|
A CAREER
in GUITAR
Glenn Gould,
Bach greatest interpreter ever, talks about why he said NO to a concert
career. |
Today
we know for a fact that it takes 10.000 hours of intelligent practice
(approximately 10 years) to excel in any chosen discipline. Yes, 10.000
hours. Every great musician you know had to go through that 10 years incubation
period and you are no exception. Yes, Mozart was being tutored by his dad
from a very early age, and composed his first great works at the age of
21... he had already accumulated 18 years of work by the time he became
a star. Therefore, the myth that talent was the only ingredient in the
Mozart success story, is just that, a myth. He had a spark of talent that
the right teachers, surroundings and hard work sculpted in the colossal
figure we know today. A very similar example of this type of growth is
Tiger Wood. His father Earl coached him from the tender age of 4 months,
had his first official golf lessons at 4 and by the time he was 21 he was
wearing his first green jacket at the Augusta Golf Master. He too had accumulated
17 years of practice by the time he was 21. Yes, no miracle stories dear
friend...just the right circumstances, coaches and A LOT of hard work.
Beginning at a young age is always an advantage because parts of the brain
that are assigned to coordination, muscular activity in general etc. become
active very soon and the brain is forever wired for instrumental playing
(or any other discipline). Talent is really misleading because we think
that the great achievers in life were "gifted". False ! The process goes
something like this: A good teacher (good is the keyword) immediately spots
talent and works more intensely with a given student and, subsequently,
the student becomes motivated and the effects works like a multiplier,
it feeds itself and growth on all fronts is faster... the wheel is turning
and, a few thousand hours later, a great player will be born. For the non
talented player, the end result can still be the same only he will have
to work harder and will seldom have the road ahead paved... One thing is
sure though. Of all the ingredients necessary to make it to success, the
most valuable one is a predisposition to HARD WORK. Talent is a bonus but
talent alone will not suffice. I am sure you have noticed by now
how Oriental players are progressively and steadily becoming the best at
several musical disciplines. It is not genetic...I assure you, all humans
have the same number and type of chromosomes. It is cultural. It comes
from hundreds of years back. Orientals were always dealt a difficult hand
and they had to work much harder to survive. When my ancestors were planting
and harvesting corn in Europe, the Chinese were doing the same with rice.
Rice is much harder to plant, maintain and to harvest. My ancestors could
lay back and look at the stars much longer than the Chinese counterpart.
Oriental players can practice much harder and for longer stretches
of time and will have the necessary patience to wait for the results (read
about guitarist Kazuhito Yamashita in my other
article on Guitar Timeline).
"Do I have
it ?" You must have asked yourself this question many times.
Especially if you are working hard at the guitar. My students' parents
ask me this question as soon as the first class is over. I know that parents
want the best for their children, and I believe a teacher has to be a parent
as well as a teacher. Eventually, we all want to make sure that we are
doing what we were designed to do. Doing that, is the only way we
will really be happy and parents want us to be happy. Who are we
asking the question to ? or, who do we think has the answer to the question?
Before you
venture in answering this question, let me give you an insight into some
very important "guitarristic" matters that you have the right and obligation
to know, matters which I' ve matured throughout my life experience and
education. All these matters point in one direction: Find out exactly
what role you and your music will be "playing" and make sure you
know yourself very well because the better you know yourself, the more
likely it is that you will be "a happy guitarist".
The Matters:
I would not
be writing this and we would not know a classical guitar world if it were
not for Andres Segovia. We are not just talking about "a" guitarist, we
are talking about a man who lived the whole twentieth Century (Segovia
died in 1987), the one century that has seen more changes than any other
century before or since. If you were born anywhere between 1893 and 1987,
you can say with all certainty that you were a Segovia contemporary.
For most of
the 1990s, the classical guitar world was pretty much divided like this:
those who "dared" to criticize the maestro, those who wanted
the man "beatified" (the step prior to becoming a Saint), and those
who used the Segovia name to get somewhere.
I know Spaniards
very well. For one thing, a good percentage of my blood is Spanish (My
grandmother was De Niquesa Bellucci).
Segovia was
Andalusian
and a Spaniard. That translates into incredibly
stubborn
and poetic. Then, of course, he was also a man.
From age 7
to 16, the only guitarists I knew were: Segovia and my teacher Vincenzo
Calsolaro. The only guitarist my teacher Vincenzo seemed to know was Segovia
(at least that seemed to be the case..."Segovia this, Segovia that..").
The only concert I attended was...of course ! a Segovia concert in
Bari ! No need to say that by the time I was 17, my life's goal was to
meet the MAESTRO !! I did, 5 years later in Madrid. This was the
heavyweight sentence in all my resumes. "Renato studied with Segovia !!".
After all, who knew Calsolaro - or Carlevaro for that matter - to even
bother including them in the resume? How could you possibly dream to make
it as a guitarist without Segovia's approval?
Time and a
great musicianship have made Segovia a really gigantic figure and it is
under this light that I will continue writing. Justice has to be made and
justice must be blindfolded.
I knew the
man in his nineties! He was soft and gentle, and everything I can say concerning
my personal experience with him is good. I certainly got the best
from him: words of wisdom and a clear idea of what I did not want for a
life. But there are many not so happy student-teacher anecdotes that almost
never make it to the guitar magazines and are as real as the ones that
do make it to the magazines or guitar books. It seems that most of my colleagues
are still afraid that the maestro might hear them from "beyond" and disapprove.
In
Graham
Wade's book Maestro Segovia you read the following anecdote
on page 72
Now ask yourself:
Is this the "maestro" I want to become? The "Mexican guitarist"
had a name and a dream, which were probably shattered that day, beyond
the amusement that it may cause to you or me when reading the anecdote..
PART
2
In the past
2 centuries (see the classical guitar timeline), the music profession
has undergone some of its most dramatic changes. Musicians in turn, have
had to cope with some almost inhuman situation, or to be more precise,
unmusical situations both instrumentally and in their lifestyles in order
to cope with these changes. There are some historical facts that have certainly
played a key part in reshaping musical life. The always more diminished
role of the Church, and spiritual life in general, in secular matters
is definitely one of the most influential. The one thing that has not changed
is human vanity. Vanity, ego, moi etc., are in a way, survival instruments.
When these are untamed or out of control, then the result is a monster.
This is so much true that I spent my first 14 years as a guitarist thinking
that success or personal achievement and prestige were to be measured according
to the amount of "fame" or public recognition that the profession carried
with it. What an horror !
The following
are some of the most important considerations to be made by the aspiring
guitarist.
-
If you want to
be a famous guitarist, remember that there is no such thing as a "school
for famous guitarists". If you want to be famous, then you are probably
in your teens or twenties at most. If you are in your thirties or forties
I suggest you see a priest or psychiatrist.
-
Remember that
Segovia is dead and recording a CD with his mediocre compositions today
will not give a "push" to your career but a kick good bye.
-
If you think John
Williams is famous, then you ought to know that people attending his concerts
often think that they will hear John T Williams, the film score composer.
I received this e-mail today -Dec 25th 2002- from China: "Hi,
first of all great job! Your page is soooo fantastic, it delivers everything
I wanted to know about tremolo and mangore! I detected that a guitarist
named John Williams recorded "La Catedral". But there is also a well known
film composer named John Williams (Star Wars, Superman). Are these two
persons the same person??? Merry X-Mas!!!."-
Or hear the short
clip below of John Williams himself clarifying the issue at a recent concert
in Japan:
No guitarist has
ever been famous except for Andres Segovia and no other guitarist will
ever be that famous again.... CONTINUES
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