Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
At The Back => Time Out => Topic started by: gwEm on February 20, 2013, 11:00:06 AM
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http://www.therobin.co.uk/whats_on/giginfo.asp?gigid=3201 (http://www.therobin.co.uk/whats_on/giginfo.asp?gigid=3201)
I just signed up. This will be great, I've not been so excited for ages. Managed to get an advance ticket bargain on the trains too - 22 quid include unlimited tram rides in the Wolverhampton area.
Better get practicing to make the most of this.
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How long is the course ? I've been looking at the Sky Academy site and have to say I didn't really understand much of it. I used to get my guitars set up by Andy who built the original Sky guitars so I got to handle one of the almost completed guitars - strange things.
Hope you enjoy it.
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It lasts for 3 hours and costs 35quid.
I'm hoping for a bit of an insight into his improvisation methods.
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hope it's fun....
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Sounds good, enjoy!
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Sounds very interesting, but I strongly suspect it would all be totally beyond me.
Looking forward to reading your "review" of the event in due course. :D
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I do wonder how much you can learn in 3 hours. Looking forward to your review.
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I do wonder how much you can learn in 3 hours. Looking forward to your review.
I wondered that, and I also wondered how many people will turn up and how personal it will be.
But then I thought, even if I just come out with two or three new ideas it will be worth it.
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But then I thought, even if I just come out with two or three new ideas it will be worth it.
Presumably there'll be some degree of entertainment involved as well (I mean a show, not canapés and a small glass of chardonnay, of course)
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Sounds awesome, I'd love to do stuff like this, and the workshops, etc.
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Presumably there'll be some degree of entertainment involved as well (I mean a show, not canapés and a small glass of chardonnay, of course)
...If there ain't at least an Iceland prawn ring, I ain't interested.
Hope you enjoy it mate.
BTW - I'm still upset we've not had any Scopions shows in the UK on this latest tour. :(
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Just got back from the Sky Academy. Overall I had a decent day and came back with a couple of ideas for improving my playing.
Some of Uli's ideas are a bit out there, but he has a really nice way of thinking about music. But I think he goes too far applying it to other fields, there was bit of numerology and pseudoscience in there, some of it far fetched. Evidently those ideas help him with his playing though, which is excellent, so who I am to doubt him ;)
Due to some organisational problems, we didn't get to do any actual playing, which might have provided more direction. I had a good day out as I say, but I do feel like it wasn't quite what I was hoping for. I did get answers to a couple of questions though.
His sky guitar is quite incredible: controls for volume, 3 band active EQ, and a high range gain control... built with high quality components, based on an old mixing desk he liked. I must admit, it does sound good.
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But then I thought, even if I just come out with two or three new ideas it will be worth it.
Presumably there'll be some degree of entertainment involved as well (I mean a show, not canapés and a small glass of chardonnay, of course)
Hobnobs, chocolate digestives, and as much tea as we could drink! I think you'd have quite enjoyed it Philly - based more on melodies than techniques.
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But then I thought, even if I just come out with two or three new ideas it will be worth it.
Presumably there'll be some degree of entertainment involved as well (I mean a show, not canapés and a small glass of chardonnay, of course)
Hobnobs, chocolate digestives, and as much tea as we could drink! I think you'd have quite enjoyed it Philly - based more on melodies than techniques.
Pretty bloody useless for diabetics! :x
I jest.... I'm sure I would've enjoyed it, although the hippy pseudo-science would've tried my patience a little.
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Yeah.. I'm willing to accept some dose of that - notes as colours, mediation etc. but it's clear he's lived all his life as a musician and tries to find an explanation for everything in terms of musical theory. I have doubts frankly, but at least he's thought about it, and its less far fetched than certain other theories of the universe that are widely taught. Definite hippy pseudo science though in places.
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I can believe the "notes as colours" thing, in the sense that that's the only way I can imagine what it would be like to have perfect pitch (although of course some people are colour blind, which is also very hard to imagine!)
But I find all these approaches which claim they'll revolutionise your guitar playing (or physical fitness, or success in business, or success with women, whatever....) ultimately frustrating. I'm hoping for some simple (effort-free) "secret", but in fact they involve either a lot of hard work, a lot of risk-taking or some kind of quasi-religious leap of faith which, deep down, I just can't buy into. And I know that'll be the case before I even start (how defeatist is that? :lol: )
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That is pretty defeatist mate(!)
At the end of the day all those tricks you mention do work for the people recommending them, since they are confident and believe in them. If you are comfortable with them then you won't be able to pull them off.
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Yeah, sorry, late night rambling...! :lol:
I went off on a rant which was nothing to do with Uli Jon Roth and his esoteric approach. That's just a particular way of looking at music which may work for some people if they see things the same way, there's no trickery or clever salesmanship involved, as far as I can see.
But what I did get sidetracked into ranting about (in my usual off-topic manner), you see all these things which seem to offer quick-fix, almost magical solutions to all life's problems. Like weight-loss plans where you don't have to think about what you eat (yeah right). And deep down you know it can't be that simple.
It's like those David L Burge Perfect Pitch courses I've seen advertised in Guitar Player for the last 30-odd years. They used to be cassette tapes, they're probably downloads now...! It sounds great, just imagine having perfect pitch! And it may very well work as an approach but it will NOT be simple, it'll involve many, many hours of work.
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I catch your drift Philly!
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It sounds a lot like the master classes I have taken, in particular the one with Pat Martino. Now, I can read music, and it took all of about 3 minutes before my head was swimming -- his technique may be amazing, but Martino's concepts are all but incompresensible! He has all kinds of wacky theories, such as basing scales and modes off of hexagrams (like the ones you see in the I-Ching (https://www.google.com/search?q=i-ching+hexagrams&client=firefox-a&hs=1FR&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=bkZtUfi0Ce-90QGPpYGgBg&ved=0CAoQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=697#imgrc=s1LA7ATla94dhM%3A%3BbKno6_PXQLA2JM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Ffractalenlightenment.com%252Fwp%252Fwp-content%252Fuploads%252F2012%252F10%252Ftimewave-theory-king-wen-sequence-hexagrams-iching.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Ffractalenlightenment.com%252F14061%252Fenlightening-video%252Fmckenna-and-bradens-fractal-nature-of-time%3B1915%3B1919)).
If I were anywhere near where this took place, I would have gladly gone; sometimes just being with other guitar players can be an enriching (if not at least entertaining) experience! :)
The BEST master class I have taken, where I did not end up taking my guitar from its case, was definitely the one with Carlos Alomar, Sharon Isbin, and Steve Vai. Incredible night!
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It still all comes down to your fingers on the fretboard and if you want to get better - you have to work hard. There is no secret.
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It still all comes down to your fingers on the fretboard and if you want to get better - you have to work hard. There is no secret.
I do think thats absolutely the case for technique and speed.
In terms of melody and song writing, practice helps there too, but I do think there are approaches you can take which can make a big difference or give you a number of ideas without much effort.
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Hard work is definitely required to acquire physical control of the instrument and to expand your repertoire. And heaven knows I haven't put in that work.... :|
But as gwEm says, in terms of theory, songwriting etc different approaches can help for different people. Some seem to be very intuitive - they can do what works for them and they don't care why it works. Personally I feel the need to understand what I'm doing, so a bit of structure helps - I can't really cope with general music theory and the details of scales and modes and arpeggios, but for the guitar specifically, I do find it quite helpful to think about intervals and shapes/patterns on the fretboard.
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I do think thats absolutely the case for technique and speed.
In terms of melody and song writing, practice helps there too, but I do think there are approaches you can take which can make a big difference or give you a number of ideas without much effort.
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True, but you still have to learn how to execute those ideas. I did many years of classical piano and the theory is not that difficult to absorb. Learning how to apply it in a musical and improvisational way is a different kettle of trout. It's hard for someone to teach you this because you were generally end up repeating THEIR ideas. I've been asked on many occasions to show someone how to play 'blues'. Piece of cake to show someone pentatonics and blues scales but I will always say that this won't really help. You have to immerse yourself in the musical form and listen to everything that's going on, not just the guitar. And this takes time and effort.
I generally advise that you listen to the singers to hear how they bend and shape similar melodic phrases over the changes.
I realise I've just contradicted myself completely by sharing a piece of advice that I believe CAN be a shortcut to understand phrasing in blues. What a pillock.
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It sounds a lot like the master classes I have taken, in particular the one with Pat Martino....
Amazing player.
I was just watching one of his workshops in Russia where a group of very unfortunate people were supposed to take that stuff in via an interpreter...He has a mysterious and wonderful way of overcomplicating even the simplest concepts. I've been wondering weather this was his teaching/playing method before his aneurysm.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ovfTlwpYIUM (http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ovfTlwpYIUM)
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Of course practise will always improve your technique but you will always have a 'ceiling' in any technique and some people will be better at it than others.
I've always been interested in lots of music but ive been well into the shred thing too so ive always put the hours in to get as good as i can, learning some very advanced stuff but I know listening to say Shawn Lane I cannot even comprehend what he is doing. The man was on a different level technically, it aint some thing you 'learn' maybe its down to genetics or if you were of a religious persuasion 'God given talent but you cannot learn that shiteeee....well maybe a select few..... but ive never heard any one.
Further to that he had his technique down by the time he was 14-16.