Group 2

Improve your Arpeggios in Two Weeks with Evan Taucher!

Arpeggios are a fundamental part of guitar technique, but are you practicing them in a way where you will improve over time? Oftentimes we find ourselves stuck in the same routine with old habits that leave our arpeggios sounding imprecise and strained. Join this intensive to break out of the box and work on our arpeggios in a precise way that will challenge your mind, and then your fingers.

  • Course Period: October 17th - 28th
  • Optional check-In via Zoom: October 24th, 10 am PST

Assignment Video for Week 1

Please follow along and share a video of yourself with the exercises Evan is presenting in his video! Scores of Villa-Lobos Prelude no.4 and Giuliani op.48 no.5 attached!

 

Week 1 video submissions should include one or more of the following:

  • preparation exercise with metronome on, playing one note per click
  • accent exercise with metronome, cycling through accenting different fingers

 

IMSLP273551-PMLP444038-HVL-Preludes-Eschig Kopie

IMSLP26384-PMLP58657-Giuliani_Esercizio_Op48

IMSLP273547-PMLP224198-HVL-Estudos-Eschig1953 (1)

The assignment  Video for Week 2 will be shared after the Zoom Session on October 24th!

 

Assignment Video for Week 2

Week 2 submissions should include one or more of the following:

  • pluck and relax exercise
  • pimiaimi arpeggio
  • pmimamim arpeggio 
  • pamamaia arpeggio
  • a repertoire example (Giuliani Etude 5 op.48 or Prelude 4 arpeggios by Villa Lobos)
47replies Oldest first
  • Oldest first
  • Newest first
  • Active threads
  • Popular
  • Hello Evan, great video.   I tried the first exercise on open string.  I find that I instinctively planting all three fingers (i,m,a) after playing the thumb, rather than sequential planting.  Do the two techniques have their place in different repertoires?   Thank you.  Vincent

    Like
      • Evan Taucher
      • Classical Guitarist and Educator
      • Evan
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Vincent Tam hi Vincent, great question. Your suspicion is correct- both full preparation and sequential preparation have their place in the repertoire. Sometimes with extremely fast arpeggios, full preparation is great to practice. When the tempo is slower however, sequential preparation is preferable as it doesn’t mute the notes if they are ringing (and they often times are!). Both are great to practice, but since sequential preparation is fairly new to you, this would be a great thing to focus on for now. I hope that helps!

      Like 1
    • Evan Taucher Thank you.

      Like
    • Barney
    • Barney
    • 1 yr ago
    • Reported - view

    Hi Evan,

    I've never used this sequential planting technique,  so here is my current status.  I included a slow version so you can view the RH movements.  I also attempted (a few times) some faster arpeggios with accented strings. 

    Please review and let me know your comments.  I want to make sure I'm moving in the right direction before proceeding further.  Thanks!

    Like
      • Evan Taucher
      • Classical Guitarist and Educator
      • Evan
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Barney Barney, thank you for the video! I think it's rather beautiful how the camera's focus shifts from the mic to your fingers a few seconds through. I think I could watch for hours...haha!

      I have to say that your preparation is looking great!! One thing I'd mention for you to try is- while i and m are doing their thing, try slowly bringing back your thumb to the 4th string. This is an advanced concept but a necessary one since the thumb is the only digit that has to fight gravity on the guitar. I was actually taught the exact way that you are playing now, but over the years I realized that I didn't like my thumb having to "shoot" or "leap" back to the 4th string. Later on after speaking with some peers of mine, I noticed that they slowly bring back their thumb, so that when it's time to prepare, it's close by just like the other fingers. Again, to be clear - your thumb still shouldn't touch the 4th string until your a finger has played, but it will be closer and close as you play i and m. 

      Let me know if that makes sense.

      The other thing I wanted to mention about your video is to make sure your being perfectly rhythmically precise. Setting your metronome on subdivisions may help you stay more perfectly locked in. Believe it or not, building rhythmic precisions here may be of even more use than everything I explained above. Because coordination on the guitar is paramount, if the rhythm isn't super precise in the RH, it's hard to put everything together. 

       

      Hope this helps Barney, and great work!

      Like
      • Barney
      • Barney
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Evan Taucher Glad you enjoyed the silly stuff the "auto" focus on my camera was doing, haha. 

      I appreciate your advice on the Thumb and Rhythm issues.  I will concentrate more on these going forward.  Thanks very much for your guidance!!

      Like 1
    • Barney
    • Barney
    • 1 yr ago
    • Reported - view

    Hi Evan,  The general study of Arpeggios( Guiliani, Carlevaro, etc.) require a tremendous amount of time to practice properly.  In order to significantly reduce the daily time required, what Arpeggio patterns are the most important and which cover the majority of key issues we will encounter in most repertoire?  In other words, I'm looking for an effective shortcut.  Thanks!

    Like
      • Evan Taucher
      • Classical Guitarist and Educator
      • Evan
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Barney I'm glad you asked, because the week 2 video is coming soon on precisely that! In that video I talked about the following patterns:

      Pimiaimi

      pmimamim

      pamaiama

       

      the 120 Giuliani RH studies really are the most common arpeggios. I'd recommend isolating just a few numbers at a time (like the first page for instance) and working at building those everyday rather than thinking of it as "lets work through this whole book". Same with Carlevaro. We must spend time practicing all the most common patterns, but the "uncommon" ones in those books are the ones we learn the most from because it challenges our minds and our fingers. That's my theory anyways!

      Cheers,

      Evan

      Like
      • Barney
      • Barney
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Evan Taucher Great, thanks Evan!  In the first week video, your focus was mainly on sequential planting ascending.  Will you cover how to do sequential planting in descending arpeggios?

      Like
    • Barney
    • Barney
    • 1 yr ago
    • Reported - view

    I was just looking at the Villa Lobos Prelude No.4 page 2, Line 1,  2nd measure, 4th beat.  Is there a typo?   It shows D natural on 6th string, G, F natural, and B.  In order for the Arpeggio's Left hand pattern to stay consistent, should that "G" really be a "B"?

    Like
    • Barney  I'd say that most certainly is a mistake that crept into the score unless VL was feeling cute and stuck an oddball in the middle of those 5 1/2 measures of that one shape. I checked and it is fixed in the Zigante edition.

      Like
      • Barney
      • Barney
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Steve Price 

      Like
      • Barney
      • Barney
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Steve Price Thanks Steve!!

      Like 1
    • Barney  Steve Price right, thanks for correction, btw you mean the 3rd beat , not the 4th

      Like
      • Barney
      • Barney
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      joosje Thanks Joosje!  Yes, I meant the 3rd beat. 

      Like
  • Hello Group 2 and Evan,

    Here are two short videos - exercises 1 and 2, and the first few measures of the Giuliani etude. Working this slow is making me focus on the mechanics of each finger and also making sure that I don't cut of the ringing of string to string. It is harder than I had anticipated.

    (My glasses are treated for blue screens/computers so they sometimes pick up a funny glow when recording.) 

     

    Martha Kreipke, St. Louis, MO

    Like
      • Evan Taucher
      • Classical Guitarist and Educator
      • Evan
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Martha Kreipke Martha, fantastic videos! Thanks for recording. The first video was excellent. You look relaxed, rhythmically accurate and very efficient. Brava! One thing to consider is your a finger. When you're ascending, by the time you're playing your m finger, your a finger is at a disadvantage by not being above the 1st string. It's too "tucked" at that moment. You can try letting your a finger relax above the 1st string and just pluck m, a, m, a and try and see if you can let a relax a little quicker back to the spot above the first string (in the ready-to-pluck position). I hope that makes sense! Interestingly in the 2nd video, that doesn't seem to be as big of an issue, but I would still recommend relaxing the fingers a bit quicker so that they don't have as long of a journey to the strings. 

      In the 2nd video, make sure your i finger is preparing immediately after the p. I think the speed is just causing you to lose focus of the preparation from time to time in that video. Keep it slow, and keep up the amazing work - you're doing very well!

      Like
  • Hello Evan and Group 2,  Attached is my attempt for Exercise 1 and 2, and Arpeggio for a few bars  in Prelude number 4.   You are right that the exercise requires concentration.  It is so easy to default back to emphasising the bass note in the Prelude.   (my apology that there is a lot of background noise in the recording, not sure the source).  

    Exercise 1 and 2

    https://youtu.be/YOhqAU0DeZw

    Arpeggio exercise - Prelude 4

    https://youtu.be/iQiZ8cCIs14

    Vincent

    Like
      • Evan Taucher
      • Classical Guitarist and Educator
      • Evan
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Vincent Tam Vincent, I'm so glad that you are finding the exercises thought provoking! I have to say that you're playing them really quite well. Great work and please keep it up!

      A couple of things:

      The first exercise in the first video is fantastic, your hand looks really good! Keep it up, and slowly bump up the tempo!

      With the second half of the 1st video (where you begin accenting), sometimes you lose track of the beat. Make sure you're staying right on it. Putting the metronome on subdivisions should help. Also, make sure you're still preparing the finger that you're accenting. This helps with the tone and the accent as well!

       

      Great work and keep it up!

      Like
  • Here are a couple of videos for the first week. It's interesting after working on accenting each finger individually, I notice a pretty significant in the evenness of my arpeggios overall. Very helpful.

    Like
      • Evan Taucher
      • Classical Guitarist and Educator
      • Evan
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      Steve Price Steve, I'm so glad you found the videos and exercises to be useful, and I have to say that you're doing them and apply them very well!! Great precision and control - I love to see this! One thing I'd recommend (and I acknowledge that folks teach the relaxation of fingers in different ways) is to try relaxing each of your fingers after the pluck. I'm speaking specifically about the 1st video with your i and m fingers. Their jobs are already done, so in my mind, they should relax! This is a method I learned later in my studies that I'm thankful for. Let me know how that works for you. It may require going a lot slower to feel for the first time.

      Thanks again and keep up the great work (and the alternate suggested patterns in the brouwer!)

      Like
    • martinTeam
    • LIVE
    • martin.3
    • 1 yr ago
    • Reported - view

    Dear friends,

    Please find the link for the TWI Check-In with Evan Taucher here: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88165370223

    The Check-In is Monday, October 24th at 10am PST.

    See you tomorrow!

    Martin

    Like
    • martinTeam
    • LIVE
    • martin.3
    • 1 yr ago
    • Reported - view

    Assignment Video for Week 2

    Week 2 submissions should include one or more of the following:

    • pluck and relax exercise
    • pimiaimi arpeggio
    • pmimamim arpeggio 
    • pamamaia arpeggio
    • a repertoire example (Giuliani Etude 5 op.48 or Prelude 4 arpeggios by Villa Lobos)
    Like
      • Barney
      • Barney
      • 1 yr ago
      • Reported - view

      martin Evan Taucher   Looks like a typo on the third pattern: should be:  pamaiama, correct?  Thanks!

      Like
    • martinTeam
    • LIVE
    • martin.3
    • 1 yr ago
    • Reported - view

    arpeggio 2

    Assignment video for week 2 is posted!

    Like
Like Follow
  • 1 yr agoLast active
  • 47Replies
  • 159Views
  • 10 Following

Home

View all topics