Here’s Shawn does exactly what I do - stretcjing between index and middle fingers
That’s a big part of my concern. I am not the finished product, I’m not trying to sell myself as the finished product. Doesn’t help that I’ve always had a bit of red light syndrome.
It’s like what Troy and the CtC team have been saying lately about starting with speed and working from there. I’ve made my start, I found that I have the speed, but I’m still working, and I expect to be working for some time.
If people want me to shut up about all of this stuff until it’s fully formed and I’m the finished product, then I could do that. I could get back to to the woodshed and keep any writing I do to myself until I’m done. You all just let me know.
Definitely not pure abduction here, Shawn’s index finger is definitely at extension at the first knuckle (actually, a very slight degree of hyperextension).
I hope you keep the discussion up. I’m learning a lot. Your approach is very different from mine, and I find it very useful to try consider these things from new angles. I’m getting a lot of mileage out of reading this particular discussion.
Ahem… look carefully. And try to imagine how his hand would look like if he extend his finger while keeping the same position. It’s an obvious streching. You can say this by comparing angles of middle and index fingers. In relaxed position it’s hardly more than 30 degrees.
I definitely won’t speak for the community, but I personally think your openness about sharing what you’re up to is cool.
No way, man!
Another thing about 1-2-4. It makes me to change my arm position so that my elbow sticks into my body. Yeah, I know that I can use different posture, but…
There’s definitely a difference in abduction (spreading the fingers), not denying that at all. Shawn had a impressive range of motion. It’s just not pure abduction.
There is most definitely greater extension at the first knuckle on the index finger in the first picture. The neck isn’t running totally parallel to Shawn’s knuckle line, which is why the side of his index finger makes contact with the higher strings. There’s a slight skew, which is critical for this alignment.
Finger abduction is important, but a subtle skew allows for small variations in extension which have big effects.
Power Licks is a frustrating source. It’s not available in high quality (at least to my knowledge), it’s easy to miss details. The Paris DVD from later in his career has some decent shots, but it was shot near the end of his life and he’d declined as a player. Thankfully, there are good examples to be found in YouTube videos if we look for them.
I’ve had that problem when I was younger. Try flattening the fingers a little and pointing the tip of your index finger toward your chin a little more.
Ok. I’ve tried to play one and the same stuff in one position, and 1-2-4 feels a bit easier in a long run at the higher frets area.
That’s what I’m trying to do. After calssical guitar with all that ‘use your very fingertip’ now I relearn to use more flattened fingers for muting reason.
Cool.
Try watching my videos in the fretting principles thread. The videos about the hand at rest and applying the resting hand to the guitar might help you.
If it’s cool with everybody, I’m going to hold off on long replies in this thread and in the forum generally for a while. I’d like to really focus on getting chapters written, but this discussion has definitely helped me and motivated me to get the writing done.
Thank you all.
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Hey I think it’s totally cool what you’re doing, I just personally find videos where players are playing more instructive than only writing (I like a combo of both tbh). Sorry if what I said came off as snarky, good luck with the writing!
Tom,
I’ve literally had a crash course on fretting hand mechanics here. Thank you, a lot was over my head but I do know in certain combinations, often a slide is best, I guess another ‘violation’ of the one finger/fret rule, I mean I do know it’s a very basic thing but certainly not one to live by, and just for here, press here, a day one thing.
My take away is my hands are very different from the average, short and stubby.
I absolutely have to be good with executing the same licks with different fingerings beyond the 12th fret: here 1,2,4 or 1,3,4 become 1,2,3.
What’s more, is above the 17th I’m often down to 1,2 and a slide!
There is certainly no one way for all, its different for everybody. Besides if this were Gattaca I probably wouldn’t be let near a guitar 
I’m def ‘very’ amateur… you’ve been warned. Something I was working on today…
I’m at 1,2,3, but then with phrases, I’m very familiar with the pinky comes in quiet comfortably without any conscious thought or effort; I have no control of it at the moment. It’s like in-flight of motion the transients create the space whereas when I’m working on something it’s all feels very crowded.
Due to the nature of my hands, when it comes to the picking, the pic really does eliminate hand types, the fretting hand is really working with what you got, push and shove until it’s working in any circumstance.
edit: I’ve also noticed like Jimmy Bruno’s 5 finger method, he teaches the major scale in 5 positions, all 3 NPS except where it’s two whole tones, there he keeps that string to just 2 notes. I guess there are many reasons for this, and for some reason, it stuck with me and I tend to avoid the double whole tone patterns to use alternate paths when I encounter them; I find it makes better connections and also kind of limits ( in a good way for me ) the options I have.
Anyways, awesome thread.
add a chromatic note there to make it 3 notes, never fails
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Tom,
Some food for thought.
It seems odd to me that you feel excited to produce this (as you should) yet that pride seems not aptly reflected in your statement that this is only recreational. More surprisingly, that it is made with the express intent to not make money; why make that distinction now even before publication?
If you truly believe in the ethos of your discovery, then I think you owe an artistic duty to give the rest of the creative process equal dedication. There is obviously a lot of research and time invested in this project that it would be a shame to see it go by the wayside (because of a less aggressive approach). I sense there is even the most implicit goal to persuade a wider audience than just the participants on CTC (or those that have commented here), and I must say a book, as a single medium, just not might be all-encompassing to reach and persuade the audience you desire or have in mind already.
Echoing others’ suggestion of video supplements, and also sympathizing with your red light syndrome, I believe there is also no reason to preemptively discard the video medium. You do in fact say you are not the finished product (and neither is anyone really) and if anyone discards what you say based on a few errors, or some random objection regarding musicality, then so be it- their loss. That being said, to discard it prematurely is worse than the potential upside of others learning more in depth and your message resonating more deeply with students and readers.
Filming can function as a real-life test of the hypothesis and that itself resonates with readers greatly when communicated well. If your theory and technique is sound then there is no need to worry that it should fail this test to a great extent. As you are aware, the scientific method we endorse is not all text-based. The difference between that and let’s say, a mathematical construct would be testing and observed repeatability. And there is no question on what resonates more with the general public when it comes to matters of gravity between the stars and planets and let’s say, that of L’Hôpital’s theorem, even though both are relatively equally rigorous in academia.
As you did say, “However, the primary value of this is in understanding that you can use these concept to build a vocabulary of your own lines that can be played at the fastest possible speeds with minimal effort and without fatigue.”
It might not seem lofty to you, given your background, but that same objective in plain-speak to many others (though they are less on CTC) might seem a rather unattainable goal. Even if your wording was finger-perfect, the nature of the medium (a book only) will seem overly preachy and condescending even if you truly do not have that intent (and I believe you don’t).
In addition, if there is a goal to teach and positively influence potential readers (and again I sense there is), apparent humility is important. I say apparent because while statements like “I was Paul Gilbert levels of fast by the age of fifteen, and I thought for years that I would never get appreciably faster…I managed to crack Eric Johnson’s code…” could be logically equivalent to a video demonstration in an ideal world, the reality is that there is a vast gap in how that resonates with people. Many people won’t do the understanding for you so in this case it may be a little bit more practical to cater to their interest.
The proof of humility is not always in words, and I believe this sentiment is often best communicated without words, hence the necessity again for visual demonstration. Video not only serves as a viable test but a necessary persuasive tool to reach and teach the audience. In this context a visual demonstration of the Paul Gilbert/Shawn Lane lick carries infinitely more weight than the written admission of doing so. Even if you have the best of intentions and are saying it “as a matter of fact,” by the time it reaches the readers eyes it becomes very ambiguous and even dangerously undermines your premise, even if the reader is “logically” in the wrong here.
As the saying goes, one does not simply bring down the church with a book, regardless of how right the book is. And while your goal is not to bring it down in one go, you did mention the contrarian in yourself that wished to challenge current dogma. I think it would help you to work with an editor who will respect the boundaries of your theory but is capable of disseminating your works. I wish you the best (in the most sincere and secular way).
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I genuinely don’t understand why. I’m certainly excited about things I do purely for recreation and proud of the things I do for recreation.
I’ve kind of come around to the idea that my writing is content that people are willing to pay for, both from feedback in this thread and through private messages.
I didn’t have the goal of making money, but I didn’t specifically intend not to make money either.
I don’t believe I have any such duty. I don’t believe I owe anything at all. Not to the ideas, not to myself, not to anybody else.
If I stop enjoying the process of writing and sharing my ideas and my discoveries, I feel I have the right to stop doing so.
I hope I don’t reach that point, and if I do, I’d hope to be able to get back to it after a short break. I’d be very hesitant to take an advance from a publisher or take pre-sales, etc, because of this.
I’m glad you feel that way.
For me, it’s more about wanting to say my piece rather than hoping to persuade anybody.
As I mentioned, I backed the magnet on Kickstarter and I’ve had to get a tripod for work due to COVID. I’m not discounting video as a medium entirely, quite the opposite. I’m just not starting with it.
I think writing the book will help me to organize my ideas and develop an outline for what I would cover in video. It would also give me more time to get the principles under my fingers and get used to being in front of a camera.
That was more in answer to what I felt was perhaps a “call out” rather than a dismissal of the idea of recording videos entirely. Looking back at this thread, I feel I misinterpreted the intention of that post.
I do intend to make videos in service to the ideas I’m trying to explain. As for making videos to answer people telling me to “put up or shut up,” I’ll shut up and let them on their merry way.
Honestly, with the regular remarks that my writing can come across as condescending and confrontational, that’s almost certainly true to some extent. I’m very glad that people here have gotten used to me, and have mostly accepted that this is an unwanted consequence of my training. However, for general a general audience, I recognize this is a problem.
I take your point, absolutely.
Honestly, I don’t really understand why those claims seem so extraordinary or so incredible to people. Especially when I’ve been totally candid about what I can’t do, both on the guitar and otherwise.
Is it really all that remarkable to see a fifteen year old covering Racer X tunes?
By the way, if anybody doubts my humility or just doesn’t like me very much, I recently posted a video on this forum of me being strangled. Feel free to enjoy my total and utter defeat, posted here for your convenience:
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Tom, I bear you no ill will, yet I find it extremely entertaining that you volunteer that video. Would love to buy you a beer if our paths ever cross.
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I think its remarkable that anyone can cover a racer x tune (live) to a high standard, regardless of age.
I quite like the straight forward approach, so don’t soften it up too much!!
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I want to have it on the record that I don’t dislike Tom Gilroy at all, but I can still enjoy watching a recreational strangling.
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I’m very glad.
Now, beer I’m pretty good at:
My perceptions on this are probably skewed by having spent so much time around my former teacher. Here he is nonchalantly playing Tumeni Notes faster than the original tempo, and he’s not even really “on” here.
I saw him play such incredible things with such regularity as a teenager, maybe it made the things I was able to play seem less significant to me somehow.
Glad to hear that my writing style works for you.