"Tommy Talk: A Guitar Masterclass with Tommy Emmanuel, cgp" Photographs by Eltjo Haselhoff Introduction In the last two years I was lucky enough to attend a few guitar masterclasses and workshops with the great Tommy Emmanuel, cgp. Tommy gives guitar workshops quite regularly. These are all mentioned on his tour schedule. For all of those who have missed Tommy's workshops so far, I have compiled some essentials of Tommy's guitar playing philosophy in this article. It will be a poor man's version of the real thing, so if you ever get the chance to attend one of Tommy's workshops, make sure to be there. It is a highly inspirational and educational experience, not to mention a lot of fun, and most definitely worth the (usually quite modest amount of) money. Even if you don't play guitar it would be a valuable experience. Tommy is a person with an overwhelming amount of 'positivity', and he has the gift to pass this on to others. Talk to Tommy, and you feel happy right away. Groove and Melody Two things are crucial in music, according to Tommy. These two things are: 1. groove and 2. melody. Groove has to do with the beat of the music. He mentioned George Benson as an example. People fancy Benson's music because of the groove, the regular beat that makes your foot tap, your hips swing, your hands clap, your head nod, and your fingers snap. Keeping a good groove is essential when you play guitar. Without a good groove, the music will not excite anyone. It will sound chaotic and little inviting. Particularly for complex arrangements of solo acoustic guitar, loosing the groove is a common shortcoming. Tommy has an efficient method to prevent this: "Tap your foot!" This is what Chet Atkins used to say, at least once a day to someone, and it's one of Tommy's rules of thumb too. As a demonstration, he taps his foot, very regularly, with about two taps per second. He asks the audience to join him. The initial rumble turns into a regular beat, which makes the whole auditorium shake. He then plays a single string solo, closely following the groove. Sometimes he plays ahead of the beat, sometimes he lags way behind, but on average he stays perfectly in the groove. And it swings! "You may want to use a metronome to practice at home," Tommy says, "to get a good feeling of what a regular beat is. But do tap your foot!" The second crucial thing is a good melody. When Tommy first mentioned this, I did not get the point. Of course a good melody is important. But what is a good melody? And how do you tell a good melody from a bad one? And isn't that a personal, subjective thing too? The answer is quite simple. A lot of guitar music lacks melody at all. And the litmus test is: try to hum the melody (or whistle it, for that matter). Take away the bass line, the harmonics, the chords, just keep the melody. That is what remains in your head after the playing is done. I don't want to mention names here, but if you listen around, you will find many examples of fingerstyle guitar players that write 'unhummable' compositions. But take any Chet Atkins song, or any Tommy song, and you'll be able to whistle it, and anyone will recognize the song right away. That's where it all starts. Instinctively, I have felt the same about guitar music all my life. However, I never was aware of it. Whenever I tried to explain what kind of guitar music I liked, it would take me a long time. Tommy's summary of two words, groove and melody, is extremely efficient and very true! Sound and Performing Good sound is crucial when you perform, and it's the first thing you should get right. Anything else can come later. Tommy plays Maton guitars, with an AER 60 combo acoustic amplifier, supported by an almost antique Alesis reverb unit, made somewhere half way the eighties. "People laugh when they see my reverb unit," he says. "But it sounds good, and life is too short to spend it on turning knobs. I want a simple unit that just does the job." He plugs his Maton into the AER, and links it to the PA. Another line goes straight into the PA. "Those two channels produce different sounds, and when they come together in the PA, they fill up the entire audio frequency range, and to the audience it sounds as if they have their head stuck inside my guitar. That's the sound I want: a big sound." Tommy's Matons have both an under saddle piezo pickup and an internal condenser microphone. He can blend the two on the control panel on the side of his guitar. "The microphone alone does not sound very good," he explains. He plays a few licks without the piezo signal, and in fact: the sound is hollow, thin and boomy. He then demonstrates piezo only. "You can hear this is piezo," he says, "because there is something unnatural in it." He then blends in the internal microphone. "But when you add the microphone signal, something happens. The sounds opens up, and it sounds like this, quite nice!" A final element of Tommy's sounds are the new strings that he puts on his guitar, every night, just before every show. "I want to sound at my best for the audience, and new strings sound best, right?" Another important advice Tommy gives to anyone who performs, is to be in control of the volume. Tommy said: "Some people walk up to the sound engineer with a cable in their hand, and say: Please Mr. sound engineer, can you amplify this for me? That is very unprofessional! But many professionals do it. They ought to be ashamed of themselves! You are the one who performs, so you should be in charge. Of course you could explain the sound man in detail what you want, but you would have to make a song list and spend a long time on it every night. I can do it better and faster myself." This is one of the reasons Tommy keeps his AER and his reverb unit within reach throughout his performances. "And if you play with others, one thing is crucial. If you cannot hear every single note the other person plays, you're too loud, and you have to cut down in volume." And what about the nerves? Nerves are nasty, because they mess up your capabilities, and make you play much worse than normal. Tommy's advice, when you are nervous in front of the audience, is to simply tell them. "The audience will feel that, and because they want you to sound at your best, they will help you. Something will happen, and your nerves will become much better right away. Just be yourself, be honest, and all will be fine. " Inspirations Tommy never had any formal musical education. "All I did was look and listen to others and try to steal as much as I could from them, and then make it my own. So all the time I get asked which guitar players I listen to. And the answer is: I listen to everybody, but not really very much. I listen to songwriters instead. Billy Joel, Stevie Wonder, James Taylor, Phil Collins. I listen to people who make great songs." As an example, he tells how The Man With The Green Thumb was inspired by James Taylor's Copperline. "I was listening to that song and thought, you know what I love about this? This constant moving! So I thought, how can I steal this idea, and make it my own?" Tommy transposed the part he liked from the key of D to the key of A, modified the picking somewhat, and added a palm mute. The Man With The Green Thumb was born. Tablature Tommy does not read or write music or tablature. "I have tried many times to learn to read music, but it never worked out. I can learn songs faster by just listening." Ear training is very important, according to Tommy. "Only by listening and learning to understand what you hear you can learn to play a song from your hart. If you always have to read from musical scores, you're not a musician, you're a robot. I was lucky to grow up at the right place, at the right time. When I was young, there was no tablature where I lived. All we could do was listen to the radio, try to remember what we heard and play it back from memory. And that's basically what I still do." Become a better player "The world consists of six billion individuals, and they all have their opinions. And you know what? You don't need them. You don't need anyone to become a better player, except yourself. You know what you have to do to improve, nobody needs to tell you. The only problem is, that when you are concentrated on playing a song from the beginning to the end, your brain is so busy that there is no way you can really listen to your own performance. So what you have to do is record yourself. And then relax and listen back. The first time you do that, it may well be a cold surprise. But that is all right, because then you know what to work on, and that was the whole point, right?" Tommy makes it clear that learning to play guitar means hard work. "Persistence is the key." And the only way to learn to play a song well is by repetition. "Play the song over and over and over again, until you can do it without thinking. And by the way: never do that in front of your family members!" Glory and Fame is such a Curious Game Not everybody is aware of the fact that in his native country, Australia, Tommy has been a national hero for a long time. Glory, success, glamour, money and fame: he has had it all. He told how many guitarists, in particular those who want to make a living out of it, become inspired by the stories in glossy magazines and glamorous television shows. Tommy's verdict is simple and straightforward: "I have been there, I have seen it all, and there is nothing up there!" He advises everyone: "Just be yourself. When you do what your heart tells you, when your just being honest and open towards yourself and towards others, you can be convinced that it is good whatever you're doing. That is where you will find true satisfaction. Don't try to be like somebody else, just be yourself. There are already so many other people!" _______________________________________________________ (Disclaimer: all Tommy quotes were phrased by myself, and are only based on what I remember and understood from Tommy's words.) BACK