Been a while since I posted because I've been in the UK. This is the 8th time I got to pre-board on British Airways courtesy of my guitar.... I've almost, but not quite, forgiven them for the 23 hours and 20 minute delay on the outbound flight, on account of their excellent treatment of people traveling with musical instruments. Doesn't help much with the 8 hour plane ride though. After I’ve exhausted the possibility of the on-board meal (is it always chicken or pasta?), a movie and am sick and tired of reading my phone, I got to thinking about the value of having more than one guitar teacher in the quest to become a better musician. It’s common to hear from those who have been learning for many years that they have had a number of teachers and learned different things from each of them. Of course I haven't been at it long enough to have had multiple teachers, in fact (except for a few lessons during the summer break), I’ve only had one teacher ( In case he’s reading this, he’s the best!)😁 And what I'm really talking about is getting feedback from more than one (knowledgeable) source.
In my case I subscribe to the online lesson site (classicalguitarcorner.com) and have received occasional feedback from an online teacher on pieces I’m learning. What’s surprising to me is how teachers seem to unerringly pick on the same thing. How can that possibly be that they all hear the same 'something' which totally escapes my ears? (I guess that's a good thing, because if they all heard different things the potential for things to be corrected would be enormous!) Apparently I can happily ignore an excellent piece of advice from my guitar teacher until a second person tells me exactly the same thing. It's not that I don't hear it the first (second, third) time I'm told, it just doesn't get prioritized until there is reinforcement from another source. I mean there are so many other things I need to work on that I have trouble figuring out what is most important. In some respects this reminds me of my students - they know a phenomenal amount but often are not able to figure out what's the key thing that matters, and which stuff can safely be ignored. So that's reason #1. Prioritizing things to work on. (Especially as my guitar teacher has developed an annoying habit recently of asking me to decide what's needed instead of straight-out telling me. I mean, what does he think I am, a musician???)
As for reason #2 - seeing personal preferences as to what's important to learn at each stage is useful. I first learned about analyzing music for different "voices" from the online site, and was also introduced to bass stopping, adding vibrato and playing in different positions for musical reasons. No substitute for a real teacher though....
However that's about it for my reasons... - feel free to comment! Before jet lag gets the better of me, I'll post the latest version of this mini piece that got almost identical feedback on things that need fixing. (feel free to do your own critique... but keep it to yourself - I've already heard it twice!!!)
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