"tek-neek, n. [from Greek 'technikos']"

Since my first few lessons have been a bit technical, let's just air out the whole issue of technique:

My Webster's dictionary includes this definition of technique:
"a method of accomplishing a desired aim."
This is by far the most appropriate definition for my purposes. The key words here are "desired aim." In other words, what are you trying to do? This gets right to the heart of the matter: your attitude about technique is going to depend entirely on what you are trying to achieve musically. That leaves it open to a very broad range of possible levels of technique- from as little as "three chords and the truth" a la Bob Dylan, to the typical jazz player's encyclopedic knowledge of theory, scales, arpeggios and chords.

Where do I stand on this? Well, I've traveled down the road of heavy emphasis on technique- in my formative years in the late 70's-early 80's, I wanted to play fast and furious like my idols: Steve Morse, Al Dimeola, Eddie Van Halen, etc. I always had a good ear, but my technical aptitude was weak, so I had to practice very, very hard to be able to play like that.

I'm not sorry I did it, but I would never insist that anyone put as much time into sheer technical study as I did, because it can reach a point where it isn't helping you play musically. Practicing technique for its own sake became a big energy drain for me, because I realized it wasn't having very much impact on the musical quality of my actual performing.

So now, my ideal is this: to aim for your technical ability to be good enough so that when you play, neither you nor the listener notices the technique, they simply hear the music.

My over-riding theme is always: concept first. In this case concept means whatever you're trying to express musically. So right away, that means I don't like certain things:

- People with lots of technical skill, who constantly have to show it off.

- People with limited to minimal technical ability, who make excuses for their shortcoming by saying that practicing would "get in the way of their creative flow".

- People who, knowingly or not, do nothing but re-hash the style of someone who came before.

- People who have a good idea, and they play it over and over, and over, and over...

I'm tempted to name names, but... well, you can think of some artist that fits in each of those categories, can't you?

Now turn this around to get to the values you do want to cultivate:

- For those with great technical skill, make sure that it's directed towards the honest and true expression of the musical feeling you have chosen to express. When your music focuses on you, the player, you are always in danger of being called pretentious, or egotistical, but as long as you are true to your musical ideals, then you can ignore that criticism.

- For those aspiring to high levels of technical skill, make sure that you practice in musical ways; never practice a technique without applying it to a song, or a chord progression, or at the very least a rhythm. Always practice with attention to things besides just playing the right notes in the right order; accenting, dynamics and articulation are just some of the things you can utilize to make anything you play have more musical content. Keep watching my lesson pages for tips on these.

- For those who play at a simpler technical level, there is nothing to be embarrassed about, as long as you are again true to your musical ideal. But be careful- the simpler styles of music leave you nowhere to hide if you don't have strong songs and a strong personal style coming through. Still, ignore criticism from those who would look down their noses at you- playing from the heart is all that really matters.

Your comments welcome!