Jump to content

When its just you and your guitar(s)


wmjp

Recommended Posts

  • Members

Hello Everyone, I am pretty new to HC but I've really enjoyed reading all these interesting posts.. I was curious about other peoples playing/practice routines. Myself, I lock myself in my man cave and plug in and play along with the music I enjoy. I am a "guitar george, I know all the chords. I dont wanna make it cry or sing" I really enjoy try to be the best rythm player that I can. Also wanted to share that my oldest guitar is an FG430 that I bought new and installed Fishman Prefix Plus preamp and piezo UST. Sounds beautiful. My inst. Goes thrugh fishman aura ast into Yamaha mixer and out to 4 Mackie studio monitors.Merry Chritmas

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Hello & Welcome

 

I know all the chords too. But I practise by playing both songs I've visited in the past and learning new ones. At any one time I usually have a couple of dozen songs - a mix of traditional and contemporary folk - that I can play and sing pretty much without thinking about it. Over time I drop a few and replace them with new ones. And my playing is not too fancy - I think of myself more as a singer who accompanies himself on the guitar rather than a guitarist who also sings.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I'm an overly developed chord-melody curmudgeon looking for other musical horizons. In other words I'm lost in it, without it and yet I'm over it. I left standard tuning, steel strings and worn out triads to explore open D with a plugged classical guitar. I'm a noob all over again and can say the challenge to an old dog is 3 equal parts of discipline, curiosity, and inspiration. Have the man cave, gear and enough time to have no excuses.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I've been playing around with guitar for almost 50 years now and have kind of fallen into two modes of play/practice. In the early evening while dinner is being prepared is practice time - I go off by myself to the music room and usually plug one of my two electric guitars in. I work on scales and chord forms - I'm trying to learn some jazz chords now so I'll just work on taking the basic triads and making the 6th or 9th or whatever, then moving it around the fretbiard. I definitely don't know all the chords. I might work on a new song or perfecting an old one, but its still practice.

 

After dinnner i'll bring a guitar into the main room. My wife reads, I play. It might be any guitar and any music pretty much as the mood suits. We have no television, and since I can't sing whatever I play is some random fingerstyle something - blues or jazz or folkie stuff.

 

Before I forget my manners, welcome to HCAG and thanks for starting the thread.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Hi and Welcome to the Forum. I'm like Mikeo, I know a fair number of chords but far from all of them. I usually play after my wife has gone to bed, whatever the praise band is playing that weekend, whatever song I'm trying to learn, or whatever original I'm working on at the moment. Some scales but mostly just chords. I enjoy putting my own touches on stuff like playing an A6 for a straight A Major because there's an F# in the melody.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
  • Members

I get up at 5:00 in the morning. The coffee is already waiting for me so I pour a cup and play for about an hour before it's time ot get ready for work. I have a list of about 50 tunes to choose from. Seems whenever I add a new one, one of the older ones drops off.

I play fingerstyle in a few different tunings, but I don't sing at all.

When I get home from work, I grab a quick meal and usually play some more as I listen to some of the talk shows on NPR.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Aloha, and welcome!

 

What's practice? Seriously, these days, I just pick up the guitar to work out new arrangements for the band, write, or record. I'll rehearse songs from the set I'm rusty on before a gig, but just sitting and practicing new technique doesn't happen. I have too many other things to do to just sit and practice stuff I don't need for the show, and I can make all of the necessary noises for that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
  • Members

Welcome!

 

Been playing and writing since '68. I just sit and play. My time is divided unevenly between learning my own songs, writing, learning covers for gigs, and learning to play dobro and mando. (I'm already as good as I'll get at guitar.)

 

PS -

 

Just curious: I notice you and several people answering say you amplify your acoustic guitars at home. Amplifying them on stage makes sense. But why at home?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I like to think that I'm technically competent to play and sing at the same time but lack the inspiration and motivation to even practice regularly. I've begun playing while livestreaming and have enjoyed getting feedback in realtime. It's giving me courage to get out of my comfort zone and inflict my talents on other people. The feedback has been generally positive and even the trolling is helping me to thicken my skin. What I've found particularly helpful has been to hit the red button with a set list and try not to strain my voice or do too much with my guitar playing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members
Welcome!

 

Been playing and writing since '68. I just sit and play. My time is divided unevenly between learning my own songs, writing, learning covers for gigs, and learning to play dobro and mando. (I'm already as good as I'll get at guitar.)

 

PS -

 

Just curious: I notice you and several people answering say you amplify your acoustic guitars at home. Amplifying them on stage makes sense. But why at home?

 

Because.

 

I mostly plug in with phones and listen to my mistakes. The phones don't lie and they amplify those mistakes much more clearly than the amp does. It's a way to hone my attack to make less noise, and as a finger picker the phones very quickly announce poor fingernail condition. On nylon strings that means a scrape-drag-release versus a clean pluck.

 

When I'm playing cleanly I'll switch to the stage amp and have a go with the vocals and guitar balance to get that down well, which changes with each song slightly because of the dynamic differences. With a classical guitar plugged in the strings are much less forgiving of noise than a steel string so it's best to play plugged.

 

Basically, though, straight up unplugged acoustic is now boring to me and has been going on a few years.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

In the past I was content to just play at home unplugged but about 10 years ago I started playing in church and installed a K&K Pure Western mini into my Larrivee OM-03R. That was when I slipped down that slippery slope. At the time the VOM1T was a mainstay here and I found my recordings lacking. That's when I got my hands on a little Behringer mixer and began to play. Now I'm feeling proficient enough in playing and singing at the same and am in the process of plugging that mixer into my amp so that I can run a microphone. I'm hoping with just a little practice that I can finally land a small gig. In order to do that I need to figure out the mix and I'd rather have the lion's share of that headwork done away from an audience.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I have a K&K, too. It's for playing for an audience. It sounds pretty much the same as unplugged, just louder. And I don't need louder at home. My ears are about eighteen inches from the sound hole. I can hear it just fine.

 

I mean, if you can't hear the guitar on your lap, you either need hearing aids or a new guitar, right?

 

So tell me a little more about what you gain by amplifying at home.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

All guitars are not the same. I've noticed that my rosewood OM doesn't project as well as my mahogany dread. I also don't get the same experience as someone who is sitting in front of the guitar, so in a sense the amp serves as a monitor.

 

Also, I find that I am straining my voice if I am singing against the guitar. Admittedly, that means that I have to use a microphone and adjust the levels with a mixer but again this means that I get a better idea of what a potential audience is hearing. If anything, my voice feels better without having to be strained as much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
  • Members

To the OP, my ideal acoustic set up at home is just me, my voice and my Yamaha LL6 in our living room. It's pretty open plan, the floors are hardwood and there are really big windows. That guitar can whisper or roar and is really balanced all over.

 

If I'm rehearsing for an actual show I do it in my study, with my Cort CJCE Custom acoustic and Sennheiser e935 vocal mic into my mixing deck, standing up with headphones on. This lets me hear and tweak my various vocal and guitar effect patches based more or less on what the audience will hear.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...