PLAY OVER... ANYTHING!

Dear fellow guitar player,

On a beautiful late spring afternoon, twenty-five years ago, two young guitar players graduated from the same music school. They were very much alike, these two young men. Both demonstrated exceptional technique and had developed large repertoires during their time in school. Both knew all the chords, scales, modes and both – as young music school graduates are – were filled with ambitious dreams for the future.

Recently, these two men returned to the music school for their 25th reunion and a class-wide, post-ceremony jam session filled with hours of improvs and impromptu 'sit ins' with past class mates.

They were still very much alike. Both play some impressive guitar solos. And both certainly turn heads when noodling between songs and conversations.

But there was a drastic difference when observing each of these men during the jam session: One of the players sat quietly, observing the sounds around him, timidly and sheepishly interjecting a musical reaction every now and then. Sometimes what he played fit, but most of the time he was a little lost. The other player seemed to thrive with every new chord change and groove that was thrown his way. Nothing was written down or discussed before hand, yet and he was consistently able to completely own any musical idea that was presented to him as if he had been able to prepare, in advance, for each new musical idea.

What Made The Difference

Have you ever wondered what makes this kind of difference in a guitar player's life? It isn’t always native intelligence, education, talent or dedication. It isn’t that one person wants success and the other doesn’t.

The difference lies not just in what each person knows but how he or she makes use of that knowledge.

The story that you just read is a modified extract from a famous letter published in the Wall Street Journal in the mid 70s. It illustrates perfectly what many guitar players observe in their musical journey. What made the difference between these two guitar players was not the number of scales they knew (they knew them all!). It wasn't that one knew more theory than the other. And it was not that one player was more talented than the other.

What allowed one guitarist to play freely and confidently, was simply that that player knew how to engage the most powerful tool any musician has ever had (you'd be surprised by how many players with music degrees and decades of playing behind them don't get this). That mysterious power made all the difference. The good news is that this mysterious power is available to you too!

That is exactly what the life changing Play Over... Anything! course is about.