Classical guitar and rest strokes

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Aretium

Posts: 277
Joined: Oct. 23 2012

Classical guitar and rest strokes

Why the hell are rest strokes not taught to be played like 80% of the time in classical guitar? I see more rest strokes in flamenco guitarists.

The sound and volume is much greater and rounded.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 18:23:59

Kiko_Roca

Posts: 82
Joined: Apr. 25 2016
From: Midwest, USA

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

> ... 80 % of the time ...

Classical guitar spends a lot more time letting things ring and playing multiple notes at once - or at least it seems from the Christmas music scores I have.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 19:30:02

rombsix

Posts: 7807
Joined: Jan. 11 2006
From: Beirut, Lebanon

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Kiko_Roca)

quote:

or at least it seems from the Christmas music scores I have.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 22:10:02

Leñador

Posts: 5237
Joined: Jun. 8 2012
From: Los Angeles

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

quote:

Why the hell are rest strokes not taught to be played like 80% of the time in classical guitar?

'Cus classical guitarists are the classical nerds that couldn't afford a piano.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 22:56:42

Piwin

Posts: 3559
Joined: Feb. 9 2016

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

quote:

The sound and volume is much greater and rounded.

I think you might have answered your own question...
Appoyando is just one option in the entire palette of sounds you can produce with the guitar. What sound you want depends on genre, style, attack, balance, etc. etc. etc.
Classical guitarists use appoyando just fine when they need it, my guess is they just don't need it as much for "classical" music than we do for flamenco.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 23:00:34

Aretium

Posts: 277
Joined: Oct. 23 2012

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

Yeah fair enough. I could probably work on my free strokes but not sure quite which angle of approach is best

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 23:29:32

Piwin

Posts: 3559
Joined: Feb. 9 2016

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

You mean work on IMA or your thumb? I almost can't do a thumb free stroke anymore coz of all this flamenco lol. I mean I can, but I really have to focus. My muscle memory in the thumb just goes automatically to rest stroke

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 16 2016 23:47:09

Richard Jernigan

Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Kiko_Roca)

I play classical as much as I do flamenco. My warmup routine is always half rest stroke.

There is a wide range of technical schools in classical. Players like Segovia, the Romeros and Yamashita use a lot of rest stroke, and project strongly in big rooms. Yamashita still follows Segovia's lead, playing un-amplified in large halls.

Yamashita's sound filled this hall effectively, blasting away on his 1960s Ramirez.

But nobody else has played here un-amplified, including Niño de Pura.

More recently some teachers have been concentrating on an all free stroke technique, claiming they can get the same tone quality and power as rest stroke. I'm unaware of any of the many classical pros who have played here in the last several years playing with no rest stroke at all.

RNJ

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 17 2016 0:53:47

Ricardo

Posts: 14799
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Aretium

Why the hell are rest strokes not taught to be played like 80% of the time in classical guitar? I see more rest strokes in flamenco guitarists.

The sound and volume is much greater and rounded.

There used to be lots more overlap in terms of what flamenco and classical players did. IMO, looking back at old Segovia teaching videos, I notice more in common between Segovias literal hand positions and fingerings with other Andaluz flamencos, than with his own students. Superficially they seem minor but when you really get into studying the difference (to me anyway, visually) it is striking and obvious. We have discussed this in the past, where segovia would get angry at students about fingering and such and most people think of that as him being a bad teacher or a jerk person, but I see it as probably frustration that otherwise good players seem to miss the point about technique details.

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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Nov. 28 2016 19:12:06

archie640

Posts: 9
Joined: Dec. 10 2012
From: Bradford United Kingdom

RE: Classical guitar and rest strokes (in reply to Aretium)

coming from someone who plays and performs a lot of classical pieces, I would say rest stroke is used to create a warmer tone, that is well suited to the very romantasied music created primerily in the classical and romantic periods of music. composed by sor, carcassi and later on tarega, villa lobos etc. This style of playing is obviously in stark contrast to the straight to the point rest stroke style of flamenco. In classical guitar rest stroke is used more to highlight subtle dynamics in the music or accent beats. Such as rest stroking the first note of the apegio for the well known Spanish romance at the start of each beat.

REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE | Date Dec. 6 2016 22:15:37