I love the org to death; you guys are my brothers and sisters who always hip me to things that have brought my friends and me much joy these past two years.

I have a question for the real musicians here.

For 2006, I have a simple goal:

I want to be able to play each song on the Purple Rain album on guitar.

I am starting from 0. To become as good as Prince on guitar, circa 1984, do you have any recommendations?

New York City area. Hohner Telecaster. How often should I practice? How much should I practice? Should I search for a teacher? Learn to read music?


After this year, I will continue to work on my skills to see how I can develop. For this year, I just want to concentrate on something that is achievable.

Thanks for all of your help!

Well, I'm no musician, but at one time I did music reviews for a local newspaper in my area. I got to go to many great concerts and met some great musicians. (never got a chance to meet Prince though).
In answer to your questions.
1. First and formost, yes you should learn to read music. If you have raw talent that's a plus. The advantage of learning to read music is the doors it will open to and for you. As well as being more in charge of your choices and the direction of your music.
2. Practice, practice, practice. When ever and where ever you can. I had a friend who actually almost slept with his guitar. Sometimes at night he would have an idea and sit up in bed and start playing right then.
3. If you can mimic Prince's style by learning all of his rifts, chords and style eventually you will find your own...
Those are just a few of my suggestions...I'm sure real musicians will give you more ideas that will be a catalyst to your inner genius.
Good Luck...

I found that Prince's song : "The Cross/The Christ" is probably the best place to start ...if you want to practice by playing Prince's Music.

The best piece of advice that I can hope to share is something that Ray Charles Jr. said :

"...You Gotta Let it Do What it Do, Baby..."

Injoy it. God Bless.

One Love
Michael
www.Fonkay.com

Here is what I recommend my students to study. I am familiar with most jazz and classical method books and after a very long time I am able to say to beginners:

1) Get a great teacher and use Mel Bay's Complete Book of Guitar Improvisation by Vincent Bredice. He was my teacher after Berklee College of Music and I learned more from him in 1 year than I did at Berklee.

2) Transcribe! every day learn... Jimi Hendrix, Freddie King, Albert King and Charlie Parker and J.S. Bach. These are the great improvisors so steal from them!

If you want to play jazz, R&B, soul or Rock'n Roll you gotta learn the blues or else you won't understand phrasing and feel which is the key.

3) Listen to music constantly and jam with others who are better than you so you can steal licks and ideas.

4) Be patient with yourself for it won't come when your ready but when "it's" ready! Rome was not built in a day!

Here is a list of important books every serious guitar student should investigate:

1."Fusion" by Joe Diorio

2."The Complete Book of Guitar Improvisation" by Vincent Bredice

3."Elementary Training for Musicians" by Paul Hindemith

4."The Solo Lute Works of Johann Sebastian Bach" edited for guitar by Frank Koonce

5."Scales and Modes" by Vincent Bredice

6."Chord Chemistry" by Ted Green

7. "Intervallic Designs for Jazz Guitar" by Joe Diorio

8."Jazz Structures for the New Millennium" by Joe Diorio



Here are a few more books to check out:

1. "120 Daily Studies for the Right Hand" by Mauro Giuliani

2. "Artfull Arrpegios" by Don Mock

3. "Bop Duets" by Bugs Bower

4. Berklee Series Guitar "Classical Studies for Pick Style Guitar" by William Leavitt

5."Two-Part Inventions for the Piano" by J.S.Bach

6. "Linear Expressions" by Pat Martino

7. "John Coltrane" by Lewis Porter

8. "Slominski Thesaurus of Scales", by Nicholas Slominski

9. "Omni Book" (sax solos of Charlie Parker)

10."Giant Steps" by Joe Diorio

This is my student cirriculum:

Beginner Student Overview:
* Note reading in first position
* Nicolo Pagannini's "Perpetual Motion"
* 15 major scales & their harmonizations
* Proper techniques for both hands
* Rhythmic notation studies


Intermediate Student Overview:
* Note reading in all positions
* "The Two Part Inventions" by J. S. Bach
* 15 harmonic minor scales & their harmonizations
* The Diatonic Church Modes
* More Rhythmic Notation Studies
* Jazz and Pop standards


Advanced Student Overview:
* Joe Diorio "Fusion" jazz guitar solos
* Chord Melodies
* Classical guitar studies by J. S. Bach
* The synthetic modes
* The blues
* Charlie Parker's "The Omni Book"
* Diminished Half / Whole and Whole / Half Tone Scales
* Whole Tone Scales
* John Coltrane's "Giant Steps"

There are so many more things to write about here but I will post more later...

I hope this helped you.

www.frankaxtell.com

FrankAxtell said:

*sniff* This is why I love the Org! Thanks SO much to all of you. This list is incredibly helpful. Finding a good teacher is hard because there are so many out there who are, at best, intermediate students, but with these suggestions as a foundation, I will have a better idea of what questions to ask.

Maybe I'll post my efforts here on 12/31/2006.

its all very well learning guitar whether it b from tuition or reading books but 1 thing i think which makes good musicians great is the ability 2 have a really good ear for songs u r playing along with a tremendous knowledge of the instrument u r also playing and never b afraid 2 wander from the norm and never ever b afraid to be daring

I live in NYC and recenly hooked up with The Studio

Www.thestudio.org

they have open jams every sat night and put togeher bands of all levels.

I've now played the bitter end 4 times thanks to them!

eventually i want to put togeher a prince and related tribute band and can use you on guitar, so start pracicing!

(i play keys)

GaryMF said:

Dude, I'm hitting the guitar now in preparation Good luck!

But software to record songs. Or buy a cheap 4-track to record songs. I started learning in leaps and bounds as soon as I started messing around with recording myself. It's totally ego-driven. You hear yourself play. You pay attention to the parts you mess up, you can hear everything and go back and improve the parts.

In fact, hell, you could start by recording every song on purple rain. And then go back and improve on each song as you get better.

Good luck! Very ambitious move on your part. I'd love to keep up with your progress.

How often should you pratice? Until your fingers bleed.

Music Theory. I find videos are very helpful here. You need learn it well.

Understanding fretboard phyisics is a must.

Please hit me with a post or org note for sudgested videos.

Alasseon said:

Oh, but in that case you shouldn't listen to anything I have to say...



The only song you can reasonably arrange for a solo guitar would be "Purple Rain", the rest need the other instrumentation too to work out to even a feasible degree. Prince's music makes for quite bad tuitional material for the guitar, I recommend someone else you might like (i.e. Lenny Kravitz?) over Prince for that purpose.



Everyday. But not on the days before an exam. Remember your school duties!



Well, I practiced about 30-60 hours each week when I was a teenager only to find out later that I really didn't like playing the guitar or listening to much guitar-based music anymore when I got into adulthood. It's your choice, do you think it's worth the effort?

Novabreaker said:

When he's ready, I'd be happy to supply keys and drum machine. I've always wanted to form a Prince Tribute band and just play music from Prince and Protege acts from 81-88 era.

I even have a LinnDrum (not LM-1 but still)