Let your mistakes be your light!

One thing I notice both as a musician jamming with others, and as a music tutor, is the fear of mistakes.

While I understand the concern when playing in front of a crowd, there’s NO excuse when one is learning, as the only critic is your 4 walls.

Yet, sometimes when one is learning an instrument, they forget that the best learning of one’s mother tongue happened while still in the cot, with little to no consciousness. Similarly in music, best to think less – to walk the fire, to swim the water, to take risks.

What do I mean?

When we are writing songs, we should just try ideas and see how they sound. Sometimes (or many times) we think too much wanting to know about the theory of why something will sound right. But how about we instead experiment and if it sounds right then it means we are using some theory rule, even if we do not know which? After all, haven’t we all learnt to listen and speak before how to read and write?

Same when practising. We need to try stuff. Take e.g. a solo – some are scared to improvise, others just go for it. Or a strum pattern of a song – some spend ages trying to get all the down and up strokes exactly like a video by the original songwriter, while others do not look up a video at all (remember the pre-YouTube years?), just sing the song’s  rhythm, & start strumming it without understanding how it would be written. So who gets on with it first? The 2nd of course!

Which brings me to the next point – efficiency. When you practice, don’t overthink because if something comes out wrong, your ears will let you know, thus learning how not to do it. Great! So try again! Wrong again? Amazing! 2nd lesson learnt in how not to do it. And sooner than you realize, you run out of all the options of how not to do it, that you will do it right! Get the point here? I am from Malta (a Mediterranean island). Do you know how most of us learn how to swim? Our parents throw us into the sea, and that way through learning how not to swim, there is only maybe 10% of the technique of swimming they later have to explain! Efficiency at its best – of course they are in the water with us to ensure we don’t drown, and that’s where lessons with a pro tutor come in – he teaches you how to swim alone, but never lets you drown.

Quick question here!
You to stranger : What’s your name?
Stranger : Lucy

Verbally ask the above – takes 1 second to get an answer.
Now write the question on a paper & hand it to Lucy, and she’ll write her name on the paper, and you read it back. Surely that took longer didn’t it?
It’s the same with your instrument – go for it, and it gives you answers sooner!

This is also what makes the best musicians live, always confident they can turn any mistake into a clarification, like in a face-to-face conversation vs an endless Facebook argument (we’ve all facepalmed at those endless threads).

And now to writing our own songs. Sometimes we are in our element, and writing the best tunes. But other times we are in a different mood – drunk, or tired, or simply not our usual self. But we feel an urge to play, maybe stronger than when we are our normal self. So whatever your mood, don’t overthink, just film/record yourself. Do NOT think of the mistakes you could do, but go for it, and only later, do listen and watch.

For example, my video above! I just was out and about, and needed to express myself so much that once home I just filmed (as you can see I literally placed my mobile on the chair and started). Did I care about the camera angle/ filming quality? NO….. because music is audio not video! So that’s my suggestion to anyone – when your creativity calls do not clutter your head thinking about mistakes/ lack of perfection/ perfect filming/ bla bla bla, but just go for it! You’ll thus build a library of snippets, and only later when writing a song that you extract the best parts of whatever you got.

Till next time, keep making mistakes, as they will be your light!

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For lessons, please book at this link.)

www.malcolmcallus.com
Modern approaches to guitar, bass, ukulele & music theory tuition

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If you can feel it, you might as well try it!

To quote a great inspiration to most of us (more about him later) : “If you can feel it, might as well try it”.

But first, a story from when I shared lyric duties for 1 of my bands. Our vocalist had better English than mine, yet wondered how I wrote better lyrics than his. My answer was that what I presented would be the 5th/6th draft, as actually I’d have corrected a lot. With each draft, I’d let the words talk to me back, seaving the manure from the gold in a bunch of hay.

How I differed from him was that I never expected amazing lyrics at my 1st attempt, but would rather let the good parts shine through the bad as I re-read them over and over again. Nothing that a novelist wouldn’t do when writing a book, and as soon as he applied that approach, his lyrics improved!

Similarly, let’s bring this to the table how to become a good improviser, which is music on the spot without time for drafts. Yet, drafts do happen, in our practice time. So what I generally suggest to my students is –

RECORD YOUR SOLOS.
LISTEN BACK & SEAVE OUT YOUR OWN GOLDEN LICKS.
REPEAT THEM TO GENERATE NEW GOLDEN ONES.

Time and time again, this approach made them understand that fire only burns the 1st time, and once you know how to walk it without getting burnt, it’s fun! And it works! Every time without fail.

So back to the quote above, by none other than Joe “Satch” Satriani!

With “If you can feel it, might as well try it” Satch tells us that after hours of training and singing scales (your drafts), melodies and fingerings become sort of attached to each other with less effort. So when you actually improvise, whatever you hear in your head can be translated onto your fingers. Be adventurous!

The main thing is knowing how and where to resolve, purposely repeating “mistakes” before resolving. The safe bet is to play a semi-tone up/down to find the note that sounds right (within the key), as explained at malcolmcallus.com/fingerboardmalcolmcallus.com/jazz

In closing, here’s some Satch talk…..

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Modern approaches to guitar, bass, ukulele & music theory tuition

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The 1st time it’s a mistake, the 2nd time it’s jazz

“The 1st time it’s a mistake, the 2nd time it’s jazz” is a saying that goes around among musicians, mostly among soloists. What’s this about, and why is it so important?

As a musician, I constantly improvise. As a tutor, I constantly showcase how to improvise. Why? It all boils down to one thing – approaching fire with fire! In other words, giving students the confidence that the sooner they walk the fire (i.e. start to solo), the sooner the fire won’t burn anymore (everything becomes easier once you try it).

A point I love during lessons is that once I teach a scale, I immediately give students a backing track and ask them to start playing the notes not in order, to be free, to play anything whether it makes sense or not. Both student & I know that they need to go back home and practise that scale in alternate/economy picking vs a metronome to brush it up both visually and rhythmically, however we ignore that point, we think less and get on with it! The point here is to improvise (= singing with your instrument) and as everyone has sung before in their life (shower singing counts!), it’s by nature that they find their way. The subconscious is a big boy, we all know more than we think we do, so just play and it works sooner rather than later. Make no illusions, it will start as crap, but the more you do it the ratio of crap:gold will soon go from 9:1 to 0:10.

Point here is not how to start soloing, but for any of you that have been soloing for a while who would like to know what happens when for some reason they hit a ‘wrong’ note, a note that does not harmonically fit with the backing chordal accompaniment. So back to our idiom – the 2nd time it’s jazz! What happens then?jazz

Repeat the ‘wrong’ note! And many times (at least 5-6 as the pic says). There’s a way how to of course, so keep reading…………

In a band, there are 3 ways how to improvise

1. the simplest way – you know the chords being played by the rhythm section (as a band you rehearsed the songs and probably also know the other guitarist’s notes, if not also the bassist’s, + you know the drummer’s patterns, when the vocalist comes in & what note, and more or less the keyboard notes too). So there you go – you have worked already what scale to use, and off you go!

2. a still simple way – let us say you have not rehearsed, but are jamming for the 1st time live with new musicians. They’ve been so great to hand you the song’s chord chart, so although you won’t know all other musicians’ parts, the chart more or less indicates what they may play. Enough info for you to choose the scale to solo with.

3. the more advanced musical way (not necessarily a hard way) that occurs when you jam with musicians live for the 1st time and they DO NOT give you a chord chart/ state the key – you are simply out there in the fire, and you gotta deal with it! With experience this isn’t difficult, so here’s how to build that!
You basically go on stage, keep your guitar volume down, and start hearing others’ chords to get the gist of it while playing some notes (just as you murmur before singing)! Then you put the volume up and continue listening to those chords on the spot, and this way you will solo using right notes without the need of knowing the chord harmonies.

But one might argue if they should be listening out to all intervals within a chord (as in aural tests in exams) to thus decide which notes within the scale to use. Which becomes too much work at every bar and takes out the fun and fire out of soloing!

Absolutely not! In a jam scenario, you just play and when you strike a note out of the chord (the ‘wrong’ note), you just move a semitone up/down. One does not need to know why it works (if you do, check out my ear training & theory course Know It Hear It!), but it works. As when you do, you are giving an illusion to the listeners of changing key. So to ensure that illusion strikes home effectively, just repeat that wrong note a couple of more times  and then return back to the ‘right’ notes (not necessarily in order, but you could go to a ‘right’ note and return to the ‘wrong’ one some more times – the possibilities are endless).

Believe me, that when you manage to overcome this fear, that fire does not burn as you know how to walk it, it’s now the sweet fire of musical passion! For all who need to see to believe, we would not have Surrealism nowadays (and with it all those amazing out-worldly artworks on some vinyls you own) if Dali had not started seeing things differently than the ‘right’ rules of the time!

So, to recap, how to deal with wrong notes when they happen?

That could happen at a gig when a couple of hot women dance dirty a few feet away from you (or any other reason anyway) not ? You can loose track of which chord you on, the tempo, the key, … Naughty boy! When that happens, you have not been paying attention to one, two, or all of these:

  1. What are you playing?
  2. What is everyone else playing?
  3. How is what you are playing fitting in with what everyone else is?

This listening list includes the notes you’re choosing, the phrasing you’re choosing and how loudly you’re playing.

So if at any time you notice the band is getting shaky, go through this list to ensure it’s not you, and if not identify who it is and do what is possible to tighten up the band. Maybe playing the same wrong notes that the other band member is playing? After all this is what makes live music so beautiful – that it sometimes differs from the recorded songs!

Music, and in particular, improvisation is a listening art! So remember to always listen with your ears not your eyes. Because those hot women can distract your eyes but not your ears 🙂

Suggested related reading – malcolmcallus.com/fingerboard/

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For lessons, please book at this link.)

www.malcolmcallus.com
Modern approaches to guitar, bass, ukulele & music theory tuition

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Change your Burger Sauce

Onto breaking rules, this article does not follow along the lines of any of my previous threads, but is my music business contribution one can get by signing up for the teachmusic.co.uk mailing list….. now onto our burger sauce!

It’s safe to assume that a good 9 of 10 players started out hearing some other player’s music, what turned them to the guitar in the 1st place. What makes each of them prefer one or more music styles over others is their very pre-exposure to their fave genres that form comfort zones within their minds regarding what to expect out of music,  hence why one prefers the subtleness of a nylon string performance over the more fiery chainsaw playing in early industrial, or vice-versa, and any sound in between that the different forms of guitars produce. At some stage, guitarists then turn to lessons and to us as educators.

As educators we play the foremost role of capturing our students’ dreams, aiding them in their quest to turn them into reality. For most it might just be to cover songs at their local pub/ family bbq, but for others getting their name out there just as their idols before them is the name of the game. And this is where music itself takes a back seat and the actual business mind is called to the forefront.

guitar_awesome_sauce_postcard-r7b82062ffc0743f49ea866017d3a8abd_vgbaq_8byvr_324For a moment, imagine one runs a worldwide take-away food franchise. Was it a love for fast-food that made one start? Probably the answer has less to do with burgers & chips than with the opportunity of a fruitful long-term business. Which makes one observe that while musicians have way progressed from just playing their instruments well to learning more about backline, accessories & sound (from choice of strings, electronics, effects & amps to producing, sound engineering & mixing), some still do not recognize the extent it would benefit them if they put their hands on actually promoting their name.

Not only via cheap/free routes the Internet provides, but by financially investing in their own product to see it hit off the ground.

To return to the take-away concept, it might be less satisfactory running a junk-food franchise than playing music, yet look at the way they run forward – every now and again they change bread, add a sauce or whatever, thus making a new menu out of it. In other words, they create opportunities for themselves. Easy to them nowadays after so many years of success, but in their humble beginnings, there definitely was lots of investment (maybe at a loss of money, surely at a loss of time). So why does it turn out that sometimes musicians fail to see the opportunities ahead of them, figure even create new ones? After all musicians are doing what they like most (playing their instrument) so one probes if, by logic, promoting oneself should only come as 2nd nature, same as owning professional gear to sound good! Needless to say, playing music is more satisfying than selling food not? 🙂

The point comes in the conclusion. The music industry (as any other) runs on the expectancy that nothing falls free from the sky. As educators, we are to foster this thinking in our students, at least the most ambitious. This will pave itself in our students managing their time even further as they start thinking more as self-employed dogs in a world of many more competing for the same bone! I once read in an innovations management blog that “If the tree cannot be moved, a new route has to be found”. This is an area that musicians – educators and performers alike – might like to look into.

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Modern approaches to guitar, bass, ukulele & music theory tuition

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The fingerboard – the be all, maybe even end all!

Speak!

Wherever we live, that’s the very act we do daily. Even if we spend a day alone at home, we still end up speaking to ourselves.

The very skill of associating pronunciations to single letters, and how their sound varies according to their placement in words of our mother tongue, became innate with ourselves from the very moment of our inception, if not earlier inside our mother’s womb. And daily we use this very skill to communicate opinions to others, presuming – maybe hypothetically – that the listening party will understand everything exactly as we mean it. Yet when this often results otherwise, we speak again to explain further. Daily, constantly and effortlessly we use speech to explain ourselves.

Now let us bring this to the string instrument world. The fingerboard is our alphabet; the scales, arpeggios, chords, voicings, i.e. the very tools to put letters together to form words, which form sentences that form paragraphs, depend on a starting note on the fingerboard, and knowing where they are.

At some point in our education we learn the theoretical knowledge that defines what scale may be used and when, and as lead players, when presented with a chord chart we recall a multitude of scale patterns that fit. Presented with some one else’s opinions (compare your chord chart to this very blog for a moment), we react to what we are reading by adding our opinions (by adding your own thoughts to my opinions here as you read along, like you’d add melodic licks while reading a chord chart). How? By recalling and playing around scale patterns that fit.

That is one way, and a successful one. Yet have you ever considered the maybe more primordial approach of totally forgetting the patterns. Here we go – let’s start breaking the rules!

Guitar Fingerboard, Cool Gool Music LondonApproach the fretboard only as a series of notes and if, for example, the key chosen is G major (having only one sharp being F), then apply an A-B-C-D-E-F#-G alphabet across the fingerboard, free of any patterns. All you have at your disposal is this flashy fingerboard with each fret representing a note. Feel free to play all notes as naturals except your Fs that have to be F#s. You are more than likely to be using scale shapes you have learnt, but you are not thinking of them, but only of note  letters! And this is what gives you the freedom a growing child has when unaware of grammar mistakes, a freedom that paves a more adventurous explorative path.

Speak! Play whatever you hear in that inner ear of yours – it’s an opinion and it can only get better by speaking it out, getting feedback about its presentation from others, even your own self on hearing it back. This is how improvisation phrasing is improved. Learning by doing! Think less scalar, think more phrasal.

You get politicians the world over speak bull for a career yet make a name in history, so why not with us musicians whose words, speech, and opinions are of a higher value?

Speak!
As the Romantic playwright Victor Hugo once wrote “Music is that which cannot be silenced”, so speak as this world is nicer with more melodies!

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For lessons, please book at this link.)

www.malcolmcallus.com
Modern approaches to guitar, bass, ukulele & music theory tuition

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