How to practice guitar - Sam Russel book

hollywoodrox

Nice one Sam thanks for presenting your side have a great Christmas & keep rockin

SamRussell

LewisJ said:

Thank you for taking the time to reply Sam. Internet is full of opinions and sometimes it’s best to stay quiet, other times stand and make your point which you’ve done well. 

All the best with your venture(s).

I mean I get it, no-one wants to waste their money and the internet is full of rubbish stuff, and the guitar world is getting worse and worse for it. And you can't really tell until you've gone and spent it - I've been burned a few times recently with that.

Thank you and you too!

hollywoodrox said:

Nice one Sam thanks for presenting your side have a great Christmas & keep rockin

Thanks, you too!

Barney

SamRussell said:

I was doing a quick google of my book and saw this thread come up. It's cool/weird to see people talking about my book, and wanted to clear up a couple of things.

Firstly, if you are happy with your playing, or an advanced player, you probably won't get anything out of this book. It's more aimed at the late beginner - intermediate players that get stuck. 

Gilly said:

I haven’t read the book but I believe he is a Tom Hess acolyte? That would be enough to put me off.

*former acolyte. I quit Tom Hess stuff several years ago. When I started, the lessons were quite useful, I did learn a few key things from him, especially with technique,  but over time the lessons were less useful and the whole culture with his community became downright weird and toxic. Learned some useful stuff, made some good friends, got fed up with the rhetoric and quit.

Moved on, found better teachers and started studying classical composition in some depth, which I've thoroughly enjoyed.

Now that I sell a book on guitar online, I'm probably permanently banned from rejoining his community, not that I'd want to 

Barney said:

I think I would be looking to check out his playing and see iff it's worked for him ...iff not I wouldn't bother

Pretty good advice. If you don't like my playing, don't take my advice on how to play! Here's a piece I did recently: 

Kilgore said:

It's got the whiff of a dubious self improvement book. "TEN SECRET STEPS TO IMPROVING YOUR..." etc, etc.

£15 though, no harm in trying. 

I've tried to avoid that. All the guitar playing advice in the book is straightforward, practical things that are easy to implement and give results. I don't advise people on creating elaborate morning routines with ice baths, visualising their goals and journalling their way to being a better player 

I don't believe in secrets, just straightforward approaches. I studied astrophysics at university, so those "woo woo" improvement books irritate the shit out of me lol. 

joeW said:

Noah Kageyama has some psychological / practise / performance info on his website the bulletproof musician.  I’d check this out as it is free and very well researched.  

Totally agree, I've been reading his website for several years. It's a great resource. I'm quite tempted to check out his course sometime, I get brutal stage fright. The stuff in my book is a bit different what he covers (some small overlap in places, but not much).

allen said:

I feel like I could answer (or at least suggest something) about every item on that list by doing some independent research.

e.g. it is well known in psychological research how people achieve greatness in sport etc. when practicing.

But I concur with a previous poster who mentioned fun. In other words, do you really know why you are playing the guitar? and if you do, do that. (sorry, for yoda-like comment).

Yeah, if you sat down you could probably find out half of it. Some of it is less obvious. My ideas on creativity you won't find anywhere online. Plus the book is guitar specific, with examples specifically for guitar. 

I've avoided promising any form of "greatness" or outstanding achievement. I'm more about taking small consistent improvements rather than promising you'll be the next Yngwie. 

Dominic said:

" Become a Guitar Multi-Millionaire in 5 days .......ask me how "

This book has nothing to do with making money from guitar, no career advice, etc etc. No promises of becoming the next Van Halen or Steve Vai. Just some tips and ideas that hopefully help some people out and help them make some consistent progress.

guitarjack66 said:

'From the worst player at school to producing heavy metal albums' is hardly a ringing endorsement!

Maybe. My point with that quote was that I'm not naturally talented. I struggled a lot when learning (hell, I still do). Sometimes people worry that they're not "naturally talented" so they can't get too good at playing, when in reality it's not knowing what or how to practice, or having unrealistic expectations which holds them back. 

But I worked pretty hard at it over the years and you can hear the album in question here: https://open.spotify.com/album/0KNYbEfDGjmUiMdYca7l6r?si=mvxli6OwTgW9Jx8-Hev3OQ ;

You might not like it, but I think it's fair to say I can play. 

Dr_Necessiter said:

If nothing else he can take credit for finding a way to market himself.

Your signature made me laugh pretty hard! I've been pretty surprised at how well it's been going, but I'll take it!


So to wrap up, thanks for talking about my book, happy to answer any other questions, and if you buy a copy and think it's shit, I'll give you a refund. 


EDIT: And you can see some reviews here: https://www.samrussell.co.uk/pages/reviews-of-how-to-practice-guitar

Thanks ...the link didn't work but searched on YouTube and found it .....yes I think it's important when picking any teacher or education product you have to like how the person who is promoting it plays and iff you like the style 

Good luck with the book I'm sure plenty will benefit from it