David hi David,

Thank you for your videos.

Exercise 1

It was really nice how you played it the acc . was also good, it could be a bit more gradually, I mean try not to achieve your end tempo, try to start from a bit slower tempo and concentrate on the step by step accelerating. If you imagine it before how you want to hear it exactly it will help you a lot. The ritardando was great and also the third one acc, rit. The imagination helps you to make it very clear in your mind how you want to do it and when you execute it everything can become more natural and you will not have to focus on it too much during the playing. Anyway all the fingers are moved by the brain so if you imagine anything before playing that will always help you for this natural feeling.

Great job thank you

David exercise 2

It's really nice that you also formulated it musically.

Your pee finger legato is quite perfect. The synchronity is almost everywhere there, only couple of times you put the thumb a bit earlier to the string and very few times your left hand fingers came a bit earlier and touched the string and of course these both will increase kind of non -legato.

You could also work on it a bit slower to be able to control both hands fingers and also to take a shorter part of the whole story. Then you can focus on each detail and on the feeling of good and smooth legato.

Nice work thank you

David exercise 3

Thank you it was nice too. In this exercise it happened a bit more often that you put some of the left hand fingers a tiny bit earlier. But this alternative stroke legato is much more difficult since we have more factors we have right hand different fingers and also many different cases for the left hand fingers. I would recommend first to try to play it only with your right hand on open strings that you can concentrate and listen to the attack of the fingers if they are enough legato and if they are always coming from the air never from the string. Basically you do it good, of course when we have to concentrate on too many issues at the same time that is much more difficult. To make it more simple will increase more security and also a kind of automatism for the right hand, and and then you will be able to focus more on the left hand too. But you can also try to play only the left hand muted, work on it with smaller parts and focus on the good changes of the different fingers on the good timing. When you have both hands separately then you can put them together and go measure by measure. If you do this way your legato can become perfect. And as I said it zoom meeting try to find the feeling of the synchronity for both hands just like you would play the piano.

Well done thank you

David Dear David,

Thank you so much on your effort of this exercise. As I said at zoom meeting on tonebase you are all on very different level. Which is good but also a bit problematic, because when we prepare let's say a this kind of course we cannot be sure what kind of pieces we should prepare for you and on which level. And of course that is why it happens many times that for some of you exercises will become very easy and for some very difficult. You said that this is your second year of playing the guitar. These Carcassi studies and also the sor ones are already quite difficult. But for sure for you very very difficult. I would advice to not to take this exercise anymore because this is full with barres and we don't want you to have some problem with your hands because of it. And please try not to misunderstand it because I appreciate so much the effort and the work which you put into it already!!!

I would I would recommend to you that you take only the exercise 6, and make it also more simple with playing only the top voice always. With this you will be able to concentrate only on the top Melody which is the main Melody and on the perfect legato of it. And of course for practicing the rubato you can also use only this material this voice because then you will be able to handle these time flexibility factors much better and you will have a still very enjoyable musical product.

I hope you didn't take it a wrong way.

Great job, thank you

Barney hi Barney,

Thank you for your videos.

Exercise 1

I find it really nice gradually how you built it up. Maybe you could work on the first version acc, since if you're listening to it you will hear, that the end of it you make a tiny rit too. Actually it shouldn't be there. But I know it's really difficult since we are used to play the end  of every piece this kind of rit (almost every piece) so it's difficult to hold ourselves back from it.

All the others were perfect! 

Excellent job thank you

Barney Exercise 2

It was really nice your p finger legato. If I'm not mistaken I realized that at couple of places you put your left hand fingers a bit earlier. Try to listen to it back without echo to have more exact control of what you were doing. It doesn't happen everywhere but a couple of times. About the right hand finger I cannot say it exactly if you would put it earlier or something but what I've heard I don't think so. Try to work on the feeling of this complete synchronity, not easy at all.

It was a great job thank you

Barney exercise 3

It was really beautiful. I am glad that you made a second shot because that was really perfect. Your alternated stroke legato seems super good.

It was also musical.ly nice formulated!

Great job thank you

Barney exercise 4

Very nice thank you.

If you would like to make it even nicer you could work on the upper voice to highlight it bit more. That would increase an even nicer singing musical material. I would recommend to take a bit slower tempo to enjoy and focus the small details, and try to emphasize your musical ideas a bit more to make them even more clear for us.

Very good job thank you! 

Barney Hi Barney,

Exercise 6

Thank you it's very nice how you formulated  it musically. The melody on the top is nice highlighted, maybe the time flexibility you could play a bit more, but this way is also very nice .

Great job thank you

Barney exercise 7

That's also very great. Only musically couple of ideas; if you give a tenuto for each first note of each measure that will increase the continuously stopping of the musical flow and you cannot hold the musical material together enough. For the listener it will become also difficult to follow you, because you are stopping each time the attention with it . Of course it's matter of taste too. 

The release at the end the rit. and the calming down is very beautiful.

Very nice job thank you

Steve Price Hi Steve,

What a beautiful tone colour!

Thank you for your beautiful video!

I am super happy that I can see that you worked on the shifting and preparation exercise really so well!

Basically I find it musically also really nice, but sometimes I have the feeling that you could hold the tension even a bit more. Try to focus on the legato Melody and try to make my (or your) musical ideas first only with the top Melody that you can concentrate on the graduality of all the musical ideas which you want to play. At the end after the stretching position you waited a bit too long and somehow it stopped the flow of the melody. 

Listen to it back, and it could also help you if you would sit only with the note and would try to imagine the whole musical story only in your head. Like you would listen to a CD inside. With this mental technique you can make all the musical ideas very clear and it will help a lot during the execution. 

Really great job thank you!

P S.: what was your story?