Anexos
CATEGORIA 2: INFORMES FINANCIEROS SUBCATEGORIA 3: Las Comunicaciones de
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hat do you think it means, to get Back to Basics? Basically, what is it that compels you to become, and remain a guitarist? How can I dig down deep and define, and illustrate, some of the basic psychology at work?Little Johnny picks up his first guitar. “I wanna play like Hendrix” (or Robert Smith, or Johnny Smith, or Slash, or maybe Segovia). And one of the
interesting paradoxes of human nature, and the activities it generates, has begun.
We want to belong somewhere; to a family, to a team, to a society, to the “in” crowd, or maybe to the renegade Breakfast Club (where out is in). In our case, it’s the guitar player family. Basic human instinct: we crave acceptance, and security.
There are initiation rituals that must be observed: techniques, equipment, all of the different kinds of things that have filled the pages of these FOR THE LOVE OF GUITAR books. But at the same time, we want to be known for our individual uniqueness: our egos desire recognition of our self-expression. The Arts is a great place for us to try and deal with this paradox (and others), and a guitar is every bit as good as a paint brush or a camera or a word processor.
Hendrix is an obvious inspirational role model for Johnny to start out with, a guitarist deified for his flaming hot style , cool and hip personality, psychedelic popularity, a flamboyant, controversial rock star show biz image. But as Johnny gets a more mature sense of what good music’s all about, under the surface, he’ll realize that the ability of Hendrix to stick and stay is because people almost universally relate to the pioneer spirit, the explorer, the committed “eccentric”
temperamental artist, defining, realizing, and then
The public love this. Buddy Holly’s story on film and in the stage play, stresses his sense of an individual spirit. Frank Sinatra did it His Way . Show business, this business of showing, appeals to a basic human voyeur instinct, and the more private, lurid, titillating, controversial, the better. Show us your dreams. Spill your guts. Strip naked. Show us your heart and soul.
An audience loves to get a sense of the “Don Quixote” syndrome from a performer: that they are bearing witness to someone who has the guts to dream the impossible dream. They also love the
“Wallenda” high wire trapeze stuff: this is dangerous, will he fall? (Also The Man-on-the-Bridge self-destruct gambit: will he jump?) Let’s not forget the magician sleight-of-hand. I recall Chet Atkins talking about this, how the trick is to make the hard stuff look really easy, and the easy stuff look really hard.
All of this is also very compelling to most of us here in the guitar player family. We’ve got our basic human instincts, too, not to mention our even more basic garage/basement dreams of fame and fortune.
The majority of us struggle within the boundaries of certain finite practical resources; the same
vocabulary of notes, the same length of fretboards and amplifiers and equipment, the formats of magazines, of popular radio and television, the conventions of marketing and promotion. How then do we realize our individuality, and get our
uniqueness recognized?
If I give 100 guitar playersEx.1 and ask them to play it, as sure as you can say basic human nature, I’ll get 100 different versions, ranging from
microscopic differences to wholesale stylistic approaches. (Ex. 2illustrates some variations.)
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BASIC PSYCHOLOGY 101: A PARADOX IN THE MATRIX
(Cont’d)Variation 1 - à la Chuck Berry
77 Variation 2 - à la Mick Jones or Tom Scholz
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BASIC PSYCHOLOGY 101: A PARADOX IN THE MATRIX
(Cont’d)Anybody that has ever tried to exactly, literally double a guitar part on a recording, knows that fractions of metre, intonation, dynamics, attack, and phrasing can become glaring inconsistencies. Anyone that’s ever had to perform the same song night after night, knows that it’s very difficult to be consistently inspired and exact. Most performers will say that they don’t even
try for an exact replication: they try to treat each performance as a unique event. Think of it as the crystallization of drops of water vapor into unique snowflakes. Getting down to the diamond (carbon crystal), dancer Marie Chouinard calls it.
So the first thing to try is just to be natural, and relaxed, to allow your self-expression to be somewhat instinctive and intuitive. In the heat of an A Aeolian solo (Ex. 3), I might go for an ascending run up, across a couple of octaves on the neck. For some reason, this repeating figure of Ex.3 comes very naturally to me, almost instinctively. Because of this, I don’t worry about hitting the notes as much as concentrating on phrasing it dynamically, starting quietly and “flurrying” up the run, then really exploding into the last note. You might find this particular run more difficult, or less satisfying, than another configuration of the notes with another type of phrasing that might come more naturally to you. Fine. Psychologically, you should have confidence in your own natural instincts, not self-loathing because you can’t necessarily get comfortable with mine.
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BASIC PSYCHOLOGY 101: A PARADOX IN THE MATRIX
(Cont’d)Once you have recognized and defined your individuality, you must try to develop it, and make it the obvious focus for
your audience. If the aspects of your individuality are subtle, (say, as delicate and tiny as the crystalline
form of a snowflake) then your performance will have to provide your audience with a microscope, and eliminate any other distractions. If you can eventually build some of your individuality
into larger-than-life forms, say, an amazing Red House, then you will indeed attract attention, and win the security of acceptance through the recognition of your unique spirit.
By the time Little Johnny has turned into Big Old John, the paradox in the matrix will be fully realized. John still wants to play “like” Hendrix, but now it’s because he wants to have the same level of spiritual freedom of expression, the same command and authority in voicing his own inner soul:
and, no doubt, the same kind of public recognition and acceptance for these very things.
Yeah, well, welcome to the club, John, welcome to the club.
Now ask yourself, generally…