Guitar Musings

I would like to introduce Hercules Castro as a new guest writer for Guitar Musings. Hercules and I grew up and learned the guitar together. I know you will enjoy his insights on the guitar and making music.

Meet My Friend

I’d like to talk about my good friend, the big red button. By this, I mean the Record button. Now, I’m not talking about recording in the sense of producing CDs, videos or demos. That comes later. For now, I’m talking more along the lines of creating a progress report.

In the Beginning

When I was a young lad, one of my favorite things to do was plug my amp into a dual cassette recorder with a mic input, play anything, record it, then take the tape to school to generally irritate all of my friends. Later, I figured out if I took the tape and put it in the other deck, recorded its contents onto another blank tape with a drum machine plugged in and going, I could multi-track. After I repeated the process with multiple guitar tracks and a borrowed bass, the line noise had built up so much that you could barely hear the instruments. Plus, it was a one shot deal per recording so I learned to either live with the occasional mistake, or just don’t make mistakes. But I had a recording that not only captured a song idea for later use, but also a small snapshot in the development of my technique.

Monitor Your Progress

Now I’ll shift gears for a second. One thing that I find as I practice is that day to day, I never get better. It’s like a body builder who lifts, looks in the mirror, and sees no change. This can be very discouraging. But one thing that body builders are encouraged to do is have pictures taken of themselves periodically during their development. Over time, the changes are more noticeable. The same is true with playing and developing technique. This is why I highly recommend getting a big red button.

Resources are Everywhere

These days, with a computer in every home and a plethora of affordable recording hardware and software, there is no excuse not to push the big red button every now and then. That is, except for one; nerves. Very few things, save for live performance, can bring sweat to palms like knowing that the button has been pushed and it’s time to do your thing. Just remember this; it’s just you and the button. The button doesn’t judge, it just captures. You be the judge. But you have to put something down to judge.

Mistakes are OK

Also with most systems, along with a big red button comes a big Delete button. There’s no shame in using the big Delete button. You want to capture your best effort at that time, so don’t be afraid to try again and again and again until it’s as good as you can get it. If you can’t get it as good as you want it, step away from the button, work it out, come back, and push the button again.

It Gets Easier

The two things that I’m thankful for after years of using the big red button are, one, that I have something to listen to and say “Wow, I actually have progressed since then!”, or “That’s an area I’m still not happy with, I should focus on that”. The other is that I’ve become proficient and confident enough with the recording process that I can create real projects, make my own CDs inexpensively and on my terms, and help others with their projects.

So like The Chemical Brothers say “Don’t hold back, the time has come to galvanize, push the button”.

Links:

www.herculescastro.com  (Home page of our guest writer)

I’ve been trying to find accurate Bruce Cockburn tabs for you play.  Unlike my Tommy Emmanuel Tabs post, it wasn’t as easy to find good tabs to find and I found many sites that were nothing but pop-ups and deceptive links, so beware because those types of sites are the kind you get spyware from.  Here are a few for you to try and if you have any other recommendations, please leave a comment and share with us.

Sunwheel Dance:  I’m not a fan of ASCII tab but it’s fairly accurate/close to the version I have in my “All the Diamonds” songbook.  This version has you tune to open E(EBEG#BE) but I believe it’s tuned to open D (DADF#AD).  Both with the capo on the second fret.  The song is surprisingly easy to learn but incredibly hard to master, especially at the correct tempo.

• Pacing the Cage:  I couldn’t not find a free tab that was worth mentioning but I did find two versions that you can pay for.  Both are very accurate and are in a tab/standard notation form.
  Version 1: $5.50 to download from musicnotes.com
  Version 2: $3.95 to download from freehandmusic.com
• Foxglove:  Tuned to open C, this is transcribed to power tab and is almost identical to my “All the Diamonds” songbook.
• Wondering Where The Lions Are:  ASCII tab again but gives you the main motive pretty accurately which is pretty much 90% of the song.
• Dear Dancing Round a Broken Mirror and Water Into Wine:  Very good transcriptions, one in Powertab.  You will have to subscribe to the Bruce Cockburn musicians group in Yahoo groups and the tab can be found in the files sections.  Many other good tabs and ideas that will set you in the right direction in learning other Bruce’s songs.

I’m at 11,000 ft in the Colorado mountains, just got my tent setup and the sleet/snow begins to fall, driving me in for cover.  Like chard’s of plastic falling on my rain fly, a rhythm began to emerge.  Embracing the moment, I unpacked the guitar and being to jam with nature.  For a good forty minutes it was just me, my guitar and the rain.  An inspired  forty minutes that washed away the ass kicking that work gave me the past month.

I used to be extremely uncomfortable being alone up there or any place away from the distractions of technology because I was forced to face the many thoughts/ideas/rants rattling around in my head.  It could be quite nerve racking and I preferred to drown it out with iPods, computers or conversations with friends.  Over the past couple trips, I have found that this “alone time” was an opportunity to face the cacophony of thoughts in my head and I was forced to organize and purge; getting comfortable with myself and in turn, more comfortable, with my playing.

So here’s to getting more comfortable and getting better!

Earlier, I wrote a review for the Guitar Toolkit for iPhone and I mentioned that it’s a decent little app but still needed some work.  I love it when developers do this but the listened to their customers and released a new and much improved Guitar Tools.

New Features Include:

• More time signatures for the metronome, including subdivision.
• Support for left handed players
• Support for 12 string guitar
• Support for Scales and there are a ton of them (Currently my favorite)
• Fretboard can be resized using the pinch feature
• The chords are now strummed (great for ear training)
• Improved slider bar for the metronome
• Much More!

Like I said before, I love it when developers listen to their customers and Guitar Tools for iPhone is now a must have for any guitar playing iPhone or iTouch owner.

I look forward to the next updates. 

Links:

http://guitartoolkit.com/

Sometimes when I’m writing or jamming, I get stuck in the same old I, IV, V progression.  Not that it’s a bad thing but sometimes I want to mix it up a bit.   I found a nice little reference guide at The Guitar Suite that gives you the chords for each degree in scale of the key.  The nice thing is that the chart addresses major, natural, harmonic and melodic minor scales which are useful when you want to mess with the feel or color of a song.  I recommend using the progressions to warm-up with by playing the scales using the chords. 

I will turn to the charts from time to time,  especially when I’m spinning my wheels and I find it useful.  I hope it helps you as well.

Links:

Guitar Suite Chord Progression Primer

Chord Progression Books