Warning: This post may be a controversial one!

Yep! Since a few days I keep on thinking about difficult to play guitar solos. And guess what! I am not thinking about Malmsteen or Joe Satriani or Steve Vai. Hell, no! The song that keeps on running through my head is “It’s probably me” of Sting and Eric Clapton. Did you ever try to play that solo? I know I did some time ago and I just couldn’t get it right. I don’t speak about the notes, cause there are not that many or that fast, but man, those note are so full of soul that you just can’t reach them!

The solo is so warm and Clapton plays it with so much feeling that it makes it so difficult to play it right…

And you know what? I remember in the high school about this guy that managed to nail the theme solo of Wonderful tonight with such feeling that nobody could play it the same. Again, there are only a few notes and I think this song (Wonderful tonight) was one of the most played song when I was in high school, but this was the only guy that managed to play it right.

I think that the most difficult to play guitar solos are not the fast ones, but those solos that requires feeling, interpretation, understanding for the notes you play and a lot of soul.

I think that as in life, or even more than in life, in music, the most difficult thing you can do is really express yourself.So, what’s your most “difficult to play” guitar solo?

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I asked myself which would be the craziest guitar project you could think of? To be honest, so far, the craziest I could think of is to adapt a regular Fender Telecaster in order to add a Floyd Rose. How about it? Fender Telecaster with Floyd Rose! I would like to see one! I have seen there is a Heavy Metal Fender Tele, custom made, but however due to the color and the way it is painted, doesn’t quite look like a Tele.

I speak about a “normal” Telecaster. Like this one!

So, any guitar project crazier than this one?

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BBC News today featured an article called Why don’t girls play guitar?

Let’s ignore the fact that it is a “journal style” headline, and some girls do play the guitar, and some of them actually kick ass, if you think about Jennifer Batten, for ex, (she was always an icon to me, from this point of view, because indeed, girls do play the guitar but how many play solo electric guitar? At that level, I mean!)

So, this post is not actually about Jennifer Batten, even if I proposed to myself to cover something about her, soon, but about the preferences that boys and girl have when it comes to picking up a musical instrument.

Here’s what the study that BBC uses says when it comes to learning an instrument:

Boys play:

• electric guitar 81%
• bass guitar 81%
• tuba 77%
• kit drums 75%
• trombone 71%

This sounds like a pretty decent rock band. What are the tuba and trombone doing there?!!

Girls play:

• harp 90%
• flute 89%
• voice 80%
• fife/piccolo 79%
• oboe 78%

Well, it may be related to social preconceptions, or just to the fact that there are some physical constraints here, such as a girl having trouble playing tuba due to dimensions, or just about the fact that being a girl may be associated to being softer, quieter, nicer, AND NOT PLAYING THE DAMN LOUD, METAL GUITAR!!!

Later edit: can it be for real that  90% of the girls play harp? I ask this because I don’t know any girl in my relatively close social neighborhood who play the harp. Actually I don’t think I know any girl who play harp while I know a girl here who plays bass guitar in a rock band. 

See the article here

Hmm, so, how many girls do you know playing an electric guitar and how many playing the harp?

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Because lately I have started to receive press releases to publish here, I have decided to give it a try, if I consider them as being of any interest to my readers. So…

(Los Angeles, CA) Solid Cables new Dynamic Arc Ultra Guitar Cable outperforms any other pro guitar cable on the market. Solid Cables C.E.O., Nial McGaughey, engineered the Dynamic Arc Ultra Guitar Cable with a formidable task - to please a musician with a highly critical ear and an ability to survive any gig. Solid Cables was born out of McGaughey’s desire to create “a cable that was extremely rugged, gig friendly, abuse proof and offers exceptional tone.”

The Dynamic Arc Ultra combines the strength of Jack Lalanne and the sleekness of a luxury designed car. Sophisticated wiring is a key element to the guitar cable’s design. The defining characteristic of this cable is its rugged design. Billed as the world’s toughest cable, it can literally pull an object weighing six to ten thousand pounds without breaking. Studio pros and live performers all rave about the “clear, full sound it delivers.” The cable makes a notable audio enhancement on any instrument. The clear sound allows you to hear any instrument. Improved note detail and complexity make this cable the go to cable for producers. Quality design features include all metal ends, without any plastic and a lifetime warranty. The Dynamic Arc Ultra is available in stock lengths from 12 to 21 feet.

The Dynamic Arc Ultra Features:

• Conductor: ultra pure oxygen free copper for the most harmonic content
• Solder: high silver content alloy for clearest sound
• Armor: tear strength of 6000 PSI - you could tow a car with one if you had to
• Ends: nickel plated - all metal for classic tone
• Insulation: 1kV shorting resistance
• Ultra quiet: no handling noise, not microphonic, resists up to 98% of EMI/RFI noise
• Hand assembled in Pasadena, California
• Triple strain relief
• All parts chemically welded together using the same stuff they use on dragsters and fighter jets.
• Lifetime warranty
• Available in stock lengths from 12 to 21 feet
• The Ultra is available in dusk cherry or carbon black

* * *

Solid Cables was founded in 2001 to offer an elegantly designed guitar cable that rewards the user every time he uses it. The design is geared towards based on 20 years of research in preserving the quality of sound as it passes through electronics. Designed, manufactured and assembled in the America with a lifetime warranty, Solid Cable products are distributed in 3 countries, and in North America. US Dealers interested in Solid Cables should contact nial@solidcables.com

For more information visit www.solidcables.com

Later edit: I think I would love to own a couple of these rugged guitar cables for those moments when I stumble on stage on my guitar cable. The tougher the better, right? Man, if you have the pleasure of a real review, send a couple over here, I would be happy to test them for you!

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If you are reading this there is a big chance that you have watched on YouTube some great performances of Johann Pachelbel’s Canon in D. There are a few great interpretations of this piece of music on electric guitar because lately it became the song of choice and the speed test of young guitars all over the net.

So here’s Gustavo Guerra’s version of Canon song, a version that I adore, since compared to other versions, he has that easiness of playing the guitar that allows him to play around and add value to the song itself. From the first notes, using the whammy bar puts him above the rest.

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Nothing relaxes me better when I get home in the evening than a short session of playing my acoustic guitar! Just that I have observed lately that I have the tendency of repeating myself from time to time. It became kind of a overused record. Most of the time I play some improvisations, nothing planned. And I find myself repeating some of the licks and, frankly, I don’t like because sometimes, instead of being relaxing it annoys me. In this situations I do my best to seek links I have never played before, to learn a solo of some particular song, because in my opinion, playing other people’s music forces you to think on an other direction than your own.

Do you find yourself in the same situations? When starting to improvise, do you recognize overused patterns in your playing? What do you do to overcome this? How do you exit this situation?

Now, be honest, don’t you dare telling me that you never repeat yourself, OK?!

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This is a fast one: I have reached 100 diggs for the article here and I was waiting for the main event: getting on Digg’s first page. Well, it didn’t happen! I am somehow frustrated and I can tell you that waiting for it to happen generated a lot of adrenaline. You can imagine the disappointment in the next morning when I saw it didn’t happen.

100 diggs in a bit more than 24 hours and no front page?

Man, I wanted to say it here since I needed to let it go! Damn!

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A few days ago I was reading on Jack Pribek’s blog about the fact that he decided to give guitar lessons (again). That made me think of the fact that I have been often asked questions like “will you tech me to play the guitar?”, “how long would it take me to learn to play the guitar?”, etc.

To tell you the truth, I have never given guitar lessons. One of the reasons is the fact that I don’t have time to do this and I don’t think I really find the pleasure for it, but it is not the main reason. The main reason is that I don’t consider myself a guitar teacher. I know how to play the guitar and I play it since a while. I love both the acoustic guitar and the electric guitar and I would probably manage to teach somebody to play. But I think that this doesn’t quite qualifies me as a guitar teacher, because there’s more than meets the eye in this, as far as I can see.

One of the facts that I don’t feel comfortable with is the terminology. Being a self-made guitar player, what I know comes from listening songs, reading books and watching video. When speaking to a friend of mine that is a guitar teacher, musically educated, at a local music school I realized that he has a vocabulary that I totally lack.

Also, I play my own way. Not the best, I don’t actually know which is the best way to play the guitar. My licks, my finger positions are personal. In time, I understood that some were not the best and I changed them or I have tried to. For ex,a few years ago, when playing a C major natural scale, starting on A string, when reaching the B note on G string, I used to play the next C (for going further on the second octave) with my little finger. I realized, at that point, when watching a basic video lesson that you need to slide your pointing finger to the C (on G string) in order to be able to play the next notes correctly.

This is a basic example, where I want to say that what you learn by yourself is not always the best thing. Sure, it worked the way I used to do it (of course, how often you play 2 full major natural scales?) . I realized that I am doing this wrong after explaining to a friend of mine how you play that C scale.

The point is that I CAN teach somebody to play. But I am not a teacher. I think there is a difference here.

I remember a great electric guitar player in Romania, when trying with his band to make it big outside, in UK, if I well remember, after a while, in order to earn a living there, somebody asked him to teach guitar. But I am not a guitar teacher, he says. I can not teach! Well, just try and do your best! This guy is one of the best guitar players here and the band is well known here, one with great fan base, a lot of sales and publicity. by the way, they’ve never made it big in UK.

Well, to make a long story short, the only reason for which I would teach somebody to play the guitar would be for my own interest, for learning myself, because it’s said that the best way of learning to do something is by teaching others.

So, do you feel comfortable teaching somebody how to play the guitar?

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Reading DragonLady’s blog, where she pointed to Bruce Dickinson’s birthday(By the way, I had no idea DragonLady is the wife of my blog friend, Dr J, is this a small world or what?!) I remember again that Maiden is going to visit Romania this year.

Maiden will be in Romania in a few months from now and I have’t yet bought a ticket! Am I an idiot or what? It is the second time Iron Maiden comes to Romania, this time with Bruce Dickinson, the first time it was with Blaze Bayley and I haven’t been to the show either.

Actually this year is pretty mad for Romania’s rock scene. Iron Maiden, Def Leppard, John McLaughlin, Judas Priest, Queensryche, Lenny Kravitz, Linkin Park, Manowar(hail, hail, hail and kill), man this is a long time wish of mine!!!, Nightwish, Testament and Whitesnake, they are all going to be in Romania this year!

Tibi from LostArtOfBlogging.com reminds me of Metallica. Indeed, Metallica too!

I don’t know what happened, seems that this year everybody wants to come to Romania! And I left out big names that are not part of the rock scene, like for ex Alphaville, Leonard Cohen, etc. Last year Alice Cooper and Marilyn Manson were here and created a historical moment singing one song together, after all the world (the one that is actually interested) knew they don’t get along well.

Won’t you come to Romania to see them this year?

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I don’t know if you are familiar with Guitar-Idol.co.uk website. I wasn’t until I recently found it and I can tell you I was surprised. To say in a few words what it is about this site (even if I think the name it is self describing)

Online competition to find the hottest new guitarist - have YOU got what it takes to be Guitar Idol 2008?

Play in front of thousands of guitar fans AND open up on the main stage for a LEGENDARY guitar virtuoso at the London International Music Show - and win tons of fantastic prizes! …

So, curious, I have started to listen the guys there trying to bet on the next guitar idol. Of course, most of them were Malmsteen, Satriani, Vai fans. Nothing to surprise me here. By the way,at a first glance, I think Malmsteen has more followers than Satriani and Vai. Just an observation…

And then, while listening around, I’ve seen this guy,Rick Renstrom!

He has entered the competition with a video posted on YouTube.

I thought I don’t see well! I looked on his website and on his MySpace page and finally understood it:

This guy, Rick Renstrom, has problems with his hands, birth disabilities I guess!

I don’t want to offend him in anyway by speaking too much about this on my post, because I didn’t find anywhere anything related to his situation on his website or MySpace page so I presume he doesn’t want to speak about it, but I just find his guitar playing freaking UNBELIEVABLE.

I know I have heard guys playing the way he does, advanced Malmsteen fans are familiar to this style, but this guy is just unbelievable considering his situation! And he is also the lead singer in his band!

To date, Rick has recorded on 9 total albums and has collectively played to over 100, 000 fans worldwide.

Man, I had the belief that because of an old surgery I had on my little finger on my left hand, (I had an accident at one of my tendons while in university), my playing will never be the same. It is bullshit! Total bullshit! It is all in my head! This guy proves it!

So, to Rick Renstrom, all my respect! Man, you rule us all!

I invite you to see more on his website and MySpace page.

Later edit: considering the number of diggs received by this article, I am that close to make it on the first page of Digg, and YOU can be a part of it! Digg me NOW and help me to make it on the first page of Digg FOR THE FIRST TIME!

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