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Sheet of Sound & Improvisation OS

 
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sieuminh



Joined: 12 Sep 2004
Posts: 25

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 1:43 am    Post subject: Sheet of Sound & Improvisation OS Reply with quote

Many people here seem to have both these books (Ed?) so how are they different and do they overlap much?

I'm ready to settle with a serious and comprehensive book ...


Thanks a lot
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alexkhan



Joined: 10 Sep 2004
Posts: 2783
Location: Chino, CA

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 8:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

They're quite different. You'll get more mileage out of SoS right away. It's like an encyclopedia of licks and phrases that you can learn and apply immediately to your playing. Wayne Krantz's IOS takes a completely different and almost Zen-like approach and you'll need to get "creative" with it to get the most out of it. Neither books are for the faint of heart and require serious commitment from the player. My bottom line is: just get both! Very Happy
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sumis



Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Posts: 570
Location: gothenburg, sweden

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 10:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I haven't bought SoS yet, but it seems to be a very good "rut buster".

I can highly recommend Wayne Krantz's book. It is a very original approach to improvisation that nevertheless makes a lot of sense. The topic is IMPROVISATION, as opposed to "building a library of phrases and clichés to use in certain harmonic situations" (not WK's words). As Ed points out, it won't present you with licks or anything of that kind, but it is very very inspirational, and it will give you some great practice ideas. But the book is also a good read as such, away from the instrument. WK presents his philosophy on the nature of improvisation and how it applies to contemporary guitar playing. It's based on harmonic concepts though, it's not about free jazz, so to speak.

I'm a bit biased maybe, since Krantz is above the top of my list (he has his own list in my house).
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frankus



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
Posts: 1100
Location: Chelmsford/Arachnipus

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 1:00 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I got iOS, you can read my grumblings here

I wished I'd got SoS. I like Wayne Krantz from the little I've heard, but the book is mediocre, it could be written in about 5 pages, or transplanted to a web-page. It's no different to Martino's Nature of Guitar in the volume of data conveyed.

It made me wonder about the nature and value of pure improvisation, is it akin to installation art? I decided to express myself through the medium of dance and discovered that composing is the act of keeping, and keeping is owning and owning is theft.. we keep because we fear loss and doubt our ability to continue to survive, but by keeping we lose independence, creativity and a lightness to life. Laughing the notion is too avant garde for someone as pragmatic as me Wink.
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sumis



Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Posts: 570
Location: gothenburg, sweden

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 2:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

frankus wrote:
the volume of data conveyed.


i can see were you're coming from.

frankus wrote:
It made me wonder about the nature and value of pure improvisation, is it akin to installation art? I decided to express myself through the medium of dance and discovered that composing is the act of keeping, and keeping is owning and owning is theft.. we keep because we fear loss and doubt our ability to continue to survive, but by keeping we lose independence, creativity and a lightness to life. Laughing


i'll have to think about that... seriously, do you really think you are capturing anything that anyone has said with that not very intelligent rant? maybe you have a lot of friends who are intellectual charlatans? i dont know? Rolling Eyes

frankus wrote:
the notion is too avant garde for someone as pragmatic as me Wink.


fair enough Wink

--

i can definitely see that IOS is not for everyone. well, actually, it's not meant for everything anyway. personally, i like to use different kinds of study material or inspirational sources. the kind of material you were looking for was obviously something that IOS didn't offer, but also doesn't set out to offer.

the way you approached reading IOS shows that you wanted it to be something else. you also managed to miss Krantz sense of humour. i don't think Krantz recommends going through all the formulas listed in the beginning of the book. the format it is written in is a very consciuos stylistic strategy to get away from tradtional ways of presenting guitar or music instruction. it's a different approach, and it demands another kind of discourse. i'd say that this is a very serious aspect of IOS, but also made very tongue in cheek.

Krantz presents an appproach to work with your improvisational skill. he's NOT saying that what's in IOS is THE WAY to approach playing/improvising. its an extreme and radical emphazising of certain aspects of improvising. in some ways it is deliberately exagerated in order to make a point. and yes, i think his book has great value even if you don't really work with it hands on. for you that might be a waste of time. for me, it's not.

anyway. frankus: you might still be cool Wink and if you're in gothenburg we could have a nice heated discussion on this over a crate of beer or something.
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frankus



Joined: 13 Sep 2004
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Location: Chelmsford/Arachnipus

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 5:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

sumis wrote:

frankus wrote:
It made me wonder about the nature and value of pure improvisation, is it akin to installation art? I decided to express myself through the medium of dance and discovered that composing is the act of keeping, and keeping is owning and owning is theft.. we keep because we fear loss and doubt our ability to continue to survive, but by keeping we lose independence, creativity and a lightness to life. Laughing


i'll have to think about that... seriously, do you really think you are capturing anything that anyone has said with that not very intelligent rant? maybe you have a lot of friends who are intellectual charlatans? i dont know? Rolling Eyes


Either you're gently taunting me with a very refined sense of humour, or my gentle and refined sense of humour is more gentle and refined than you gave it credit for. I found the idea of creative notions like butterflies amusing but a bit meh, I'm a selfish trampling Anglo-Saxon what use have I for setting butterflies free when they can be skinned to make clothes and fried in butter to make crisp snacks? Laughing

sumis wrote:

frankus wrote:
the notion is too avant garde for someone as pragmatic as me Wink.


fair enough Wink

--

i can definitely see that IOS is not for everyone. well, actually, it's not meant for everything anyway. personally, i like to use different kinds of study material or inspirational sources. the kind of material you were looking for was obviously something that IOS didn't offer, but also doesn't set out to offer.

the way you approached reading IOS shows that you wanted it to be something else. you also managed to miss Krantz sense of humour. i don't think Krantz recommends going through all the formulas listed in the beginning of the book.


Except where he recommends using them to select formulas for scrutiny using the exercises laid out later.

sumis wrote:
the format it is written in is a very consciuos stylistic strategy to get away from tradtional ways of presenting guitar or music instruction. it's a different approach, and it demands another kind of discourse. i'd say that this is a very serious aspect of IOS, but also made very tongue in cheek.


Yes it's laid out as an OS manual (IT doco) AKA my bread and butter, I've proof-read books for O'Reilly for a few years now.

sumis wrote:
Krantz presents an appproach to work with your improvisational skill. he's NOT saying that what's in IOS is THE WAY to approach playing/improvising. its an extreme and radical emphazising of certain aspects of improvising. in some ways it is deliberately exagerated in order to make a point. and yes, i think his book has great value even if you don't really work with it hands on. for you that might be a waste of time. for me, it's not.

anyway. frankus: you might still be cool Wink and if you're in gothenburg we could have a nice heated discussion on this over a crate of beer or something.


Okay, if you read my original review you'll see that I said I'd return to it after reading and completing Mickey Baker's,Ted Greene's, Mick Goodrick's, Alan De Mausse's works.. (and possibly the Satriani Book and the Al Di Meola Picking Book, and the Second Guthrie Book, and Bret Willmott's Harmonic Extensions Book) THEN I'll apply iOS and Scott Henderson's Chord Book.

If you read the thread on The Guitarist forums, you'll note that I took the approach Krantz advocates back in around '92, before I had much theory understanding at all. I spent around 3 years studying the extreme methods he's advocating... and without wishing to sound arrogant, I only gave up because it seemed exhaustive, mostly unmelodic and there was noone who supported the idea.

Frankly over time I've learnt the process needs to have some meaning; he doesn't provide meaning, he sidesteps the issue that in writing a book on improvisation that he should provide insight into improvisation. Let me illustrate, imagine for one minute I'm Jack Kerouac and this is my book on creative beat poetry:
In his much vaunted work, A Beat Poets OS, Jack Kerouac wrote:

AA
AB
AC
AD
.......
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

99.999% of this book is the permutations, if you want to make up words go for it. Words that have meanings are constrained, set yourself free.

There will now be a brief question and answer session where I will answer my own questions, you may experience some chagrin as the questions I answer are not yours and the questions you want to ask are ignored while I happily chatter about things that are irrelevant.

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sumis



Joined: 22 Feb 2005
Posts: 570
Location: gothenburg, sweden

PostPosted: Thu Nov 10, 2005 11:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

frankus wrote:

Either you're gently taunting me with a very refined sense of humour, or my gentle and refined sense of humour is more gentle and refined than you gave it credit for. I found the idea of creative notions like butterflies amusing but a bit meh, I'm a selfish trampling Anglo-Saxon what use have I for setting butterflies free when they can be skinned to make clothes and fried in butter to make crisp snacks? Laughing


well, sometimes your irony can bite you in the ass. that definitely applies to me ass(sic!) well Laughing

frankus wrote:

Except where he recommends using them to select formulas for scrutiny using the exercises laid out later.


exactly. to select formulas.

frankus wrote:

Yes it's laid out as an OS manual (IT doco) AKA my bread and butter, I've proof-read books for O'Reilly for a few years now.


well. this isn't an IT doco though. it's definitely not published by O'Reilly Laughing this probably explains why you think the metaphor sucks, and also why you're reading it from, in my opinion, a faulty perspective. but what the hell Wink

frankus wrote:
Frankly over time I've learnt the process needs to have some meaning; he doesn't provide meaning, he sidesteps the issue that in writing a book on improvisation that he should provide insight into improvisation. Let me illustrate, imagine for one minute I'm Jack Kerouac and this is my book on creative beat poetry:
In his much vaunted work, A Beat Poets OS, Jack Kerouac wrote:

AA
AB
AC
AD
.......
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

99.999% of this book is the permutations, if you want to make up words go for it. Words that have meanings are constrained, set yourself free.


i can't see how your analogy applies. this is simply not a meritorius description of the book. but to be fair: my bread and butter is actuallly writing a doctoral thesis on illegible literature, where i stress the importance of not interpreting (yes. this is true) Laughing so i guess it's obvious that we're coming from different ends of the spectra, so to speak Wink
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dkaplowitz



Joined: 19 Mar 2005
Posts: 73
Location: Narberth, PA

PostPosted: Fri Nov 11, 2005 2:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

SOS is terrific. The longer I have it, the more cool things I discover about it every day. I can't wait for SOS II, which Jack seemed to indicate might be released (with CD-ROM) by the end of the year. I hope he does it. I'll scarf it up in a minute.

As to IOS, I agree with a lot of Frankus' points about it. I still think it's a valid book and a great way to open up new avenues of thinking on the guitar (never a bad thing). My biggest gripe is the cynical, gouger price tag of (how much?) $25. + shipping was it? This book is about 20 8.5"x11" pages, cut in half and cheaply bound together by a plastic spiral. I understand WK's gotta earn a living, but I'm not a fan of his (I just haven't heard any of his music, I don't have access to any of it, and I won't pay $20. per CD to check out someone I've only heard about on the Internet) so it was a stretch to pay that much for a book. Am I saying that a book's quality is judged by its production value or by its girth? No, not really. But I am saying, that if this book were $12.00 + $3.00 shipping, he'd still make a good profit, and he'd be providing a good service to improviser's every where ...and there'd be no way someone could complain about the price, at least IMO.

Silly gripe, I know. But shit man, how many mediocre $25. guitar books can a guy put up with in a lifetime?
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