Tag: Nails

Top Tips for Creating a Beautiful Sound on Classical Guitar

Nicole Neal2 Comments
musical notes
musical notes (Photo credit: EpicFireworks)

 

Playing with a beautiful sound doesn’t just mean playing super tasto (near or over the fingerboard) all of the time. We should always be striving for a beautiful sound regardless of whether playing tasto, ponticello, or somewhere else on the spectrum of tone colours on the guitar.

 

 

There will never be an absolute, one-size-fits-all approach to producing a good quality, beautiful sounding tone – we all have different size and shape fingernails, different sized hands, arms and so on (the physical drivers of our sound creation). There are a number of things you can check in with though that will certainly help you in creating that beautiful sounds.

 

(1) Free stroke – push, don’t pull. Yes, initially this may sound slightly at odds wit the tirando (free stroke) technique, but the key to achieving a rich and full sound (as opposed to thin and twangy sound) when playing free stroke is to ensure your right hand fingers (if you’re right handed) are first pressing down the string slightly, and then moving through or across the string rather than hooking up under it and pulling or plucking. In this way you’re loading up the string, putting  a lot more potential energy into it ready to release into sound energy. More energy in = greater energy out. Don’t be a plucker! 😉

 

(2) Find the right angle of attack. Oftentimes playing the strings with the right hand fingers square on to the strings can produce quite a thin, brittle sound (go and try it now to witness what I’m talking about). Now, that’s not my idea of a particularly beautiful or even nice sound, but if it floats your boat then go right ahead! You may want to try this instead: have the right hand fingers (again, talking from the point of view of a right hander) attack the strings at a 45 degree angle with the contact point between string and finger somewhere around the corner of the white of the fingernail and the flesh of the finger.

 

You may have to play around with this a little to suit how your own fingernails grow, but playing in this manner with a little bit of flesh initially, then moving through onto and across the nail is a surefire way of improving your sound quality.

 

(3) Do your nails. It is not enough really to file and shape your nails with just a plain old emery board alone. This is good for taking down length and working in shape, but the playing surface will be pitted and as rough as a badger’s backside! Getting a really smooth, glassy finish to your nails, will undoubtedly help you create a really smooth, rounded and glassy sound.

 

My favourite bit of kit for this is the 1200 wet and dry sandpaper. It’s really fine and can be used to refine the shape of your nails, buff out remaining nicks and then smooth the underside and playing surface of the nail to a super-smooth finish. I used this material until my nails are literally squeaking on the paper. That’s when you know you’re generating a glassy playing surface on your nail. And then the ultimate test of course is how smoothly the nail passes over the string to help you create that beautifully rounded sound.

 

 

 

 

 

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Getting back to basics on the guitar

Nicole NealLeave a comment

This post follows on quite nicely – well, I think so anyway! – from my earlier post on taking a step back and taking some reflection time.

Just like a little time to step back and notice the world around us, so too can getting back to basics with our playing give us renewed vigour, and help us to check potential bad habits that may have crept into our playing.

So, when I say getting back to basics I mean just taking a bit of time to reassess the fundamentals of our technique. That, after all, is the bedrock and the foundation upon which we build our playing, so it pays everyone and then to do a wee survey and a check of how those foundations are holding up.

So then – how do I do that exactly, huh?

Well, I’d recommend going from “large” to “small” in terms of getting back to basics with your set up with the following checklist:

• Posture – ask yourself how am I sitting? Is my back straight when playing? No undue strain on the back, legs, arms? Are the arms feeling nice and relaxed? Are the feet rooted to the floor and/ or foot stool? Legs in a good solid position, bent at the knees around 90 degrees?

• Left hand and fingers – are you holding the neck in a relaxed fashion? Is the thumb at some kind of funky angle that causes tension? Am I using the arm to leverage pressure into the strings or is it all coming from the hand and fingers? Is there any extraneous movement or undue tension in the hand when making certain movements?

• Right hand and fingers and tone production – how’s my tone quality and consistency in producing the sound I want?  What’s my angle of attack with my nails? Are my nails shaped and polished to maximum effect for the tone I want to create? Is my right hand playing in a neutral position from which I can move around to create different tone colours?

I’d then recommend going from “small” to “large” in terms of reviewing your playing:

• Open string tone production – have a look at the above dot point. Same applies here!

• Scales and arpeggios – excellent medicine for all guitarists! How’s your clarity, control, speed, left/right hand finger co-ordination, right hand finger combinations. What movements are extraneous? What else in your body is moving, perhaps unnecessarily, when playing?

• Studies – this is application of our technical stuff (scales, arpeggios and other little exercises) in a more “musical setting”. Be sure to check what’s relevant to the piece or pieces you’re playing at the moment? Key? Rhythms? Movements and textures – i.e. arpeggios, chords, movements in thirds, sixths or octaves?