The Best Practice Technique, Ever.

If I were to give the best practice technique ever, it would be this: Variation.

Take the same exact thing that you are practicing, be it a chord progression, a lead guitar lick, or a scale, and practice it in as many different ways as possible.

Doing this strengthens the synapses needed to execute the skill faster. The synapses become coated with more Myelin, and because the circuit is more insulated, the skill becomes faster.

Last night, I was helping a student practice variations of the chord progression D to A. I asked him to play on different strings, different frets, different tempos.

Of all the practice techniques I know, just this one will make you a 10X better guitar player.

Hit me up to learn how to apply variations to your guitar practice routine!

Talking Shop About Teaching

The business of running a guitar school has weirdly fascinated me for many years. Truly, how successful I’ve been I owe to the idea that teaching guitar has to be ego-less. In other words, just because I’m the authority in the situation (the teacher) doesn’t negate from the fact that the person I’m working with (the student) is the most important person in the room.

I’ve been surprised when I’ve heard other guitar teachers talk about their students, their income from teaching, their livelihood. This type of thinking is indicative of a teacher who hasn’t really given up the dream of being a rock and roll star, and is teaching to make a little money on the side. This type of thinking also makes it seem like this teacher doesn’t care about the students in the first place!

The most surprising thing that I noticed when I began teaching was how invested I got in practically everyone’s progress. I found a large income when I focused on providing the students an excellent story, one where they transformed themselves and became the guitarist they always knew they were. Not only was it profitable, but it was incredibly satisfying.

I teach less now than I did two or three years ago because I began to limit how many people I was working with in the first place. Good people are out there and finding them is important. With good people in my life, it’s easier to live and breathe. It’s easier to go about my life and create the life I want to live. Moreover, I found out that working with and reaching out to great people for lessons is far more satisfying anyways than just simply working with anyone, no matter what.

I’m reminded of that thought today as I’m working on parts of my life that I’d like to take to the next level: Good people first. This would be my recommendation to all new guitar teachers: Find the good people and serve them well.

May I have the opportunity to serve and guide all the good people of the world who want to learn guitar.

Deep Roots

Learning is about growth.

Learning is about growth. When you think about what growth is, when you try to define it, what comes to mind?

If you’re like most people, growth happens upwards. Our economy grows upwards, our skills grow upwards, our financial well-being grows upwards (if we have the right attitude about it, of course).

AS a lifelong guitarist and a teacher for more than a decade, it seems to me that growth happens in many different ways. I think of it like trees:

Tree will grow…

1. Upwards

2. Thicker

3. Downwards

Three Types of Growth In Guitar

Growth upwards is one the we are most familiar with, as guitarists. We grow to play faster, more songs, better technique, and so on.

Growth that is thicker is less familiar for most guitarists. This is growth where we look to learn different genres of guitar. Where we purposely challenge ourselves to learn a new style of playing, something that is alien to us currently. A good example would be a punk rock guitarist deciding to learn jazz guitar.

Grow that goes downwards is something that is incredibly unfamiliar for most guitarists. This is a different type of growth, and the type of growth I most concern myself with as a teacher and life-long musician. It’s simple: Growing deeper roots means stabilizing how we practice and how we approach guitar.

An example is this: If we wish to get faster at a certain passage, we not only try to learn the passage, but we learn the techniques of working on that process over time, we work on trying different ways of playing (or in my world, workflows).

It is my sincere wish for all guitarists to know exactly how fun it is to have deep roots, to be able to practice and learn anything, to be able to solve one’s own problems. We can always learn more stuff on guitar, but it’s learning how to practice and how to adjust our process where the real fun comes in.

An Apology To A Music Theory Teacher

Assignment for Music Theory 400

Santa Fe sounds like a romantic city, but really, it's a city of small houses. My girlfriend and I have been getting rid of anything that's taking up unnecessary space. We both had a stack of college binders that we schlepped from Austin to our home, here. Two weeks ago, she got rid of her stack and felt wonderful for doing it. That made me think... what on earth am I holding onto my old college notebooks for? It's not like I read them, really.

So, in an effort to get rid of old notebooks, I have been going through each three-ring binder and seeing if there's anything worth keeping. I was struck by a pang of hot shame when I came across an old music theory binder. Wow, it was intense.

My job now is coming to terms with how idiotic I was when I was younger. I was a jerk to this poor theory professor! It's sad in retrospect because this theory professor was incredibly smart, had a good head on his shoulders, and was also incredibly talented. Like, virtuoso talented. I didn't get his mannerisms, his clarity and command over the subject matter at that time, so I dismissed him for all of it. Worst of all, I feel guilty to this day for dissing him for his in-class performance of a Beethoven piano sonata both during and after he was done playing. Thinking about it now is so tough that the only things I can do is shake my head and laugh at myself...

I had some incredibly challenging assignments in this class, but I did enjoy the work (see the analysis I did to the left). The professor cared enough to write clear and encouraging comments to each student. In looking at what he wrote me on one assignment, I realize that he was actually doing something I just didn't get because I was too stupid to see it. He was trying to reach out to me, to help me become a better musician, to force me to be stronger and think better. He had (and I imagine still has) a clarity and depth about music, about music, about being a better musician. Hindsight is 20/20, and in this case? Uhg. More so. I really missed the mark.

To that professor, Dr. David Temperley if you're interested,I offer my sincerest apologies that I dissed you. You didn't deserve it. I had my head up my ass. Obviously, I needed life to kick the crap out of me. Thanks for being the better man, and I promise I'll pay it forward to all my students.