Why bother doing Etudes? (Teachers)

[angelique]

anyone who shares is, in essence, a teacher after all!

thanks for so much feedback guys!

[arby]

“The second volume of The Christopher Parkening Guitar Method is based on the same premise as the first: to learn guitar technique and musicianship by playing beautiful pieces of music. Practicing is more enjoyable and rewarding while working on exciting and inspiring compositions instead of dry exercises.” - Christopher Parkening

”Play only pieces you love.” - Pepe Romero

“Always pick pieces within your abilities. Take problems out of a piece and turn them into exercises.” - Pepe Romero

[TedtheBear]

“The second volume of The Christopher Parkening Guitar Method is based on the same premise as the first: to learn guitar technique and musicianship by playing beautiful pieces of music. Practicing is more enjoyable and rewarding while working on exciting and inspiring compositions instead of dry exercises.” - Christopher Parkening

”Play only pieces you love.” - Pepe Romero

“Always pick pieces within your abilities. Take problems out of a piece a turn them into exercises.” - Pepe Romero

The problem IS, not many heed this. The key words here are your ability. As one who is self taught (meaning that I receive no formal instruction), I can tell you that there are not many self taught individuals that exercise retraints. A teacher knows what to have you practice, and when. Parkening's books don't just throw one to the dogs. There's gradual progress (if you follow it). Each lesson a little more difficult.

[black_moonlight]

I'm a seft-taught and I figured one of the greatest problems for self-taughts : you get bored before you could finished half of method book ( of any kind).
I know it's best way to deal w/ techniques before play some REAL pieces but ... .

[arby]

I'm a seft-taught and I figured one of the greatest problems for self-taughts : you get bored before you could finished half of method book ( of any kind).
I know it's best way to deal w/ techniques before play some REAL pieces but ... .

Even with a teacher this can happen. It is absolutely grueling to have a study assigned that bores you, feeling you must have it nailed by the next lesson.

[angelique]

Even with a teacher this can happen..

Yup...I spent 2 years with a teacher who didn't have any problems with me "rushing through stuff". I kept asking him, "Do you think I should be doing this? Is this too advanced for me? Am I going too fast?" One of the reasons why I quit because the more difficult the material got, the worse I played, and he didn't do anything or say anything and I just got frustrated!

[citizen110]

I played rock and pop music on guitar for many years and since I've started learning to play in the classical style its like I'm a beginner again! And in a very real sense I am. I've already discovered my lack of dexterity with the 'a' of my right hand-something I wasn't aware of at all before! The studies are an essential part of developing the basic techniques.

[rdc1991]

If you have ever played Regondi's 10 etudes, then there should be no question as to wether an Etude can be a piece on its own. These are absolute gems. There beauty make them more valuable as a performance piece than they are as a mere study.

[RJay]

Hi rdc. If I'm not mistaken your avatar is a picture of Regondi. Do you have some sort of admiration or connection here that you are not telling us about? I'm not trying to be anoying or abusive, I am really courious about your admiration of Regondi... and please, if you can tell us something here that we really shouldn't know please ramble on.

[leeman]

Good question. Simple Answer.

Did you crawl first or walk first? Did you walk first or run first?

Everything we learn is a gradual process and studies allow us to do this. Much of what we learn in life is involuntary and we don't break it into steps and observe it. However, unconciously our brains do. In performing etudes we are conciously breaking our practice to develop certain technical skills.

Brouwer's studies for example, well the last 10 more so, state the purpose of the etude and allow us to focus specifically on a skill - e.g. slurs, etc.

Specific pieces of music, while they may incorporate aspects of these skills do not allow the musician to focus specifically on the skill and develop to the level whereby it is second nature, i.e. going from a crawl to a walk.

[Guitar Slim]

”Play only pieces you love.” - Pepe Romero

“Always pick pieces within your abilities. Take problems out of a piece a turn them into exercises.” - Pepe Romero

Easy for Pepe to say, who has been playing guitar longer than he's been on solid foods!

For the rest of us, however...

Look at it this way. Few of us enjoy doing the technical work. We all want to get right to the music. But for aspiring students who hope to improve and progress to more difficult pieces, etudes and exercises are actually a shortcut. As Martin points out, etudes focus on a host of general techniques that can be applied to a whole lot of different pieces. Improving general technique allows you to play more difficult pieces with greater ease, and to learn them faster.

[JohnRoss]

Surely technical aspects, theory and exercises like scales and arpeggios are simply part of becoming a rounded musician? In the 'real' musical world, whether you are a teacher or a performer, you can't always pick and choose what you do or play, and you can't consider yourself a complete guitarist if you can't cut it at, e.g., sight reading, or ornamentation, or playing by ear, or accompaniment, or following a conductor, or improvising, or explaining a harmonic progression to a student, or whatever. You can't get out of it by saying "No, I never learned that because it bored me." I taught English as a Foreign Language for years, and the same applies: I used to know foreign businessmen and bureaucrats who used English every day and were 100% competent in their own little world, but who still felt the need to study because the English speaker who can't deal with a particular situation, going to the doctor, talking on the phone, whatever, is not really an English speaker. In language teaching, drills are one of the ways of getting past that, like scales and arpeggios in music.

[Trent in WA]

Surely technical aspects, theory and exercises like scales and arpeggios are simply part of becoming a rounded musician? In the 'real' musical world, whether you are a teacher or a performer, you can't always pick and choose what you do or play, and you can't consider yourself a complete guitarist if you can't cut it at, e.g., sight reading, or ornamentation, or playing by ear, or accompaniment, or following a conductor, or improvising, or explaining a harmonic progression to a student, or whatever. You can't get out of it by saying "No, I never learned that because it bored me." I taught English as a Foreign Language for years, and the same applies: I used to know foreign businessmen and bureaucrats who used English every day and were 100% competent in their own little world, but who still felt the need to study because the English speaker who can't deal with a particular situation, going to the doctor, talking on the phone, whatever, is not really an English speaker. In language teaching, drills are one of the ways of getting past that, like scales and arpeggios in music.

To be fair, though, it's not always obvious in looking at a piece labeled a "study" what exactly it is that you're supposed to be studying. I quite like Sor's pedagogical pieces, but many of them seem to fall more in the category of nice little pieces of music rather than technical studies. You really need a competent teacher or a good book (like Tanenbaum's guides to Carcassi, Sor, and Brouwer) to get the purpose and use of many studies. That's not the case with, say, most violin studies: if you even casually sightread through Kreutzer #9, it's obvious that it's a string-crossing exercise.

[JohnRoss]

Ah, sure, there was a 19th century fashion for putting the name "etude" to short works which didn't necessarily have much study purpose, wasn't there? Webster's has this double definition:
1 : a piece of music for the practice of a point of technique
2 : a composition built on a technical motive but played for its artistic value
According to that, the 1st kind of etude would be more or less like practising scales, the 2nd kind would be more showing off that you can do something flash, like the Chopin etudes. I thought we were talking about the kind of study you would practise or have a student practise to improve your/his technique or correct a fault.

[guitarmonk]

I came across a title of the book long time ago. It said "Questions are the Answers".

I think this question has the answer in itself, which means you are right.