What do we think about "natural talent"?

Playing Technique
#1

It takes me weeks to learn a speed picking run and work it up to a fast speed (like 115bpm sextuplets, for example.) And yet, I cannot play 100% perfectly even at a say, 80 percent consistency. That’s pretty discouraging when there are people out here playing like this guy, who claims to have been playing for only 3 years. Jake Genest on Instagram: "Yngwie/Jason Becker stuff #shredguitar #guitaristsofinstagram #guitarist #metal #neoclassical #yngwie #jasonbecker #neoclassicalmetal"
I’ve been feeling down about myself about this lately, even when I compare myself to only myself and not others. It seems like progress is coming extremely slow, and the lack of concrete consistency in my playing is the main thing that bothers me.

Is natural talent a real thing? Is there a genetic factor to guitar playing? Those questions are all separate embodiments of my real question, which is really just this: am I capable of being great on the guitar? I think that is a sentiment we all can relate to.

I’ve started studying this book called Jazz Guitar Single Note Soloing by Ted Greene to try and learn some theory stuff and really develop my harmonic abilities and phrase vocabulary, but I’ve been wondering if it’s even worth it to learn all of that and try to apply it if I’ll never be even 10 percent as good as the pros. Maybe I’m just caught up in a limiting belief. What do you all think about this topic?

Here’s what I can do. It’s pretty sloppy.
https://youtube.com/shorts/G01X4E_LQu8

#2

Of course there is natural talent! There are people that are geniuses and are famous for their work, centuries later, like Liszt, Mozart, Bach, etc.

Now, turning to guitar, you are you. How can you learn as quickly as possible?

  • Get a great teacher.
  • Practice many hours per day.

It’s misleading to think somebody has been “playing for three years.” If that is one hour a week, that’s what, about 150 hours? But if it is eight hours a day, that might be approaching 6,000 hours—quite a difference. And are they studying under a teacher, or randomly looking around on YouTube trying to put a syllabus together?

This is talent plus a lot of homework plus a famous teacher, and one can find the same thing going back, younger and younger, to little kids with monster chops.

#3

It all takes time, and there is a hierarchy of things that need to be in place.

  1. Can the motion you are using do the thing you’re trying to do? Elbow won’t work for Eric Johnson, EVH rotation won’t work for bluegrass, etc…

  2. Practice speeds should be on the cusp of error. You need to mostly be playing successfully, with the occasional error because you are pushing yourself forward. If you practice fast enough that your hit rate is near zero, you’re wasting your time. If your hit rate is 100%, you’re just demonstrating what you already can do.

  3. You need to be self-aware. When mistakes happen, why do they happen? How can they be solved?

#4

“Large quantum differences in performance between you and and other players don’t happen because other players are more more dedicated, and train harder than you. And most of the time they don’t even happen because players have ridiculously better genetics than you. They happen because other players are simply doing things differently.”

The more I play, the more I find this statement to be true :slight_smile:

If I ever catch myself slaving over something for far too long with little improvement I know I have to admit to myself that I’m doing something wrong or sub-optimally and re-investigate what I’m doing with my right hand and see if I can change what I’ve currently been doing and find something that works better, that’s what I’d encourage you to do!

I do believe there is some level of natural ability in certain players but what could potentially be a big factor of success on the instrument is a person’s ability to quickly troubleshoot what is and isn’t working very quickly and adapt.

#5

Something that comes to mind:

Social media being a “thing” has changed how people approach any endeavor.

Think of any hobby / activity, do a quick search, and you’ll find someone that has apparently only done it for a marginal amount of time, but is now “world class”.

This can easily be discouraging, but you have to remember that:

  1. People can easily lie / bend the truth
    1a. Especially if they are trying to sell you something
  2. You’re comparing yourself to anyone with Internet access (100s of millions of people? A billion?)

I started playing guitar before social media, and the recurring story with people I listened to (like Petrucci) said they’d practice for something crazy like 8 hours a day. This made it “easy” for me to grind for years, telling myself when I wanted to quit that I just hadn’t put in the time.

When I was finally exposed to a different story (Shawn Lane apparently getting his technique down within like a couple years of playing, and then rarely practicing for more than like 30 minutes at a time) I felt more inspired than discouraged. I think I reframed it from being “put in the time” to “luck of the draw”, similar to how @Troy would talk about skateboarders nailing a trick after some random amount of experimenting. Some people get it within a few attempts, some a few dozen, some after hundreds / the thousands.

What helped me, and might help you, is think of it as an experiment: see how many variables you can change in your playing that might finally get you something that works.

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#6

Your test results show forearm rotation at 220. That’s high. Most people get super low numbers on that test. It’s a very specific skill, and getting a high number on it usually just reflects some type of prior training in the skill, from some other activity, even if you weren’t aware of it. If you can make a TC and show us video of this test,I’d like to see it.

In general, I don’t think you have to worry about “natural ability”. It’s super vague anyway, and probably encompasses a hundred different things that people do which are all governed by different underlying traits.

It’s also mostly a moot point. The vast majority of the things that people come here to learn are all well within the fat part of the bell curve for “average” human performance. When someone can’t do a thing, it almost always boils down to lack of knowledge of the existing techniques, awareness of what they are doing, and so on. It’s really not worth worrying about.

I recommend making a platform TC with video of your motion tests, and if possible, Magnet video of a phrase you find problematic. I’m certain we’ll see practical things we can work on right away.

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#7

Natural talent? You mean when you try your best to execute some music, and have a blast doing it? Fast or slow, matters not to me, although we all would like the option of going fast. Do what you can, I firmly believe that for whatever thing you can’t do that someone else can, you have your own things that you can do that they likely can’t. Not the way you do. There’s an ocean of music in everyone. Rock on. :grinning:

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#8

I think the only other thing I’d add here, is a lot of technique-related challanges are things that can be solved and trained (I was always an abysmal picker, and I’m actually not ashamed of myself these days), with time.

The truly hard thing, and I think maybe where I do buy “natural talent,” is the ability to come up with interesting things to play.

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#9

^ I would agree largely with this. There may be some physical advantages one might have, but the mechanical aspect of it all is fairly easy to overcome. You can watch people shredding with their feet, or so I am told by @jptk

Where the natural aptitude comes in lies with how you utilize it all - music and creativity as a whole. Its a bigger picture assessment with the scale tipped towards the creative aspect more so it does the physical.

Can that be overcome as well? To an extent sure.

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#10

I think this is one huge advantage of a teacher: they can do this troubleshooting based on their decades of experience.

Why not have a teacher to accelerate that search?

I’m totally sure, as Troy is an amazing teacher.

Anyway, I notice that people often seem hesitant to get a teacher… I’m sure that they have good reasons, but it’s definitely something to consider.

#11

Sounds like a good idea. I’ll make a TC platform critique with my motion tests and I’ll capture a video of a run that consistently turns out sloppy when I attempt it. Hell, I’ll muddle through a few phrases. I’ll record with my phone’s 120fps camera just so you can get a broader idea of where my struggles are coming from.

#12

You already know that your playing is by far better than 99% of people who will ever touch a guitar. I’m not sure why the humble post but…

Enjoy the process of this instrument. Enjoy the hills and valleys man.
Don’t obsess and get in your own way. Like Nuno said… no matter how good you get there is always someone better.
Don’t ruin it with your thoughts.

#13

I’m not sure if you’re asking me, the OP, or just rhetorically, but I have had experiences and know of teachers that are honestly bad at experimentation / understanding the variables associated with technique. They achieved theirs and don’t necessarily know how, and most will try to just teach what they know exclusively (which might not fit the student). Aside from that, teachers can be expensive, and also not in your vicinity (teaching over videochat is an option, if both have good internet / setups).

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#14

A good place to start is creating licks with chord tones on all the downbeats and mixing chord tones and scale notes on the offbeat. Feel like I haven’t heard anyone mention this on any of the hundreds of lessons I’ve watched on improvising - wish I would of had someone stress to me the importance of it earlier. Normally you just get taught a scale shape or an arpeggio and that’s about it, you might get told to experiment with being rhythmic if you’re lucky :laughing:

Once you get an ear for it you start developing a deeper knowledge of the colour of each interval and you can start adding more intervals on the downbeat (which creates more tension).