How To Speak The Same Language

A few days ago I was writing about that pig bleeding party, if this is how you call it in English(thanks, Sammy!). I have observed a very interesting fact while being there, something that made me think about it for a few days. Remember I said that when I arrived, there were already some guys playing on stage, guys that we teamed up with, to make a band for the evening. Most of them haven’t played since a few good years, but all together, we managed to have a good “show” that evening.

Also we took breaks, because after all, it was a party with friends, we had lunch, had a couple of drinks, chit-chat with everybody around, etc.

Well, in those moments, the stage usually got full of other people that used to play an instrument at one moment. Well, one of those moments is the reason I write this here now…

It was that guy there, fan of SRV and John Mayer, that loved to play Lenny (and it sounded really nice, plus that I listened Lenny that very morning so I had it fresh in my mind). He approached me at one moment when I went for a coffee and we had an interesting conversation about guitars (mine especially), SRV, Satriani, Vai, you know, the usual chit-chat guitar players come up with when they get together, he’s a very interesting guy,we even exchanged phone numbers and asked if he can come to one of our rehearsals sessions one day. Well, yes, I guess.

Then it was this other guy that was totally addicted to metal. He asked me if he could try my guitar. Yes, no problem. He told me he has a Gibson Les Paul at home and if I am not mistaken, also a Strat. Nice, I don’t have any of these. Well…

So, he started to play some Maiden, then a few riffs of a local underground metal band in Romania, a band that I also like to listen once in a while (but probably I am the only one in the 100 people that surround me that even know about that band). Well, I liked to hear those heavy riffs, I knew the songs, I have them on my laptop, but the people there didn’t know them…

At the same time, on stage it was the SRV guy with his guitar. But he couldn’t play metal under any circumstance, he was the Lenny guy…But the Maiden fan didn’t know blues…

I was looking at them, one trying to play metal and the other trying to play blues. Didn’t work. Didn’t work at all. They seemed like 2 guys speaking two different languages, they didn’t have any common grounds to rely on…

Do you know what I’ve thought at that moment? I have thought about my post of a few months ago about being original in blues. You commented there saying that blues actually offers the common ground that both musicians and the audience know, gives everybody an international language to speak. This is so true, with only 3 chords, basic “blues culture” they could have had a great time jamming together. Probably the Lenny guy could have put it together, but there must be 2 to play tennis, isn’t it?

I still have that image in my mind of two guys, each of them being able to play the guitar pretty good, but not being able to communicate and play together at the same time.

And here I remember a movie that I’ve watched a lot of years ago on TV, with a jazz trumpet player, I think. He wanted to play in a band, it was a jazz band playing down the street, he went there to speak to them about it. The band leader listened to him, told him about learning scales and sent him back home to come back later after learning scales. He came back a few months ago, I know to play this.

OK then, now go back and listen those songs and learn them. When you can play them, come back and we’ll speak about it. He came back a few months later playing the songs.

OK, NOW YOU CAN START LEARNING TO PLAY WITH A BAND.Go back and…

I don’t remember how the movie ended, if the guy joined the band or not, I just remember the idea. There’s more to it that learning to play the guitar, it is not enough to know the chords or the notes, it is not enough to know the song, you must learn to work with the others in the band and listen to them…

Don’t you agree?

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