Tuesday, November 5, 2024
GuitarGuitar Tips & HacksTips & Hacks

6 Things The Pros Have (And You Can Too)


Today I’m discussing 6 things the pros have that can help you. If you learn these things, or avoid the corresponding mistakes, you can really level up your guitar game. I hope you enjoy the video!

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0:00 What and why
0:29 Number 1
1:21 Number 2
3:01 Number 3
4:03 Number 4
5:29 Number 5
6:15 Number 6
7:12 The Bonus

#Pros

Originally posted by UCvlPdKSXxjPAQ2jwYgKEJ-A at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrNdflEZH_M

31 thoughts on “6 Things The Pros Have (And You Can Too)

  • Hey Elmo i was wondering if you could try out one of those Leo Jaymz Monsoon guitars as apparently the owner of Leo Jaymz collaborated with the youtuber known as The Bald Shredder Richard James for specs on making them and look like a great budget guitar but would love to hear your thoughts on one, thank you for your awesome and honest content Elmo

    Reply
  • Hi Elmo. I stopped playing for some years but now I want learn well the foundations.
    First step: learn every note on the freatborad. Boring as f*** but the results have been very interesting.
    Quick question: Have you ever played with a Hohner Professional ST Special Strat or something of the brand? If yes, quality-wise, are they comparable to what?
    I'm choosing between a used one (1989) and a JS300 (maybe JS400) because of reviews I've seen/read.
    Thanks and cheers from Portugal!

    Reply
  • Hey Elmo, I was wondering if you've had any experience with the affordable Jackson line of guitars, in particular the Dinky JS11, JS12, JS20, JS22 or the SC JS22, JS1X, JS32T?

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  • Ear training and identifying chord qualities, relative pitch, some solfeggio, humming melodies all and more fall under your 1st suggestion.. All your suggestions are gold here ????????

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  • Whenever I see something new from you, Elmo, I do my best to watch it.

    Again, you may be Finland's most valuable export: The export of ideas on guitar, learning and the pursuit of excellence.

    Best Wishes.

    Reply
  • No.1 problem i had when learning was pressing to hard on the strings. I was intermediate for years then i decided that I wanted to get better so i expanded to new genre, that helped me emencely.

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  • Number 5 saw a video of John Williams taking advice from Paco Peña about how to play a change in Sevilla he had been playing probably for 30 years + and still not happy with it, no one of us would know but he was still working on it every day

    Reply
  • what do pros have and you don't?
    a contract to owe a record company $$
    90% of signed acts END UP OWING $$ to the Suits and working in Dollar General
    because they spent their youth chasing a bag

    Reply
  • …"you are never the finished article". Great advise, we never stop learning. Good video Elmo.

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  • I still find it strange that so many guitar players have trouble with ,or a complete absence of, bending and vibratos. When I first began to learn lead guitar on electric, this was the first thing I worked on,… before scales, boxes, picking ,or anything. The one thing that makes electric guitar soloing different is that you can do this at all. Most instruments are not capable of this sort of thing, so why play electric guitar ( even jazz), if you don't use vibrato and bending…. you might as well play piano. George Harrison on "Come Together" was the first time I heard this, and soon after I heard Jimi and Eric C , I knew this was important to work on. One afternoon,I stumbled on ( by accident, while trying to play " Who knows" off Band of Gypsies live) what I later learned were called pentatonic scales, I just called them five boxes which repeated shapes up and fown the neck. Learning that first blues lick ( bending the fourth up to the fifth, playing it agsin on string two , then the root on the top string followed by a bend on the second string, showed me that the better players sll felt where the bend was going and also somehow executed the vibrato in time with the underlying beats. Perhaps because I didn't have TABs in thise days, I listened hard ,and watched closely whenever I saw film of Jimi or Eric or anyone else do this. From that time on I couldn't abide anyone not doing this on guitar, unless they were playing flamenco finger picked. The only way to make guitar leads expressive, as a human voice is, is to use brnds , slides and vibratos. If you took them away from an Eric Clapton solo, the stiff little notes,although not being out of key would be so boring and wooden that anyone would switch off. For heaven's sake ,even Django Reinhardt does all sorts of bending, and he's playing jazz on acoustic! The problem is that people learn guitar now using all four left-hand fingers ;( not a problem by itself) and it's hard to relate to the usual Johnny Winter style bends and vibratos unless you use a slightly slanted fingering with the first three fingers. To shred ,and play most three note per string shreddy phrases you have to really use that little finger, but this usually happens by being taught rather than aping things by ear, and if like me, you've played using only three fretting fingers for many years, it's hard to relearn hand positions needed to shred fast alternate picked passages. The upside is you think more of a physical feel in the hand as you vary pressure on the neck and fingerboard, and the tendancy is to learn stuff from a combination of ear-percieved subtlety, and sensual degrees of tension. If you're reading tabs of rapid notes, then you're thinking of the notes as just part of a construct, and because they are flying by you have no time or any inclination to afford an individual note any expressive quality ,… so the music sounds neutral and the result is heard as a musical structure, not actuall physical pressure waves against your ears and body.

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  • Thanks for another great video Elmo. I am personally most guilty of #6, because of my work schedule the past month I have barely even been able to touch my guitars. ????????????

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  • I'd like to add. Having a consistent pressure of your fingers on your strings. Putting to much pressure on a note can often bend it slightly out of shape with horrible results. And if you don't use the same pressure on all strings and notes you will always sound slightly out of tune! This of course will vary between different types of frets some are higher and will yield more out of tune notes. And you should know Elmo since you are using a scalloped neck(and doing so with bravissimo). This is something I often encounter especially with less experienced guitarists when I mix bands.

    Reply
  • Bends and vibrato were the banes of my existence for years. The internet was still just starting out and the only local teacher was a jazzhead who was great but who barely knew what a string bend was. It took me ages to even work out the fulcrum mechanic, and by that time I'd already gotten the beginnings of RSI by trying to do heavy bent vibrato using mostly my fingers.
    These days everyone can find the mechanics in a trice but to my surprise I still hear lots of unmusical and frankly tasteless vibratos.
    What I wouldn't give to go back in time…

    Reply

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