Real discipline is not sticking to a practice schedule or spending xx minutes on scales and xx minutes on arpeggios every day. Real discipline is also not practicing a certain number of hours each day or playing a hard section 20 times straight.
Real discipline is knowing when to stop. It’s knowing when working on a bigger chunk of music is not helpful–real discipline is having the mental fortitude and focus to break a hard passage down into even smaller sections. Real discipline is only working on one of those sections until it’s perfect, resisting the urge go on and keep up the rhythmic flow. It’s listening to your body and knowing when your hands and head need a break.
Real discipline is also knowing what level of repertoire is appropriate for you and, for the most part, sticking to it. Sure, play some challenging pieces, but try to balance those with pieces well within your skill level.
Michael Chapdelaine has been in the guitar business for a long time. He studied with Segovia and many other of the older maestros, and has a unique perspective on the guitar world today–he’s not afraid to tell you exactly what he thinks. I hope you enjoy this interview as much as I do.
Part One
How Michael got started on the guitar
When he started playing classical guitar and how fingerstyle came into the picture
How some of the fingerstyle stuff Michael has done carried over into his original compositions
Part Two
Michael explains how fingerstyle influenced his classical guitar playing
What Michael does in a typical concert program
About his recordings
Part Three
How classical guitar has changed since Michael’s days as a student
“Intelligent intuition is the result of deliberate practice.”
-Jonah Lehrer, in How We Decide
I was looking through some videos of concerts at Classical Guitar Retreat, and stumbled upon this video with Amanda Cook. It features two pieces composed by William Lovelady.
This is a (very incomplete**) list of some of the best repertoire for beginning and early intermediate guitarists. For now, this includes mostly books/collections and etudes.
Methods
Most of you work with methods to start with. I personally use the Mel Bay Classical Guitar Method by Stanley Yates. Why? He was my teacher, and after a lot of discussion in pedagogy class it became very clear to me he knows what’s going on. I’ve also had more success using his method than using others (Parkening, Noad, etc.). My only critique of this method is that it’s not strong on notation reading development and may required some supplementary material.
If you’re looking for sight reading material or something to help you learn to read music, just about any method will work.
Other Methods
The Carcassi Method is very good. It takes the approach of many other instrumental methods and progresses by key. All the music relatively good, and great for beginners. There has been some modern translations of the Carcassi method, but if you’re just in it for the music (and not the text), use the free stuff online.
Giuliani’s Opus 1 contains many exercises. This is the same work from which the 120 right hand studies are extracted.
Aguado’s new method is also a great source of later 19C music. I like Aguado’s music because it’s chromatically surprising and interesting. Even the easy studies. There’s a lot of text, but more music towards the end.
The Julio Sagreras Guitar Lessons books are also very popular. I don’t have a ton of personal experience with these, but I do know quite a few teachers who use them.
Repertoire
Graded Repertoire for Guitar (books 1 and 2) by Stanley Yates are unique in the modern guitar rep book world: Dr. Yates worked with other publishing companies to include modern music. That’s a great selling point. If you play gigs, these books are sight readable and have attractive music, well worth the cost (even for advanced players).
Estudios Sencilos by Leo Brouwer. A great collection of studies that are definitely Brouwer-esque. The linked books contains all 20 (and a bunch more Brouwer guitar works).
25 Etudes Esquisses by Gerald Garcia. A lot like Brouwer, but a bit more out there. Still fun to play and attractive.
Carcassi: Etudes, Op. 60. The standard collection of 19C etudes. Please use a facsimile edition, as many modern editions omit or change Carcassi’s expressive markings which are incredibly important
These two videos give a history of the double top, show off some of the materials involved, and talk about the benefits of a double top. It seems that the videos are more geared towards guitar builders, but it’s still pretty fascinating for the non-builder.
