Joined: 10 Sep 2004 Posts: 2783 Location: Chino, CA
Posted: Sun Sep 12, 2004 8:08 am Post subject: Post Your Questions for Guthrie Here
Guthrie advised me that he'll do his best to participate in this forum although he's really busy now putting the finishing touches on his upcoming debut album, "The Erotic Cakes". I don't know if he'll be able to answer every question you post, but I'm sure he'll try. So fire away and ask Guthrie what you'd like to know. _________________ Ed Yoon
Certified Guthrie Fan-atic
BOING Music LLC - Managing Partner
.strandberg* Guitars USA
Ed Yoon Consulting & Management
Guitar Center Inc.
Joined: 09 Sep 2004 Posts: 58 Location: Boulder, CO
Posted: Sun Sep 12, 2004 7:49 pm Post subject:
Guthrie,
1> How do you practice today?
--How many hours a day?
--What do you practice? Scales, Arps, Techniques, melodies, lines?
--Do you do a lot of transcribing?
2> How did you practice when you made the most progress as a player?
I'll ditto Kirk95's questions. _________________ Guthrie Govan
Matthias IA Eklundh
Rusty Cooley
Steve Vai
Tom Morello
Michael Angelo
Yngwie Malmsteen
Buckethead
Joined: 12 Sep 2004 Posts: 21 Location: Lincoln UK
Posted: Sun Sep 12, 2004 10:33 pm Post subject:
Hi Guthrie. How do you get cherry toms to ripen outdoors? I've had mine in a plastic cover, but I've only had a few this year. I don't know whether it's due to the bad summer or whether they are in too much shade. I've fed them with Tomarite all summer, but I have had a disappointing crop. Also, what made you pick up the guitar in the first place? What inspired you to take it up?
Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2004 10:01 am Post subject: Hi from the confused-looking guy pictured top left...
Evenin' all - Guthrie here!
Seems like as good a place as any to make My First Post...
I've never participated in any forums like this before, so I'm not sure of the etiquette side of things, and I'm a little uncertain about all those subtlety-eradicating yellow people (you know - these guys...javascript:emoticon('')javascript:emoticon('')javascript:emoticon('')) but I'm sure I'll get into the swing of things. Bear with me here, folks...
(Big sloppy thanks to everyone who's been posting stuff on here, btw!)
Okay - first and boldest question comes courtesy of Shredrulez; last time I checked, I was 17 years old. That was 15 years ago, however, so I'm considerably older nowadays. Most of the time, I try not to think about it...
DuncanM - I promise you, you really wouldn't want my hands; you don't know where they've been. Thanks, however, for reminding me vaguely of the immortal Mr Burns line, "Smithers... this monkey is going to need most of your skin!"
Kirk95 - Uh-oh - I feel a long rambling spell coming on...
First up - I used to do a lot of transcribing - Coltrane, Zappa, anything I found interesting - long before I realised that magazines like Guitar Techniques will actually pay for such services! Nowadays I tend to transcribe whatever the magazines tell me to, and by the time I've got through all that stuff it generally feels like I've done enough scribbling for one month...
(That might sound a little sad, but it wasn't meant to - the physical process of committing notes to paper is probably the least beneficial aspect of transcribing. I think the main benefit of doing it is to hone your listening skills, rather than your writing skills, and working stuff out always does you good, even if it's music you don't like. Most of the magazine stuff I transcribe now is done without a guitar in my hands, incidentally, because I find I get less easily distracted that way, and the job generally gets finished quicker. This only works for guitar music; if I was trying to find a good fingering for a Charlie Parker solo, I'd definitely want a trusty axe at hand...)
The "practicing guitar for n hours per day" policy never really worked for me. I generally play as much as I can - preferably in a gig context, where I get to play with people and to people - but I can't cope with the prospect of forcing myself to go through any kind of daily ritual. Practice is obviously really good for you, but I think it's especially important to maintain a balance between working on the physical aspect of playing and listening to the little voice inside you which tells you what you actually want your playing to sound like.
All I've ever really tried to do is play what I hear - be it something on an album, something a bandmate just played at the gig or just the disturbed ramblings that go on in my head... Running through scales with a metronome for the sake of it seems a bit like learning to type ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWZYZ as fast as possible - however good you get at it, it's unlikely that you'll ever really move anyone!
(A technique-obsessed student once defended this approach to me on the grounds that notching up another 10 bpm on the metronome felt like achieving a new high score on Super Mario. I guess he made a very good case there, and the best counter-argument I can think of would be - how much fun is it when you go round someone's house and they make you watch them play a computer game for hours on end?)
Musical influences? The easiest (and most truthful) answer would be, "Everything I've ever heard" - but that sounds like a cop-out, so I'll try and be a bit more specific.
Guitar-wise, the first stuff I tried to learn was mostly 50s rock'n'roll - Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, pre-army Elvis and so on - because that's what I heard at home, and kids under the age of 5 are generally smart enough not to dismiss any music on the feeble grounds that their parents like it...
(That stuff still sounds great to me now, btw - so much raw, filthy energy!)
Then I discovered Hendrix and Cream (as I assume we all did at some point), which got me more interested in the distorted, bluesy side of things. The most unusual influence from back then was probably Zal Cleminson, the guy from the Sensational Alex Harvey Band, who had this incredibly biting tone and a zany sense of humour which I wasn't hearing in the playing of the better-known guitar heroes. (He sounded to me then the way Bumblefoot and Mattias sound to me these days...)
Then I guess I got distracted by the fact that I also wanted to sound like Alex Harvey's keyboard player - listen to the sound and note choice on a track like "Give My Compliments To The Chef", and you'll surely agree that an SG Special through a Pro Reverb is never going to sound anything like that, but I had fun trying!
Jazz-wise, the first stuff I tried to work out was the "Virtuoso" stuff by Joe Pass - I thought it was cool because it was just Joe on his own, which made it easier to work out those expensive-sounding chord voicings!
After that, it's all a bit of a blur, but Steve Vai, Yngwie and especially Frank Zappa deserve special mention, because that's what I was really into when I really had the most hours in a day to spend on jamming along with records...
Holy sh*t, this is turning into my life story - I should stop rambling before I get started on Stevie Wonder, or the Beatles, or Stravinsky, or Bela Fleck, or Trilok Gurtu, or Shawn Lane, or...
Greg - ditto Kirk95's replies!
Thing - I started playing guitar because my dad's battered spanish was lying around the house and I thought music sounded cool. I never really decided to take up guitar - it just kind of happened. Apparently, I was about 3 years old at the time, so it's a bit like asking someone why they took up riding a bike (which I still can't, to this day, btw!)
But let's focus on the vastly more concerning topic of your cherry tomato dilemma. Seems to me that you need to let your toms know that you love and respect them for what they are, and that they shouldn't feel any pressure to ripen until they feel emotionally ready. Maybe they're just depressed - have you ever tried just talking to them? (I refer you to www.HRHThePrinceOfWales.com for detailed guidance on that topic...)
And WYNIRO - I guess I should get on the case with the old website; the guthriegovan.co.uk "teaser" page was done about a year ago by the guy who did Jamie Humphries' rather lovely site, and I just never followed it up, due to congenital laziness. One of these days, one of these days...
Peace and love and good happiness stuff,
G
PS: Ed- how the hell do you manage to type so much stuff in a day? I'm spent!
Joined: 10 Sep 2004 Posts: 27 Location: Highcation; it's all the same really...
Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2004 2:59 pm Post subject:
Cool! The man himself!
Guthrie, how did you develop your frankly unnerving command of styles? Did this come about mainly from jamming to various styles of music with various different musicians, and picking things up from your transcribing work or was there ever actually a point where you sat down and said, for example - "Right, I'm gonna be Mr Bebop for the next 6 weeks/months?"
And if you would be so kind, could you tell us a little about how that funk style of yours evolved? Any tips on that?
I'm really big on the funk thing myself, I really love digging into Stevie Wonder Clavi parts on guitar and having loads of fun - but what really floors me is some of the more - I guess chordal funk rhythm you play. I can not do that kind of thing with my wrist (surprisingly, given the amount of exercise my wrist gets).
Okay, I'm being greedy now!! No more questions, m'lud! _________________ I before E except after C? Man, what a weird society.....
So that seems to be a common activity of the great players. Zappa and Trane? That's very cool!
What are your favorite Coltrane solos? What did you learn from transcribing his work. BTW, I am a huge Trane fan!!
It's easy to tell the players that mindlessly practice scales and patterns with the metronome because thats what comes out in their playing - extremely fast, technically proficient, sterile and mindless scale licks. That's what has always turned me off about the shred thing. "So many words (notes), nothing to say."
That said, the thing that really amazes me about your playing is that you have mastered such a high level of technique, yet it still feels and sounds like true improvisation. More specifically, there are musical lines, melodies and motific development in your playing - not to mention you seem to transcend and merge so many different styles.
How do you become so proficient in so many different styles?
How do you then develop such a high level of technique with all those different styles? If you are not practicing with a metronome, what's the secret to developing such accuracy and speed?
I hope you don't mind, but, I'm going to keep digging! I have been playing guitar now for over 30 years and I am still trying learn and grow.
Your playing has really inspired me! Thank you!! That's the greatest gift of all.... inspiration!
Joined: 10 Sep 2004 Posts: 2783 Location: Chino, CA
Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2004 5:21 pm Post subject:
Hey Guthrie,
Great to see you in here! Thanks for dropping in and giving us a few words of your wisdom.
It figures that you didn't go through the dry daily routines of doing scales for 2 hours with a metronome, then an hour of chords, then an hour of doing counterpoint exercises, then an hour of this and an hour of that, etc. Your playing never struck me as a "product" of that sort of a regimen. Even when I first saw you at the shop in Jan '03 just trying out different guitars and amps, that's what I immediately noticed about your playing - very fresh, off the cuff, improvised, creative, free-flowing, melodic, musical and all those good things that make us feel good when listening to music.
I guess, like everyone else, I'm curious as to how you assimilated so many styles and have all those styles mesh together seamlessly into a greater whole. I should definitely get your books first, I know! Hopefully you'll get to publish more. Thanks again for dropping in and hope to see you here on a regular basis.
As for my verbose prose, I type fast and my background in literature and journalism from my college days certainly seem to come in handy! _________________ Ed Yoon
Certified Guthrie Fan-atic
BOING Music LLC - Managing Partner
.strandberg* Guitars USA
Ed Yoon Consulting & Management
Guitar Center Inc.
Joined: 12 Sep 2004 Posts: 21 Location: Lincoln UK
Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2004 8:02 pm Post subject:
Quote:
But let's focus on the vastly more concerning topic of your cherry tomato dilemma. Seems to me that you need to let your toms know that you love and respect them for what they are, and that they shouldn't feel any pressure to ripen until they feel emotionally ready. Maybe they're just depressed - have you ever tried just talking to them?
I've tried all the talking business, been kind, watered them, tried the tough love, you know pulling leaves off, that kind of thing. I have had a few toms off them but I must admit I'm disappointed with my first foray into tomatodom. Should stick to guitar I suppose. But then I talk to my guitar (mainly 'You 'kin twat piece off wood, why will you not do as I say') and more pearls of wisdom of that ilk. That doesn't work either.
Oddly enough, your influences are very similar to mine, especially Zal who I thought was a little beacon of light in the seventies, along with Bill Nelson. I was talking to Martin Taylor once at a show and he asked me what my favourite solo was, I said it was Amos Garratt playing on Maria Muldaur's Midnight at the Oasis. He looked a little suprised and said 'Well that's my favourite too.' I always thought he had good taste. I seem to have been influenced by the same people as a number of fine players, unfortunately, the associated talent does not seem to have filtered down my way yet. _________________ It is the height of bad manners to light one's cigar from a burning hat.
Joined: 13 Sep 2004 Posts: 101 Location: Chula Vista, CA
Posted: Mon Sep 13, 2004 8:13 pm Post subject:
Guthrie, after reading thru the first 50 pages or so of your Creative Concepts One book and then your above post I wonder if you have any formal background in writing? I enjoy your style and wit very much.
As far as your playing goes, well, I simply HATE YOU. You see, I must because whenever I watch the DVD of you doing the Cornford clinic at Ed's place, well I just want to go on an insane Ebay selling binge and part with all of my treasured guitars and amps and things.
Seriously though, with the little exposure I have to date of you, if someone were to ask me who I felt were the 3 most amazing players on or above this earth the answer would be Lane, Holdsworth, and Govan.
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