I am having a serious ponder.
Every night I practice for an at least an hour and a half- religiously - often at the expense of spending time with the misses after a hard day at work. I do this because the income from gigging with the band is a nice little bonus and i would like to earn more (which means practice!!)
HOWEVER - when i look at the songs we play and the songs we want to play none of them require more than an intermediate level of skill. for example, we are currently practicing Sex on Fire by kings of leon, and kid rocks all summer long - good songs but not terribly difficult to learn for the intermediate.
I do love to practice and improve, but I am already at the level where i can comfortably play the type of songs we pick (all be it with a lack of musical understanding and using tab as a crutch). I am never going to be a great player, so what do i do?
i could keep going as i am, learning new techniques and styles, but never use them gigging - this way i could enjoy seeing myself improve but, like i said, i am too old to ever "make it" gigging full time with tribute bands etc.
Or, i could chill out, reduce my practice time 45 minutes, concentrate on learning new songs that are within my ability and enjoy my newly found free time, but never get any better!!
has anybody else had spells like this - what did they decide???
"I like to play that guitar. I have to stare at it while I'm playing it because I'm not very good at playing it."
Noel Gallagher (who took the words right out of my mouth)
Dude. (<- the all purpose, international phrase)
What's the issue? You're at a point were you can learn/play all of the songs in your set list and can pick up the new tunes your band would like to play. I think you've already answered your own question. Practice what you need to for the band and afterwards, play something that is a bit more challenging. The way I see it, there's no downside. You WILL only get better.
I look at it this way. I've not played my guitar as much as I would have liked to over the past few months. Picked it up past night and found myself strugling a bit with things that I played very easily last time I touched the guitar. So I'd say be happy with your current status. Take advantage of it to learn more. Put your new found time into learning theory. It can never hurt!!!
Teamwork- A few harmless flakes working together can unleash an avalanche of destruction.
You are the only person who can answer this question. I wouldn't let guitar cause a problem for your personal life, your wife and marriage is more important than playing guitar. But I suppose everybody is motivated to their own degree. Some folks are satisfied with being able to play chords and strum songs well, and really don't care about playing solos, while others want to be a master of the instrument. I guess it really doesn't matter, whatever makes you personally happy and satisfies you is what is right for you.
If you know something better than Rock and Roll, I'd like to hear it - Jerry Lee Lewis
hey Alman we are going to play that song also although no one else inthe band knows it but me, there's not really much of a lead so I know the lead guitarist won't like it much, plus that guys got a pretty strong voice I hope you have a singer that can do it justice.
There are actually three guitars playing in certain parts of the song. I try to learn all the differnt parts if there are multiple guitars in a song just so I can play something different. The only difficult part and it's not really difficult is the intro is slightly different than the verses. In the intro he does a slide on the D string from the 11th fret down to the 9th and then alternatly picks the D string and open E. They do that twice and when he does the verses he picks the D string at the 11th fret and then the D at the 9th alternating with the open E.
The other thing you can try are picking songs that had two guitarists and play off each other. Judas priest and Thin Lizzy are two bands that come to mind.
We do Hot Rockin (not really a song I like) and I do the first part of the solo and the other guitar player does the second. that's kind a fun and for me that 1st solo is kinda fast so it gives me something to work on.
The Thin Lizzy song has a short little harmony solo that both guitars play together.
Blueline is right and I'm in the same boat as you pretty much just learn what you need for the band then do your own thing, no matter what you are working on it'll help ou improve. I can learn a new song in a couple hours usually at most (that's the rhythm) so I've been working on the solo's for some on my own to help me improve my skills.
"It's all about stickin it to the man!"
It's a long way to the top if you want to rock n roll!
I'm really not buying the "only requires intermediate skill" assessment. There is a big difference between playing even an uncomplicated tune well-enough-to-perform-in-public and really well. There is a lot of control and nuance a seasoned musician brings to the band and its songs that can take a tune's performance from "pretty good, the audience liked us" to "really %$@#ing hot." ANY tune. The changes could be crisper, the voicings different, better vibrato, really locked-in rhythm ... hitting the groove, better harmony, better stage presence, better instumental balance ...
And then there is consistency. It requires a fair amount of mastery to be a hot performer, and do it 99% of the time.
I say ponder a bit more.
-=tension & release=-
good point gnease. perhaps i should have said it needs an intermediate level player to play it to the standard we play our other songs at - after all we are only a small pub band. :D
"I like to play that guitar. I have to stare at it while I'm playing it because I'm not very good at playing it."
Noel Gallagher (who took the words right out of my mouth)
the word that sounds like "all be it" is albeit.
i play because i like playing and i like practicing a lot because i like playing well. if i'm not playing, i'm often thinking about playing. but if i had a family, i'd probably also like spending time with them. or possibly not. either way, it's up to you. you know the consequences of your actions.
true.
i guess i should rephrase the question slightly.
"is putting hours and hours into learning techniques such as fingerpicking, finger tapping, sweeping etc a waste of time if you never use them live. or does it help your overall playing and understanding to a point where it is worth the effort?"
"I like to play that guitar. I have to stare at it while I'm playing it because I'm not very good at playing it."
Noel Gallagher (who took the words right out of my mouth)
not if you want to learn them and would enjoy learning them. if i never played in front of other people, i'd still play for myself. i mean, i read books to learn and to be entertained, not so i can show off my intellect. so yeah, for me, it would be worth it.
but some people are a lot more outwardly motivated than i am. for them, if there isn't some kind of tangible payoff in terms of money or fans or whatever, it's not worth it to them.
but then again, i like to write songs, and i can write them however i want. for instance, i can slap and pop a guitar, which is pretty useless if you're doing slayer or britney spears covers, but i wrote a song using it, so yay me.
in general, though, it should help you. it's pretty much always the case that the more time you spend with your hands on a guitar, the better you're going to be at it. but at the same time, i'm one of the very few people that doesn't really advocate a systematic approach to the guitar. i wouldn't spend 45 minutes learning to sweep unless i wanted to sweep for 45 minutes. i just let my fingers/brain/ears tell me where to go next, and i've really enjoyed where it's taken me musically. but like i said, my focus isn't on doing covers for money.
i don't think that's a really good answer, but it's probably the best i can come up with.
true.
i guess i should rephrase the question slightly.
"is putting hours and hours into learning techniques such as fingerpicking, finger tapping, sweeping etc a waste of time if you never use them live. or does it help your overall playing and understanding to a point where it is worth the effort?"
learning these things can improve your more mundane techniques, as many require a better-developed sense of timing, phrasing and coordination. then there are emergency and extenuating circumstances: no or lost pick? can you do it well enough with fingers-only? break a finger during your day job: can you still play slide or work in open tuning or use partial chords as you recover? how about adding tasteful flourishes and fills to tune? a little goes a long way. check out how sparse Mark Knopfler fills are, yet the incredible impact. in a rowdy pub with flying bottles and food, could you continue to play your part only with your fretting hand, while the other extracts broken glass from your forehead?
okay, so you play in a pub band now. and it sounds as if that is not challenging you enough. what about later on in your musical life? could you be learning to do studio work, get good enough to sit in with other bands, start writing and recording, learn to sit in at jam sessions and really be good at it? so much to do. keep learning.
-=tension & release=-
Maybe you should start getting the band to work on more "complex" songs, but I have to agree with what gnease posted earlier, even a simple song can be improved
There is a lot of control and nuance a seasoned musician brings to the band and its songs that can take a tune's performance from "pretty good, the audience liked us" to "really %$@#ing hot." ANY tune. The changes could be crisper, the voicings different, better vibrato, really locked-in rhythm ... hitting the groove, better harmony, better stage presence, better instumental balance ...
"It's all about stickin it to the man!"
It's a long way to the top if you want to rock n roll!
I'm really not buying the "only requires intermediate skill" assessment. There is a big difference between playing even an uncomplicated tune well-enough-to-perform-in-public and really well. There is a lot of control and nuance a seasoned musician brings to the band and its songs that can take a tune's performance from "pretty good, the audience liked us" to "really %$@#ing hot." ANY tune. The changes could be crisper, the voicings different, better vibrato, really locked-in rhythm ... hitting the groove, better harmony, better stage presence, better instumental balance ...
And then there is consistency. It requires a fair amount of mastery to be a hot performer, and do it 99% of the time.
I say ponder a bit more.
+100% to the wise words of Gnease.
The difference between a good musician and a mediocre one isn't usually whether they can play this or that chord, or play so many notes per second, it's about how they do it. Touch and timing is the difference between the good and the great - and you can't have too much skill or subtlety at it. For instance, many people concentrate on trying to play fast, yet only the good players can carry off slow really well. Keep working on those tiny fractions, they're the bits that count... :)
Chris
