Are GOOD guitarists POOR musicians? The crisis of classical guitar w/
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- Опубліковано 17 тра 2024
- Today I have a chat with Brandon Acker, a classical guitarist and expert in early plucked instruments.
He’s probably the most trusted classical guitar content creator on UA-cam with over 500K subs. Brandon and his wife created Arpeggiato, an online music school for plucked instrument enthusiasts. Additionally, Brandon's classical guitar online course, has attracted over 1100 students globally, showcasing his dedication to musical education and performance.
In this episode we're talking about:
- the challenges of social media and UA-cam as a musician
- online vs in person music lessons and online courses
- the goal of technique
- the fundamental problems of classical guitar
Connect with Brandon: @brandonacker
His online school: www.arpeggiato.com/
His online courses: classicalguitar-pro.com/
Oh sheet! is a new video podcast series for musicians and music lovers. I aim to bring awesome conversations for you every other week, and improve the production quality episode to episode. If you enjoyed this episode and would like to see more, you can help in by becoming a Patron!
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0:00 Intro
1:26 The start of Brandon's channel
14:07 The place of educational content
24:55 Brandon's channel's future
29:06 discussion of beginner lessons and cheesy pieces
37:47 are good guitarists good musicians?
52:36 how to start improvising
1:03:03 discussion on online lessons, courses and live lessons
1:15:13 Brandon's advice
Who should I have on the podcast as a guest next? 😏
PS: consider supporting my work on patreon!
www.patreon.com/beatrixguitar
Farya Faraji! Not a guitarist (that I know of) but a musical specialist nonetheless.
John Williams! Can't hurt to ask!
Lucas Brar
Who should I have on the podcast as a guest next? Julian Lage.
Bradford Werner (YT channel Thisisclassicalguitar) is by far the best instructional classical guitar channel on UA-cam I am aware of. He manages to combine high quality videos and excellent pdf publications with earning money. He does not lower himself to cheap worthless marketing tricks and is not obsessed by the collection of views.
Thanks for having me on your channel, Beatrix! It was a great conversation😊
Thank you for joining me on this episode, it was awesome!
Really nailed it 😁
@brandon. You described exactly how I also got introduced to classical guitar on UA-cam and now I'm on my journey to learning it, which also brought me here to Beatrix's channel. Thank you both for such a great conversation with such beautiful insights and thoughts.
I received two degrees in classical guitar. I fell in love with the music at a young age but the toxic competition culture and the overall lack of creative appetite drove me away from the classical guitar scene. 7 years later, I’ve never been more satisfied as a musician: composing, collaborating and improvising. I am eternally grateful for my training, mentors and peers but there are too many out there that need to open their hearts and minds and get their heads out of their asses.
Jazz used to be the “anti-classical” but it seems to suffer from the same issues that you mention now.
I had a debate once with a classically trained musician who said that it was an objective and empirical standard. I explained that art was a matter of opinion, but I guess mine didn't matter to her.
@@masonhancock5350 that's usually what happens. Opposing sides always connect. Indifference is where they don't.
I left for the same reasons
I definitely understand. My classical ‘career’ is not public. I do it for me, family and friends. However it does enhance my public ’career’.
The problem with classical musicians is the way they learn everything: by putting a sheet of music in front of them. They should transpose and learn pieces by ear and practice contrapuntal improvisation in major and minor keys. If you want to get better at improvisation, practice it! Learn how to analyze harmony from the masters.
I started with classical guitar around 10, moved to flamenco, and then primarily to gypsy jazz and bebop. Classical technic and discipline was amazing, and so many pieces are masterpieces, but it wasn't until I started playing jazz jams and gigs that I actually felt like a musician. Improvising really connects you to your music in a way that nothing else does.
For Brandon's 1 millionth UA-cam subscriber bonus, I look forward to the video of him playing Lagrima as he makes a sandwich while doing somersaults on rollerblades. But seriously, it was Brandon's videos that got me started in classical guitar, and I'm a student of one of his Arpeggiato instructors, and my life has been enriched a hundredfold.
Spam. Shame.
Thank you both so much for this discussion; spot on with your observations and nice to know I'm not alone! I have long despaired that all the work of Segovia, Bream, Williams and others to expand the audience had gone for nothing and the scene had turned in on itself - guitarists playing for other guitarists. I studied the instrument to an advanced level (Conservatory) in the early 1980s - I was frustrated by the limited repertoire and wanted to play baroque lute but as it was still early days for the period instrument scene and lived on the other side of the world from its epicenter, I changed career and stopped playing. While remaining an avid classical music buff, I completely disengaged from the guitar scene in disgust at its obsession with empty technical perfection. Three months ago I attended a guitar recital by a young talented player, my first in 30 years! Something clicked and I have picked up the guitar again at the age of 60 - some twenty years since I last played. Thanks to discerning UA-camrs like yourselves, I have found a community of like minded musicians, a great educational resource and thanks to Maestro Edson Lopes, I have discovered the wonderful music of Brazil. I regret that, with the inevitable physical decline, I might not be able to play Bach as fluently as I once did , but I'm so happy playing less demanding repertoire - with all the expression and color I can summon.
Thank you both for your sincerity, and obvious passion. At 65, just now learning classical, I love it and watching channels like yours is inspirational as well as motivational and informative. God bless you both, thanks
I picked up nylon guitar during the pandemic and have absolutely loved it. I say nylon because I like exploring flamenco, classical, Brazilian, and modern indie/singer songwriter music on nylon string guitar. I think one of the reasons people don’t consider classical music is because it seems stuck in time. There’s certainly value to it and a lot of it is beautiful but it seems unable to evolve and there are almost no new compositions. Other genres, even flamenco have evolved to meet the modern moment (much to the chagrin of many traditionalists). I’d love if either of you discussed this topic. As much as I love the sound of classical guitar I couldn’t possibly focus on only “classical” repertoire. Maybe that’s just me but I think it’s a common sentiment. Thanks for the discussion!
On the topic of people looking down on "easier" repertoire, I know someone who won literally dozens of guitar competitions in his youth, and then during his masters was told by his teacher (who i will not name but is a very influential figure in classical guitar) that the music he proposed for his masters recital was not virtuosic enough. What makes me sad about this story is that this was a player who had already more than proved his virtuosity, but was putting together a masters recital based on musical themes and ideas relating to building his own ARTISTIC identity, and then he is just told to play something like the Jose sonata, which probably like 3 other people will do on their exams that same year.
Its clear from this example that in academia we are often being pushed to think of ourselves as athletes rather than artists, and the great irony is that mindset isnt even helpful advice for the very difficult task of being successful after school as a freelance artist from a financial or professional perspective.
Brandon, O Brandon, O Brandon...
There's something so infectious about this classical guitarist! 💓
He's the first Classical Guitarist I subscribed to on UA-cam! 🌟
Thanks Beat! I love you, too. 🌹
This was really a great interview with Brandon. One thing that I have found is that many musicians do not know anything about the musician, the composer of the music they're playing. For instance, many do not know the faith journey that JS Bach went on. If you look at the lyrics of his cantatas and his other pieces of music, they're deeply spiritual. It behooves us to know more about the history of the composer. The reason the piece was written, the mood and background of the piece. To me this really is the key to better musicality.
Indeed, the point of music is expression, right? This is art, there is a performer and an audience... and they are to have a dialogue of sorts through this experiential exchange we call a musical performance. Melody, harmony, rhythm, technique, performance... these are vectors for expression. But the real value in any good piece of art is "What were they trying to express?" or maybe simply "What were they thinking about when they made this?" Those are the things that guide the creative decisions, the things that ultimately make the finished piece a whole greater than the sum of its parts. Composers like Bach have written some of the most emotionally evocative music... but if you don't know his life, you don't know the reasons for the music, so at best you can copy the mere motions. And maybe you copy those motions pristinely well... but without a reason for playing those notes, they ring eerily hollow. Art is like a channeling down of one's experiences... all of these different things we take with us, never seen nor heard, until we make them real. That's what making art is, to me anyway.
Bach, and quite a few other classical composers get a lot of praise for the knowledge, and the sheer technical feats so many of their works demonstrated and still command immense respect by... but what so often gets lost is how rare the air they were breathing was when it came to musical expression. It's something you only truly begin to appreciate when you dive head-first into your own expression and realize how easy it is to get lost in the sauce... and how sometimes the more you know, the harder it is to choose! To muster the level of pure, concentrated, unadulterated expression that Bach did, takes a level of inner patience, that I think few who live and pass ever come to comprehend. And THAT - THAT is what makes it special.
I'm not religious, so sometimes I joke that music is the closest thing I have to religion. To me, artistic expression and matters of the spirit are very much akin in that they both principally deal with bridges to things that normally can't be transferred across senses. If you aren't doing the work and taking the time to walk alongside yourself, intertwining your emotional processing with the music you make, is it even art anymore? To me art is not process. If it's more than 70% an A-to-B process to make something, whether its a new piece or a performance of an established one that you are working up, it's not art because it's not about expression anymore, but hitting a predetermined mark that already exists. Expression is idiosyncratic, by its nature it is unique to you and your experience and will not match any other external goals. That's YOU. And you have to find THAT in your music, and in your playing.
We celebrate these composers not for being the best at following rules, or for having empirical intuition beyond that of their peers... we celebrate each of them for what they did different. And what they did different... if you really dig (keep playing the 'why' game like a kid toying with a grown-up, while learning about the lives of these individuals,) has always come down to the things that made them different as people. They're all messy, even deeply flawed people who go through lots of changes in their lives. They took that and turned it into some of the best music of all time. Being concerned only with theory and replication dooms one to gaze into the reeds. And you can collect 1000's, say to people "Look at all of these fine reeds I have collected." But they won't care, because to them they're just reeds, and you've done nothing with them that gave those people a reason to care about you and your pretty fields of reeds. Mmm...pretty, tho. But dyou know how many people out there have fields just like them? We've all seen them.
No, I like to think that people like Bach... they successfully transmuted themselves into music that has lived on for centuries and gained eternal life. We should all be so lucky. Yet, so many don't appreciate what it actually means to do that, what it entails. And hey, ever witness somebody performing a common piece that meant a lot to them personally? Does it not also have a bit of that same magic, something extra that happens when somebody has their own inner reasons for playing something? Do you not play at your best when you love what you play? Where does that love come from? I tend to think the terms "musicality" and "feeling it" are basically interchangeable. The former just came around cause feelings are icky to virtuoso players and they don't want us to know they have them, so they call it musicality😉
And you think art is not spiritual in itself? Interesting. And what a strange place to draw logical conclusions, I must say.
Bach was contracted through the Catholic church to compose sacred music for church services.
@@ernestmendez5487 The way I see things, internally... is that my logic leads itself to unravel, if left to. I see it as sort of this truth about us, a part of the little contradictions that shape our decisions... something we wouldn't/couldn't push to conceive of art without. All human thinking ultimately sublimates to feeling if they dig deep enough. Everything is ultimately 'spiritual' in that there's no way for us, within the confines of our perception, to know what's absolutely real. These bodies of ours ensure that we gaze at our universe through just a slit, a tiny peephole. Within and without, there is a big unknown, no matter what you believe about what's in it... and all that you can possibly learn about your relationship with it comes from faith. The logical answer to the half-full/half-empty conundrum is "It's just half of a glass," or not EVEN half, but simply a glass with water in it. But we all know that's not how human beings operate. I think most would even take 'half-empty' over 'just a glass.' It's just that the information we wind up with is inconsistent and heavily truncated, and so logic on its own is insufficient. Logic brings order to chaos. Emotion and spirit make room for it, let it fill in the many gaps in our conscious rationality. The bigger that room-where-spirt-lives, the more information your logic has to build an ordered framework from. And the latter is important, because communication with others requires consistency. Our emotional, irrational, spiritual sides whither without connection, and the 'whole' of the person follows precipitously.
Language is a prime example... a system that requires logic, in order to convey things that are not always gonna be logical or rational. It's those dang contradictions. Art is a contradiction. In a 100% logical and rational world, it shouldn't exist, can't exist. You wouldn't even have the kind of idle conversations where the words themselves are secondary to the vibe of the interaction. Yet for us, these subjective, interpretive-narrative-driven pockets do exist. And there is definitely something magic in that, something that feels beyond corporeal. I think that matters of the subconscious often do, because our own minds are not fit to plunge the cold waters and behold the mass of the iceberg below the surface. It's like your own personal 'outer space,' your final frontier. Because our consciousnesses are so logical, they build docks and boats to get around the top of the iceberg, casting shadows over the mass below the water and hiding them further. Yet, it's only an irrational intuition that lets you think there is more below the waterline, when you can't actually 'know' it to be true. The human condition is weird. But probably one of the best things about our relative ignorance and uncertainty is the richness in experience that it yields. From that, we get many wonderful things, art being but one of countless chief aspects that speak well to the value of us. Art, or further, expression is always a fine thing to have in the world. It's kind of like a pH test for the collective unconscious... the more flourishing of expression there is, the more 'in bloom' the hearts and minds of a people are, which itself is a product of a healthy society with healthy communities.
The interesting thing about human communities is that even when they are secular, the connection to them feels spiritual, as though there is something vital to all meaning in it. It becomes something you can only see to the growth and protection of. And you can't tell me why. You can explain logically why it works out better. But the root of the compulsion still involves that faith. You can't know the future, your vision of the present is limited, and your understanding of the past is racked with compounding distortion. You do it because you want to do it, in your heart. Without that, it just don't work out. And further, one doesn't need another reason to protect and nurture one's home. Right? Again, just because you can layer rationality over it, doesn't mean that it's rationality that drives us to do it. I tend to think it's the other way around. Rationality explains and resolves emotional drives. We do nothing without an emotional impulse. And then comes reason.
I guess the logic-emotion split is a bit like an ouroboros, where emotion is always eating logic and birthing new meaning that comes out in the expression that we end up experiencing on the conscious/rational layer... which ultimately gets eaten by the feelings that capture you during the experience - try as you may, no words will ever be good enough. I think it's as connected to our happiness as it is our creativity, and the expression thereof. Personally, I lean towards believing that there are things within our impulses and intuition that simply refuse to be tabulated and quantified, and suitably are of a value that itself is of wholly incomparable measure. That's why I value any and all mediums of art, what I most value in it - and it's why call it "the closest thing I have to religion." And also why I do not sit around telling people their religion is pointless. I think that in the end we are all in the same boat and the only thing staying the darkness around us is eachother, and the lights our innermost drives cast upon the void... and so we can only do our best to understand ourselves and one another better. Art, with real expression as the implicit goal, can do no better. It's a dark, grim day, when the last piece of art is completed.
I mean, I can trace this little pet philosophy back to what drew me to guitar. The textures in a guitar's sound, echos the physical and mental state of the hands manipulating strings across the fretboard, which itself is mathematically impractical to even have perfect intonation on. Nearly every note on a guitar is slightly out, with the best necks just balancing it out of your active noticing. You as a player hear the notes, and wind up pressing harder or softer to tune each one as you play. So the sound changes depending on how you press down, how you move-to/approach frets, so on. That changes, the same way a person's gait changes. And yet I see people who try to practice that out. I did as well. But I've been trying to practice it back in. And I do find that after 2 decades on the instrument, you will hear where I'm at that day, if I let go and play. Not even in the notes or the rhythm, but how my hand movements are texturing the sound. Guitar has that same 'essential slop' to it that to me mirrors a big chunk of what we are.
All I can say is, whichever way you go, I think you're missing out in your journey as an artist if you pursue an art form for a long time and never so much as consider where it comes from, what it does, and why you do it. They talk of separating art from artist. But the best ones are inseparable from it, because they know what it is and believe in it, in their hearts and minds. Their creation speaks to a truth in their perception and experience, like the wrinkles on one's face is a cast of the time passed, or how the mask reveals the wearer's insecurities in its mirror image. They've transcended the reason itself, and that's what elevates the whole past the sum of its parts. I do think you have to give up on rational understanding at some point, if you want to get to the bottom of your own expression. Idiosyncratic expression and experiences that seed it, are the difference between art and mere tradecraft. Or between product and object of nonfungible sentiment. If you can't let it go, you can never hold beauty.
@@differentbutsimilar7893 you must think you're pretty smart, eh? 🤣🤣🤣
Way before the social media age, In the 1970's, John Williams used to appear as a guest regularly on mainstream UK Saturday night tv progs such as the Val Doonican show where he would play one of those clichéd pieces such as Asturias (or, of course, Cavatina). I've heard him say in a later interview that he felt was a great opportunity to introduce a multi-million audience to classical guitar.
As a guitarist I find the classical guitar world stuck in the past. For example, I find that learning jazz on the electric improves my playing on the classical. Learning classical pieces from a jazz chord chart is also better than just memorising arrangements. But I see classical guitar teaching is focused on this sort of virtuosity in reproducing written pieces and 'progress'.
Wow, great video Beatrix and Brandon! I'm not a guitarist but I wish I was because of all the great educational content online! This is the first time I've watched your channel, but I've been following Brandon for a while. The classical guitar and lute communities are so lucky. This video is really useful to me as an aspiring musician.
For me, listening to heavy metal bands in the 80's like Randy Rhoades from Ozzy, and Yngwie Malmsteem got me listening to classical. They had small classical pieces on the albums.
Great collaboration! There were several nuggets of wisdom in this one.
What he's saying from 38:00 on is so true. I recently started learning Bach's ``Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ'' (BWV 639) (arrangement by Gérard Abiton) and found it really hard to get it to sound decent. There is so much subtlety in this piece that a casual listener might not appreciate, that makes it harder than many flashy pieces. On the other hand, I keep getting sent videos by non-guitarist friends of party-trick guitarists doing pseudo-Flamenco strumming, telling me how impressive this is...
thank you for this guitar content beatrix!! I love brandon's stuff and it's great to see a collab!!
This is my story with classical guitar. As a kid I always wanted to have an acoustic guitar but I've never had one! And I've never met my Dad, only when I was a baby. And when I was 26 in 2020 I met him, I went to his house where he has a a lot of streams instruments he was a Luthier an excellent one as a hobby for a big part of his life, he always worked as a mechanical Engineer in the most important oil company. So that first time we met he gave me a beautiful classical guitar. It sounds amazing, and I'm just in loved. It sounds every time that I play it as if I really know what I am doing. 😂😂😂 it's easy to play, the sound is the most beautiful thing ever. I can't even explain it. ❤
I'm really glad you discovered your passion and connected with your dad. Good for you.
Thank you both so much, I used to be the hired gun doing all the crazy stuff, now that I'm older my last journey has been exactly what you are talking about, strip it down and make things more beautiful and poetic. I found true beauty in arranging Eric Satie and some amazing jazz ballads but strip it down so we can focus on the quality of the notes rather than the amount of notes. Make you music, no matter what it is more musical and speaking. Tell a story rather than rattle of loads of notes. A great exercise has been to start leaving out what you can to the point where just melody and bass are left and you only fil up the middle when there is room for it and when the music really need it. Again thanks soo much.
Wonderful conversation !
Great discussion Beatrix and Brandon - thank you! I definitely did a "dip-down" when I started classical study with a good instructor two years ago - after 50 years of playing folk, rock, etc. Lots of learning (and unlearning!) to do, it's been very humbling, and now I enjoy being a student again! I've learned a lot from both of your guys' videos, keep up the good work! Warm wishes from Michigan!
Enjoyed the part about guitarist/musician and improvising. I think that one word/skill that is missing is "arranging", something that Dyens also did so very well and which helps to enlarge the repertoire with new pieces that are familiar to the general public.
Great video really enjoyed the conversation.
I love the fact that Brandon has taken to use a strap, it’s the thing that makes the most sense but people just won’t use it in the classical guitar world I don’t know why !
Love both yours and Brandons Channel Beatrix. Great inspiring content.
Wow! My two favorite YT guitar teachers talking!!! This is awesome! As a beginner it is nice to have the basics explained several different ways. Keep making the basics videos even if the topics has already been covered by other contributors. Thank you for all you do online!!!!!!
I remember some long time ago, i attended a conference on some topic that i do not remember. There happened to be a piano on the stage. And for some reason, the speaker sat down and played a very simple melody on this piano. I was shocked! I knew that i was technically capable of playing this music. But, for some reason, the beauty of his playing was stunningly far beyond my ability. It was the first time that i really understood the evanescent beauty of music that exists in a realm totally outside of (while not independent of) technical accomplishment.
thank you to the both of you for your insights!
The idea of a guitar competition seems insane lol
very interesting conversation. Thank you !
Thank you both so much.
Such a great interview! Greetings!
Hey! Worlds collide! Two very good personalities and plucked-string ambassadors come together. Wonderful.
This is real! Thank you @beatrixguitar, and thank you @brandonacker. You two are humble and real. That is what attracts me to your channels. @beatrixguitar, please leave your mistakes in your videos. It makes you more relatable than so many that are just "perfect." This discussion is epic!
Wow, there is a whole book's worth of useful information in this interview. Thank you!
This was great, both of my fav classical guitar tubers in a conversation is always nice
I have dabbled with classical guitar on and off for over 40 years, preferring acoustic steel-string during an even longer period. But seeing and hearing the two of you play Lagrima, which somehow I had never heard before, haunted me. It was enough to start me, at age 73, back on the road to studying classical guitar. So the effects are real as is the influence. Bravo to the two of you!!!
musicality is most important
I listen to some highly technical guys play and I don't remember anything they played after
they are playing to people's eyes I guess because it's what works in video format
This WAS indeed a great conversation! So many good topics were hit upon. I LOVE your comment, Brandon. I found that "experiencing music at "a deeper, more profound level" is making a huge difference in my playing. Case in point... I've been working on Dowland's Frog Galliard. Well, I had NO Clue about the derivation of the name "Frog Galliard" until I researched the topic. Certain sources claimed that Frog Galliard is a quick dance in 3/4 time... but that just didn't fit... the piece is not necessarily fast or jumpy. Turns out, Frog Galliard is an instrumental version of his song “Now O Now
I Needs Must Part” from John Dowland’s First Book of Songs (1597), which is about a man leaving a
woman who rejects him. Between 1579 and 1581 Queen Elizabeth was courted by the Duke of Anjou, the youngest brother
of the King of France, who was 22 years her junior and Catholic. She called him “my frog.” They never married,
and if she ever thought marrying him was a good idea, her senior advisors thought it was a terrible one. So, you see... Frog Galliard is essentially a love song... not a fast, jumpy tune... but a somber, sad one.
What a fascinating story! Thank you for posting it. Now I have to go find that song.
What a nice, useful, positive conversation! At 49, after playing rock and blues guitar in my youth, I started formally learning classical guitar with a great teacher, and my love for the instrument has never been stronger. People like you, with the kind of content you produce, will make my journey even richer and surely more pleasant. Keep up with the great work and THANK YOU!
It's great to see two of the greatest (IMHO) younger classical guitarists of today sharing their thoughts with us. Great not just because of technical prowess, but for humility and sincere desire to help people to come to love classical guitar. Thank you guys!
Great video. Now I want to get back to playing Lagrima and practice more and more guitar. My motivation got boosted a lot.
You both are amazing educators, musicians and content creators for anyone, you have achieved excellence with your passion and dedication. Is good to see you talking about this topics. Thank you for being part of my favorite content all this years. We all need this in the future.
Very interesting ! 👍Thank you for sharing 🙏
‘We’re storytellers’, Brandon states. Good ones too I’d like to say, in more ways than one :-) Thank you both for this enlightening and inspiring conversation.
I am enjoying this video so much. I'm about a quarter of the way through it and already know that I will be following both channels. Thank you both for such a great video.
I am very excited about learning classical guitar. I like to challenge myself with difficult new things because it builds my confidence to try other difficult things in life. I love channels like yours and Brandon's. Keep doing what your're doing!
Please keep up the good work!!
Great talk guys!
Best keyboard player I ever saw, and I'm 68, was busking in Manchester and people were throwing money at him. That's very very rare in Manchester. I asked him if he would teach me and he said no, because he couldn't read the dots.If you can't improvise a melody on 6 notes of one string then you have a long way to go.
Thank you both for sharing your expertise with us. I often find myself reflecting on how fortunate we are to have access to resources and opportunities that were not readily available when I was younger. Back then, pursuing a passion like playing the guitar at such a high level often meant having to travel abroad for specialized training. While I may not have achieved the level of musical proficiency I once dreamed of, I am grateful that I can now pursue it as a hobby, albeit with the same enthusiasm. It's heartening to see how times have changed, allowing us to indulge in our interests more easily. Warm regards from Hungary.
What a great video! A big thank you to both of you. You were deep into an exchange of ideas when a commercial came on. Psi.
Like Brendon's comment about authenticity. All you have to be is you loving your music and sharing what you love and I don't think you can ever go wrong, thank you both!!!!
Think you'll find this issue across the board in classical music. A good discussion and thanks to the both of you.
Though I remember many fun times myself disappearing into a music room at school and improvising on my Viola. It was a form of escape. Scales and arpeggios help a lot though. Since 'The Pandemic', I have been learning classical guitar and following a variety of YT material but I also worked through a structured course by This is Classical Guitar and that helped immeasurably.
Lucky though I can read music and understand many facets of music but translating that onto guitar, still a challenge. Making the instrument sing. Feeling I am nearing time to give back with insights.
Work to a lovely tone and have fun - advice to aspiring students and be patient with oneself.
p.s., nail free player.😁
Yes!!!! Video by Brandon telling me i can learn classic guitar and play without nails really made me go and start to learn. And i mean it. That was it
So much enjoyed listening to you both share. I have watched numerous videos from the 2 of you and can honestly say I'm a better musician for it. Thank you for the time invested in making us better
In other words - you guys rock.
Another challenge is, The Cell phone speakers and microphones nowadays are not able to pickup the sound of low notes, most of the time:
If you do some Facebook Live, you might want to use the ukulele rather than guitar. For them (audience) to hear every chords you play.
Cell phone speakers and microphones 10 years ago were way better in sounds though the picture quality of today's models are better. The sound is more important if you are a guitarist
i don't understand that. i have never listened to anything on my cell phone speakers. at minimum i listen on good headphones, usually studio headphones, and at home my phone is hooked up to my studio monitors, although i watch on my computer which is also hooked up to my studio monitors. who the hell actually uses the speakers on the cellphone? as far as microphones, the modern cellphones have much better mics than older ones.
Hi Beatrix, I love your channel, I’ve been watching Brandon for years and he is one of the reasons I have spent sooooo much money on classical guitars 😊😊 not quite £275,000 dollars but a hefty sum. Watching you guys gives me so much inspiration to keep picking the guitar up daily. Thank you both. Have a lovely day. Tony
Love your insights Beatrix. -Katana & Becca
Both of you are great musicians and teachers!
Brilliant video! Means so much after finishing my Master's in music where technique is everything and musicality felt like it took a back seat. Damn, fear played such a big part of my time in music education, took me so long to heal from that mentality.
Brandon really has the smoothest most pleasant voice to listen to.
This is going to be epic❤️
I have made numbers of comments about players and the musicality and approach to playing classical guitar on UA-cam There are many players who are technicians of the guitar that is they can play many complicated pieces but they they are not creating music just notes. Then there are the ones who are technically great and also musicians. Even Bach should be musical not just notes with out phrasing or vibrato. Lagrima is one of the hardest pieces to play to make it sound musical and also to phrase in a way to make it sound whole I have only heard a hand full of players in my life time give this piece life.
Fantastic Masterclass on insights into aesthetic beauty, pedagogy, player maturation, the online ecosystem & extemporisation/improvisation
Like so much both of you and all your musical and very human way of expose and talk about music! Thanks for this!
Cheers from Brazil!
I started my Guitar learning journey about a month ago from today, I was actually inspired by Brandon Acker among other things.
I had wanted to learn an instrument but felt unsure of what, and kept being pushed towards guitar for some reason but I hated folk and western styles of guitar, it just seemed so...uninspiring to me. It never evoked much in me.
Just as I was about to hop onto learning Piano, I found his channel, and I had that exact feeling he's talking about: "What is this? You can do this on a guitar? Why do I feel like crying?" and it struck me then and there that maybe guitar was the right choice for me.
I shortly after found this channel and a few others since, and more and more of my UA-cam and Instagram has just been filled with this type of content and I'm so thankful to have a world with people like you and Brandon in it, to be able to learn so freely from people I might never have met 50 years ago, but now have access to through the miracle which is the internet.
Thank you for all you guys do for this amazing community that I'm eager to some day be a proper part of!
Bravo Brandon! Excellent points all around. So eloquently stated. Here’s to your continued success!
For too long, classical guitar has been fighting for legitimacy within the conservatory model. But this is like kicking and shoving our way onto the Titanic! We have to remember that the goal of the traditional conservatory is to create orchestral musicians. The metric for this is how well one can play a standard canon of repertoire with as high a level of technical proficiency as similarly and consistently as possible. This is perfectly logical if you want a unified large ensemble sound. (You certainly don’t want people who’ve been trained to have their own creative ideas who might challenge a conductor!) For the 19th and much of the 20th century, this was a perfectly sensible career goal. Today, however, with many orchestral programs facing serious financial challenges and contending with existential crises regarding cultural relevancy, even this is becoming less tenable. Yet, the conservatories haven’t gotten the message, and they’re only reluctantly entering the 20th (yes, I do mean 20th) century. Guitar should be the leader on how serious music making can be done in other ways.
It makes NO sense for a classical guitar program to be centered around this outdated model. In my own conservatory guitar program which I direct, I focus on helping musicians achieve their artistic goals. We do improvisation (in historical and modern styles) and figured bass, arranging from lead sheets, etc. Yes, of course there is technical work and standard (and non-standard) repertoire, but the music always comes first. It’s incredibly useful for a career and - this isn’t underscored enough - also FUN! I recognize that this makes me an outlier, however. It’s frankly been a fight with the administration who are often apathetic, unsupportive or even antagonistic to these initiatives. I have faith that eventually these folks will realize that fairly soon those other conservatory students will be doing what we guitarists do now. It might take until the 22nd century for them to catch up to today, but they’ll get there maybe.
Thanks, Chris! I've actually never thought of the current problems in the way you've described them here and couldn't agree more.
What's your take on, say, arranging Hendrix for a classical guitar curriculum?
Brandon's point at 38:40 and 44:00 re "The Crisis": the virtuoso players who can't play Lagrima with expression. TOTALLY AGREE!
Me just playing Lagrima for myself and thinking, how is it even possible to play that piece without expression... Do these people not have a SOUL?! 😆😱🤷♂️
But I know exactly what he means. Also there's some INCREDIBLY talented guitarists on UA-cam that I listen to and just get bored of listening to, if not disgusted by (let's leave his name out, LOL). Music, the medium for transcending ego and connecting directly with the divine. Made into another ego thing. It's a trap, for sure! Enjoy your playing ❤
I like how my friend plays tunes of John Williams' record El Diablo Suelto a lot more than I like hearing JW play it.@@willemakkermans4067
amazing !!
There's a great difference between an instrumentalist, a musician, and an artist. That's why there are different words for each. Expertly pushing the "buttons" on a piano or flute doesn't make one a musician or an artist.
You have brought such an interesting topic. The main reason I didn't want to study classical guitar on regular schools is because they make you play pieces I never wanted to play. I'm more interested in how a music sounds, not how hard it is to play
Wow, I've been thinking about this very subject lately and I'm not even a professional musician. I believe this is a problem that goes beyond music, though, as it's related to modern day obsession with productivity and performance. See, for example, the late scandals regarding fraud in scientific papers.
I love this video. I've probably learned more from you and Brandon than anyone else. Don't worry about producing videos that cover the same subject as other people have done. Each video on a given subject is different than any other. I recently watched a video you did on left hand technique and I have watched many others. I learn something different from each. In your video you discussed thumb position and then you began discussing and demonstrating fingering frets in a way that no one else had done. Everyone else has given the impression that the guitarist pushes the strings into the frets. A light bulb went on when you said and demonstrated PULLING the strings down into the fret with the fingertip. I realized that technique is compatible with the plucking hand technique of pulling the strings up with the fingertips. Brandon can do a video discussing left hand technique and he may focus on something different, but equally useful.
We are poets! What a fantastic metaphor that seems obvious, but which I never heard or thought if before. And for me the "simple" (😂) poets are my favorites. I have never been able to write like Emily Dickinson, but I love her work. My teacher for the past 10 years teaches in hus studio and through Skype. During Covid he only taught online and now his only in studio lessons are with school children. During Covid I moved 2500 miles away to another country and I still receive great lessons and a personal touch.
As a musician and composer/ guitarist. I loved this conversation.
I watched your videos on posture and warm-up exercises and I never realized I never subscribed. I just subscribed!
I got a degree in classical guitar and couldn't be more disappointed and upset with the program. I learned some difficult music (Barrios, Bach, Sor) but they didn't help me develop my ear, my voice, or my ability to think. I'm a gigging musician in the pop/rock/country/blues/bluegrass/jazz worlds and improvise constantly and often need to be able to pick up tunes I've never heard by ear while on the gig...My classical training didn't help me to do any of that. Earning my degree felt like it prevented me from actually getting good at music and instead had me waste time learning difficult pieces that most people don't have the patience to listen to, and didn't help me improve musically besides playing those pieces of music.
The complication of classical guitar is beyond me. I trust however you two have addressed the topic admirably. But forget all that ! I am 77 years old and have stumbled across not only Brandon's school (for which I am not nearly ready :>) but Beatrix utube videos. I am TOTALLY unprepared for the technical stuff. I watched with amazement Beatrix's video on "left hand exercises". How ridiculous ! I could not execute a single one of those. Two days ago, when copying her exercise on bar codes for the umpteenth time, I FINALLY got one single stroke to sound good ! ONE ! I cannot tell you how happy I was to be able to do what she was teaching, even for just a brief moment. These two folks have made my life better. Thank you both ! Cheers !
BJ
Thank you so much Beatrix for introducing me to Brandon Acker, that I didn't know, and of course for the content that you put in your channel. Thank you so much 😍
You should invite Fabio Lima, he's a Brazilian classical guitar player, he studied Master of Arts at the Royal Academy of Music in London and is also one of the most awarded classical guitar player in the world (he won the 2012 Julian Bream Prize, which was judge by Julian Bream himself).
The moment you take a deep dive into past you realize the role of improvisation and composition. It was expected that you played your own stuff. So different from today. I 20:57
Oh, my god. Just stop. Nobody cares about Fabio Lima but his Brazilian sycophants.
@@wernerretief4569, Yes, i've seen the podcast too, but what does ita have to do with my comment ??
@@edusauron, You bloody ignorant, you probably does not know anything about music and is commenting in sheer hatred of my country.
I don't know him personally, and I probably never will, so I'll never gain anything in promoting him. Do I know your language better than you? You don't even know the meaning of the words you use, you execrable!!
Beatrix asked for people to recomend new guest for her podcast so that's what I did.
@@edusauron , you ignorant!
I don't even know the meaning of the words you use. I don't personally know Fabio Lima, and I probably never will so I'll won't gain anything in promoting him, Beatrix asked for people to recomend more guests for her podcast so that's what I did.
You probably do not know anything about music and you're commenting in sheer hatred for my country, you execrable!
Very interesting I been teaching guitar for 40 Years and find composing for other instruments really does help with guitar composition best wishes Phil from UK England 😍👍
This is great.
I got inspired to learn the guitar by listening to Vitor Ramil, decided to just grab a guitar from someone, and just started learning. The points you tow make are great! I have been following and checking several videos of guitar teacher (folk and classical) and comparing methods to find what suits me best!
I ws also wondering if at my age I could learn classical guitar, and Brandon videos made a huge difference for me, I just got to know @beatrisguitar and I'm sure she will make a huge difference too.
Thanks you both!
I'm one of those students. I like to listen to complex music, and I play piano at an intermediate level. Just got a classical guitar for xmas.
I get to see the struggle for musicality very clearly in my son, who's just starting piano. He wants to move on from a piece as soon as he has the right notes at the right time, but music is more than that. You have to make it your own.
Thank you for the awesome chat.
I am similar to you. Classical Piano player here, but bought a Classical Guitar last year. I took different approach and started with Flamenco Guitar - similar to classical guitar, but more simple Harmony, in Phrygian mode and just the timings (compas) and right hand technique is the effort.
Till 20th century - there is no things written for quitar, so its hard to play classical music on Guitar :P
29:49 Honestly Brandons cover of 'Music For A While' is the most metal thing i've heard in ages.
I really liked the part where you talked about authenticity. I feel like it applies very well to private lessons. The more authentic you are during your lessons, the more you'll get out of them (at least as a student, I didn't have the opportunity to apply this as a teacher yet)
In the UK, many years ago, BBC radio and various TV stations, used to broadcast dedicated programmes on classical and other types of guitar music. Major theatres and local music societies would mount regular guitar based concerts.
I noticed most of these start to dry up around the millennium. At present, to my knowledge, there are hardly any recitals of guitar music in any medium other than on YT, where there are almost too many.
YT is great, but it is fundamentally, a virtual experience.
Well, improvising was a prized skill in the classical world at one time. Bach, Mozart, Beethoven and, in particular, the amazing Franz Lizst. It really is time that improvising and playing by ear becomes an integral part of all classical music student's training.
It's sad that classical musicians are so disconnected from improvising. It's something I never really encountered until I got into baroque music.
Great info Thanks guys . I don’t grow nails because of work . Now I know I can get into it. 🙏
I remember stumbling on your Reddit streams, just when I started to really take learning seriously. They were very inspiring. I’m still nowhere near competent but a long way from that point.
'Becoming a technician' is common with those learning electric as well
You are so right about playing simple things expressively. As a kid I had a Segovia album which began with six pavans by Luis Milan; they were completely beautiful and are about as simple as you can get. He also recorded some simple suites by Robert deVisee and some of the easier Sor Etudes. At the time he was the king of classical guitar and he was very happy to play simle things beautifully.
Just want to say you're both legends. So it's nice to see the collaboration. My votes for next guest would be: Marcin Dylla or Merce Font.
This was a great podcast - thank you Beatrix and Brandon! You asked who you should have as a guest - you may want talk with Simon Powis. He created Classical Guitar Corner Academy - an online school of classical guitar for adults. I've been a member of the academy for 7 years and my playing has grown by leaps and bounds. He has an incredible graded curriculum focusing on musicality from the start , and including improvisation and composition.
I'll never forget the day I was playing manuel ponces prelude 1 and some guy told me "you won't get far playing that piece" so I played scherzino mexicano and he stared at me in shock and I said "that piece is cool sure. However prelude 1 by ponce is beautiful" moral of the story just play what you like and enjoy doing it.
ever since Brandon's interview with Rob MacKillop, I've been trying to improvise during Sor and Carcassi Etudes I've been practicing. It's honestly a lot of fun, and makes the song feel more like your own. Improv definitely needs to be encouraged more
I am that exact guy the Brandon desribed as able to play Chaconne from memory but not able to play Happy birthday.
Both of you guys. When I see your faces, I remember to go work on my tremolo or I feel bad that I'm not going to go work on my tremolo. I'm getting better!
Brandooooooon 🥰