It's rather foreseen that the old school mentality would be at odds with the new school players when it comes to the definition of real guitar playing, you know, that jaded argument which defines legitimacy because it's done a specific way.
I was the unfortunate, lone audience of a quasi-enlightenment lecture on how 'kids' these days let their guitar effects pretty much mask their guitar playing. It's an implied lashing out at yours truly just because a guitar was put in his authority & the request to showcase some capabilities followed suit. Naturally, he let loose maximum distortion to supplement his playing style because that's what he's all about. The sage duly told him he prefers to let feel dictate his playing because that's the real player-instrument interaction; letting soul do the talking, not shrouding behind lifeless technology. What entailed were recommendations on how one can develop one's weak, technology-pampered hand to achieve masculine accomplishments all in the name of bringing life back to one's fretboard handling. One should hold back on the distortion & let feel take over because it's irrefutable that tone are in the fingers. Oh?
Anyway, this entry isn't about retaliation (yeah, right...) but perspective pondering; is there an established right (or righteous for that matter) way to play one's guitar & that technology is undermining this institution? We acknowledge the existence of different playing styles as time had proven- a simple case in point would be how Hendrix's digging in is as relevant as Van Halen's letting fly, today. As much as our acknowledgment of how feel proves to be the real time connection between the heart & mind in our playing, technology is a valid intermediary in propagating feel. Some of us feel as much with technology under our fingers as the next guy who practices restraint in terms of gadgetry. Why should there be a contest of which philosophy should one emdear in the definition of instrument embrace? We should be happy with any means of playing if these get the job done. The human nature is such that, in the wake of technological assimilation, there is an instinctive retaliation of all things mechanical. It's a good reflex action, this one, but if left unchecked, it would breed elitism & dissent. I dig in & let fly all the time. If you catch me letting fly more than digging in, your dismissive behaviour would probably make you the lesser player because it means you know only know one way of getting it right. Tone is in the fingers but fingers are nothing without manipulatives- try letting your fingers talk without your guitar.
6 comments:
who is the "wise sage"? how good can he play?
someone, somewhere who thinks age commands authority. he can very well play but his style is limited to lots of digging in, something Gary Moore would be proud of.
May i ask what is digging in and what is letting fly?
abit the counfused here haha.
digging in- play with lots of feel, fret hard, harder if you can. not hard enough? then you're not a man :-) letting fly- under tremendous amount of gain, one need not fret one's note hard to play. in fact, one can go a million notes per second quite easily. rather effortless.
fret hard = frets wear out faster. light touch is harder to master than fretting hard, anyone can fret hard if they want to. but not everyone has a light touch, which takes alot of practice to develope.
i discovered that light touches often involve effects saturation which, as mentioned above, requires extra control in dealing with muting - quite a challenge this one.
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