New Malmsteen Masterclass

General Music Discussion
#44

Yes and I’ve said this many, many times! It’s not the ability to do this stuff, it’s the ability to figure them out without anyone teaching them and also not being aware they’re doing it.

However, now that I’ve said that, just keep in mind that everyone has this ability to some degree. We have seen hundreds of clips of players in “Technique Critique” doing perfect versions of the motions we teach, but nobody taught them. Very often they come to us saying they need help with their picking technique, when in fact the only help they need is realizing which kinds of phrases fit with the motions they are already doing perfectly.

So the difference between these “gifted” players really isn’t as large as we think. They just stumble across a couple more insights (consciously or otherwise), and that makes all the difference.

A lot of times, ironically, that difference is simply knowing to avoid certain kinds of phrases — like three-note-per-string scale playing, for example — and focusing on only the ones that work with their technique — like even numbers of notes per string. I mean, John Mclaughlin plays 90% of his fast stuff with one motion and pretty much avoids alternate picked scales. And tons of players learn and use his motion without knowing it. They just don’t realize it only works for certain phrases.

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#45

I think there was definitely a time where he did, but these days (say, at least the last ten years) he seems to have much more of a sense of humor about himself, which is great to see.

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#46

Oh yes. I remember seeing him in 1990 on the Eclipse tour and it was without doubt the most preening, arrogant performance I’ve ever seen at rock gig. He was f*kin awesome. :grinning:

I still have a pick somewhere - he was tossing them out to us fan boys in the pit like the lord of the manor throwing bread rolls to starving children. :rofl:

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#47

I understand exactly what you’re saying. It’s not defeatist, any more so than it would be ‘defeatist’ of me to think that just because I train with a fantastic coach and practice basketball every day since I was a young boy in grade school, I most likely would NOT have become the next Michael Jordan (or Labron, or anyone of that caliber).

I’m glad Troy has already mentioned this, and very well in his above post. There are people who just have that something that we all would love, but very few have. But much like we can all be the best versions of US that we can be, we can still learn from things like CtC to great benefit. That Yngwie got this way, on his own, in Sweden, before any of this was really widespread?..he must have felt at times like he had uncovered the keys to the universe (or…Lamborghini, lol! Okay, it’s Yngwie, so let’s use a Ferrari!)

The real defeat I see is that people out there practice their asses off, thinking that there may be something ‘wrong’ with them for not being able to play like their heroes…even with all the best instruction and whatnot available to us. Guitar playing is not that much different from any other human endeavor in that you can accomplish a great amount if you put in the time and effort, but there are just going to be certain people who have a greater genetic capacity than others. And when it’s linked to an incredible drive to learn and improve, the sky’s the limit. They’re the innovators, the trendsetters. If it were simply a matter of following a particular regimen of training and exercises, there would be a hell of a lot more virtuosos (a term that’s really thrown around a bit much these days) around…more than their actually are, and with YT and the internet, we see just how many world-class players there are out there, which can demoralize us even MORE, lol!..if we choose to let it. That’s the thing: those people out there, the Yngwies, they never quit. They just kept working and working until they got what they wanted. We can do that too…just maybe not as quickly or efficiently.

Troy has already shattered so many illusions behind wizard guitar playing, I’m grateful that a guy as dedicated to this stuff is around. I mean, who else would have taken the time to do it? That’s an aspect of genetic advantage: sheer persistance! I mean, who would have taken that rinky-dink little Casio with its digital recorder and make recordings of his guitar heroes phrasing, or follow frame by frame Malmsteen’s video (the one that plays at two speeds: fast and faster) to see what he’s actually doing? On VHS tape?..lol! THAT is also genetics at play, in my opinion. I watched all that stuff that he did, I even recorded some of the intro to Trilogy on my buddy’s old PC to slow it down, just like Troy. But after marveling at the speed, I couldn’t make much more sense out of it…and just kept plugging away, without much success. Not everybody has what it takes to research the hell out of a topic, any topic, let alone something as niche as virtuoso guitar technique. You have to respect that some people are just more driven, intrinsically, than others.

Anyways, that’s enough of my novel, I wish you all the best in your guitar journey!

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#48

“A lot of times, ironically, that difference is simply knowing to avoid certain kinds of phrases — like three-note-per-string scale playing, for example — and focusing on only the ones that work with their technique”

Do you just mean playing 3NPS phrases/licks in general or actually going up & down scales in 3NPS form? If it’s the latter, that’s a great observation because you rarely hear in songs players just running up and down scales in pure 3NPS form or even play the pentatonic box 2NPS across and back. There is always some twist that helps assist players, right?

#49

Great response! And the cool/unique thing about music/art is that there’s room for many kinds of success. For example, Slash, who is my all time favorite, just doesn’t have the same technical abilities as some of these other guys, yet still kicked some major guitar butt

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#50

Yes correct, Yngwie plays scale patterns which terminate on upstrokes, but does not generally alternate picking 3nps scales because his motion doesn’t do that. He does do ascending 3nps scales with sweeping though:

Sweeping for scales wasn’t super well known back then, so it was very easy to hear stuff like this on a record and assume Yngwie was using alternate picking to do it, but this wasn’t really the case.

Players like Paul Gilbert, yes, they alternate pick 3nps scales in either direction, but he uses a different technique for this.

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#51

Bill just watched the “far beyond” performance, I think it’s the best one live yet! Floored :joy:
Inspired :joy:

#52

I think in general Yngwie has a very high top speed he is capable of playing at. It amazes me how fast some of that Alcatrazz stuff is. I am not a slow player - but when analysing all my efforts in trying to learn some of his fastest runs during the Alcatrazz era - I can get the lick clean- but only at 80% speed. I know because my version syncs to his perfectly when I slow his recording to 80%. I reckon I may have got to 85% on one or two takes - but I have recorded the lick so many times and my speed is consistently only 80%. My accuracy has definitely improved after all the practice - but the speed is always about 80%. It is really interesting.

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#53

There was an old post on the Petrucci forum, quoting his guitar tech, claiming it was 1/8" off the body (3.2mm).
https://web.archive.org/web/20100202233052/http://www.petrucciforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=22546

The same post however puts his string height at 1.6-2mm at the 17th fret. A long way from 5-7mm Yngwie states. It definitely looks higher than 2mm, but it’s a shame they didn’t take the photo properly from the side so that you could see it clearly.

Edit: just checked the post and it’s 2mm for the low E at the 17th fret with a capo on the first. 2mm at the 12th fret without capo.

Unrelated, I have a vague memory of Carl Verheyen giving more useful tremolo advice…

  • adjust the claw so that the bottom spring is longer, to match the higher tension of the bottom strings
  • set the height so that pulling up gives a semitone on the E and a tone on the B

Yes I remember that. I think it was a Guitar World interview or something. The only thing I can think of, is how you would string a Strat in a hurry. Put the string through the tremolo, cut to the right length, push the end into the tuner and wrap it around the tuner a few times. Only then turn the tuner to tension it. If you did it this way, you’d want to twist the ball end as you wrapped it around the tuner. But I don’t know anyone who suggests stringing this way so it’s just a guess.

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#54

I’ve noticed that he sweeps descending when playing Bach’s Badinerie, didn’t know he does that at all. It’s funny, his 5 string sweeps are usually a mess descending because he tries to play them with some weird rapid repeated downstroke thing but there are actually examples of 6 string major sweeps that he does right, sweeping the descending part like that one in 17m08s.

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#55

Thanks, man! I use the Carl Method, but have long since stopped doing the spring claw angle thing. There was a lot of debate about it that I don’t want to get into here, but Carl definitely knows what he’s doing. I don’t know why I didn’t ask Yngwie’s tech when I had the chance a couple years ago…I’d like to ask that, as well as a few other things that never came to mind at the time. None that I can remeber right now, though, of course!

#56

Seems that good ol’ Yngwie chilled out a ton from his younger days.

And man, his technique is still flawless.

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#57

[quote=“carranoj25, post:43, topic:40599, full:true”]
But there are tons of other young kids who may work just as hard and be nowhere near the level of Lisa-X at her age or Yngwie’s level at 18. Maybe this just becomes a looped debate, but I think about it a lot. And I wouldn’t call it defeatist because it doesn’t stop me from playing or practicing. Lets take mindset out of the equation for one minute. If every kid is practicing many hours but not all are to the level of Lisa-X at her age, what can that say[/quote]

This is off topic from the Yngwie discussion, but I’ve been a guitar teacher for almost 20 years and I’ve taught hundreds of kids between the ages of 7 and 18, sometimes from when they are 7 until they are 18. In that time I’ve had only maybe 5 or 6 students that wound up reaching a technical facility by the time they were 18 that one would consider virtuosic (and currently am teaching a student that will probably get there). If we open up the category to include playing that doesn’t fall under “shred/speed virtuoso” and just “great general guitar playing” then that number of students goes up.

To me, it’s a 3-part recipe to arrive at the kind of player that makes a Lisa-X or Yngwie or Gilbert:

  1. The innate kinesthetic genius we’ve discussed already.
  2. Pure love and obsession with the instrument. My friend Denis Chang (prominent gypsy jazz instructor, go search him on YouTube) talks about this, and I agree. All the great virtuosos had a burning obsession with music. To them, there is no hour counting, no difference between “playing” and “practice”. They’re obsessed with the instrument and can’t put it down.
  3. The desire to want to play in this virtuosic way. As I said, if we count the number of students I’ve had who became really excellent guitarists without achieving shredder-level speed, the number goes up. A lot of people just don’t care about that side of guitar or music. It’s quite possible you have plenty of students out there who have number 1 and 2 but just don’t really care about playing super fast. So you just don’t see them get there.

This is all purely mechanical, too. There’s a fourth category that you really need for an Yngwie or Eddie and that’s the creative innovation. That’s the true secret sauce that I think is probably the hardest to come by.

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#58

Very interesting insights from someone who has seen the effects firsthand. They whole “time in” vs “gifted” debate flares up from time to time and to be honest, I find myself sometimes switching sides as new info and experience comes down the line.

Not only that, but this obsession of which you speak, I’ve read it countless times from the interviews of the greats: EVH, Malmsteen, Vai…etc. Sure, there’s probably tons of other folks who wanted to reach those heights and went to such extremes (taking the guitar to the shower, etc, lol) and didn’t get as far. Why not? I’m not completely sure, but I have my ideas.

I also wonder if there is, shall I say, a ‘clinical’ aspect to the obsession…as in, perhaps it’s an actual, real obsession we’re talking about with certain individuals. Star athletes come to mind. Many of them were driven to success from countless hours over the years to develop their skills. But time in isn’t enough, as we have learned. It’s a mix.

And as far as innovators, so much of that has to do with what I consider blind luck. And EVH or a Malmsteen happened to be around at a time when that kind of music still had some room to grow (although many of those on the scene also probably lamented, “It’s all been done!”), both in the playing aspect of the music and the instrument side. Money is a big driver for innovations in the field, both for guitar and equipment manufacturers. Fresh thinking comes from very few, and these days, perhaps there isn’t as much incentive as there once was to ‘make a better mouse trap’, or in our case, ‘build a better Floyd Rose’.

All I know for sure is that as I get older, I think a lot more about these things, and have greater empathy for those great players, not only what they went through in order to become great, but also the ways they find to be creative (or, maybe sticking to their own turf) to keep wanting to create on the guitar. For some, it may have started out being fascinating, but could you imagine after three, four decades? What drives a guy like Satriani to keep pushing forward? Is it just sheer artistic drive? Is it to pay the bills? Maybe a mix of both?

I think about this stuff a lot these days.

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#59

Yngwie’s biography, As Above So Below is very revealing of the insanity. This guy is a savant in a very real way.

We’re at a cross roads as far as the music industry in concerned, the golden age will be back with NFT crypto. Artists will own their music and have total control with fans backing them where it counts. This pandemic has in a way had some profound positives, progress loves misery.

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#60

A part of me would like to read As Above, but with all the slanderous gossip, I think I’d rather not. He has a pretty shady past as it is and a book full of that stuff…there’d have to be a LOT of guitar oriented stuff in there for me to get any value from it. He’s a character for sure.

I’m not quite up to speed with all this NFT stuff, so I’m not too sure what you’re getting at, but if it means that artists can start making money from their actual MUSIC again? I’m all for that.

#61

Yngwie seems like a really chilled guy, I’d sit down with him for a beer.

#62

Great video thanks for posting it. He’s so funny.

Picking technique? Na I just play bro ! A true legend.