Great Bit of Advice!

TGMatt
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Tue May 12, 2009 12:05 pm

I posted this originally in the Technical Forum but it may be more appropriate here in General Discussion:

One of the best bits of advice I've heard in the last few years came from Classical guitarist Philip Hii. He is very big on left hand fluidity and planting the fingers as early as possible. I never really thought too much about the timing of planting my left-hand fingers--I always thought if I got them there before the next fingering I was OK. So, I began to focus on making the fingering as quickly as possible (given all other musical considerations) rather than waiting. I have to say it really has made a difference! It has really cleaned up my sound.

I know he has an approach to guitar--AOV I think it is. I have never researched it beyond his website--nor do I want to trample on Neil's toes, whose website this is and has his own great approach! Nevertheless I thought this was great advice on something that is often overlooked by not only beginner and intermediate players, but advanced ones as well.

A great quote from his website:

"You don't have to practice countless exercises or studies. I have never practiced any of those hundreds of Giuliani exercises, and I don't recommend them.

The truth is speed and dexterity is mostly dependent on creating good conditions in the body, not on how many times you repeat some exercises.

If you have those conditions, speed naturally results."

http://www.philiphii.com/aov/more/