Preparing To Learn A Piece For Guitar

The repertoire for the guitar is endless. Most guitarists, including professionals, give little thought to the process of learning a piece of music. But, if frustration and slow progress are to be lessened, then there needs to be an understanding of preparing to learn a piece for guitar.

Learning About Preparing To Learn

My first ideas of this kind began as I learned about the process of teaching children through the Suzuki Method. Let me get this out of the way, as a method, I do not think it is good or bad. It all depends on the one instructing. I will possibly leave my comments about the methodology in a later post. One of the elements that the books do well is to give preparatory exercises a few pages before the piece the skill that requires it begins.

One day, it dawned on me that I never really looked at pieces this way. Sure, I’ve worked on techniques like scales, arpeggios, and tremolo. But to look into a piece prior to learning it and asking what skills are necessary before actually beginning the piece was not a part of my thinking. This goes for classical pieces, jazz solos, rock solos, acoustic fingerstyle, and any other type of song learning.

I’ve always done this type of thinking when it comes to teaching a strumming song. Find out what the chords are for the song. Teach the student to play the chords accurately and change quickly enough and then give them the song to learn. It makes sense, right? But after the basics were learned, then I wouldn’t continue down this path.

Skills From Pieces Fallacy

It’s as if I thought that all skills could be learned now from the pieces themselves. As I have learned, this is a notable fallacy. To my knowledge, the best expository of this fallacy is found in Christopher Berg’s book, Practicing Music by Design: Historic Virtuosi on Peak Performance.

To be completely transparent, I have been a student of Christopher and he has had a great impact on my playing and teaching. However, I have questioned many of his teachings on my own. I remember one lesson asking about different techniques used in various source material books that he used for his book. He looked up surprised and said, “Chad, in all my teaching I don’t know if any of my students have actually read the source material from which I used in my research.” After leaving the lesson, I took it as a compliment. But during the lesson, I thought it was the norm for scholarly work and found it odd that he had made such a statement.

His argument, on what he calls the “Technique-From-Pieces Fallacy,” goes against the prevailing idea that you can learn all the techniques necessary for playing the guitar by learning pieces. I will not go into restating Christopher’s argument. Reading his book will stretch your understanding of this particular point. As far as it concerns the topic of the subject at hand, I quote this, “The student wasn’t ready for the piece to be interpreted because the student’s energy and brain power were appropriated by the mechanics of getting the piece played,” and “As one assimilates and acquires a skill, brain activity decreases, leaving energy for approaching higher levels of skill or adding more skills.”^[1]Berg, C. (2019). In Practicing music by design: Historic Virtuosi on Peak performance (p. 13). essay, Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.

I’ll attempt to put the above statements in context for our subject of preparing to learn a piece. When learning a piece of music, multiple problems need solving. And this is secondary to the technique needed to solve them. If the technique is not already present, then all of our energy will be expended on trying to learn the technique rather than solving the musical problems contained in the piece. Or, all of our energy will be put into trying to make the music sound appropriate and we think our technique will somehow arrive as we find the notes. But as Christopher explains, this is not how the great virtuosi have and do approach these issues.

Preparing To Learn Requires Forethought

Most of reading or listening to this will not be concerned with becoming virtuosi. But, we need to think more critically as teachers and students about the inherent technical challenges presented in the piece or song before beginning to put our energy into actually learning the song. This should be given and has different ramifications for those that are professionals, college students working towards a performance degree, and/or aspiring professionals.

I understand that this forethought might be difficult for the beginning or intermediate guitarist (most of the readers of this post). How, as a beginner, do you know the skills you need before you need them? That’s where the aid of a teacher is worth the cost. But if having a teacher is out of the question for whatever reason, then you are going to need to be extra critical in examining the songs you want to put your work into before you begin.

The following is a rough understanding of how to begin deciphering the skills needed for any piece you are attempting to learn. I will do my best to cover the large variety of learning that I teach from chord songs to tablature playing, to notational playing. Obviously, I cannot cover every style of music and every situation. The differences between pick and fingerstyle playing make this more difficult. Also, I am not taking into account the current base level a player might already have before beginning a piece. The questions below help guide you at whatever stage you currently find yourself with whatever style you currently play. I mean, really, I could probably write a book about each one.

Chord/Strumming Evaluation

Let’s begin with the simplest evaluation when preparing to learn, chords, and strumming. Most beginning guitarists start their journey here. It’s a rough and tumbles thing to begin the guitar with chords. Before I ever have a student begin chords, we learn to pick individual notes to coordinate the right and left hands. Then we add double notes and finally chords. Of course, this takes into account that the student’s goals focus on this type of playing. When chords and songs begin in the lesson, the below evaluation can begin.

First, look over all the chords in the song. Most pop songs are going to have a very limited variety of chords and chord shapes. Do you know all the chords in the song? Have you played them before? Are there any barre chords? Are there more chords that you don’t recognize than ones that you do? Do they require shifting up the neck?

Second, make a list of all the chords used. Notice how many are new and how many are familiar. If you have a song with more than 20% new chords that are not the same shape, then I’d suggest picking a different piece. Otherwise, notice if the chords require large hand movements or shifting up the neck in the song’s progression.

Third, figure out the tempo of the song. This doesn’t need to be scientific, just tap your foot and find out how fast the chords are being transitioned between. Then, attempt to play the chords you already know at that tempo. If you can play all of them at tempo, great. Otherwise, you know you need to work on them. Practice the chords you don’t know and eventually play them at tempo.

I remind everyone working on chords that the most important element is to play the chord on the beat that it changes. The strum pattern does not mean a thing if you cannot change it on time. Imagine accompanying the song Happy Birthday at a party. You strum the first measure with an awesome rhythm and then everyone has to wait for you to grab the next chord. That’s not a pretty sight. If you just play one strum for every measure, then everyone can sing along.

Finally, after successfully playing the chord changes on time, then move on to working out the strumming. I won’t go into how to do that here. This is about evaluating a piece to help in preparing to learn a piece or song.

Tablature Evaluation

Preparing to learn tablature is a bit more difficult but follow similar rules given before. The two problems most prevalent with tablature are the medium’s lack of indicating rhythm and fingerings. The former is remedied when the notation is included with the tablature. The latter is usually absent. Also, most online resources for tablature have neither the rhythm nor fingerings included. This makes evaluation even more difficult.

When moving to tablature notation the guitarist is more than likely advancing in their chord strumming skills and seeking to add a riff, more intricate chord playing, or possibly a single-note guitar solo. Without a teacher, this can be difficult to evaluate. But, let’s try.

First, listen to the piece you are attempting to play. Notice the use of guitars throughout. Are you interested in just the main riffs (rhythm guitar) or are you interested in soloing and fill work?

Second, if your interest lies in the rhythm, then follow the previous steps for the chord/strumming evaluation for songs that contain mostly block-style chording (not riffs).

For riff-style rhythm, play through each riff without any tempo or rhythm and evaluate the hand movements. Are there any that seem out of the ordinary, use large stretches, or big shifts up and down the neck? Have you seen any of these shapes and movements before? This will make learning easier. Then, tap out the tempo as previously described in the Chord/Strumming Evaluation. This is where you will need to make an educated guess based on your ability on whether it is within reach to play it.

At this point, you might begin to isolate specific types of movements. One might be power chord shifting or double notes with string crossing. There are endless factors that may be considered. That’s what makes learning from tablature and on your own very difficult.

Third, if you find soloing where you want to go, then you need to figure out the key and scales. This could mean you put the solo aside for a while until you build up the necessary speed in your scale forms. Also, notice any technical challenges like bending, sweep-picking, harmonics, tremolo picking, etc. If any of these are not up to the tempo of the song, then you need to practice them away from the music before returning to work on the piece.

This evaluation using tablature may sound like an advertisement for studying with a teacher. In a way, it is. After 20 years of teaching, the lack of identifying limiters to learning a piece causes much frustration in students. Many times, it leads them to quit and/or constantly struggle. A set of eyes on what you need to learn and the ability to formulate a path to learn cut the learning curve greatly.

Classical/Notational Evaluation

Tablature evaluation is very difficult for a beginning or intermediate guitarist. However, due to the nature of notational standards in classical music, evaluating for classical/fingerstyle guitar is actually more clear-cut.

First, look at the rhythm and tempo of the piece. Is the time signature unusual? Are there any measures or phrases that look unusually complicated from a rhythm perspective? Can you figure out these passages rhythmically in a short amount of time? When considering the tempo, are there any passages that look like they would be difficult when played up to tempo?

Second, look through the piece for tonal issues. What key is the piece in? Do you play in it often? Are there any areas with a lot of accidentals? Do you notice string numbers or Roman numerals indicating notes played at different locations on the fretboard?

Third, check for any left-hand challenges. Are the fingerings written in or are you going to need to spend time figuring all of them out? Do you notice many barre chords, stretches, or fast scalar passages? Are there any special techniques indicated like artificial harmonics, slurs, trills, etc?

Fourth, check for right-hand challenges. Is the piece mostly arpeggio or tremolo? Are there scales that require string crossing and alternation? Does it move from one musical texture to another (i.e. homophony to polyphony, etc.)? Are special right-hand indications given (ponticello, sul tasto, etc.)? Are there any specialized right-hand techniques including rasgueado, artificial harmonics, etc?

Fifth, play through the piece as best you can to identify anything you think might give you trouble. You will miss something, so don’t worry if you find later that you need to step away from the piece to learn a new skill before returning. If you cannot make it through the piece in one short reading, then I am going to suggest it is too difficult for you to begin with. You should find another piece to work up to first. That being stated, if you want to eventually play this piece, then there is nothing wrong in making note of the technical challenges that need to be worked on to build up to playing the piece.

Finally, write down everything you have identified and put it to the test. If you identified a certain arpeggio, then can you play that arpeggio using standard chords at the desired tempo for the piece? If you identified scalar passages, then do you know the scale it comes from, and can you play it at tempo? Are there a number of barre chords, other chords, or difficult stretches you are unfamiliar with? What are their names and can you land them at the tempo required for the piece? Through this type of questioning, you can begin to understand the technical requirements needed and evaluate whether you can meet those requirements now or need to wait to begin the piece after you have done the preparatory work to reach those requirements.

Again, it is impossible for me to write down everything to check for when evaluating a piece to consider preparing to learn. I hope you get a general idea and that there is much to consider as a student’s skill level increases.

Jazz And Other Evaluations

Jazz has its feet in a number of the evaluations above. It uses notation to identify the head (or melody). It focuses on chord changes to develop comping and soloing. An understanding of scales and arpeggios is paramount to good improvisation. Due to the mixed nature of the field, I will leave this evaluation as a combination of the aforementioned material.

Preparing To Learn Summation

That is a lot to think about. I wish finding a teacher solves this problem. However, many teachers don’t look at learning pieces this way. Or, they do so in some areas and not in others. I know I have been incomplete in my approach many times to songs my students are working on. No teacher is perfect. But, hopefully, I can learn from teaching failures in the past and keep putting my best foot forward.

As you think about preparing to learn a new piece or song, I hope you’ll consider taking a step back to look at what needs mastering in order to play it successfully. This may mean working on exercises and skills before ever playing a single note of the actual piece. If you take this approach, then I am confident you’ll find your progress moves quicker and you are building a base that follows you and grows from piece to piece.