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Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Tue Jun 22, 2010 9:26 pmby robmurtha • 94 Posts
I attended one of these back in the late 70's and it was very beneficial.
Duquesne 2010 Guitar and Bass workshop
Started in 1986 by Joe Negri, Bill Purse, Mark Koch, Tom Kikta, John Maione and Jim Farquar, the Guitar and Bass Workshop aims to help students become more familiar with the guitar programs at Duquesne University. The workshop also provides an opportunity for any guitar enthusiast to learn more through working with guitar department faculty and famous guitar icons.
Having grown from a first year enrollment of 20, the workshops now attract 100-150 students each summer. Thirty percent of the students who are admitted to the University guitar program are already familiar with the department and its faculty because of their participation in this workshop.
http://www.duq.edu/music/summer/guitar/index.cfm
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Wed Jun 23, 2010 12:00 amby be&say • 12 Posts
Me personally,
I'm considering my options with this one:
http://berkleevalencia.org/en/ opening on 2012.
My worries being I'll be 31 by then, and will I be able to beat the hordes of people coming to it as it opens...
Also, there's no news on them teaching performance yet... although I'm VERY interested in composition lately...
Maybe a "normal" school here in Madrid will do the trick... who knows?...
http://www.beandsay.com
besay@beandsay.com
beandsayguitar@gmail.com
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Wed Jun 23, 2010 4:20 pmby uderoche (deleted)
I was a jazz guitar major at a university from 94-96.
I would say I learned a lot, but at the same time I'd also say I learned nothing.
It's funny because, I did improve as a musician. I was a teenager...17 when I was accepted.
Basically I did learn a lot about music. Harmony, theory, solfege...that sort of thing. And it helped.
You know, they were trying to help me get a career in the music business. Reading was a top priority. Developing virtuoso technique on the guitar was not a top priority.
So, I learned to read well and follow charts, but I was more into learning who I am as a musician. What do I think? What do I have to say? Can I say anything? Can I speak? Who am I? I need the tools to find out who I am on the instrument.
So, I learned a lot about music, most definitely.
But, I didn't learn. Hard to explain my thoughts on it I guess. I would not recommend college level music major for most people for various reasons all of which I did not touch upon here.
PB may be able to give greater insight into music schools as he studied at some fairly prestigious ones.
-Ursin
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Thu Jun 24, 2010 12:01 amby pebberbrown • 926 Posts
I spent many years in music schools combined with private lessons from some heavyweight musicians. I think that the best music schools will always be the big names - Juilliard, Eastman, Manhattan, Berklee, North Texas State, and USC. MI is a wannabe Berklee but they have an altogether opposite vibe and mentality - at Berklee you can find a lot of very artistic and experimental/avant garde musicians and at MI you just get the heavy dosage of what sells and makes money in the industry. Hollywod/Studio City/Burbank/North Hollywod is where the TV and film industry are focused so you get a LOT of commercially oriented music - very little explorative music as one would find in Boston and new York. I find that most colleges these days with music departments can give you just about everything you need in terms of music theory and musicianship - however - the IMPROV classes and ENSEMBLES is where schools like Dick Grove and Berklee and the other big names all really make a huge difference.
You can study theory at "North Dakota Badlands Junior College" and get the same information from anywhere, but when you want to JAM and PLAY OTHERS CHARTS and MAKE CONTACTS - North Dakota Junior College is not where you want to be!
Boston, New York and LA are always the best places to meet musicians and movie industry contacts and make huge connections. People get the same introductory music theory at MI as they would in North Dakota but you get to see tons of heavy players and teachers day in and day out and walk out the door to the HOLY WOOD MOVIE INDUSTRY right in your face.
In North Dakota they have a bar about 80 miles down the road with a bunch of fucked up rednecks listening to Country music on the Jukebox.... Louisiana I dont know about - but if its LSU look at the course offerings for theory and see if an ensemble even exists.
When I was at Dick Grove (after I already went to Berklee) we had 7 days a week ensembles and then after school lots and lots of jams and rehearsals and gigs with everyone you knew and were constantly being introduced to NEW people every 3 hours. It was amazing - I ended up meeting so many record producers and getting SO MUCH studio work while I was in school I had to back off to complete the school. It was mostly all sightreading studio work anyway - a total fuckin bitch all the time - not for everyone. I have often thought about going back to that world of the hired gun studio sightreader - but man its FIERCE competition and the new guys all can read ANYTHING. Maybe if I were 30 years younger once again I could do it. All the new guys would rip me to shreds pretty much now anyway. Besides I didnt start playing music to sit there and fuckin have to sightread intense shit for 5 hours straight with ultra stressed out producers bugging the shit out of you every 3 minutes. Some guys like that shit and can do it day in and day out.
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Thu Jun 24, 2010 10:36 amby uderoche (deleted)
That is it exactly.
LSU, they don't even have a guitar major...not classical or jazz! They are very uptight and pretentious in their music department. It's all a bunch of purists.
I went to Southeastern Louisiana University where you could major in classical or jazz guitar. I studied under a guy named Hank Mackie who is a tremendously respected bebop style player around here, however, he just made me read out of the Berklee book, which is fine, and he corrected my picking technique, which was horrid at the time, but he never showed me how to really improv or anything.
The avant garde composer David Behrman once told me I would never make it in Louisiana and that I should come to New York...for the exact same reasons PB just mentioned...you MUST be in a COMMUNITY of musicians that are exchanging IDEAS with each other and forming a SCENE around themselves where they PLAY.
Of course, this does exist here in Louisiana, but mostly with regards to blues and dixieland style jazz and definitely NOT anything remotely experimental.
I should have listened to you Mr. Behrman!!!! But I was 17 at the time and New York was a scary place!
PB is 100% spot on with his comments. You can learn theory and harmony ANYWHERE.
-Ursin
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Fri Jun 25, 2010 6:43 pmby robmurtha • 94 Posts
Pebber your advice is priceless at Duquesne we had to go to clubs to sit in but that is limited, one of the reasons I went to Berklee was to get with more musicians and the experience was much better than the education. I actually left Berklee because I was ticked that they made me start over even after having two years of theory and ear training already. I still went back and played with people and had tons of friends on Hemingway, I lived on Beacon which was about 10 blocks away, much better to live in a roach motel on Hemingway than to be out of the scene, you basically have to sleep with your axe though ...
Nothing else will get you shedding as much as when there are 100s of other people that could be taking your spot in a cool ensemble, or when you get invited to jam with amazing players - you want to be ready! Youtube is a game changer but the live gig with the eye contact, trading 4s and basic adrenaline rush is still worth any kind of sacrifice you have to make.
Anyway another stealth tactic is to just move to the area and hang around meeting people and crashing jam sessions. There are tons of players that do this ( mostly good ones ) so it doesn't hurt to make friends with someone who is in demand in order to get your foot in the door. The lobby at Berklee is like being at a halloween party for musicians!
Rob
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Sat Jun 26, 2010 9:52 pmby FRaKh • 321 Posts
This is great information!! I would be happy to live back in Chino where I was 20 min away from lessons again! I thought about going to the local college by me....just to get the gears moving again. Where that would take me....who knows...but at least its better than sitting here in the desert playing to a bunch of rocks and lizards! Kinda fun...:)
No college has what Master has given us!!!!
"The Pebber Brown School Of Advanced Noodling"
P.B.S.A.N
“A World Without String Is Chaos”
Randolf Smuntz
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Mon Jun 28, 2010 11:08 pmby FRaKh • 321 Posts
Your right...
First self education ....gone
Second.....school education...gone....
Now people just drop out wander around and end up at WalMart eating and drinking leaving wrapers everywhere then only pay for a pack of gum.
but for me...I need that push!
Well...maybe a shove!
“A World Without String Is Chaos”
Randolf Smuntz
RE: Pittsburgh area workshop
in PB Guitarstudio FORUMS Tue Jun 29, 2010 9:43 amby uderoche (deleted)
Good point Rob.
It's kind of like, back at the dawn of man...people learned certain skills through years of trial and error. They passed down what they learned. The next guy took the ball and ran. More trial and error. Then he passed the ball to someone else.
You got sick, you went and saw the shaman or healer. You wanted to learn how to hunt and gather, you visited the hunter. You wanted to learn how to make horseshoes, you visited the blacksmith.
Nowadays, everyone is a frickin expert.
"Schools" make things much worse it seems because they continuously hire the so-called experts to just continue the vicious cycle.
Music is the same.
-Ursin
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