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And while I'm here, and still suffering from insomnia, and given that Ricardo entered the thread, I may as well give my praise and endless thanks to him for some advice he offered on a thread about whether one can play flamenco without nails. I was going to wait a few months, in case it all went pear-shaped, but the effect is real.
Kalo, it may be of use to you. I don't know. All I know is that it has transformed my playing.
Ricardo mentioned that when he put glue on his nails the hook nail he had became unhooked. He also suggested that the sides of the nail grow out and the nail tips be filed flat. Forgive me for not explaining this properly. Ricardo is the one to explain it properly and I searched and found out that he has done so, again and again here, in the past.
After playing for around 18 months without nails, and I was happy camper I can tell you, I was enjoying the experience of playing without any impediment. Before that, picado was never something I had any chance of doing. It was simply impossible. Anyone who could do it must be born with it or made a deal with the devil... something... I don't know. I couldn't do it anyway.
I have a hook nail on the 'm' finger. It never bothered me a bit in the distant past when I played classical. I filed short and ramped, after lots of experimentation many years ago. But my attempts at flamenco techniques always ended up with me being able to bang it out along with Juan Martin but my picado always sounded as bad, or worse than his. This was not something I could live with, seeing as I could play Lauro or Bach to my heart's content and not have to feel like I was 'imitating' flamenco, slowly and laboured.
But blow me down wiv a fevah. I decided to follow the maestro's advice. I grew out my nails and bought myself a little tube of glue. I had never used glue; no need, thought I, my nails are okay.
But it happened just like he said. As the nails grew I practised and waited for the hook to arrive. Blimey, I'm sure last time I saw it it started very quickly, hugging the skin like it wanted to grow right back into my finger.
But no, not this time. It's been a few weeks now. I've filed them many times and applied many layers of glue... no hook.
This might not sound like a big deal to anyone but I can tell you it is a revelation. Is this what it feels like for you guys without hooks? Damn, it is so easy. All I have to do now is go bip bip bip and the technique develops at what seems like an exponential rate.
Tremolo feels easy, arpeggios a dawdle. It's just wonderful.
I could do all of things before but never 'easy'. Never with an easy feel, like I can 'let go'.
So, thank you Ricardo. Never has someone changed my playing so drastically. And it's not just the playing itself either. Now I have a feeling, when I play, similar to that dream people have when they sit down at a piano and they can just do it.
I worked awfully hard over the years and a lot of it was certainly useful but nothing comes within a million miles of this. It's like Christmas.
Glue. Jeez. Glue.
I would never have guessed in a million years that an 'A' shaped nail filed straight across plastered with glue would make it all work so well. I never believed there was ever a 'secret' to anything, but while this certainly won't turn me into anything to write home about I know, for a fact, that it's all there in front of me now, waiting to be explored.
Well, I didn't write the right way. It never feels natural, but sometimes it is possible (only with simple scales, let's say descending - if there are more changes ore the scale is longer - forget it forever). The audience also counts, I don't remember a gig when everything went as well as I would like to because I got tensed (the good thing is the more gigs I play the less it happens)
So, thank you Ricardo. Never has someone changed my playing so drastically. And it's not just the playing itself either. Now I have a feeling, when I play, similar to that dream people have when they sit down at a piano and they can just do it.
Cool, glad it worked out for you. These 3d concepts about nails and such are tricky to get across on internet, and it does take a special "student" to grasp concepts the right way. I have had many that just couldn't get it to work out, mainly cuz of the patience and trial and error it takes. Good luck on the path amigo.
The images on Ricardo's thread seem to have gone but if you read them both there is enough information.
A video is mentioned in a post Ricardo makes. I'm not the one to make videos or offer advice on this. It's working for me... big time. But I have no understanding of why that is. No insights or rationale.
I'd say you have nothing to lose by just doing it, as described.
And about the video, I tried to make one with my mobile, but after sending it to youtube there is nothing on the screen (I will try to fix it, and if anybody knows what to do, please help). But there is a sound. The metronome was set at 100 (the speed is doubled). Some of the runs are better, some worse, some not finished. Sometimes it is possible to play them clearly, other days no way. Anyway it is still not usable on stage. Any help, critics or whatever is wanted.
I listened to your video. You have the makings of a very fine picado. Ole Bro.
You asked for a critique or help and I'm not sure I can and I am sure that others certainly can. But as one trier to another:
That ain't 16ths at 200bmp (as would be generally accepted anyway) I listened to it and could be dead wrong but I don't think me poring over it to make sure I get an exact analysis rather than the 'jist' would change anything.
16ths at 200 sounds like this: Brrrrrrrrrrrrrp.
Sounds to me like you're playing (sort of) sixes against 100bpm, so it would be 150bpm in 16ths (real speed) if it were in time.
As a long-time metronome deficient player myself it seems to me that your 'problem' is a relatively easy fix.
Right now, it's like you and your metronome are having a fistfight. You need to make pals with it. The technique is right there already.
You're playing, obviously, right at the limits of your technique. You most certainly will not feel entirely relaxed when you're pushing the envelope like that. But it's all there to be had. I'm not suggesting, by any means, that you stop doing that. Good for you if you're letting it rip onstage.
But first you might want to let the metronome speak to you more. He's the drummer, and he may be a bit thick, but he's never wrong.
For the relaxed feeling you'd need to find your cruise speed. As I stated here, when Ricardo came onto a thread and asked 'for how long' when people were discussing top speeds, it all became clear. If you can do it for a minute or more then a quick run will be a dawdle.
You might find your cruise speed is way below your burst speed, maybe not, I don't know. But your technique 'sounds' relaxed enough that the cruise would catch the burst with some patience.
But you should be able to subdivide the beat (2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, etc,. etc.) and be able to nail it every single beat.... forever.
I can see what you mean though. I guess you have a feeling of being so close yet so far. You're getting there but something's amiss?
If you find problems hearing your groove you might want to try something like the slow-downer for iphone (or similar). That'll give you the skinny on how you and the metronome are really getting along. And you can input Paco, and others, as well, to hear how these guys seem to do it to the nanosecond.
I only listend to a bit of it and if it is indeed 16ths at 200bpm please forgive me, ignore everything I said (which is probably a good idea regardless of anything) and let someone who knows what they're talking about sort you. I'm more of a 'same boat', 'shoulder to cry on' type.
But again... Ole! I doubt your audience share your doubts.
At the risk of flogging a dead horse and seeing as you asked (and it's not intended as advice or something that I think you or anyone else 'should' do) but you did ask and I just finished a little technique session and realised I hadn't quite explained my 'random and timeless' approach to the problem of focus:
When I do arpeggios and tremolo and picado I spend a lot of the time doing all of them together. For example, arp pima, picado imim, arp, arpeggio, tremolo, etc. All in time, or with a strict beat and fitting it all in. I like to change it up constantly so that I work towards a seamless shifting between techniques. Every beat or for a few beats or within beats... whatever.
It's doodling, yes, but the focus is there and the discipline. The tremolo can be regular piami, or longer, or classical ami, everything changing according to how I feel or what I want/need to do. It kind of 'explains' to me where I am and what I need to do.
It's about the focus.
I recently finished a stint at a pharmaceutical company in Switzerland where they were organized to a level bordering on insanity. But just because a roomful of people use project management software and have charts coming out the wazoo that make them look and feel as if everything is in hand doesn't mean they're organized.
Indeed, in this particular case they most certainly will kill people. No doubt about it. I got fired for explaining this to them.
The focus was wrong. All the times and dates made sense, all the laws obeyed, but the focus was up their arses. They missed the fact that they were publishing documents that would lead to certain death, if followed to the letter. I expect people may already have died but the information leading to why it happened is buried in obscure places (software service manuals where the misinformation is coded months or years before the result of that coding hits the unfortunate people whose diagnostic tests happen to 'hit' the 'wrong' combination; leading to erroneous results of lab tests that themselves can go entirely undetected long after the unfortunate recipient of this very 'Swiss effect' is dead and buried).
Luckily, we're not going to hurt anyone with our little guitars but it is analogous. We must distinguish between form and true function.
So I bugger about with techniques in a random way so that I can express music without being aware of technique.
For me, it's about practising the 'feel' of getting it right rather than the fear of getting it wrong.
(And I suppose I had to get it off my chest that I know people will die and I at least tried to stop it happening. I know something about focus and analysis and it has some value. If I don't get to work because I refuse to kill people I can least help people learn a little guitar more easily.)
Should there be a smiley here or am I completley gone, I wonder....
Of course, do not take the screwed up ones. Lets say this starting at about 0.32 (or more 0.33) I can hear only 3 clicks of te metronome. I can play this scale at 160 easily.
What is the proble: as you see one of lots of runs goes +/_ what it should (or I start to early or cant control the speed and land somewhere between beats). Maybe the audience can't hear it, but I hear.
quote:
I guess you have a feeling of being so close yet so far.
Well, yes, this is what I am talking about. Cruise speed and slowing recording down seem to have lots of logic. Thanks .
I have just started playing again after a 40 year break. My first teacher (who as a boy learned from Ramon Montoya) said "We will start with the solea but first you gotta get the clock in your head" Taka taka TAK taka taka TAK taka TAK taka TAK bom bom
so with a c cord and one finger i takataked all day and night. walked down the street taka takking, banged the table by TAKs The next week we added rasgueados and takka takked that.
Soon added some falsetas with the thumb.No tabs books or Youtube available, so you had to learn it note by note from the teacher. Well, begining to sound like music, seeing you only had one flaseta. you practiced it a lot until you got another. next was a falseta with fingers (arpeggio) practiced that one for a couple of weeks
My teachers wife taught dancing and all the beautiful girls wanted to dance Alegria like Carmen Amaya, so I learned that, After a couple of months i could play for them.
As i remember there were never any discussions about technique. "listen to me and do it till it sounds right"
After a year of instruction i could play Solea, Alegria & Seguidilla with a total of perhaps 30 or 40 falseta's
When i started playing again last year i would sometimes hear something familier, find the tabs and start playing, in many cases although i could not describe note by note the fingers remembered perfectly. I conclude if you practice something several thousand times it stays there forever
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