Thank you for the detailed response! :-)
What bothered me is you saying I could be good if I took YOUR advice. What made you good for 55 years dude?
The thing that makes me good is a simple method of concentration and comprehension of the musical landscape as well as my role in it. On a personal note, my advantages are that I was born in a classical music family. Both parents taught in the house until I was 7 years old. By 9, I was performing in a choir with the New York Philharmonic, which is when Leonard Bernstein encouraged me and became a super positive influence in my life. I began teaching guitar to kids in the building at 12... at 17 I was making up to $500. per week teaching in the Greenwich Village where I grew up.
At 30 I created a guitar institute where we hosted most of the REAL guitar legends for clinics, and all teachers had to have track records with #1 hit acts.
I'm sure you learned alot of it on your own COPYING licks. Is it still considered COPYING a lick if you add your own little flavour to it! When i play i'm not trying to copy anybody....
Good point, if I am in a foreign country and I keep repeating the sounds that I copied from my friend, who lives in that country.... then eventually when I say. "Where's the bathroom?" I will actually have more understanding of what those words mean because people will show me the bathroom each time and maybe even chuckle and correct my pronunciation. The higher enjoyment in guitar is not just to knock around the musical neighborhood and be able to order food without being spotted as a foreigner, but to be fully articulate in the language, grammar, and subtle context even if that language is music.
....its from my heart man whatever comes out comes out!! I have been speaking the language of music all my life and you tell me otherwise....
Certainly your heart is involved, and if you will allow me to continue with the example of a foreigner looking for the John..... When you need a bathroom you really feel it in your heart, and nobody will deny that, but if you're running around in London asking for the bathroom in Swahili instead of English, it will be hard to satisfy the nature of your heart's desire, which is to find the John. LOL Without REAL comprehension, one will never be musically FREE. To be fully musically lingually satisfied is to be fully cognizant of all aspects of the language that you are speaking, even if it includes the coordination of many more faculties than you use with words.
Are you free tomorrow?
Of course, I am here for any sincere musician and in order to make myself available, I have modified my studio to be 100% virtual online. This affords me tremendous flexibility in scheduling.
... with all due respect I take this as serious as a heartattack I study scales and modes Intervals but im still Copying?
Well, sure I am putting things in a way to provoke any student that has real possibilities to improve exponentially. That is the real fun, exponential improvement. The fact that your studies have not brought you to a point of... let's say a higher articulation or understanding than you would wish for is not your fault.
As I said I come from a long line of musicians and the fact that the word magician sounds very much like musician is not an accident as the way music really works has been as much of secret as kung fu was in the past. So you've been duped, as we all have, and even though you seem naturally expressive with some great energy and desire, still you've been led down a path of chasing your tail to some degree.
It's like the Buddha Masters are happy to have the student chase his ego for 40 years, justifying that as long as the student is stupid enough to go through it, then let him. The problem is that according to Buddhism the thing they are chasing which is their ego, doesn't exist. LOL neither do the modes exist my friend… In a deeper sense, and that deeper sense is where the virtuosos live....
I use them in my playing in various waves! In a world where everything has been done I think I'm doing pretty good.
Honestly I don't remember your video, and I searched around and couldn't find any video of you playing in the time I had, so I'll certainly take your word for it.
You know there is music and there's "folk music". In other words folks make all kinds of music and sounds and probably 80% of all the stuff that's composed for pop music are simplistic beginner exercises. So that's folk music and I don't want to put folks down for making music, but that's a far cry from what I offer. What I offer is to take the conclusions of classical music theory and apply them to the instrument called guitar in terms of how the instrument was developed and how the instrument actually works. The other thing I offer is to understand theory in terms of what it really is. Fortunately I have been at the crossroads up close and in person as part of the electric guitar revolution and how it changed music theory forever by introducing demi-tones that have a high content of common tones over a musical system that includes a tritones played in every chord.
How does one personally deliver a scholarship? Curious.
Okay money is the first step that students use to take themselves out of the big game. This is great when you're going to a local music store, but when you're dealing with a bona fide guitar Maestro, then having money be an issue is a perfect failsafe for self sabotage. Even you brought up the money as if it might disqualify me somehow. lol although you are smart to be skeptical. :-) You see the idea is that if the student takes on more scholarship, in other words passes tests and completes tasks on time, then that is rewarded by paying less tuition, or no tuition...the motivation is expotential improvement.
My programs are very simple. Free correspondence program with almost daily attention. My sessions now are rated at a Joe Satriani level teacher, which is about $1800. minimum booking value. Obviously people can't afford that, so aside from scholarships, my packages are $99.per month, $200. per month, and the fast-track program $600 per month. All of those have a built-in scholarship immediately of more than 50% based on standard (non-maestro) commercial value.
Can it be done over Skype?
Absolutely… I am attentive to daily correspondence and I review any videos of students progress on a daily basis. The Skype lessons work fantastic, largely because file transfers are so easy and so the session beome more of a clinic the way I conduct them. I also use livestream in order for you to have full stereo access to the session. I recommend a minimum of one WebCam lesson per week and 2 is great. If you are on the fast-track with a scholarship then it's every day lessons on WebCam. I also make videos at the drop of a hat that are personally addressing the issues that you request.
How many students are you teaching Now?
All my students are online now… As far as how many, I just kicked out all my live clients and students out so that I could go "all virtual" only about 3 months ago. So I will be able to offer this service for at least several months or more until I reach capacity and then I will have to create a waiting list. As far as live students, I've taught over 5000 students including many that went on to become big names, and many that are big names. I taught online (and in person) a student who is one of the major songwriters of our times, for example.
How musch time could you devote to lessons and how long would they be?
I recommend exponential improvement for the super valuable time that you take for your instrument. Until I actually see you playing and work with you I can't be overly specific, however the way for exponentially improving is sort of a brain games style program where you perform five-minute interactions for a minimum five times a day. These interactions could be biofeedback pitch games on your phone, bona fide metronome exercises to perfect your core tempo, or theory comprehension puzzles. The webcam lessons are 40 minutes.
I need a mentor and I have been trying to find the right one.
Well I don't know about being the right one, but I will say that there are very few of me around. By "me", I mean people who have enough completed education and application in the science of music, people who have also created and directed an Institute to apply that science with the top players for 20 years and they are not on every corner.... For me to have been in the thick of it, in the studio and sometimes on stage with the actual creators of this revolution in musical instrumentation and theory application.... and to have had my 1st electric guitar gig in the Cafe Wha? where I met Jimi Hendrix, does make me unique, but not alone. When it comes to teaching electric guitar I am not the only "man" as there is Wesley the Wright, Steve Vai, and many others, however I seem to be the man that is "available". lol
Meet me at the crossroads to get the secret of music, which I will give you by contacting me at Skype at "guitarcrossroads" thnx :-)
2) FREE Webcam Guitar Lessons - no sign up - no obligation
CALL Paul to book your free lessons now: (707) 634-4447
spartacusofguitar@gmail.com
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