Tonic and Dominant

Music Theory

Last Week we talked about the chords in a major scale. We discussed how roman numerals work, and how we label chords with them. We also learned that the chord of the major scale are: I ii iii IV V vi vii(dim) The assignment was to figure out the chords in the minor scale. You […]

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Listen to Music

Musical Interpretation and Musicianship

A recent discussion appeared on the Delcamp guitar forum asking how to improve interpretation. The one overlooked aspect about playing music is that a great musician listens to it. In fact, they listen to a lot of it. Guitarists get really caught up listening to our own instrument, which is depressing because many other singers […]

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Mondays.  A time to start anew!  But sometimes we’re stressed and unmotivated. Today I have juries, a culmination of a long semester. The rep I worked on this semester was Mertz’s Elegy and Brouwer’s Preludios Epigramaticos.  Juries are a culmination of a long time spent with a piece.  Most time you’re ready to just step […]

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A friend, who is probably more intelligent than I can ever hope to be, suggested that I start a column called “Music Theory Fridays” as a medium for talking about this whole music theory thing. Today we’re going to talk about the chords that are found naturally in a major scale. Last week I talked […]

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Your Body, Your Instrument

Classical Guitar Technique

I’m going to go ahead and make a not so bold statement:  people should exercise.  We no longer live in an extremely active society, and sitting in a practice room for hours a day probably doesn’t help matters. I love to lift weights and do more high intensity exercises at least 3-4 times/week, but I […]

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Musician Professionalism

Guitar Related Links

I stumbled upon a really great article about how musicians alienate their audiences.  It’s really a humorous guide on how to act like a professional musician, and touches on a few things I’ve spoken about here before. The article is geared towards orchestra musicians, but still rings true for us guitarists–even more so because we […]

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An Interview with Scott Kritzer- part 2

Interviews with Classical Guitarists

The final part of an interview with Scott Kritzer.  The first part can be found here. — You run a guitar festival every year as well, what is it and what was the reason for starting it? It’s called Classical Guitar Immersion-CGI-this year will be the fourth annual event and it’s on of my big […]

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An Interview with Scott Kritzer- part 1

Interviews with Classical Guitarists

I recently had the opportunity to get in touch with Scott Kritzer and ask him a few questions.  Scott is a classical guitarist and teacher based in Portland, Oregon.  As you’ll see in the interview, his influence extends far beyond Portland; Scott offers distance video lessons.  Mr. Kritzer has had the opportunity to study with […]

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Koyunbaba on Lute

Classical Guitar Videos

Koyunbaba on lute?!  I kind of like it. -CD PS:  guitar version

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When is it time to perform?

Guitar Performance Tips

I had a strange shift in my guitar playing these fast few weeks.  I was pretty on top of doing some intense practice for the past three months, and that suddenly stoped.  Go from an average of 18-25 hours/week with my instrument down to about 10ish now is a pretty dramatic change. But I have […]

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