X Marks the Spot

Look at the young girl in the picture for a second. She had to have known where she was going if she’s was going to walk on top of that little bridge on top of the water.

Why did she want to do that?

It doesn’t really matter.

Its simple. She just did. Just like we go to the fridge in the middle of the night. We get that urge and we just take the action to satisfy that urge.

It doesnt matter why.

Just like it doesn’t matter why we want to know something on the guitar…we just do.

She knew exactly where she wanted to go and thats why she got there.

That’s what I’m gonna try to get across to you in the next couple of paragraphs.

Some of you might have gotten it already.

Some of you will have to keep reading.

It’s very simple yet so complicated, with so much guitar instruction going around.

Let’s pretend for a moment that there are no guitar lessons available on planet earth.

What would you do?

Would you play a single note on your guitar, or a melody, or would you grab some chords and sing-along?

Would you grab a CD or visit You Tube and listen and try to play along?

Would you come up with an original riff?

This is what I want to get across to you.

It’s the point that you should play, what you truly love and absolutely need to play.

What do you need to play?

What is it inside you that will satisfy your urge?

You don’t need to learn to play what others want you to play or what others want, or think, you should learn.

Yes, this is helpful advice …from the right people.

But the most helpful advice is the advice to come from your gut.

What is it that YOU want to play?

What is it that YOU want to express? That’s what you should work on and that’s what you should do day in and day out.

Forget everything else.

Forget all the guitar teachers and all the guitar videos and all the guitar lessons out there.

Pick up your guitar and explore.

Become one with it.

There’s absolutely no need to stress over which lesson or which lick to learn. Most of us try to impress the next guitar player down the road but it only causes frustration because of comparison.

Just do you.

Be you and no one else.

I guarantee you that you will sound unique.

You might not play better than the other person and you might not ever play a Joe Satriani or Steve Vai guitar solo…or an etude by Heitor Villa-Lobos.

You might not ever compose like Mozart.

But you sure as hell can sound like yourself.

God made you into a person on this planet that is exactly like every other person, yet, has his or her own unique qualities and characteristics.

What are they? Focus on that.

And I guarantee you that you’ll have a much better time when you pick up your guitar.

I don’t know why this is, but I never really wanted to learn cover songs.

Never wanted to learn anybody’s solo and I never wanted to learn anybody’s riffs.

I wanted to compose and play my own.

Sure I learned a few of them, but I was never really into it.

I see the benefit, but for some reason I am just against it.

I don’t know if it’s my ego or if it’s just something that I really don’t need, because I really don’t like to do it.

Fast forward a bunch of years

Now I love learning classical guitar covers.

This means I’m learning classical guitar pieces. Country Dance, Tarrega study in E minor, étude 10, etude 2 by Carcassi, prelude by Carulli in A, prelude 3 Villalobos, Interlude by William bay, minuet in D minor by Bach.

For the way I like to play guitar I think this is the best thing for me.

I also like practicing a book that I have which takes me through an entire key.

For example in C major I’ll study arpeggios in three different octaves, then I’ll do the major scale in three different octaves as well and the chromatic scale in that key too.

This kind of technical work and these classical guitar pieces give me great fulfillment.

So what do I take or what can you take from this?

Well what you can take and what you can implement is the search, the quest, to find what you truly absolutely love to play.

For me it’s my original songs and compositions on electric guitar as well as the classical guitar. I also love classical guitar pieces and violin scale studies adopted for my guitar.

Why? because it teaches me the entire key in 3 different octaves and it also teaches me diads, triads and sixth intervals. I can also go and add my own work out to it by including the Pentatonics in that key, the modes and I can also include the parallel minor key.

I can modulate to another key if I wanted to and extend the workout. The options are quite frankly…limitless.

The best thing is for us to keep pushing ourselves forward with things that we love to play.

Theres no point in learning other genres if you don’t like them.

I would love to learn Alex Skolnick guitar solos. For some reason I just think they’re the best out there for any metal guitar player.

Of course you have Steve Vai and Joe Satch and Joe Stump and Zakk Wylde and Randy Rhodes and all these great players like Malmsteen, Greg howe and George Bellas. Just learn what you love!

I guess I really don’t like single notes too much. It’s kind of boring for me. I like playing chord solos and riffing and double stops. Every now and then I like playing lead, but it’s not my true love. My true love is rhythm and chords and riffs.

When it comes to electric guitar I am just more motivated and psyched up to learn this black piece that I am learning.

So I’ve been doing that and I’ve also been learning my bands songs on acoustic guitar so that I could rip it up later on electric guitar.

Stay motivated!