“When every pothole seems like a personal insult, beware.”
— Bicycling Complete Book of Road Cycling Skills: Your Guide to Riding Faster, Stronger, Longer, and Safer by Jason Sumner a.co/3wRT3Su
Styling Guitar Class for Practice
Guitar Lessons — Derek Gripper
people would arrive over the course of two or three hours and do their practice. I would walk around helping them, showing them new things, or just leaving them alone to do what they do.
This is how I would like to make the individual classes. Not a confrontational Segovia style “you play and I correct” class, and not an individual version of the group class (unless required). Just a time for you to practice with my ears in the room, and an opportunity for me to hear your practice and know what to show you next, either in your class or in a group class. Sometimes you leave with a video of your own that you can practice with, and sometimes we practice together.
Why practice music?
Because I really enjoy the effort and the process of practicing.
How slow is slow enough?
From a book on running but also applies to playing guitar.
“How slow is slow enough? This question can be answered by another question: how slow do you need to go in order to discover something new? Consider that slowing down is simply a tool by which you can become aware of things that you were not previously aware of.”
— Slowing Down to Run Faster: A Sense-able Approach to Movement by Edward Yu a.co/iRsrBKg
Panoramic photo of Red Wood tree in Muir Woods.
cool quote
The End of Dieting
“NUTRITARIAN DAILY CHECKLIST (Make copies of this chart and check off each point each day.) Eat a large salad as the main dish for at least one meal. Eat at least a half cup, but preferably closer to 1 cup, of beans. Eat one large (double-size) serving of steamed green vegetables. Eat at least 1 ounce of nuts and seeds if you’re female and at least 1.5 ounces of nuts and seeds if you’re male. Half of them should be walnuts, hemp seeds, chia seeds, flaxseeds, or sesame seeds. Eat some cooked mushrooms and raw and cooked onions. Eat at least three fresh fruits.”
— The End of Dieting: How to Live for Life (Eat for Life) by Joel Fuhrman a.co/gujbKrE
On the virtues of slow practice from Tilly Fleischmann
“The first phrase (or less, if difficult) is played so slowly that about three seconds can be counted between each successive note or chord. Rhythm and dynamics are eliminated so one can concentrate exclusively on the progression of voices. Students with a knowledge of theory should reflect on tonality, harmonic structure, modulations. The phrase, or portion thereof, is repeated with about two seconds between each note or chord. The next repetition takes time and rhythm into account. The tempo is “exceedingly slow,” but note values are proportional. From this point, the tempo is quickened at each repetition, dynamics, phrasing, and interpretation are considered. Succeeding phrases are practised in the same manner. When all the phrases of the first period have been practised, one begins practise of the period as a whole, beginning moderato and gradually working up to tempo. 22”
— Practicing Music by Design: Historic Virtuosi on Peak Performance by Christopher Berg a.co/bqzZa5j
Classical guitar strings
St. Augustine Catholic Church.
Apple Century City.
Truing wheels.
J. Paul Getty Villa.
Vroman’s Bookstore.
Marukai Market.
Village Well Books & Coffee.
Trump National Golf Club Los Angeles.
Ace Hardware.
Kurata EyeCare Center.
Barbeques Galore.
Borel Creek.
Magical Bridge Playground.
Laurelwood Park.
CuriOdyssey.