This video of Richard Lloyd (from Television) is wonderful and bonkers. Highlights: 3:00 when he starts chanting numbers and says "Agriculturalcadabra" and 5:38, when he orders his guitar to obey him. If you're really clever, there are lots of guitar lessons on his site, which includes Why is the guitar tuned like that?. (Thanks, Drew) UPDATE: An anonymous commenter points out uncanny similarities between Richard's lesson and Alan Partridge explaining World Cup '94.
Posted by Tom Whitwell.
Comments:
chuffing nora! i know my major scales, not convinced this is the easiest way to learn 'em but if it works for mr lloyd ON PLANET ZOOFARG then um fairplay
i'd like to know why the dots are where they are .. on the fretboard
i think its easier to learn what all the notes are on the guitar and figure out major scales, then you are dealing with note names and not obtuse confusing patterns of numbers.....whew
When I started, I found it helpful to know the note names for the root note, and then a visual pattern on the fingerboard to help me remember the "shape" of a scale such as a major or dorian minor, etc. Later, I'd learn what the 4th, or 5th, note name was... but since I didn't read music & didn't want to, I never bothered to memorize note names. I memorize a root note, a pattern, and go with that. If I ever really need to know what a certain note is, I can figure out quickly [after 25 years playing], but who ever asks me that? It doesn't come up often enough for me to worry about it.
Ah man, take it easy!!! Richard Lloyd teaches guitar like a mystic kung fu master. Once it clicks, it leads to a really intrinsic understanding of both the architecture of the guitar and western music and modulation in general. In the videos especially he spins off these little cryptic pearls of wisdom that you do really well by investigating on your own (a little bit of self study is good for you). He writes a column every month in guitar world magazine. I have had a lot of "a-ha" moments studying his teaching and I see the instrument in a totally different way now. The secret is out!!
gd: Ultimately you don't want to think in numbers or note names; you want to make immediate mental connections between patterns and the sounds they'll make. Otherwise your brain is not taking the shortest path to the music. The question is, which crutch is better to lean on until you get to that point?
Wow. At the end he says "Do you get it?". No, Richard, I really don't get it!
All these years I've been teaching music I thought the goal was to make difficult concepts seem easy to the student, not make the simplest concepts seem totally incomprehensible!
i'm neither steven hawking nor richard lloyd so this may well be a little nugget of gold in the (not so hard) world of learning the major scales on the guitar and i just can't see it, but ...
from bitter experience i've finally accepted there are no shortcuts to learning a musical instrument and developing a high standard of muscianship, good teachers and clear explanations and tips and tricks all help but at the end of the day it's GRAFT
this just trigger my "shortcut" alarm and possibly "shortcut to nowhere" sub-system alert also!
I played a lot of different instruments before picking up the guitar so things like intervals and scales were very easy to pick up by just 'playing around'. I think a lot of people who start on guitar get really boxed in by learning basic shapes and patterns instead of really understanding what the scales and intervals mean to each other. I think Lloyd is demonstrating how moving from position to position can be a very fluid thing even when moving very fast (which he isn't in this video but the fingering is right). Those 3 pieces of scales he talks about are things I use whenever I play. He is breaking down the scale into small shapes (Whole Whole, Whole Half, Half Whole) instead of showing a rigid, fretboard-wide pattern. In order to use this way of thinking you do need an ear as to what scale step you are currently on...
After reading Steve K's comment it makes a bit of sense but I still have no idea (I've studied classical piano and music theory to high levels and now a guitar hacker).
What the heck does the tritone have to do with anything.
this is why music education is osmotic. come to think of it, rL seems to be undergoing a bit of osmosis himself. i'd be interested to see him teach a modular synthesis class
tama.brett: I would imagine the tritone he's referring to is between the 4th and 7th degree, so when playing 4-5-6 on one string and 7-1-2 on the next, you would remember to shift the index finger over by one fret (whereas for any other switch to the next string it would be a perfect fourth, i.e. the same fret).
The fact that he rattles off every relevant number along the way is information overload, though, and makes extra mental work for the student trying to zero in on the basic idea of it all.
I really hope the person who wrote "has he ever played anything worth listening to?" was joking. Please tell me he was joking. Dude, you were joking, right?
@ Chuck Lamborghini - I jest not. cannot for the life of me hear what is so great about Television.
and cut out the 'dude' crap. Such terminology is not permitted in NYC.
ha, ha, I love the fact that apparently Television came to be known by some as the 'Grateful Dead of Punk' because of their lengthy improvised solos on stage.
I can't figure out if I'm supposed to be more impressed by the fact that you don't like Television, or by the fact that you live in New York (New York City I assume, Albany wouldn't seem to carry the same weight). Or maybe it's your usage of the word "terminology" in response to my usage of the word "dude." You polysyllabalistic-metropolitans are always so equivocal. Brevity is for pussies!
What's the old joke about how to stop a guitarist from playing: put sheet music in front him? It always amazes me how ignorant guitarists are about music theory and how proud they are to be so. Even a little theory goes a long way to making you a better player.
: 10:54 am