Here’s the scenario. You are a lead guitar player in a band. You just performed for a group of people. Overall, you feel like it went well and really poured everything you had into playing your parts and improvising that solo section. Most people tell you they were impressed with the performance. You feel good about it.
However, one friend, who also happens to play guitar, says to you, “Yeah, dude, you played your parts well, but the solo section seemed way too long and lacked interest in the melody.”
Some of you might not pay much attention to the comment, but for others, this could be devastating, especially for newer guitar players who don’t have a lot of experience or confidence.
In general, I think at a gut level we believe that critique directed towards us is somehow a bad thing. Maybe in our minds we would say it’s a good thing, but when it comes towards us, our initial reaction might be to write it off rather than consider it, and in some cases, we might be even afraid of it, or discouraged from ever playing music again.
I learned a very important lesson as a guitar player this past week.
I don’t know how this happened, but I’m seeing it quite a bit these days. Somehow it has become “cool” or just “the thing” to have your guitar strap adjusted so low that your guitar is swinging at your knee caps. I have no idea how such a thing has infected the guitar community. And no offense metal rockers, but I see it a lot with you.
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