How Fast Are You? Options

[Marcus Desaiha]

I was wondering how fast (in hours spent) are you on nailing a GMC lesson, by this meaning:

- Understanding what you are playing - technically and theoretically
- Being able to execute things with flow and as good as possible at the slowest tempo available (slowest backing track)
- Bringing the lesson up to the original speed, keeping the execution as before - clean, in time, tight and expressive
- Recording the lesson for a REC take?

You'll probably pick your maximum level for certain for the involved difficulty but by this I'm trying to figure out how everyone's clock is ticking

-1. It is very hard to say, it all depends on what level of difficulty the song/sequence is. But I would say pretty fast, the theoretical and technical part is the easiest part, being able to execute it is a whole diffrent story though.

-2 To do it right away slow after examining the sequence in question? Sometimes, it all depends on the level or difficulty of course.

-3 weeks, months, if it is difficult enough, and something completely new to my "playingstyle library".

-4 Never ready to do that, I'm never satisfied with my playing

It might be worth mentioning for your little experiment that: What I do in my free time in life has a huge impact on how fast I learn things on the guitar. If I just sit at home and practice by myself without any recording or rehearsing during the weeks it goes alot slower to progress. But If I have a full on studio schedule where I record guitars every day, and rehearse in between thoose hours my learning process is boosted about 40%(Wild guess of course, but my gut tells me it should be around 40% ). I guess it all has to do with how focused I can get when I record compared to when I'm 100% relaxed at home "Just practicing" even though I really try to focus and do my best. Its a mystery!

This post has been edited by Marcus Desaiha: Mar 13 2012, 04:08 PM

[vdcraats]

For me it depends on the difficulty level offcourse

I'm working on 'guitar loves piano 6' by Piotr difficulty 4

- took me about 5 hours to play it slow
- It will take me about 6 hours to get it at full speed with mistakes
- To play it for a recording that will take me about a week I think

So in total about 10 days. Depending how much I play offcourse. I have another life next to guitar playing

- Arthur -

[ElHombre]

What I master the most in advanced technique would be me sweeping which came very naturally to me.
My tapping and alternate/economy picking is not as good in comparision to my sweeping

[Cosmin Lupu]

Cosmin,

I tend to tackle the lesson as a whole. I don't completely master all the parts, but I want to feel like I am progressing. To stay motivated, I just move on to the next section. Sometimes I have to come back to something later. Or maybe sometimes I will learn the "cool" part first. As in your Djent - Time Signatures lesson, I learned the rhythm part before the alternate picking part. It was really cool.

I might say that I use my ear the most in learning a lesson, and the tab to reinforce what I am hearing. To learn with your ear...I would say that is a very good thing. Right? We are musicians after all. \m/

-Brandon Burch

An you are right I use my ears first hand and then the tab to see if I got everything right, the thing is that when I'm sorting out classical music for instance (Mozart Rocks stuff) I have to come up with a combination between the actual phrases played by the main violin or other solo instrument and my own ideas - so sorting out what is played there will come first and tweaking it, afterwards.

The thing is that ears helped me a lot - if you will take a peak at what Guthrie has to say about tabs for instance, you'll end up realizing that they are only meant for backing your ears up and not used as a main tool, from a certain point onward. When my ears were not that accustomed to picking up things from recordings, I was relying on tabs most of the time, but I was very frustrated by the fact that most of them were inaccurate and there is NO RHYTHMIC notation in them usually which is one of the main reasons for which I couldn't figure out things from tabs. I must admit that I was so into sorting the songs out from tabs, that I have completely forgotten that I could've used my ears instead

For me it depends on the difficulty level offcourse

I'm working on 'guitar loves piano 6' by Piotr difficulty 4

- took me about 5 hours to play it slow
- It will take me about 6 hours to get it at full speed with mistakes
- To play it for a recording that will take me about a week I think

So in total about 10 days. Depending how much I play offcourse. I have another life next to guitar playing

- Arthur -

10 days is a very good timing Arthur

[thefireball]

When my ears were not that accustomed to picking up things from recordings, I was relying on tabs most of the time, but I was very frustrated by the fact that most of them were inaccurate and there is NO RHYTHMIC notation in them usually which is one of the main reasons for which I couldn't figure out things from tabs. I must admit that I was so into sorting the songs out from tabs, that I have completely forgotten that I could've used my ears instead

It was my frustration in the inaccuracy and no rhythmic notation of tabs that drove me to use my ears.

[Cosmin Lupu]

It was my frustration in the inaccuracy and no rhythmic notation of tabs that drove me to use my ears.

Well, for instance, my best friend used to learn everything by ear - he was a Dream Theater fanatic in his college years and he had learned a serious amount of Dream Theater songs - not for note - afterwards, making his own backing tracks (so he figured out the other instruments as well) and played with Petrucci's precision over them Well, all this tremenedously tedious routine, transformed him into a very versatile orchestrator and player - he is my bandmate in Aria and I have learned a LOT from him during the last 5-6 years.

Check out some of his playing:

[thefireball]

Well, for instance, my best friend used to learn everything by ear - he was a Dream Theater fanatic in his college years and he had learned a serious amount of Dream Theater songs - not for note - afterwards, making his own backing tracks (so he figured out the other instruments as well) and played with Petrucci's precision over them Well, all this tremenedously tedious routine, transformed him into a very versatile orchestrator and player - he is my bandmate in Aria and I have learned a LOT from him during the last 5-6 years.

Check out some of his playing:

That's Cezar!! He's good!

[Cosmin Lupu]

That's Cezar!! He's good!

Yeahah

[Dinaga]

I was wondering how fast (in hours spent) are you on nailing a GMC lesson, by this meaning:

- Understanding what you are playing - technically and theoretically
- Being able to execute things with flow and as good as possible at the slowest tempo available (slowest backing track)
- Bringing the lesson up to the original speed, keeping the execution as before - clean, in time, tight and expressive
- Recording the lesson for a REC take?

You'll probably pick your maximum level for certain for the involved difficulty but by this I'm trying to figure out how everyone's clock is ticking

This is a great topic mate!

It doesn't take long until I memorize the notes and the fingering I decide to use. As for theory, unfortunately I don't think about it that much, I learn stuff "on the fly", which means that if I play a particular new scale or mode lots of times, eventually I'll become familiar with it

As soon as I learn all the parts of the song, it doesn't take long to combine all the pieces together at 50% speed. That's the easy part - except if I have to learn a completely new technique used in the lesson (like in Muris' Oriental Shred lesson - took me a while to learn the grace notes, which are all over that lesson! )

Bringing the lesson to the original speed - this takes most of the time... Depending on the speed/difficulty/motivation/spare time/health issues it can take from few weeks to a few months!

Recording the lesson - weeeell, the night I *DECIDE* to record the lesson is the day I'm definitely gonna do it, so after a few takes I usually get it done, but in some cases it can take a few hours (warmup, bloopers etc) I often rush it because I'm too scared my battery will run off and not recording the video the exact day I wanted to record it is very depressing

This post has been edited by Dinaga: Mar 15 2012, 09:45 PM

[derper]

I've had the same camera battery issues... just got a new(er) one. A Nikon Coolpix with rechargeabe battery pack (included) for only $50 on local craigslist. Now I can just "keep it rollin" while looping my attempts. A great method, to aviod "red-light-fever". Thanks for THAT pointer!!

[Cosmin Lupu]

-1. It is very hard to say, it all depends on what level of difficulty the song/sequence is. But I would say pretty fast, the theoretical and technical part is the easiest part, being able to execute it is a whole diffrent story though.

-2 To do it right away slow after examining the sequence in question? Sometimes, it all depends on the level or difficulty of course.

-3 weeks, months, if it is difficult enough, and something completely new to my "playingstyle library".

-4 Never ready to do that, I'm never satisfied with my playing

It might be worth mentioning for your little experiment that: What I do in my free time in life has a huge impact on how fast I learn things on the guitar. If I just sit at home and practice by myself without any recording or rehearsing during the weeks it goes alot slower to progress. But If I have a full on studio schedule where I record guitars every day, and rehearse in between thoose hours my learning process is boosted about 40%(Wild guess of course, but my gut tells me it should be around 40% ). I guess it all has to do with how focused I can get when I record compared to when I'm 100% relaxed at home "Just practicing" even though I really try to focus and do my best. Its a mystery!

Good points man - for me it goes a bit the same if i have to learn something difficult and challenging just because I want to, I tend to lengthen the process, but if for instance, I have to play that piece in a concert or prepare it for GMC in some way, I am focused to get it moving fast and good!