Not everybody's idea of a bluesman, to be sure, but Steve Vai gives an extremely honest, interesting, and useful interview here. The things he says about his own relationship with music, including his practice routine, are applicable to all of us. I don't usually watch YouTube videos for 12 minutes straight, but I watched this one.
If you don't know what Vai achieved, take a listen [sic] to this video:
Not everybody's cup of tea, but still remarkable in its own way. Not the work of a traditionlist! But somebody who helped create a tradition (shredding).....
Last Edited by on Dec 02, 2010 9:47 AM
Here's the other Little Walter of guitar-shredding: Jason Becker. Give him time to get going:
Becker has ALS and can't move his limbs these days. Quite a remarkable downfall. Here's a paragraph from his Wikipedia entry:
Considered a virtuoso guitarist and one of the top players of his time, Jason Becker studied the works of violinist Niccolò Paganini and was a playing partner with Marty Friedman. He later arranged Paganini's 5th Caprice, performing it during an instructional guitar video. Becker's compositions often include high speed scalar and arpeggio passages, both of which are trademarks of his 'shred' style of guitar playing. Often incorporating advanced techniques such as sweep picking, alternate picking, artificial harmonic accenting, and tapping; He was among the leaders of the field during the technical 'shred' guitar and Neo-Classical Metal trend of the mid to late eighties and is still respected and honored by his musician peers today. He demonstrated the arpeggio sequence during a clinic at the Atlanta Institute of Music. A video of this performance first appeared on his Hot Licks guitar instructional video.[1]
Last Edited by on Dec 02, 2010 9:55 AM
Every now and someone posts about their harmonica practicing routine, so if anyone likes the above video they might be interested in searching for "steve vai 30 hour workout" to see Steve's approach.
I had seen the interview a week or two ago because I subscribe to Justin's channel. I'm not really into Steve's style of playing at all, but I really enjoyed the interview.
I've been a fan of Vai since Flexable, and I've seen him live a few times. He's an amazing guitarist and musician in general. The man can do it all-shred, and lay it down slow and sweet;he's no one-trick pony. Definitely one of the all-time greatest. ----------
