Category Archives: Phrasing
Learning How to Phrase
It’s amazing how many sites, including this blog, there are that are trying to teach guitar. Many of them are really good learning aides…I’ve used a few of them myself when I’m trying to drum up something new and just don’t have creativity on my side at the moment. It’s also amazing how many sites there are out there that shouldn’t be. I’m not saying if you happen to learn how to play and want to teach others what you’ve learned that you should avoid doing so, but make sure if you’re going to post something, it’s not going to make people cringe, it’s got to WOW them. One of the biggest mistakes I’ve seen is in the musician’s phrasing.
Phrasing is when you use legato (from the Italian meaning “tied together”), staccato (meaning “detached”), piano (meaning “soft”), forte (meaning “loud”), crescendo (meaning “to become gradually louder”), and diminuendo (meaning “to become gradually softer”), as well as sustains and vibratos to achieve a sound that’s pleasing to the senses. Phrasing is an important part of music as it helps to convey the message the artist is trying to create.
In the example below, the creator of the video does an excellent job showing how the song is played, then shows it slowed down with the tab underneath. Where they failed is, if you know any of the songs they are playing, phrasing is not one of their strong points…nor is timing or dexterity. For instance, if you were to look at the tab for Smoke on the Water that they have in the video, instead of using one finger to play the whole score, they could have used the first finger for the third fret, the third finger for the fifth and the fourth finger for the sixth…making the song easier to play and less hand movement to allow for better phrasing. In One, the notes they played are mostly muted. The musician never allowed for them to ring out. This is also true with The Kids Aren’t Alright and many of the rest of the songs. This is an example of what lack of phrasing sounds like:
Here is an example of one of the songs they played. This is The Kids Aren’t Alright by The Offspring. Notice how the original song allows all the notes to ring out and sort of melt into each other. This is the key to perfect phrasing:
If you listen carefully, you can hear at the end of the phrase how The Offspring use more of a tremolo picking (or rapidly and continuously picking a note) technique that is lacking in the previous example.
With enough practice, anyone can play their favorite songs, but with real practice and focus on your phrasing, you can make it sound like you’re the one that wrote and recorded the song. Sure this all sounds like nothing but music theory, but the fact is is if you listen to any style of music, it’s only choppy if it’s intended to be and there are many more facets of musical technique that haven’t been mentioned in this blog. My advice is…practice the song you want to learn the most. Find the actual recording and listen to it be for you play it for different phrasing techniques. Play along with the song so you can get the feel of the true timing. Then, play the song without the real recording…even better, record yourself and play it back when you’re done. Play your recorded version against the real version to see how close or how far you are from the real thing. Then, when you think you’ve got it down, make the real recording that you want to post for everyone to see. I’m pretty sure by that time you’ll WOW your audience.
Real Tabs and Lessons for Guitar 