Ballad soloing - Dynamics & Phrasing #2, Lesson By Darius Wave Options

[yoncopin]

Original lesson: Ballad soloing - Dynamics & Phrasing #2 by Darius Wave

It's been almost 5 months of practicing primarily just this piece daily, but I believe I've finally managed to conquer it. I hope so, because I just can't play it any more, it's time to move on to something fresh. I think learning this lesson is probably my greatest achievement here at GMC thus far, it was very challenging. Thanks to Darius for the lesson, Gabe for the motivation, and for all your instructor feedback here.

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[Kristofer Dahl]

Very well done on this tricky but super musical lesson.

Your take was enjoyable. The trickier section (around 1:40) needs more work - there are some missed notes / bad hand sync. More importantly I felt you needed to prioritise the technical side of things here - consequently during this section I think you lost a bit of feel.

I have given you an 8 and I am looking forward to Darius comments.

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[Gabriel Leopardi]

Hey mate!

Nice to find this take here. I could follow your work on this lesson at the mentoring thread and you already know what I think of this take. This video is a great achievement since the lesson is a whole new level. The results is a very enjoyable take in which guitar tone is just perfect for my ears, and your overall playing really tasty.

As I said at the other thread, there are details to adjust and things to sound more natural but there is nothing that distracts me from feeling good while listening to your take.

We already talked that it's good to start working on new stuff, but remember to keep playing this one at least once every day to remind it, and to continue adjusting those details (dynamics, vibrato, adjusting trickier parts) that could be even better.

Congrats!!

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[Darius Wave]

First of all...thank you for choosing this lesson and for all the work you did to make it sound like it does.

This lesson is actually much more difficult than it seems after first play. There are in fact a few technical difficulties but the true challenge here are tons of hidden, dynamics and articulation details. The reason I'm saying this is that from the one side you need to realize how much you did and how pleasant your performance is, from the other side I have to objectively point that there are still some important things missing to give you one of top grades. Keep in mind that I'm really pleased with your take and you've took that lesson quite far, what can be treated as a clear, personal succes that I would like to congratulate you

Let's start from things that can be pointed in general:
- you timing tends to go cleary off. there are moments of visible hesitation in playing, causing notes to go after the beat.
- hand sync isn't perfect all the time but it's not critical at all - there are lick executed really well and clean
- You got very close with your tone and frequency-wise it's perfect. There is though a magical sweet spot of gain where dynamics translation is simply perfect - soft notes are quiter adn warmer sounding almost like a clean tone, while heavy notes are sharp and sparkling. You have crossed that spot a little and that made your dynamics been flattened. The contrast in playing is just a little too low


As for other stuff:
- switching to a bridge pickup was not a best choice. You have a single coil in the neck position. With the "sweet spot" I've mentioned" it can give tonal response that have a great percussive response same,as bridge pickup - it's a matter of balance between treble and gan settings. I only did switch from humbucker to single coil split mode in original lesson video. In your cas staying on neck single coil through all the lesson, would be just fine.

- respect notes length. You tend to cut the ends too early. "Tail" of note is same important as perfect timing of it's hit moment. 1:06 is a critical example. Alwasy try to shift positions at the very last, possible moments, when in original track there's a smooth connection between notes/licks.

- Your strumming could be more consistent. At some points you have a kind of irregurarities in picking dirrection assignment.

- picked vs legato notes. Not always that makes much of a critical difference to the track, but for this kind of plyaing it really does. Replacing some pick strokes with legato or picking some notes that where originally played with legato, does affect tension layout through particular lick. In this lesson every single stroke or lagato had it's purpose. It's worth to recheck it to be 100% sure it's exactly like in original. This way you would achive 100% profit from the lesson. And yes...I know, it's a lot of things to be remembered and executed while playing, but that's exactly what dynamic playing is all about I'm sure you would be able to spot all the differenced while listening to your take and rewiewing the lesson again


Now the most important. No matter what you think on how my opinion looks (maybe looks like there's much things to be fixed in the lesson), you need to know that all you did is a really advanced point of learning this lesson and not all have enough patience to get to the point you did. We all have a moment when we decide to abandon lessons at the stage they are at the moment. you need to be your self-judge at this point and I clearly understand this. I'm satisfied with your results and I highly belive If someday you would decide to take it to even higher level, than you definitely would be able to do this Also remember that the judgment is with no kind of tolerance for student. You've been just judged as a pro player so there are no reasons to feel underratd at all! That's a great job

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This post has been edited by Darius Wave: Apr 25 2017, 08:34 AM

[Fran]

Pass: 7.7

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