Session 5 - Classical Guitar

[colder]

I've got the fingerstyle course (ahead of the Fingerstyle Retreat this fall, woohoo!), and I've been at it for several weeks now.

I have to say, this course is a lot of fun! Two things have been surprising me so far - first, how difficult it proves at certain times to learn how to play the instrument in a whole new way and to keep time accurately without the pendulum of your forearm helping you... and secondly, how great and musical even simple things can sound when you're playing fingerstyle. It's really satisfying!

I'm up to Canon in D and Bach's Cello Suite, but these are coming pretty slow for me. It's a bit difficult for your fingers to determine what to do when you don't always have a familiar chord shape that you can lean on. I will press ahead every day, but these two songs are kind of a bear for me. Did anyone else need to slow down quite a bit on these? 

For those of you who have an actual nylon string classical guitar, do you find that they make things like this easier to play? I love the way they sound, but at the same time, I'm playing all this stuff on my OM which I am absolutely in love with. I have an embarrassment of riches in terms of guitars...  but I do love the sound of Steve's classical in the videos too! 

Just a roadside update... for those of you who have done the fingerstyle course, how did your progress come along in lesson 5 and after? A few weeks for each one, or a month or so? 

[Wim VD]

Hi @colder, I am not on the fingerstyle course yet, but currently learning the fingerstyle intro of "Let her go" (Passenger).

Getting these 16 bars of trickiness under my fingers takes much more time than expected. I have not played this kind of alternating bass style for a while, and it feels like I have to build the picking hand coordination up from scratch again. But the good news is that there is progress. It just takes a bit more practice, perseverance and patience.

Wim.

[Gene C]

Hello Colder, I read your post regarding the classical guitar with nylon strings and it sounds all too familiar. I started the L&M course in the Fall of 2011 and when I got to section 10 for Fingerstyle  I thought "Hey this is something I REALLY want to do", so I ordered the L&M Fingerstyle set and worked my way through lesson 6. I bought the Jazz guitar book at the Gathering as an additional resource to use while I tackle lesson 7.  With all that said, what I found is that going back and forth between the Yamaha classical guitar and the more narrow neck of the Taylor with these 2 lesson sets has helped stretch my left hand and made my right hand more accurate for both. I viewed a 2011 video in the Skills House of Steve describing his classical guitar. If memory serves me correctly, I think Steve has a Yamaha G245SZ he has been using since college. I too love the sound of Steve's classical in his various videos so I rescued a Yamaha C40 from the pawn shop for a hundred bucks and use it almost daily for practice. This guitar works fine and like you mentioned a Classical is a whole new way to play and in order to keep time accurately a metronome is needed until you can internalize the rhythm better. I have a love/hate relationship with my MATRIX MR500 Metronome but it does help solve timing issues. You can work around some of the timing by playing songs like Terrega's LaGrima that has a slower pace and that too is where the simple things can sound "great and musical". Bach also wrote for the Lute, an early gourd looking guitar. I like Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring, and from his Lute suite in Em,  Bourree. Steve has a nice  arrangement you may like to try. Before timing you will have to get comfortable fingering worked out for the left hand. Give the progress time, it will come with persistence, see Wim VD's message above.

Check with Steve Krenz to get it straight from the Master, this is all just my thoughts on fingerstyle. I hope you find this helpful, good luck in all of your guitar learning. If you have any questions for me let me know.

Gene C

 

Edited July 12, 2018 by NueGene

[Amy Greenblatt]

Hi Colder, 

I’m also finding the Fingerstyle Course fun, challenging, excellent for practicing  patience and persistence, and learning some very beautiful music.  

I used two classical beginners methods during five years of lessons as a kid - so have a nice classical background, though very elementary. 

The nylon strings and wider neck certainly make some chords and bars easier to play.  I switch off between my steel string and classical while practice L&M Fingerstyle.  (The steel string is new, and the classical is from the 1970s.)

I spend maybe two months on each lesson. Maybe 50 half hour practice sessions before I move on.  There have been plateaus and times where I’ve had to switch to easier pieces to play for a while, and then return again.  The methods used as kid were Christopher Parkening’s and Aaron Shearer’s. Now I’m working with Frederick Noad’s.  

I really love the practice structure Steve gave us in the general L&M course of 30 minutes - 5 min warm up, 10 technique, 10 pieces, 5 free play, and tend to stick to that all the time, no matter what I’m practicing.  Logical, and useful.  

When I feel frustrated with the difficulty level of Fingerstyle, or my own limitations, I move back to earlier lessons, and easier pieces,  and come back later.  

These lessons are not easy, but they offer so much.  This music is truly beautiful.  Have you noticed that many of the later pieces are composed by Steve? And how he teaches us to understand how to arrange songs we all know, like Happy Birthday? Great stuff!!

 

Edited August 11, 2019 by Amy Greenblatt