiculous or fantastic, in a music journal, the negative thoughts bought a ticket for the coast; the positive, productive thoughts rushed right in. Notice when your mind is the busiest with "negative," or seemingly destructive thoughts. That time is a good time to begin writing in a music journal.

Another approach that's helped me get the guitar gumbo flowing onto the page is to fantasize what it would be like to achieve total musical success. I picture a TV documentary, like the Ken Burns Jazz series, with only one performer being spoken of: me.

Great musicians like Wynton Marsalis and Eric Clapton are interviewed, and Keith David's rich, resonant voice narrates. My musical journey becomes an epic, a fable, which practically forces my hand to start writing. "I *have* to write this stuff down, so my grandkids can read the cool things Wynton Marsalis had to say about my playing."

Are you getting any music journal ideas of your own yet? I have another for you. Did you ever have to teach someone how to do something you weren't quite sure of how to do yourself? When you were teaching this person, did you discover that the teaching process taught *you* a lot more about what you were teaching? Stephen Covey, a master motivator, says that one of the key components of understanding a subject is to teach someone else how to do it. I'll add to that by saying that *imagining* you're teaching something to someone else can deliver that understanding to you.

So, if you're having a tough time starting your music journal, imagine you're helping a little kid write in his music journal. "I don't wanna! I hate writing!" yells the kid at first. But, he respects and listens to you. You know how much writing can help him grow as a player.

You patiently listen to his objections, and remind him that he also doesn't like to eat lima beans, but does it anyway because he knows it's good for him. You also know how writing builds literacy. This will be useful when he gets older, finds he can't get a gig as a musician, but has a good shot at writing music reviews because he knows how to express himself through writing.

There you have it: way too many approaches to begin your music journal writing. Now, get to it! Eat those lima beans. Write those music thoughts down daily, and watch your playing and your *attitude* toward playing grow.

== More triad stuff ==

This following tab is from an upcoming Special Lesson. Make sure you pronounce the capital S and L when you read this, because triads are important.

This wee bitty ditty will throw some Blues your way in the form of triads. The melody is centered around a target note: the G on string high E, fret 3. The chords are C, Dm, B dim, and back to C.

*REMEMBER TO SET YOUR FONTS TO COURIER TO READ THIS PROPERLY. IF YOU DON'T, I'LL TURN YOUR GUITAR INTO A BALALAIKA.*

|-2-3-3--|-1-5-|-1---1-|-3---3--|
|-----5--|-3-6-|-3---3-|-5-4-5--|
|-----5--|-2-7-|-4-3-4-|-5---5--|
|--------|-----|-------|--------|
|--------|-----|-------|--------|
|--------|-----|-------|--------|

The purpose of this progression is to work out three different triad types: major, minor, and diminished, and to do so in a musical Bluesey way. We're working out triads centered on the G note here. Further progressions in the upcoming Triad Mastery lesson work the remaining notes of the C major triad -- E and C -- on the high E string. Plus, we go way beyond that to work out our triad skills on other strings and other notes while eating exotic foods such as blood sausage.

The full Triad Mastery lesson isn't quite finished yet, but look for it within the week. The preview and a good chunk of it will be available at www.MaximumMusician.com, and the full lesson will be available at True Fire.com.

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If you haven't yet picked up your copy of the Guitar Chords ebook, it's waiting for you here, while supplies last.

Have a terrific, safe, fulfilling, guitar-playing Independence Day. And, have a great week. May the guitar strings of your mind ring and twang with your musical ideas.