Week 2: "Brazilian Rhythms Rendezvous"

Steve Pederson That is really impressive, Steve. You have the entire piece under your fingers! Looking forward to seeing you progress on this.

Nice 'Heroic' camera angle.

Steve Pederson great job and that is a seriously difficult piece! I cannot imagine how guitarists manage to memorize it and play it but it looks like you work out most of it. Did Villa Lobos used those Torres guitar too? May explain the 7 fret stretch. Those guitar were much smaller than ours now. 

Jack Stewart Thanks Jack! 

Blaise Laflamme Thanks Blaise! The comment about the camera angle was kind of a joke. I recorded in my bedroom, and that was the only angle I could get. I thought it was very cinematic, though, like an old Alfred Hitchcock trick. Maybe I should've done it in black and white! 

don Thanks Don! That's an interesting point about size of the guitar Villa Lobos might have played. I actually considered playing this with a capo to make it a bit easier.

As for memorization, this piece has a LOT of repeats, so that helps. I think the other thing that helps is that I've been listening to and have loved this piece for a LONG time, so I think on one level I have just internalized it. I have a good deal of it memorized, but I am looking at sheet music for this recording. 

Steve Pederson Ya, listening definitely helps. On a somewhat related topic,  I remember there was this tonebase live stream on youtube with Seymour Bernstein. I may be wrong but I think he said he will always ask his student to play simple tune like Fur Elise from memory and by ear to help them with ear training. This will in future help them to play pieces from memory easier. 

Once you can play the melody on this piece on the guitar, I think the rest should be easy to remember. Just out of curiosity which measure is that with the 7 fret stretch? 

Blaise Laflamme Yes, still using the MV88+, which comes with a little tripod that works great in my office/studio but not so much in my bedroom. I recorded in there because simply I needed some quiet space. 

Steve Pederson This is coming along well, Steve. About that stretch, it's certainly a stumbling block in this piece! I frankly doubt a shorter scale length would help much. The absolute difference in stretch distance between a Torres and a modern standard instrument would likely be only a few millimetres. (It would probably be easy on a ukulele though!) My impression is that your hand is large enough to manage the stretch if you approach it a little differently. (Mircea has a video somewhere on ToneBase in which he discusses how to facilitate difficult stretches.) Here are a couple of 'tricks' you might find useful: (i) play the initial chord (I guess it could be called a D13 in first inversion) with a full barre - even though the barre is not actually needed. This will make it easier to fully expand your hand; (ii) don't worry if your pinky is in non-canonic position at the 7th fret - if necessary, use the side of the finger, as is common in non-classical genres. (If your hand is large enough, either (i) or (ii) alone may be all that's needed.) I find this works for me, and I certainly don't have long fingers. Btw, having said all that, I think your solution is a good one, and very useful as a practical performance option!

David Krupka Thank you David! I appreciate the suggestions. Great ideas. I've never heard the expression "non-canonic" refer to guitar playing before, but it totally makes sense! 

Ron Thanks Ron! I appreciate it. David Krupka also suggested the barre idea, and I think it's worth a shot. I will see if that's something that I can eventually work into my playing of this song as I get more and more comfortable with it. 

Steve Pederson Good work! That is a lot if you started from scratch.

You are struggling with the same stretch I am fighting with. I will try to remove one of the notes as you did! But if it helps, I changed the fingering as follows (they are on your ~2:17 and ~3:23):

This way your left will be on the frets and most important at the right angle to place finger 2 on the f# and 4 on the b (first string), instead of jumping abruptly from the first position to the tough stretch.

Ernesto Thanks Ernesto! The part I'm having difficulty with is actually the measure just after this - where the chord is made up of F# - C - D - B. Hitting that high B with all those other notes is just not happening for me right now. I am leaving out the D note, and that seems to work.  

Steve Pederson I should have explained better... I changed the fingering of the bar prior to the problem as it makes the pinky to be on fret 7 (and just shift from string 4 to 1) and finger 2 just has to move one fret behind. For me it is preparation, and avoid the shift where it is the hardest. Also, my thumb goes all the way down to the bottom of the arm of the fretboard.

Anyway, as I said, the removing of one note of the chord works great!

Ernesto Ah, now I understand what you're referring to. Yes, that's a great idea! Getting the left hand into position would definitely make that chord easier to reach more quickly. Thanks for the suggestion!