Scott Henderson Interview #3of3 (Guitar Lesson MA-003) How to play

[jcayer2]

Thanks so much for this interview !!! (part 1,2,3).

Very interesting guy !!!

[closetome]

Thanks Justin. Really interesting. Am interested right now in those msuical ear training exervises you guys were talking about. I've been thinking scales, intervals, sounds of chords so far...anything else you can add. Transcribing of course...

[cyberflea07]

enlightening!

revealing.....

inspiring.

rock on Scott

[187alacran]

awesome interview, i learned a lot.

[louverrone]

"learn to sound good with what you know now..." Scott Henderson

Many musicians do spend too much time trying to learn new concepts and technique. Putting it all away and just playing is so important.

[rafikimetalperu]

that last minute was funny hahaha thats for all the shreders ha

[yagamei]

@rafikimetalperu Not even, man. Your average shredder would be completely bewildered against a tune as harmonically dense as say, Body and Soul.

I believe Scott is referring most to those dime-a-dozen bebop jazz players, guitar or otherwise, that use the same vocabulary used by boppers since the 50's. A lot of schooled guys play this way - they are incredible, but it's the same old roll-off-the-tone, stream of eighth-note crap.

[deltabluesboy10]

I remember Scott at GIT,...I would often see people come out of his open sessions in tears, after he exposed their weakness.....lol but honesty is something artists need to be open too..

[stevieVantanna]

@deltabluesboy10 seriously? they were crying lol?

[yagamei]

@deltabluesboy10 A friend my teacher knows had an experience like that. He was so hellbent on playing chord tones he spent the whole time jamming with Scott with his eyes glued to the neck. After the tune, Scott went "Great .. So can we get anybody in here that can actually play?", and it has shook him ever since. It's very irresponsible as an instructor to do that to a student or peer, but Scott will be Scott. His intentions are always good.

[tonpulsar]

This is a great interview, thanks a lot for sharing it man!

[GaryNull]

Easy way to improve feel/playing : smoke a joint.

[yagamei]

@GaryNull I envy you, buddy. I play like shit when I'm high, and worse yet -- I'm the only guy in the room that thinks what he's doing is amazing. ; )

[m4dich]

I will for sure follow this advices by a legend named Scott. I really enjoyed this interview, he explained things in a cool way, so we begginers can actually understand how to play with feelings, not like robots trying to hit correct notes.

GJ@Justin, u helped me alot since I visited ure website, and I really mean it.

[skint0n0minted]

7:26 - 8:00 defines modern music - it's all so lifeless and theres no feeling

[bobbakert]

I have been a fan of Scott's since the first time I heard him..... several years ago... I bought his instructional videos and have about everything he has recorded..... I have met him at the Suhr booth at NAMM the last few years and listened to him play from 3-4 ft away..... I love his no BS attitude.... I am always inspired by him... I have been playing for 45 years many of them professionally...and after listening to this interview I have to reexamine some things about my playing.....

[nonallort]

God I need to work on my rhythmic sensibilities

[fletcherbarton]

Amazing that the amt. of views goes down as the interview #'s go up...everyone should watch all 3!!!! thank you for posting these & thanks to bizkin for suggesting them!!!

Joy (Fletcher's mom) =)

[blakesguitartuition]

So true...al of it...I'm so gonna show this vid to some of my students!

[freemancarl]

Sir Scott Is Absolutely Right.

Thanks 4 sharing :)

[osensei2987]

LOL! That mofo said, "All is lost!". LOL! Scott is my main man! Who more down to earth than this dude!

[chessdude67]

I met Scott a few times when he played a small club in Cleveland, Ohio. He and the band would hangout in between sets. Man, I saw some of the greatest musicians in that small club. A lot of people have not been exposed to fusion. So, you get a crowd of maybe 150 people, lol. Sad, but great for meeting this guys.

Thanks for posting this.

[bizthin]

Stratoblogster Approved!!!

[FranticRock]

Scott is one of my favorites. He does have the best of both worlds: the feel AND the vocabulary as well.

[Guernseyopman]

What do you call a guy that hangs out with musicians? A drummer. I am totally joking, Scott said "drummers are creative musicians too". I agree and have many drummer friends that I've had the pleasure of playing with over many years that amaze me with their musical abilities.

[JensKolonD]

Uh, I want to hear some Yngwie Malmsteen after this interview!

haha..

[perromanchado]

i´m gonna show this interview to some of my students. i´ve learned a lot from it myself too ;-)

[jcshirke]

Fantastic interview. Thanks so much for sharing this.

[versuskonrad]

I wish he was my father :) Well... or brother! :D

I saw him live 3 times, I spoke to him and have to say... he deserves more than he gets. Respect. Great musician , composer and teacher!

[Modes9]

Scott has a big advantage with Latin music because he came from Florida. I guess guys from Wyoming probably have trouble feeling that stuff!

[paengdulay]

very nice.

[PatricioLeija]

Just amazing!

[johnnywinternut]

This is the most straightforward advice for guitar playing that I have ever heard!.........I wonder if any shredders out there are hearing this?

[jatotsusuken]

you have no idea

[LeovHeineken]

Robot Musicians... so sad... so true....

[y34r]

I learn alot from Scott's word than i ever learn in music school

Thx alot

[loren1283]

LOL I thought he was going to say music comes from the heart...nope it comes from your speaker!

[soren650]

5:55 = the essence of guitar

[swivelingchairguy]

music*

[soren650]

true :)

[Kjutte1]

I hate rustey cooley.

[DougFCKNSteele]

@Kjutte1 Me moreso.

[en4sm8zn7g8]

Good choice in interviewing Scott!

[earsoup]

hilarious dude !

[strabbs1]

i think this guyssmoked drugs in the past

[skint0n0minted]

most people have

[stevieVantanna]

@strabbs1  Nah most musicians especially JAZZ Fusion musicians are super drug free.

[strabbs1]

@stevieVantanna do ya think?? what like miles davies and steve gadd?? maybe the newer guys from guitar institute have cleaned up there act a bit, maybe iam just cynical!! lol

[stevieVantanna]

@strabbs1 ahhh...I was just trying to be funny.

[cyberflea07]

drugs can only help a musician if after using them for a while he can realize deep within him self that he needs to kick them far away from his path in order to focus 100% on his instrument,music and all the stuff Scott just mentioned.

[DougFCKNSteele]

@strabbs1 They didn't hurt him, he's fucking great. Maybe some robots out there need to hit up a joint, get drunk, bang a chick or two. LIVE. Probably help with the songwriting process, lots of boring shit out there.

[strabbs1]

@DougFCKNSteele ha ha ha.true. imagine if the x factor guys where given acid and forced to listen to joes garage? id watch that

[dmchingham]

Very interesting and inspiring. Thanks Justin.

[drandre2campos]

I had the HONOR to play with this guy....

and I became his 1st fan.

God bless you Mr. "perfect"Henderson

[Bluesboneband]

Scott is a wise man!

[NotYourTypicalNegro]

Man, Scott is the coolest...love this guy.

[yetimach]

An interesting interview. I got a lot of helpful ideas out of it. I'm going to try to find my musical soul. Plus, as a private language trainer, I really liked the comparison between language and music acquisition. Spot on. I think it has to do with higher dimensional energy interaction that we are only intuitively aware of.

[ajfx]

i think he saying steve vai is shit when he talks about players who are robots and have no feel

[HjalmarGuitarMaster]

Are you out of your minds? listen to whispering a prayer!

Rusty Cooley...he's a robot!!!

[Sandemose]

I wouldnt put words into Scotts mouth if you dont know what he means. Its quite arrogant actually...

Best, Sandemose

[EthnHayabusa]

Why do you assume that?I think Vai has very decent feel.

[yagamei]

@ajfx Vai has a ton of feel, technique, and confidence.

He also has a huge head, and in MY opinion, couldn't compose his way out of a wet paper sack.

[vracan]

Extremely valuable advice.

If I were to personally put a percentage of guitarist that I have met in my life that are actually able to play by "feel" and know how to groove, i would say 0.0001%. But I must admit it is VERY hard hard work to pass this huge milestone. Once you do pass thru it though, You'll swear you feel connected to everything in this universe!

[yagamei]

@vracan I have to be honest here, I think "feel" and groove .. being able to find that pocket ... That's the kind of stuff you're either born with, or don't have. And if you don't have it, you will have to work incredibly hard to fake it. 

[vracan]

@yagamei

Oh i definitely was NOT born with it!...But what I WAS born with- was the strong desire to be able to do it!...and with perserverence and focus I can honestly now say I can pick up my guitar anyplace/anytime and groove to anything I want to!

"Don't play to impress....play to intrigue!"

[YouSpamTard]

I teach, and this idea of listen to the amp is so true. Most kids play along with records to much and never actually cut the record off to actually listen to what they "sound" like. For beginners, I think for every hour of transcribing, one should play at least 4 hours making what they have learned from the record sound correct. With "feel" so to speak. Listen and learn, then cut the thing off. I encourage youngsters to completely stop "playing along" with records. Its a really bad habit.

[voodoo411]

i love youtube. everything is up side down :))

[Azrael888]

"hope I didn't talk too much" haha

[bean1967]

I almost didnt' recognize Scott without the 'Fro'

[NWB]

thanks Justin! Good interview with an awesome and one of my favourite guitar players!!

[Sitzriese321]

This interview was very interesting. Thx for that. And as Justin mentioned on his page a zillion times and what Scott says in the interview a trillion times the most important part in music is to develop your ear and to transcribe. And still i don't get it. I try but it's just too hard for me to figure out chords from songs etc. Maybe it comes in time but i got very little hope left ;)

[Donkey655321]

" i got very little hope left"

I personally believe that if you can appreciate harmony then you can do it.

I listen to a chord, then try to figure out the root note first, then I guess a bunch of times and then listen to the chord again until I get the right one, and the more often I do this the less guesses it takes to find the right chord.

[63gmac]

Almost sounded like at the end, Scott was about to insult Justin. I got the sense when Scott was talking about "robot players" and how new players are so wrote in getting scales and notes right, that they don't pay that much attention to how they sound -- their musical "soul" as it were. Justin didn't have much to add on that thought.

Or maybe he was pressed for time. I dunno. I tend to agree with Scott - play what and how you feel

[JustinSandercoe]

What an odd comment... Scott certainly wasn't about to insult me - we got on great. I didn't "add" much cos I was interviewing Scott, so it's about his thoughts. And yes at the end we were pushed for time... J

[63gmac]

Good thing then.

I know you are an instructor and the comments that there are [some musicians] out there that are "not capable playing anything that sounds good, they're only capable of playing correct notes... the feel sucks, the tone sucks, everything sucks... because they're 'schooled' guys".

I would have thought that this would be contrary to you being an instructor and creating these great lessons.

[Kjutte1]

He was speaking in general, not about justin. Epic people skills going around...

[luisgarciaalanis]

I never tought he was insulting Justin. But its an interesting idea to learn to pay attention to whats comming out of the speaker while playing and let your subconsius learn to move the hands. I mean I do pay atention to the sound, but I am also very concentrated I am going to do a recording to see how I sound :P loved the interview

[nfleig]

Why take your time to answer that Justin? Whoever said that probably can't call himself a musician like yourself or hasn't, with the likes of Page, Hendrix, Clapton to name a few, inspired thousands across the globe to play guitar (this would include myself). Btw this was a great interview. I tried out the one-string soloing and it helped me a great deal to remember notes and recognize intervals and scales across the fretboard, then gradually adding another string at a time.Great stuff man! thx

[protocosm]

@JustinSandercoe Great interview! Been a fan of scott ever since his first LP with Players. Have all his cd's & dvd's and these interviews complement it. Scott knows it all and is a nice guy. And funny!

[yagamei]

@JustinSandercoe It's easy to misinterpret Scott's tone of voice at times because of how much of a straight shooter the guy is. No BS, it's just his opinions and he's very confident in them. He definitely has an edge, but it's the kind of thing that I don't think you'd see come out unless he were in the midst of someone truly incompetent or rude.

[therealrandcamp]

dude, you are really missing a lot of points here: in no place did he say "play what and how you feel." Henderson did say the sound comes out of the speaker, not your fingers, which I take to me develop an ear and listen to what you are presenting.

That said, I hope Justin ignores your odd comment about some misguided notion you have that Henderson was about to insult Justin.

These interviews are helpful in the great education you present on YouTube, Justin. Thanks.

[padraigf76]

great interview. very interesting (and funny). that's really good advice to listen rather than watch your fingers.

[amac143]

are you serious? Do some research before you make a comment like that.

[espChris93]

have u seen this man play? hes even phenomenal in these interveiws

[jdean9]

yeah, and they should both be interviewing you, because you're apparently very knowledgeable.

[NearlyNormalSteve]

In high-performance motorcycle riding there is a theory that you have 5 dollars worth of attention, if you spend it on where the gas is, the brakes, the clutch, then you don't have enough attention left to negotiate the corner at twice a sane speed. Sounds similiar to what he's saying about timing.

[messerJ4H]

Twist of the Wrist? :)

That's indeed, a really helpful book.

[guild618]

Justin,

I'm sorry I typred your name wrong.

[KitDivine]

Justin's too talented at playing music to spend all his time interviewing ;-) But you're right that was really good..

[guild618]

Jason, you should become a professional interviewer of musicians. That was great.

[ViciousMaximus]

HENDRIX SAID "Many people know the notes but not what goes in between".That´s all about,feelings!

[richardshapiroII]

it's all about feeling the one! yeah! great, super valuable info, thanks justing and scott!

[Learoy76]

Some of the best advice I've ever heard for guitar players. Big thanks to Scott and Justin.

[flabdabit]

Playing all the wrong notes .....Man i got that down pat........ im, farthure along then i thought........

[freemanizer]

very interesting! Gonna watch the other ones now!