RE: Do you actually loop with the instrument you are most proficient on? (Re: What would loopers do without power?)

["Dave Gallaher" <micdave@hiwaay.net>]

Back in the dark ages when I was studying guitar in Boston, William Leavitt
was my private teacher.  Besides hooking me to the metronome, he had a
couple other things that he would force on me at lessons.  One was to play
with my eyes closed, visualizing the fingerboard and taking risks on long
leaps of ten to fourteen frets, resolving the notes musically if I came out
on the wrong one (citing Charlie Parker's quote "There's no such thing as a
bad note--only a bad resolution.")  The other was trickier than that.  I'd
play a solo, and he'd say "Good.  Now go back and play that same solo on
just the fourth string."  This forced some interesting movements, to say 
the
least, and while I rarely--if ever--actually executed the exact solo 
phrase,
it gave each string more fertile territory and broke up the box-position
habits very nicely.


dave 




Warren Sirota
Sent: Friday, July 25, 2008 8:09 AM
To: Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com
Subject: Re: Do you actually loop with the instrument you are most
proficient on? (Re: What would loopers do without power?)

Interesting discussion. In the realm of jazz guitar, I've been
breaking away from cliches by - well, I don't know whether you'd call
it "adopting" or "abandoning" position playing. I have a to move all
over the neck when playing jazz tunes - if the root is D, I'll want to
play at the 5th fret (where the D bass is on string 5) or the 10th (D
bass on string 6), more or less.

Now I'm trying to play through tunes without changing position - start
at the 8th fret and play scales and arpeggios that suit the underlying
chords, but without moving from that fret as the tune cycles through
all its changes and keys. Then, on the next chorus, do the same thing
at the 2nd fret, or in open position. That has certainly been
effective for expanding my vocabulary (and, I feel it's made it more
authentic-sounding). As I go through these changes, preferring
accuracy and coherent phrasing to speed, I find  the  connection
between what I hear in my head and what comes out to be improving as
well.