Playing with other musicians

[kiowa1]

Sometimes you gotta just do it! Like when my father taught me how to swim. He just took me down to the creek and threw me in. I struggled with it for a little while, but it wasn't all bad after I fought my way out of that gunny sack!

[EdBega]

 

 

Exacary ...

[TheClutch]

Do you? I'm constantly hearing that this is an important thing to do. It's supposed to be valuable in improving your musical skills. No worky for me. I'm not super slow, I can play a tune, but I've learned my speed limit, and as long as I stay under that, I can bang out an acceptable tune. But if I go over that speed limit, my playing goes all to hell. My speed limit is far slower than what any other musicians I get around play at. I can't keep up. If I try, I wreck everyone else's music. I'm like a bull in a china shop. And no, I'm not going to ask them to slow down. So what do you do?

[FretFiend.]

Doomed to a life of playing with no one except a damned metronome.

[kujozilla]

Doomed to a life of playing with no one except a damned metronome.

 

Yup, seems like what Clutchy meant.

[Grant Harding]

I'm not saying I'm good - I just like to surround myself with players...

[DeepEnd]

I do play with others (but note other guitarists, alas) in the praise band at church. I enjoy it but the pianist decides what we're going to play and she and the drummer decide together how we're going to play a given song and sometimes--not always but sometimes--I really don't like the way they want to play a particular song or even what song we're going to play. (Example: "In The Garden" really shouldn't be done as a praise song.) I really wish sometimes I was good enough to be a soloist. This is one of the reasons I like playing originals: nobody else knows better than I do how it's supposed to be played.

[valentsgrif]

Doomed to a life of playing with no one except a damned metronome.

 

Ok, you can do what I did. First, I married into a family of amatuer musicians who play sessions at most family gatherings. This allowed me early on to have the opportunity to take my suck into safe confines of sympathetic family members who entertained my spastic chord changes and timing that sounds like a drunken pong game.

 

This worked in the short term, however, the sympathy and patience abates over time if you don't make progress. After 15 years I'm less likely to play along now than in the past. These folk take their playing earnestly and good humor only goes so far. Alchohol helps though.

 

Right now I have transitioned to a guitar teacher who , now that I have chord changes down and a sense of keys and progressions, he focuses a chunk of a one hour lesson on just playing along with me and singing to our playing. We switch rhythm and leads, have fun, but he is quick to sternly point out my sloppy fingering or lack of foot tapping. It helps that I am paying him, so it never feels personal.

[totamus]

 

I've always thought that you need to learn how to play the guitar three times : First, on your own; then playing with other musicians; finally, playing live before an audience. People who want to perform need to work through these three stages (although the second can of course be skipped by solo performers). A song you have down cold at stage one will fall apart when you bring it to stage two, and again when you get to stage three. Maybe fall apart is too strong; I don't mean to suggest that trainwrecks are inevitable. I mean only that people should not expect that preparation at stage one will make the move into stage two easy. You have to put in the time at each stage. There's no getting around this process, it seems to me, unless you make a conscious decision to stay put at stage one.

 

 

^ this

[Terry Allan Hall]

Do you? I'm constantly hearing that this is an important thing to do. It's supposed to be valuable in improving your musical skills. No worky for me. I'm not super slow, I can play a tune, but I've learned my speed limit, and as long as I stay under that, I can bang out an acceptable tune. But if I go over that speed limit, my playing goes all to hell. My speed limit is far slower than what any other musicians I get around play at. I can't keep up. If I try, I wreck everyone else's music. I'm like a bull in a china shop. And no, I'm not going to ask them to slow down. So what do you do?

Here's what I tell my students:

Practice w/ a metronome...start at your comfortable speed, then s-l-o-w-l-y speed up in very small increments...

If a given piece is comfortable at 120bpm, move it to 122bpm until you can do that comfortably, then 124bpm...in time, you'll be able to play as fast as everyone else.

[WashburnGuy]

If you want to improve, you'll ultimately need to play with others.

 

When my brother-in-law decided to start playing guitar a couple of years ago, he said it would be months before he'd feel comfortable at one of our jam sessions. I convinced him to learn G,C,D and Bmin chords and that, within a couple of weeks, he'd be able to play about half the songs we play in our jam session. Just sit back, enjoy, play what you can play and consider the rest free guitar lessons because there's not a single one of us not willing to help a beginner.

 

There's so much to be learned by playing with other people!

[Jerry Atrick]

I think this advice needs to get reframed--it's not that playing with other people makes you a BETTER musician, it's that NOT playing with others makes you a WORSE musician.

 

 

I dunno. I'm by no means a great musician but I enjoy playing solo. I think playing solo before an audience is exhilirating because I am forced to practice and be good without having to rely on a band to cover up my mistakes.

 

In other words, I disagree that not playing with others makes you a worse musician. I understand that there is a lot to learn by playing with others but I don't think it's a necessity. Every person has their niche and if someone is destined to play solo, so be it.

[TheClutch]

Here's what I tell my students: Practice w/ a metronome...start at your comfortable speed, then s-l-o-w-l-y speed up in very small increments... If a given piece is comfortable at 120bpm, move it to 122bpm until you can do that comfortably, then 124bpm...in time, you'll be able to play as fast as everyone else.

[Opa John]

All I can say is, find a pickin' partner if you can. You can learn something from even a rank beginner if you pay attention.

[jamesp]

Playing well with others is important to me. If I didn't have people to play with it's doubtful I'd do much playing at all. Like learning any language, immersion is the surest shortcut to competence.

[herbie d]

Before I lost My Father, he taught me two things I carry daily.
1) If you talk to an A-- h---, you can't expect him to be any thing else.
2) if you talk to an Idiot, listen to him, he may know one thing you don't.

All I can say is, find a pickin' partner if you can. You can learn something from even a rank beginner if you pay attention.

 

[valentsgrif]

 

1) If you talk to an A-- h---, you can't expect him to be any thing else. 2) if you talk to an Idiot, listen to him, he may know one thing you don't.

 

 

Ummm, which one is fretfiend????????/

[FretFiend.]

Ummm, which one is fretfiend????????/

 

Ummm, FretFiend. is the guy why always calls you on your Zager bull{censored}.

[acousticdepot]

 

Okay, so is the clutch our Harpo Marx?

[TheClutch]

Okay, so is the clutch our Harpo Marx?

[valentsgrif]

Ummm, FretFiend. is the guy why always calls you on your Zager bull{censored}.

Actually its the other way around, since you've neither held nor played one. But we digress.

[Pine Apple Slim]

Back to the OP.

You say you arn't "fast" enough.

I ask fast enough for what?

I dont care if the tune is 200 bpm, you can play just the 1 & 3, or the 2 & 4.

Or just the friggin 1.

Theres is something you can do to fit in.

Figure it out. You'll be glad you did.

[FretFiend.]

I've always thought that you need to learn how to play the guitar three times : First, on your own; then playing with other musicians; finally, playing live before an audience. People who want to perform need to work through these three stages (although the second can of course be skipped by solo performers). A song you have down cold at stage one will fall apart when you bring it to stage two, and again when you get to stage three. Maybe fall apart is too strong; I don't mean to suggest that trainwrecks are inevitable. I mean only that people should not expect that preparation at stage one will make the move into stage two easy. You have to put in the time at each stage. There's no getting around this process, it seems to me, unless you make a conscious decision to stay put at stage one.

 

 

After due consideration, I think you're on to something with that. So does an aspiring musician needs to reach a certain level of competency solo before he/she tries it with another musician?

[Hudman]

Do you? I'm constantly hearing that this is an important thing to do. It's supposed to be valuable in improving your musical skills. No worky for me. I'm not super slow, I can play a tune, but I've learned my speed limit, and as long as I stay under that, I can bang out an acceptable tune. But if I go over that speed limit, my playing goes all to hell. My speed limit is far slower than what any other musicians I get around play at. I can't keep up. If I try, I wreck everyone else's music. I'm like a bull in a china shop. And no, I'm not going to ask them to slow down. So what do you do?

How long have you been playing?