210306 March 2021 Message

Hey everyone, I wanted to just speak about some things to note about the curriculum, mainly to any students that are engaged in our Video Exchange (VE) learning, but to all of our subscribers.  I’ve gotten a few questions from time to time about the “order” of the pieces in the 3 Curriculum designations: Basic, Intermediate, Advanced, and how this relates to the Video Exchange (VE) Learning process.

The curriculum pieces are really not in any particular order.  Each category or designation  (Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced) is merely a collection of pieces and/or exercises in 3 very general degrees of difficulty.  This is what was suggested by AW at the beginning of the process, putting the school together.  If the student wants to dig a little deeper into their study here, they can use the VE feature and send a video of what they’re working on, directly to me and Colin for feedback.  Not a couple pointers or tips, not a pat on the back… actual instruction from 2 concert guitarists who are in the middle of this practicing thing every day.

One of the things I learned early on when I started teaching back in the 1990s was this:  while it would certainly make a teacher’s job a lot easier to basically impart to every student a kind of tidy methodology of the same things for every player,  the reality is that teaching is not that simple or easy.  What effective teaching aims for, is to address the individual student and their needs, help them to understand their strengths and weaknesses on the instrument (and with the incredibly complex language of classical music), and to prescribe very specific tasks and goals to help them strengthen their current weak spots in their playing, so that they can work in concert with their strengths.  And, certainly, while it’s important to acknowledge the most common problems students tend to encounter when trying to get better at classical guitar - it’s not productive to be beholden to those commonalities. 

It would be a fool’s errand, in my view, to try and accurately presume an order in the Curriculum that works for every single player, because every player of course is different, and at different stages of development, either instrumentally or musically.   That’s why me and Colin are available to advise you, and all students that use the VE feature, on what piece or exercise to study next, how many pieces to tackle at the same time (whether it’s 1 or 3 or 5), for how long to study each piece, how many VEs it will take before the piece is put down for awhile, whether or not a previously studied piece should be reviewed, etc etc.  This is going to be different for every student, as it must be… this is the reality of classical music study.

Because of the opportunity the ArtistWorks platform provides through its technology, the student no longer has to learn through a pre-printed, predetermined method or a 1-size-fits-all, inflexible template delivered either by a book, video, or actual person.  This is precisely because of the VE Learning feature, which allows the student to study directly with us.  Obviously this was not possible before the internet.  If you wanted (or had to) study remotely, and you bought a VHS tape or DVD, that was pretty much it… a 1-size-fits-all closed communication.   Every student that bought that video got the same information, and the communication from teacher to student was a 1-way street. 

So, please remember that here at ArtistWorks, you don’t have to apply the kind of DIY, or long-range planning, strategies that you would with DVDs, YouTube tutorials, or frankly, some of the newer online or virtual alternatives that are out there on the market.  Colin and I, if you’ve been watching a fair number of the VRs (video responses), are answering the student’s questions, and we’re directly advising the student on what they have to practice *now*, what is next, demonstrating, looking ahead, even as we’re working with them on the detail work of practice breakdowns, expressive and musical notation details, technique, prescribed fingerings, alternate fingerings, posture, seating position, interpretation, etc., etc.  

Best, Jason