My Theory On The Advancement Of Technique

Playing Technique
#1

When you think of the technique Jimi Hendrix had and how he was considered the best of his day, and then think of how rock guitar technique advanced from him to Jimmy Page, to Eddie Van Halen, Randy Rhoads, then Yngwie Mamsteen and finally the slew of imitators that came along after Yngwie made his debut in which he played things no rock guitarist had ever approached, it’s pretty amazing how far rock guitar technique came from the 60s to the 80s.

Remember they had nothing like what Troy Grady has pioneered to help them. They could listen to a guy like Page, or Van Halen or Rhoads, and even watch them from their concert seats, but their view was a far cry from what the magnet camera allows. So how is it so many guitarists seemed to improve so much after one guy, whether it was EVH, or YJM came along and shattered the perception of what was possible on rock guitar?

My theory is that even though they could learn relatively little about their techniques simply by watching them from their concert seats or listening to their records, they gained one huge advantage the originators of those new levels of rock guitar proficiency didn’t have: They discovered it was humanly possible to play that way! That’s it. Just knowing that it was possible to get that good because someone had proven it was possible was enough!

It reminds me of the story of running the 4 minute mile. For many years runners had tried to run a 4 minute mile and failed. The consensus was it simply wasn’t humanly possible. Then one day an Englishman named Roger Bannister came along and broke the 4 minute barrier. He finished the mile in something like 3:59 and as soon as he was told he had broken the 4 minute mile mark, he immediately collapsed in a deep exhaustion which lasted for quite some time. However, as news started spreading that the 4 minute mile barrier had been broken, runners from all over the world also started breaking the 4 minute mile mark. Knowing it was humanly possible (along with their considerable talent and training) was all they needed to accomplish it!

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#2

This is absolutely true, was certainly true in my case (as a blues nut, hearing Satriani for the first time was completely paradigm changing - I’d known I could play faster using hammered and pulled notes rather than picking everything, but always thought it was cheating), and the story of the 4 minute mile is a pretty famous example of what mental limits can do to a performance.

I think it’ll be interesting to watch the effort to run a sub-2-hour marathon, and if we see a similar change in running times after that barrier is broken.

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