To continue on the subject of shifting your focus from action to pre-action.

There’s a second and perhaps even more critical angle to this technique.

And that is to shift the beginning of the stroke to the end of the previous stroke.

Yes, it sounds like a mouthful, but there’s no other way to make it more succinct

Basically, the principle comes down to; when is the beginning of your stroke?

Some people will say ‘the beginning,” and that will make perfect sense in ordinary reality.

But in virtuoso reality, if you want to develop a free and effortless stroke, the beginning of the stroke must be the end of the previous stroke,

In other words, your plucking motion is the end of one stroke but it is also the beginning of your next stroke.

Try this short exercise:

Play the third string with your i finger, very lightly and gently. Don’t worry about tone or anything else. Just stay as relaxed as possible.

Now, focus on the plucking motion.

The instant you pluck, release all the tension in your finger and in that same instant, move it back to reposition it for the next stroke.

This is critical.

The two must happen simultaneously. The instant of plucking must be the beginning of the movement back to reposition the finger. In other words, the two happen in one motion.

Don’t pluck and then move to reposition, that’s two separate movements.

Pluck, and make that plucking motion the movement back to reposition, in  one motion.

It’s a very small subtle difference, but the difference it will make to your speed and relaxation will be dramatic.

That’s because the main focus of your strokes is on relaxation.

Each stroke becomes a movement into relaxation. The actual act of plucking, of playing becomes an act of relaxation.

It brings us back to the walking analogy. Take some time to observe how you walk and how other people walk.

Notice that most of the effort is in getting the foot to the ground and once the foot is on the ground, the actual step itself is a release of that effort, the actual step itself is an act of relaxing the foot and ankle.

That’s the same sensation you get when you shift the beginning of the stroke to the end of the previous stroke, the actual plucking is an act of relaxing the fingers.

I’ve written about how virtuoso reality differs from ordinary reality.

For instance, if you want more speed in virtuosity, don’t try to move faster, instead, generate it by creating a self-propelled engine in your body (or fingers as in the case of playing guitar) and using the momentum in that engine to create effortless speed for you.

Or if you want more power, don’t try to apply more force, instead create more potential energy (by pulling at the string more) and then harnessing the power in your fingers.

Those are the core elements of virtuosity but there’s one more component of the virtuoso reality (which I have alluded to before in my article on walking the fingers) and it has to do with shifting the focus from the action to the pre-action.

Let me explain:

Every action involves two phases, the pre-action (getting to the point of action to execute the action) and the action itself (the actual execution).

For instance when you walk, you’ll have to place your foot on the ground (the point of action) before you can take that step (the actual action).

Or when you play guitar, you have to get the finger to the string first (the point of action) before you can pluck it (the action).

A side note: I’m referring here not to the technique of ‘preparation,’ which is a conscious act of placing the finger on the string before you pluck it, but to the simple act of bringing the finger to the string to pluck it.

In virtuoso reality, the point is to shift the focus from the action to the pre-action and to let the action occur as an afterthought, as a logical conclusion to the pre-action.

To go back to the analogy of stepping again, when we walk, most of our effort is focused on bringing the foot to the ground, the actual stepping occurs naturally as a release of that effort.

The same principle works on the guitar too. When you pluck, you should focus most of your attention on getting your finger to the string and let the actual plucking occur naturally, as a conclusion of that action.

To do this well, you’ll have to have all the basic physical conditions described in the AOV in place, a super loose body, a light touch, and smooth and fluid motions.

And even then, it’ll still require you to be fully warmed up.

Even though I’m familiar with the technique, if I’ve been away from the guitar for any length of time (like a few weeks), it still takes me a while before I can feel the technique working in my fingers again. It’s something I can’t force, I’d just have to practice and wait for it to come and when it does, I know I’m fully warmed up.

Let’s try this exercise.

Play a simple i m a m arpeggio on the first three strings, i finger on the third string, m on the second, and a on the first string.

Relax the fingers thoroughly. Don’t force them.

As you play, gradually shift your focus away from the plucking and focus your efforts on getting the fingers to the string. (Again, this is not an exercise in ‘preparation,’ so don’t try to prepare the fingers on the string before you pluck it.)

In other words, focus all your attention on finding the string with your fingers.

And let the plucking occur naturally almost as an afterthought.

Practice the technique until it feels perfectly natural.

To this right requires you to be incredibly relaxed so it’s critical you stay relaxed.

At all cost, don’t try too hard to make it happen, just keep on practicing and let the technique happen naturally.

The great thing about shifting the focus from the action to the pre-action is that it not only results in greater relaxation in your strokes (because of the built-in release mechanism at the point of execution) it also dramatically increases your speed and accuracy.

This is simple to understand. First speed.

If you focus your attention on the pre-action, you’ll create a more dynamic and forward-driven technique in your fingers. Contrast this to the more conventional approach of focusing on the action (the actual stroke) which will produce a more static technique.

It’s as if you have to run from base to base. As soon as you arrive at one base, you’re already off running to the next base. You never stay still on any one base, because you’re always focused on the next base.

This is what happens when you focus on the pre-action in plucking. You’ll be constantly moving forward to the next stroke. As soon as you arrive at a string with one finger, you’ll be moving to the next stroke and to getting the next finger onto the next string. This results in great forward drive and momentum in your fingers.

And accuracy.

If you focus your attention on getting the fingers to the strings, you’ll also be, by extension, focusing your attention on finding those strings with your fingers.

And if you focus your attention on finding something, you’ll find it a whole lot more accurately than if your attention is elsewhere.

While we’re still on the subject of rhythm, (yes, I know I do have an obsessive streak in me) let’s do some practicing with a metronome.

But first, a note about playing with a metronome.

When you play with a metronome, always let it lead you. Become totally subservient to it. Focus your attention on it and follow it. This is a critical part of metronome technique.

To do this, play softer. This will help you hear the metronome better and take your focus away from your playing and onto the metronome.

Let’s try a simple piece with a constant stream of sixteenth notes, perhaps a Carcassi study from his opus 60. Numbers 2 or 7 will work well and both happen to be my favorites.

First, set the metronome on the quarter notes, perhaps one quarter to 52. (This is just a suggestion. You can try a faster tempo if it helps you keep time better.)

Start by listening to the beat. Feel that pulse within you. As you listen to it, start to anticipate the beat. Feel each beat coming up and tap your foot with it. What you want to do first is develop your ability to predict when the next beat is going to arrive by anticipating it.

As you get used to the groove, start to play the piece.

Now, this is very important, make sure you land the notes absolutely right on the beat. As jazzers will say, play right on top of the beat.

Your playing and the beat should occur together, simultaneously, and sound like one. That’s how tight you want your playing to be. And play the subdivisions, the sixteenth notes, as precisely as possible between the beats.

Again, focus all your attention on the metronomic beat, and make your notes line up precisely with the beats. Don’t worry about mistakes, worry more about getting your notes right on the beat.

Your playing should sound very strict and mechanical. This is, of course, just for practice purposes. In real life, your rhythm should be much more flexible and contain many subtle inflections.

But for now, the focus is on precision.

When you feel confident about your ability to place your notes right on the beat, bring the exercise up a notch.

Put the metronome on the eighth notes. If you’re playing at 52, just double it to 104. You haven’t increased the tempo, you’re still playing at quarter notes to 52, except now you have the metronomic beat on every eight note.

Now, play the piece again, playing each eighth note right on top of the beat. And make the subdivisions as precise as possible too.

Practice this way for a while, mechanically, focusing on precision, playing right on top of the beat.

Now we’re ready to go to the next level again. Set the metronome on the fastest setting 208 and play the sixteenth notes on every beat.

Again, the tempo hasn’t changed, what’s changed is that now you have the metronomic beat on every sixteenth note. The basic tempo is still quarter note to 52.

Play the piece again, focusing on precision, on playing the sixteenth notes right on each beat.

The whole point of these exercises is to train your technical and rhythmic control and to develop your ability to follow an external rhythmic beat. (The concept of separating your rhythm from your playing is central to the AOV and crucial to rhythmic mastery.)

If you can play the above three exercises and make your playing follow the metronomic beat precisely, you’ve achieved both technical and rhythmic mastery.

That’s because you need both skills to be able to do what you just did.

You need great rhythmic skill to be able to sense when the beats are going to occur, and you need great technical skill to be able to execute your notes precisely right on those beats when they do occur.

The above progression of going from quarter notes to sixteenth notes is just a suggestion. You can reverse the order and start from sixteenth notes and work your way to the quarter notes instead.

Either way, you should have incredible control over your subdivisions by the time you’re done.

Over the years, I’ve spent no small amount of time contemplating rhythm and its many implications on our existence.

I see it on many levels, as a universal force operating at the super micro level—the so-called strings (as in string-theory. Although I harbor some lingering skepticism about this, I’ll defer to the experts here.) to mega waves out in deep space where their oscillations are measured in light-years.

And of course, to the more mundane task of playing classical guitar.

To go back to my previous post.

Playing to me is like navigating a craft down a river, you need both the craft and the skill to navigate your way through that river of time.

Yet why is rhythm so hard to learn and master?

The problem lies with the fact that it exists in its own dimension—time—and it’s very hard to explain time and its passage.

Most attempts with trying to describe or depict time is to use two-dimensional imagery such as a timeline or musical notation.

But time does not exist in two-dimensional space; it’s experienced, one moment at a time. And it’s fleeting. The instant we experience a moment in time, it’s already gone—history.

The same is true of rhythm.

On the musical score, rhythm is notated with symbols indicating relative durations in two-dimensional space.

But in reality, we perceive it by experiencing it one beat at a time.

And—this is the important part—we experience it in anticipations.

Let’s take a simple example.

Let’s say that you’re playing a simple song with one note on every beat.

If you start playing the song at 60 on the metronome, you’re setting up expectations in yourself and in your audience that you’re going to hear one note per second.

To play with good time means you must be able to fulfill those expectations.

In other words, you can’t suddenly change the tempo to two beats per second.

And if you want to create rubatos or ritardandos or accelerandos, you must do them within those expectations too, and make sure they’re done in a smooth and logical manner within that tempo. Otherwise, it’ll sound as if you’ve lost control over your rhythm.

To execute your notes rhythmically, you must anticipate each beat.

To do this, wait for the beat to arrive and when it does, play the note lightly on the beat.

Then let the cycle start again. Wait for the next beat to arrive, play the next note lightly on the beat again, and then let the cycle repeat itself again.

That’s what happens when we play.

We anticipate each beat and when it arrives, we execute our action on that beat.

Having good rhythm in this case simply means having the ability to anticipate correctly when the next beat will arrive, and possessing the technical means to execute on that beat when it does.

And that’s what I mean by being able to navigate down that river, you need both the craft (physical ability) and the skill to navigate that river (rhythmic control).

There’re two important things to note here.

First, the element of waiting—you must never rush or hurry toward the next beat. Wait for it to come and when it comes, place your action lightly on that beat.

Second, your rhythm must be a thing separate from your actual physical execution. You must feel the rhythmic pulse as an entirely SEPARATE PHENOMENON FROM YOUR PLAYING. This is such an important point I have to put it in caps. I’ve also written about this elsewhere on separating the source of your rhythm from your execution.

The above just applies to the minimal requirements of rhythm, playing in time.

We know of course that good rhythm is more than just playing on the beat. It’s a highly expressive device in itself and in the hands of a master, it can create pure magic in itself.

I’m aware that some of the ideas espoused in the AOV may sound strange, perhaps even radical in concept.

Such as the principle of creating the automated engine, the idea of walking your fingers, the cornerstone principle of focusing on the plucking etc.

It’s not my intention, of course, to try to be different. I’ve never believed much in gimmicks because they wear off very quickly.

No, this is just the way things are.

Because, the truth is, the virtuoso reality is quite different from normal reality

For example, in normal reality, if you want speed, you would try to move faster.

In virtuoso reality, that’s inefficient and ineffective. The better way would be to tap into the energy in the strings and use it to catapult your fingers from one note to the next.

Catapult? When was the last time you saw that word? Lord of the Rings?

Precisely. But that word describes perfectly the sensation in my fingers when I play a series of fast notes in a scale. There’s no effort involved, just the sensation of letting the fingers fly from one note to the next, the sensation of one finger propelling the next one forward, like a catapult.

Or in normal reality, when you want more power, you simply apply more force. Not in virtuoso reality, where if you want more power, you apply less force, and you reap that power by releasing more energy.

I know this may sound like a bunch of mumbo jumbo and I would understand it perfectly if that’s what it sounds like to you. But the benefits of this mumbo jumbo are very real to me, as in when I play a fast scale or a tremolo or an arpeggio.

As I said earlier, the virtuoso reality does not follow the rules of ordinary life. I encourage you to try them out in some of the ideas on this blog and in the AOV and AOVgtr.

It’s a lot more fun and rewarding, and you may be pleasantly surprised by the results.

I posted this last year under the title “Dancing with Mr. D” and decided to repost it again under a less obscure title. Another fond look back to my early guitarfaring days.

In 1980, I had just finished my studies at Victoria U in New Zealand and was anxious to go to Europe to further my studies. After talking to friends, I decided to study with John Duarte. Everyone I talked to seemed to think highly of him, including Karl.

So in January of that year, I took the plane from Wellington to London. After a stopover in NYC where I stayed a week with Karl, I took a People Express flight and crossed the Atlantic.

At Gatwick, I called him from the airport and he told me to take the cab to his home. I met him at his home. He was not a big man and was strangely nervous. He did not look you in the eye and was constantly fidgeting with his pipe. I remember he had a slight twitch in the nose.

Needless to say, I was full of excitement at being in London and at the prospect of studying with the great man himself.

A few days after I arrived, I had my first lesson. Mr. Duarte had arranged for me to stay a few doors down from him so it was just a short walk to his house.

The lesson was in his studio upstairs, I seemed to recall it was on the third floor (second in some countries) I took out my guitar ready to play. But Mr. Duarte started talking.

I sat there and let him talk. I don’t remember all the things he said but it was mostly about other guitar players. One thing I do remember is the ‘humorous’ birthday incident with Segovia. He told me that Segovia had called on his birthday to wish him happy birthday. He had just gotten out from a bath and had to stand there in his bathrobe holding the phone. I supposed the image was meant to be rip-roaringly funny so I laughed politely.

After about an hour, I gently interrupted and asked him, “Can I play something for you?”

He said yes, and I played him a few variations from Ponce’s La Folia. When I finished playing, he started talking again. He said a few things about the piece. At one point, he took a guitar and started playing. I was astounded by what I saw and heard. He could hardly hold the guitar properly and what came out of his fingers were a few scratchy sounds.

After having studied with Karl Herreshoff, a superb musician and a true virtuoso, it was a bit of a rude awakening to find myself taking a lesson with a man who could barely hold the instrument, let alone play it. But I was still eager to hear his comments. Unfortunately, he went on again about other guitar players and about Segovia.

After about two and half hours, the lesson was over. It had cost me £11. To say I was disappointed was a mild understatement. I went back the next week, and the same scenario played itself over again

I decided I would look for another teacher. I had always been a fan of John Williams and decided that if I couldn’t study with him, I would study with one of his students. At that time, his most prominent student was Julian Byzantine so I contacted him and was able to set up a lesson with him immediately.

When Mr. Duarte found out, he was furious. One morning, I woke up to find a letter in an envelope under the door. It was from the great man himself. Three typed pages of pure vitriol and biting sarcasm. I should’ve kept the letter. Maybe I could’ve sold it on ebay these days. I’m sure he still has fans out there who wouldn’t mind giving a few bucks to have his autograph.

In the letter, he was extremely critical of my playing. I remember thinking, now why didn’t he tell me these things in the lessons? That’s what I wanted to hear, not all that happy guitar talk.

Needless to say, I didn’t last very long in England. I salvaged my stay there by attending a great number of concerts, and met many musicians and guitarists. While I didn’t meet JW himself (although I did get to see him after a Sky concert at Hammersmith) I got to meet Kevin Peek, Paco Pena (an incredibly gracious man) David Bedford (who picked me up from the train station on his motorbike and gave me a bunch of scores which I still have today) and I saw Alfred Brendel, Misha Dichter, among others, in concert.

So yes, I guess I didn’t handle my encounters with Mr. Duarte very well, but I had a great time in London.

Many years ago, I think it was 1979, I was browsing the Wellington Public library in NZ when I saw a new record by some unknown guitarist by the name of Manuel Barrueco.

I borrowed the record, brought it home, put it on my turntable, and to use an old tired cliché, it literally knocked my socks off. I had never heard such musicianship on the guitar.

Here’s one of the tracks I heard. Today, when I hear it, it still sounds as fresh and as exciting as when I first heard it over thirty years ago.

What’s so exciting about this performance?

Here’re the first three bars.

Notice the rhythm. It’s pretty plain, 1 quarter note followed by 2 eighth notes, followed by quarter note, followed by 2 eighth notes etc.

Lesser musicians will play these notes strictly in time but not Barrueco. Listen to the subtle rhythmic inflections he puts into all the notes, esp. the eighth notes. He doesn’t play them squarely on the beat. He pushes some of the notes and he relaxes others. In other words, he makes these notes come alive.

And notice the resolutions. He pushes the phrases to a high point and then he lets them resolve, like letting out a sigh, completely effortless.

Try taking the score in hand and conduct with it, and then try to conduct to Barrueco’s recording. It will be a revelation. You will hear things that you never knew were there before.

The most amazing thing about the recording is that it’s totally devoid of all the usual guitar affectations that were common in guitar players at the time, even in big name stars — the sudden inexplicable accents, the equally sudden inexplicable accelerandos and ritardandos etc.

There’s no other way to describe it, — it’s pure poetry in rhythm.

Interesting, the response I got from the last post. I thought no one was reading these posts, judging from the amazing number of comments I’ve been getting. I’ve been basically writing these things for myself, one hand clapping, so to speak.

I’ve never been one for politics. If I had wanted to play politics, I would’ve stayed on as a law major in NZ (and I think I would’ve made a pretty good lawyer and made a lot more money too). I didn’t become a guitar player to play politics. That’s why I stay out of the guitar mainstream, much too much politicking going on. But what I saw last week, I had to make public.

When I wrote the post, I knew I wouldn’t be making many new friends with it, but it was clear to me that the people organizing these competitions must be put on notice — that people invest time and money to participate in these things and the least they can do is to make it as fair as possible.

And frankly, what’s wrong with asking people to recuse themselves? Conflicts of interests occur all the time, and real judges routinely recuse themselves when they know they are too close to a case to be impartial. When people recuse themselves, it removes any perception of bias, and that’s a good thing. People will be able to accept any decision if they know there’s no bias or conflict of interest involved.

Differences of opinion arise all the time too, that’s what makes this world such a wonderful place to live in. But there’s a difference between genuine differences of opinion and plain old bias. As the old Chinese saying goes, I’ve eaten more salt than some people have eaten rice, and I think I know the difference when I see it.