The 1983 Annual
Conference held by the Guitar Foundation of
America
Master Classes at Guitar Quebec
“Many students
attend master classes hoping that by touching the
hem of the robe of a master they will
benefit—this is just not true. The best one
can hope for is knowledge.”
John
Duarte’s introductory comments at his
Tuesday morning master class summed up the attitude
of all the performers giving master classes
during this festival. None of these
world—class performers tried to mold
their concepts or interpretations of the music
into the students or remake them in their own
images. What did take place was a sharing of the
techniques the student needed to more fully
express his or her musical intent.
This was refreshing for
us, as I’'ve audited some classes during
which the student would be told, “No,
that’s not the way to play it”,
"You play like a pig”, and a friend of
mine was once told. Happily, we never heard
“pig” or even “blowfish”
— just helpful hints and encouragement.
Rather than give a
blow-by-blow account of what was told to each and
every student, I think it would be more
advantageous if I briefly describe the technical and philosphical
hints the various guitarists gave.
David Russell
On warming up:
Mr. Russell begins his
daily practice with slow chromatic exercises
played with a slow vibrato. He feels this limbers
all the muscles of the left hand gently and
evenly, unlike simply jumping into a piece cold.
For the right hand, Mr. Russell plays scales with
one finger. He then plants his right hand fingers
(p, i, and m, for instance) and plucks with one
finger (a). This is intended to develop
independence. Throughout these exercise he is
constantly aiming for the quality of tone be
likes. Mr. Russell then plays Recuerdos De La
Alhambra with a two-finger tremolo: p i m i, p m
i m, p i a i, p a i a, p m a m. Three—finger
scales, slurred and non—slurred ornamental
figures complete the warm-up. [Picture at
right, above: Harry Pellegrin attempts to leach
talent from David Russell.]
On performance:
Mr. Russell suggests
that one not mix cross—string trills and
single—string trills in the same piece
unless it is absolutely unavoidable. This is
advisable as these two trifle have very different
qualities (as we all know) and these sonic
differences can confuse the intent of the piece
by drawing the ear towards one or the other, when
things should be equal.
Slurs shouldn’t be
used as a technical crutch. They should only be
used for accent. Mr. Russell hardly ever uses
slurs when he performs — my own observation
from second row, center at his recital Wednesday
evening.
Benjamin Verdery
On learning new pieces:
When learning a new
piece, one should play each voice in the piece
separately. In this way, the player knows which
voices should be accented, brought out, and where
the voices go. This gives the player a better
understanding of the piece musically and may
prove helpful in case of memory slips.
Mr. Verdery suggests
that one should practice with the printed music even
after the piece has been memorized. Many times
mistakes will be incorporated into the
memorization of the piece. By practicing with the
music, one is afforded the opportunity to catch
and correct these mistakes before they are
committed to memory. [Picture right and
above, Chris Hnottavange, Ben Verdery and Harry
Pellegrin, once again trying to leach ability
from a master.]
On relaxation:
Proper posture is a
must. Mr. Verdery is an advocate of the guitar
cushion, a device which straps to one’s left
leg, supporting the guitar at the proper playing
height and angle while allowing both feet to
remain on the floor.
There would be no
tension in the player’s arms. Tension wastes
the muscle—power of the arm. The player
should also remember to breath. Holding
one’s breath makes one rush through the
phrase.
On etiquette:
One should always
acknowledge the applause positively no matter how
bad you feel your performance went. Why should a
paid the entertainer wish to spoil it things for
the paying audience by storming off stage or
simply sitting and frowning at them?
Costas Cotsiolis
Mr. Cotsiolis had. a run
of bad luck as far as performers in his class.
The beet performer in this class (and one of the
better performers of any of the classes) played Sevilla
on a steel—string guitar with a pick.
Another guitarist came up to play with a piece of
music he must have just started to read through
that morning. Mr. Cotsiolis bad to spend most of
his time with this student correcting wrong notes
and mistakes in the rhythm.
Mr. Cotsiolis
recommended two things in class.  First, dealing with
actual playing, he suggests that the player
develop a great sense of security with his right
band. For this be recommends practicing scales
(or any exercise in which the left band repeats
patterns) slowly and forte, gradually increasing
speed as confidence increases. Second, Mr.
Cotsiolis highly recommends a product known as
NAILOID Nail Repair (Richards & Appleby Ltd.
50 Jermyn St., London) Be related a story in
which he broke a nail hours before a recital,
used NAILOID, and played not just that recital
but the next six recitals in his schedule without
incident.
After the class had
ended, a friend of mine and I sat down and bad a
chat with Costas in which we managed to pry some
real information out of him. (That’s a joke,
anyone at the festival knows how Costas will tell
all his “trade secrets” gladly!) For
rapid scale passages, Costas uses a right hand
fingering of i a i a etc. ascending. Descending,
he uses the same fingering but uses the same
finger when crossing strings. If you were at his
recital, you know how well this works for
him! Another wry he speeds up his scales is
by using left hand fingerings that minimize left
hand motion — the fingerings Look more like
chords than scales. [Picture right and above:
Chris Hnottavange, Costas Cotsiolis and Harry
Pellegrin. This time Chris and Harry are both
trying to leach...]
John Duarte
On right—hand
technique:
Mr. Duarte recommends
that the student rest the right hand thumb on the
bass strings while playing free stroke scales. By
doing this, the right hand has support, plus the
bass strings don’t keep ringing or begin to
ring sympathetically.
Optimum nail shape is as
individual as one’s right hand technique.
The most important consideration one need make is
to ‘be sure that the path across the nail
which the string takes when plucked by the finger
is as smooth as possible, with no bumps. Think of
the nail as the launching ramp for the string.
When plucking the
string, always be sure to keep in mind that the
string produces the most volume and best tone
when pushed in towards the top of the guitar
before it is released. Plucking the string with a
motion parallel to the top creates a thin tone
without any real volume. This piece of advice was
given in all the classes during the festival
— a very common problem among the students.
All in all, the master
classes conducted during this festival were
informative and enjoyable. I wish I could have
been in two or three places at once as there were
other classes offered that I would have liked to
have covered.
Let me take this
opportunity to thank everyone involved in
organizing this truly outstanding festival. Only
by having actually been there can one really
comprehend the amount of time and energy as well
as blood, sweat and tears that must have gone
into the planning and arrangements. This past
week will always live in my memories as a time
for making new friends as well as friendships
renewed. We learned a lot and shared a lot, and
then, of course, there was the music!
Harry Pellegrin
Soundboard
Magazine Winter 1984
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