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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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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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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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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This week started quite well! This morning I managed to solve something that was bothering me for a few days and I had a great feeling of things going well!

Then, when less expected, I’ve found I have been honored by Jack Pribek (pribek.net) with the E for excellence! Thanks, Jack! I am happy to know that my blog and everything here can be taken for useful or good or at least funny and relaxing, as for excellent, I couldn’t dare to hope!

So, as the rules of this E game state, I must give this E for excellence to 10 other fellow bloggers. I don’t know if you can pass it back, but even risking to break the rules, I will pass it again to Jack because I read his blog almost every single day with great joy. So, here’s my list:

• Jack Pribek (pribek.net) for making me think, for sharing his over 30 years experience in “applied” music and the cool exchange of ideas we often have by commenting on our blogs
• Dr J (Mixin’ it with Dr. J, jinright.edublogs.org) for the educated view on music business
• IG blog (igblog.wordpress.com) for a particular light on blogging about the music, that “je ne sais quoi” that makes me come back again and again
• Jon of GuitarNoize.com for all those beautiful guitars he continuously manages to find
• Cary of electric-guitar-review.com for the serious approach he takes when reviewing the guitars and guitar accessories
• Jol Dantzig of guitarguru.typepad.com for sharing all those wizardries about how to build a guitar, it is such a nice experience to read anything on this subject!
• Shoemoney of…what else than shoemoney.com for opening a door to me, a world where websites are really marketing instruments, not just a hobby. His website is one of the best schools of marketing I know.
• Yaro Starak of entrepreneurs-journey.com for his down to earth experiences about entrepreneurship, making everything sound easy to reach to everybody
• Brian of copyblogger.com for teaching me that not only the things you say matters but how you say them! Copyrighting rules! PS: I still suck at this!
• John Chow of johnchow.com for teaching me how a website can be turned into a money making machine, for his “money feeling” and for the ideas that I couldn’t have thought of without reading his blog!

So, as you see, not all the blogs there are about music. Half of them are about marketing, internet, blogging. I can’t help it, I am a citizen of the web, so I read this kind of blogs everyday so if it comes to pointing to a few websites, those are my choices. I don’t know if all the above mentioned bloggers will notice me pointing to them, but I hope you will discover them as great and interesting resources, if you don’t know them already!

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I know a lot of people(mostly men) consider Bon Jovi as a band for women, ballads, etc, not my thing…right? Well, at one moment I came across Richie Sambora’s solo albums, and that, my friends, turned me into a a fan!

I don’t know if you have listened “Hard times come easy”. If you haven’t, I suggest you do. I have both his albums at home and I love to listen them with the light off at night. I realized that I don’t know other band to relax me the way his music does.

I guess the reason for this is the beautiful mix between the voice and the guitar, because, you know, on his solo albums, Richie Sambora plays “another” guitar.

He is closer to his blues roots and honestly I have been surprised by what he plays there. I know Richie Sambora from Bon Jovi’s albums, I am used to his playing, but the guitar on his solo album is an other thing…The guitar on his solo albums, is bluesy, he seems calm and relaxed, feeling that he succeeds to transmit to the audience. I guess it also comes from the fact that he doesn’t need to play and sing for a living anymore, right?

I have also listened Jon Bon Jovi’s solo albums, but they didn’t get through. Richie’s albums yes! I have Hard times come easy on a CD in my car and I listen it when in the mood.

Try it for yourself here and share your opinion on this.

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I’ve seen via Guitar MX an interesting list of top 25 greatest guitar riffs of all time! Man, this should have been one of my next posts, now I can’t write it anymore! So, what can I do about it? Well, join it and sustain the post! So, here’s my short thoughts on this:

I think that Metallica patented the dark clean guitar riff. I don’t understand why Enter sandman is there and One is not. I remember about 10 years ago we used to consider One as being the hymn of rock fans. I don’t know if this is something international or not, but, man, that riff identify Metallica and rock music IMO. Enter sandman has a great starting riff but, man, One is better!

Regarding Paradise city (GNR) I can’t tell what’s more easy to recognize: the fast picked/strummed chords in the beginning or the solo part on the same starting part.

Iron Maiden’s Run to the hills…well, I love’em but no! There are far better starting riffs like for ex Metallica’s One (does it start to become annoying, or what?) And if we’re speaking about Maiden. why not Fear of the dark? Man, how about Megadeth and Symphony of destruction, any decent metal head recognizes that part by one single note! Symphony of destruction is a rock hymn too!

No Satisfaction? Man, that song can be recognized by a non-rock fan on spot! I think that those notes are kind of the most famous in the history of rock (maybe I am overreacting, but you get my point). What’s that thing with The white stripes - Seven nation army? Why is that one of the greatest riffs? Don’t blame me, but I didn’t even know the song! Should I worry?! Please tell me if you didn’t know it either so I can chill!

The list has been actually started by The Telegraph and people there contest it also. The fact is that the list is called “greatest” which gives a subjective feeling to it. Greatest is like good, beautiful, something that stays in the eyes(ears in this case) of the judge. Greatest does not actually mean most famous, most recognizable or something similar.

Anyway, let me hear your opinions on this! And stumble me, baby!

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I have found a very interesting news today, seems that last week Dunlop released a limited series of guitar picks, “Left Handed Dunlop”, designed as an homage for famous left handed Albert King. Seems that there are only a few thousands such left handed guitar picks and they were only released in USA.

Guitar picks usually tend to get “polished” on one edge after repeatedly playing them. As a design particularity, these left handed guitar picks seem to have a tougher structure on the edge that usually comes in contact with guitar strings when playing left handed.

Due to being a limited edition, they may be quite hard to get. Anybody managed to get one of these?

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These few days I have been quite busy and to be honest I didn’t have that much of a mood for posting. I don’t know why, really, just that over weekends I try to spend more time away from my computer since I give it too much time, in my wife’s opinion. So, due to my target I have thought about what makes a site move better or worse. And I don’t speak here about optimization for search engines, but i speak about YOU! Yep, you are the main factor, believe it or not. And if you think about, it has nothing to do in particular with websites, it is the same with anything around us driven by people. Think about a company, think about your family, thing about your BAND! Yes, I really believe this! What makes a band move is you!

OK, there are other factors such as luck, knowledge, a particular situation where you fit, talent, but I can observe that one of the main factors is you and how much are you willing to put into this.

Think about it. If you wait for other people to find you, you will wait for nothing since I don’t think anybody will notice you when doing nothing. Instead, you should do your best to find concerts, gigs, play in front of as many people as possible, make a name for yourself, be proactive! I know I have never liked those free gigs, we had enough of them here, locally, where the city council organized kind of a “city fest” where we celebrated Day of The City, Tulip’s Festival (we have some local thing with tulips here in our city), etc. I have always hated this, but if I think about it, they are good. They are good because such kind of shows expose you to people. If you know to play your card, you can make a name for yourself.

There is a big chance that, if you read this, to meet 2 criteria: have a band (or had in the past) and have a site. Now, if you do, then please think about how similar these 2 things are. Try to be more proactive with your website and you will see how traffic will increase, try to be more proactive with the band and popularity will increase!

Be prepared to make efforts

As with any other thing, running a band is the best when you do it full time. If you do it after work, it won’t be the same since you can not give 100% to your band, you will need time for your job. I have always thought about a local band here that has nothing to do with rock music actually, but decided at one moment to leave their city and move to capital, sleep all in a rented apart and spend 100% of their time doing music. I can say that they had a very big success, it still happens now after 10 years and I know this happened because they had their mind set on music and on band, not on doing anything else!

In my opinion, the reason for which a band succeeds or fails is the quantity of effort you put on it’s development. You need to work hard for it, it is not enough to play good since there is no doubt here that all people reading this blog play good, right ?

I know I didn’t stop doing other things in order to make it big with my band, I have always played in a band while doing other things (like working, doh!) and as time goes by it is more and more difficult to do this and I don’t even think I could do it(or want it) anymore from where I stand at this moment…

Learn a bit of marketing

In your journey to success it is very important to understand a few things, like a bit of marketing for ex. I didn’t know that some years ago, and at that moment, playing like somebody else was not such a big problem. Why would it be? They play like this and do just fine! Well, indeed, THEY do just fine, not us! So I think a bit of marketing won’t hurt anybody. If you study it a bit, you will understand why your manager(supposing you have one) tells you to find a particular style that nobody else plays there or just find a particular thing that identify you, why he asks you to dress in a particular way or an other, why he asks you to be consistent in your music and general style, as a band. By the way, if your manager doesn’t understand this, change him!

It is very similar to running a website, really! Just that it depends if you have the passion for it.

So, one having said here a few things, let’s see why your band failed(from not making it big) and what would you have to add to what I have just said here! Shoot!

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