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Hi, I was wondering if anyone has any advice for new Flamenco guitarists. I have a couple of books (Oscar Herrero), and I attended one and a half workshops (stationery prevented me from completing the other, don't ask). I have also bought myself a nice, new flamenco guitar. I have everything except (1) a regular teacher and (2) fingernails (I have to give up bowling I suspect).
Hi Strumit and welcome. I would recommend that you log on regularly to this forum - there's a ton of information here on just about everything flamenco related. Dont get lazy with your technique - find out the right way to hold the guitar, position your hands, attack the strings, basically everything technique related. You can find all of that here too. The wost thing you can do is spend years learning the wrong way and then have to go back and start from scratch! Next, set aside the next five years and practice, practice, practice! Have fun and no matter how much you want to, never throw your guitar against the wall!!
When I started out I didn't pay enough attention to rhythm. I'm not talking about compas. Just the regular subdivision of beats etc. I used my ear and sort of faked it, instead of really grasping and feeling the time value of each note. I'm having to cope with the backlash of that today, years later.
You don't need your guitar to practice this. When you're working on a piece, tap the rhythm, or speak it with rhythmic syllables. Take your time and start at a really slow tempo. When you're confident about the rhythm you'll find it easier to hone in on the right technical details - you now have a decent context to fit them in.
Welcome Strumit. I've been learning for a couple of years now and still learn absolutely loads on the Foro.
MrMagenta is absolutely right about the metronome. A few weeks ago I went back to practising with a metronome and was pretty horrified how uneven some of my playing is. To give you an example there's a hammeron/pulloff exercise I do every day (because they need serious work ). It was sounding pretty good, thought I was really getting there. Then I put the metronome on.....
When I started out I didn't pay enough attention to rhythm. I'm not talking about compas. Just the regular subdivision of beats etc. I used my ear and sort of faked it, instead of really grasping and feeling the time value of each note. I'm having to cope with the backlash of that today, years later.
i cant tell you how that is similar to me , i have axed all falsetas now just play 3 chords (i.e e7 am, dm ) and do a farruca with metronome, hear the beat
the last few weeks i just feel like giving up !! i have faked rhythm like a long time ..........my days of playing classica i just felt the music in a way .....people like ron and anders have really helped with comments
RE: Advice for Beginners? (in reply to minordjango)
quote:
cant tell you how that is similar to me , i have axed all falsetas now just play 3 chords (i.e e7 am, dm ) and do a farruca with metronome, hear the beat
the last few weeks i just feel like giving up !! i have faked rhythm like a long time ..........my days of playing classica i just felt the music in a way .....people like ron and anders have really helped with comments
I saw Nunez live the other night, as part of a flamenco ensemble. He did an awful lot of straight rhythm playing, just banging out chords. And, the show was all the better for it.
I'm so glad this subject came up. For some reason many people learn to play without that rhythmic discipline. There is a player here in the States that offers lessons on-line that plays with a terrible sense of "meter" (no one from our admirable group needless to say!). So he plays "in compas" but since he rushes everything he is really out of compas. I remember reading both Jason and Ricardo talking about being "in the groove". Great advice and really important I think. Metronomes are really important for all of us.
The new metronomes like Ron's are great and a lot of fun. They correct your timing, and I find that they actually make it easier to play, which makes them very useful for recording.
If you want to play live with other musicians, though, the real issue is the ability to distinguish (feel and play) eighths (1/2), triplets (1/3), sixteenths (1/4), quintuplets (1/5), sextuplets (1/6), and their combinations.
Beyond that, I guess all that's left are the remaining tuplets (1/7 etc.) and patterns over two beats, like eighth-note triplets (2/3)? Anyone care to post on the remaining mathematical possibilities?
A very important bit of advice for beginning flamenco guitarists (IMHO) is not to listen exclusively to guitar solos. You need to listen to singers and dancers and how the guitar fits in with them. A flamenco guitar player's education is not really complete without learning to accompany cante and baile. Solos are nice but it is in the melding of the song and guitar that the essence of flamenco is found.
Norman.. how about 3/4. There's a funky passage in the intermediate challenge that is giving me a headache, sort of like this image. It's just regular dotted eights but it still throws me off a lot of the time.
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So far I have heard Sabicas, Nino Ricardo, Paco Pena, Paco de Lucia, Juan Martin and Manolo de Huelvas
I think you have some great stuff to start out with, although I would recommend not listening to Paco de Lucias newer stuff if you want to learn rhythm and structure. Its really easy to get overwhelmed with too many palos (forms), so I would sugest starting out with basic Tangos and Soleares. Once you know the 12 beats of soleares you can then branch out to alegrias and bulerias, but its much easier to learn to count with something slow like a solea. Tangos are easy to listen to, fun to play palmas to, and are not that complicated for us beginners.
I also recommend that you listen to different older CDs and work on learning to recognize the palo, or song form. This can actually get a bit tricky in the beginning and it will work to develop a good ear.
Norman.. how about 3/4. There's a funky passage in the intermediate challenge that is giving me a headache, sort of like this image. It's just regular dotted eights but it still throws me off a lot of the time.
This is the rhythm to use when you want to switch a Bulerias to a Tangos.
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). It was sounding pretty good, thought I was really getting there. Then I put the metronome on..... 
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