Brigitte Zaczec on Baroque lute

I just found this very nice video of Brigitte Zaczek on baroque lute. I'd never heard of her before but was  intrigued because of her last name's similarity to my own. I find the interviewer to be a bit creepy, frankly, but I enjoyed the performance and the great footage of her right hand technique. It's especially interesting how she uses her right hand thumb to manage the beginning and end of every bass note. We have to do the same thing on guitar, too, but in comparison, we've really got it easy!

As a bonus, here's audio of her playing a piece by Mertz on a period instrument.

Make your own path

I'm not sure what made me think of this, but a while back (it must have been a long time, since it has been several months since I removed myself from internet forums in order to enjoy my life more) maybe a year or two I remember someone saying he planned to spend the next year immersing himself in the music of one composer. The responses varied, but I believe the general feeling was that in the interest of being a well-rounded musician, this was not a good idea.

Well, if your goal is to be a well-rounded musician, maybe so. Being a well-rounded musician is a great thing. On the other hand, if the music of Fernando Sor is what gets you out of bed in the morning, I think you should go with it. Cultivate the obsession and learn as much about Sor and as much of his music as you can.

Several years ago, for a variety of reasons, I quit playing guitar altogether for about a year. I used to really regret it; I did lose some technical ground and some flexibility in my hands that took a long time to regain. On the other hand, during that time, I became a pretty good irish flute player because that was the obsession that drove me at the time. Flute led me to a world of social music-making that has helped me make some very close friends and enriched my life. Making music in that kind of capacity has brought me a wealth of insight into the nature of music and performing, following the flow of and getting carried away by music. All these things could have happened if I'd followed a straighter path, but they would have been different.

A few years before that, I'd been working hard to prepare myself to audition for music school. I was ready to quit my job and start my life over, despite being deeply in debt at the time. In the end, I stuck with my job and paid off my debt. A long the way, I fell in love and got married, and together the two of us saved up a substantial amount of money and went for a 7-month road trip. I'd probably be a much better guitarist by now if I'd stuck to the plan and gone to music school, but instead I had the experience of a lifetime, the likes of which most people may never get a chance to have. Was it a better choice? I don't know. The right choice? For me, yes.

I'm not saying you shouldn't go to music school or that you shouldn't try to become a well-rounded musician. I'm saying that if you should never regret following your dreams and making the best of whatever you end up doing. To paraphrase a famous quote, it's better to have tried and failed than to have never tried at all.

Making art vs. making pretty pictures

Just a brief post this week. I've been reading "The Rest Is Noise" by Alex Ross for the past few days and would strongly recommend it to any classical guitarist even though there's not much, if any, info related to the guitar in it.

If you're not a fan of 20th century/modern/contemporary/new music, this book is especially for you. For one thing, the author's thoughtful descriptions of many of the key pieces can help unlock this dense music for a listener who doesn't have the ear for it.

More importantly, The Rest Is Noise traces the development of many of the composers, movements, and ideas behind modern music through their historical context. Understanding how and why this music came about can help us learn to recognize the art in what may actually seem like a bunch of noise at times.

My art teacher in high school, Mr. deGroot, used to say that the point of art is not to make "pretty pictures." Setting aside the fact that a lot of 20th century art is unapologetically the opposite of "pretty pictures," let's consider that the guitar repertoire in fact contains a lot of music for which the composer was essentially paid by the page for their work in order to satisfy demand. A lot of that music is more like "pretty picture" music than art music.

That's not to say that its unworthy of being played, but it is up to us as performers to find the art in the music that we play. And sometimes it is worthwhile for us to take on music which we may find difficult to appreciate; to explore it and come to terms with it. The better we understand what makes something a work of art, the better prepared we will be to create art of our own, with whatever raw materials we have available.

Unforgiving

After doing some maintenance on my guitar this week, I put on a new set of strings, of a type I hadn't used before. I'm not going to tell you what they are, but they are much lower tension than I normally use on my guitar.

I strung it up, tuned to pitch, and played a few notes and was really blown away by how beautiful they sounded. All the warmth, fullness, and volume I've ever wanted in a string, yet so easy to play. 

Today has been kind of a crazy day for me, though, and after playing for a while I was really unhappy with my sound. At first I wanted to just swap them for something familiar, but I thought maybe I'd damaged my nails, so I redid them. As I tested them out, I could get that great tone again, but it went away when I started playing normally. Frustrating.

These strings are just totally unforgiving, and with any carelessness on my part the tone is unusably lousy. But with nails well-cared-for, solid contact with the string, and well-directed plucking motion, they reward me beautifully. That's how I want to sound all the time, and that's how I want to play all the time, regardless of the strings. 

I think it'll be worthwhile to leave them on for a while and focus on whatever I need to do to get that classic tone.

Between the notes

We need to develop technique so we can communicate with our listeners. We often get caught up in what is cool, or difficult, or whatever, but that's not really worth much if it doesn't help us communicate.

We can work endlessly on scales, arpeggios, slurs, tremolo, etc, but that's just where technique starts. Real technique is attention to the details that make the music come alive. Virtuosity is mastery of the details of those details.

Listen to some great flamenco guitarists, and notice when they buzz notes. It's not random and it's not merely because of the setup of their guitars. It's integral to the feel of the music. You learn that by listening.

Listen to when a singer or flute player breathes, and the sound of the breath. That's part of the music.

As a fan and player of irish music, I can't tell you how obvious it is when I hear someone who thinks that all there is to the music is playing the notes. I could learn flamenco falsetas from a book but to a real flamenco afficionado it's just going to sound like a classical guitarist reading the notes. It has to have the right feel, and you learn that by listening.

When people say "music is in the space between the notes," they don't just mean the rests. They mean that the notes are one of many aspects of music, and they all require our attention.

Why you should perform

But actually, doing what other people expect you to is what’s overrated. The external rewards for pursuing a dream may or may not arrive, but regardless, you should feel proud of doing so. The first steps are more important than the later ones, because they’ll provide inspiration and security for everything that comes later. Just keep walking!

Never despise small beginnings, and don’t belittle your own accomplishments. Remember them and use them as inspiration as you go on to the next thing. When you venture outside your comfort zone, wherever the starting point may be, it’s kind of a big deal.

- Chris Guillebeau, in "Kind of a big deal"

I recently commented on Chris Davis's post "The missing ingredient no one likes to talk about" that of all the musicians I've known, we classical guitarists seem like the least likely to get out and perform. We also complain about lack of public interest, diminishing ticket sales, etc. I bet these things are related.

If you love classical guitar and you play classical guitar, you should get out there and perform.

Don't feel like it's not worth it if you can't sell out an auditorium. Don't feel like nobody will want to see you if you don't have a degree or haven't won a competition. Don't worry about trying to impress people.

Just have fun and do your best. You don't have to blow everyone's mind, just make someone smile.

Pepe Romero & Joaquin Rodrigo

Here are some videos which are somewhat buried on Youtube, that I find inspiring and insightful. Both feature Pepe Romero and Joaquin Rodrigo, a look into their working relationship, and a bit of the creative process behind these works.

The first offers some background about the famous Concierto de Aranjuez.



This one is in Spanish. My spanish is weak but I was able to follow most of it well enough (at least until they get to the part about astronauts). It's about Concierto Para Una Fiesta, which is one of my favorite guitar concertos. It's not nearly as well known as the Aranjuez but to my taste, it's even better.