Chris Rushton .com

I hope you like the reference in my title. For those that didn’t get it, it references a book called ‘Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance’ by Robert Pirsig You can get the book on Amazon, here. It’s only £6, and a great book.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: 25th Anniversary Edition: An Inquiry into Values

Anyway, enough rambling and onto the meat of the post.

I’ve recently started playing electric guitar again.  There are a few posts on this site about classical guitar, my first instrumental love, but I really wanted to share something with you about electric guitar too.

Cluttered Guitar Setups

I used to have it all.  Seriously.  I had every little gadget I could afford when I was playing guitar.  My setup was something along the lines of  Line 6 Pod 2.0 (32 Amplifier Models), TC Electronics G Major (A billion effects combinations), a BBE Sonic Maximiser, a Marshall stereo power amp and a Buddha Wah pedal for fun.

This is a pretty decent setup, possibly excluding the POD, but my god is it complicated to set up and move around.  Not to mention if something goes wrong.  However I can simulate whatever the hell sounds I want on it.  From whale sounds to playing in a Cathedral, I could do it.

Now

I share  a house with friends who don’t always appreciate loud music.  I’ve had to scale down considerably.  I chose to keep the wah pedal from before, buy a Q-Zone Envelope Filter and have a simple 5 Watt Class A Peavy tube amp which cost £80. Considerably less complicated to set up and much much lighter.  I’ve also changed guitars from an 80s shred monster of an Ibanez RG550 to a more classly looking Telecaster Re-Issue.

Simplicity And Guitar Playing

I was so hesitant to do this.  I love my effects units.  I still have them and don’t plan on selling them any time soon.

As soon as I plugged my guitar into my amp and started to play, the clarity was amazing.  Not getting hung up on what type of reverb and how many repetitions on my delay was not something I expected to look forward to.  I’m a geek.  I love that shit.  It really amuses me.  However, the effortless nature of playing without all the crutches of effects was really eye opening.  It reminded me of this quote.

We can make this complicated.  We can make this VERY complicated, or we can make it simple

I say let’s make it simple.

The really interesting thing was that once I started throwing in random sounds and effects, they simply added to the overall beauty of the sound.  Putting new accents and variations on things that were already of a high quality, rather than just messing with it for the sake of messing with it.

Simplicity and The Art of Living

This is (in all but name) a personal development blog.  I hate the term but it is what it is.  I’m just trying to write the most useful things I learn in the most entertaining way I can.  What does this mean? Is it possible to simplify life to a level where we have perfect clarity?

For me, I like a bit of spice.  I still have 2 effects on my board and I like to use them.  These effects are no longer my crutch.  I believe the same is true for life.  It’s nice to have cool stuff to play with.  I can see an XBox and a really pimp lamp from where I’m sitting (actually laying) right now and I’m writing this on an over priced but very pretty Linux based computer (that’s a Mac).  Cool stuff is important but it shouldn’t become the crutch for living your life.  They should be there to accentuate what is already good in your life.

You’re not your job. You’re not how much money you have in the bank. You’re not the car you drive. You’re not the contents of your wallet. You’re not your fucking khakis. You’re the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.

Have I used that quote before in another post?  Maybe.  I like it.  A lot.  Tyler Durden has got a point, but if you rock.  You might as well rock and wear some nice khakis or live in a cool flat too.  Just so long as you aren’t using these things to create your own identity.

Any Other Business

It’s been a while since I posted anything here but I have not been idle.  I have started up a graphics design website called http://www.uninhibiteddesigns.co.uk where I want to put my graphic work.  I also hope to turn the designs into high end t-shirts.  Think AFFLICTION design but with less attachment to MMA fighters.  Slightly cooler and more ‘romantic’ in a libertine sort of way, but still badass and sexy as fuck.

Go out and enjoy yourselves people!!!

It is critical to any serious musician that they are able to read music.  Playing guitar makes reading music a little more difficult than (for example) a piano because there are multiple places to play each note on different strings.  High E can be played in 3 places for example.  On a piano, just the one.  Being able to identify the notes as they appear on manuscript is just the start of the story for the guitarist, who must then figure out the most efficient way to play the notes written.  You could always try and find a tab for what you are looking for, but the tab has no rhythm information and it is unlikely that you will be able to find many good works written in tab.  The people that play this kind of music can normally read normal music.

There are endless resources on the web which will tell you what each note looks like on paper so I’m not going to go into any detail about that, but instead offer some advice for associating the names with the physical action of playing them on a guitar.  The following is a description of a game I used to play with my guitar teacher but with a bit of effort can be done by an individual.  It isn’t as much fun to do it by yourself but it definitely helps you to get used to the positions of all the notes.

• A beat is set up, either using a metronome or a tapping foot, it’s up to you
• A string is decided, for example 6th string
• The first person calls a note in time with the rhythm, eg 6th string, A
• The second person has until the next beat to play the note
• The second person now calls a note keeping with the rhythm
• Process repeats until someone gets the wrong note and a new string is chosen
• If you lose 3 times you lose the game

This game is quite easy once you know where all the notes are.  If you are finding it too easy, increase the tempo until you start making mistakes.  If you want to make it even more challenging, try to picture each note the way it would look on a sheet of music at the same time as playing it or don’t call the note, use flash-cards of the note instead.  This is difficult and definitely not doable if you are practicing alone.

There are other ways to get more used to the positions of notes on the guitar such as playing scales and arpeggios.  Whist these are good technique builders and certainly shouldn’t be excluded from a good practice schedule, I find this method a lot of fun, especially if you have someone to practice with.  It is good to try and push each other to be better but a teacher should never lose to a student at this game unless the student is extra special.  I never beat my teacher!

I have dealt with the technicalities of a guitarist’s right hand in a little depth in a previous article so I thought I would talk a little about the technical side of good left hand position and how you can get the most out of your instrument in this respect.  The most important thing with the left hand is that it is always under total control.

Thumb Position

The thumb is key to being agile on the fretboard.  The thumb should be square on the back of the neck.  It should not wrap round even a little.  Someone sitting directly in front of you should not be able to see any of your thumb.  The reason for this is that your thumb provides a stable and solid base for the fingers to fret against.  The thumb should be pushing in the exact opposite direction your fingers are pushing on the fretboard.  If it is pointing at an angle away, the neck is less stable and more likely to slip.  Also the fingers can accidentally stretch the strings and change the note you are playing.  This effect can be desirable in many situations but it should always be under control.

Active Fingers

The active fingers are the fingers which are actually pressing down on strings at any one time.  The position of these is very important.  The final joint should be as close to perpendicular to the fretboard as possible and as close to the fret wire as you can manage without actually touching it.

I find that a little nail is useful on my left hand since it provides support for the rest of the finger but you should always aim to be making the contact with the fleshy tip of your finger.  This gives a much smoother tone and lessens the hammer effect of banging your fingers so hard onto the fretboard that they create a note without any right hand action.  Often the hammer and snap are desirable but, as with everything else to do with the left hand, control is so so important.  You only want to be hammering notes when the music tells you to.

Inactive Fingers

The inactive fingers are the ones that aren’t fretting strings at any given time.  They should be hovering as close to the fretboard as possible without touching the strings.  It is unlikely that any finger is going to be inactive for very long so it should always be in a position where it can fret a string quickly.  It also looks a lot nicer for someone watching the artist.  The hardest finger for me to control in this way was my little or fourth finger.  It is so important to be able to control this finger and it took a lot of practice and concentration to reign it in but it is totally worth it.  A fourth finger which is under control is one of the greatest assets a classical guitarist can have as it makes longer stretches and intricate holds possible and, with practice, easy to do quickly.

As with the active fingers, the final joint of the inactive fingers should be as close to perpendicular to the fretboard as possible.  The actual fretting should come from the first finger joint and the angle between the second and final joint should hardly change through fretting and releasing the strings.

Individualization

Each finger should be able to move independently of the others on your hand.  This is especially hard considering your fingers often share tendons but with a lot of practice it is possible to get close to total individualization.  It is something that every guitarist should work on every time they practice.  Here is an example of an exercise:

(6i) 4 2 3 1 (5i) 4 2 3 1 (4i) 4 2 3 1 (3i) 4 2 3 1 (2i) 4 2 3 1 (1i) 4 2 3 1

Where the bracketed number and letter represent the string and the position in Roman numerals.  (6i) represents first position on the sixth string.  This pattern should be repeated up and down the strings.  Take time with every note you fret and make sure that it is as close to perfect as possible, each and every time.  I mentioned before that being in a zen type meditative frame of mind when doing these exercises is the best way and this is no exception.  It is harder than the last one for me and requires a great deal of concentration to make sure everything is as perfect as it can be.

Finally

I can guarantee your hands won’t thank me for this exercise at first but persevere.  At least 10 minutes every practice session along with the other exercises presented in the previous article and you will be well on your way to having a strong and dexterous left hand to match your finely tuned right hand.