Recording Acoustic Guitar - A Professional Amateur's Prespective

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While I've been playing guitar for 30 years, I've only been recording music for roughly 7 years. Recording software and digital effects emulation make recording electric guitar fairly straight forward. It's really just a matter of dialing in the sound you want and tweaking a few things like virtual mic placement etc. Recording acoustic guitar however is another beast altogether. In the last 7 years I've written a good amount of songs for acoustic guitar however I've rarely recorded any of those. The vast majority of my acoustic recordings sound like shit. Some sound like I'm playing in a canyon, others don't capture anything but the low end of the guitar. Others still are just plain awful making the first two types sound like studio quality recordings by comparison.

A Hellish Process

When I record acoustic gutiars here at I'm using a Samson C01 Studio condenser mic, a Presonus Inspire 1394 Firebox, and a $99 Epiphone acoustic guitar. I've had much more experienced people tell me that if I practice enough I can produce something of quality. I practice plenty but there are so many things that can fuck up an acoustic recording. I'm sure professional audio engineers and producers have very little trouble in creating and capturing fantastic and vibrant acoustic guitar but that's still a ways off for me.

• The Room You're Playing/Recording In - Playing guitar in any old room is fine but recording in any room just isn't going to cut it. In fact the room you elect to record in can render a perfect set up useless. Recording in an acoustically dampened room for instance will allow you to pull a microphone away the guitar being recorded which generally produces a rather nice warm sound. Rooms with echo and noise however will require you to either place a mic very close to an acoustic guitar or pack up and look for another room in which to lay tracks down. Everyone has their own recording and sound preferences but generally speaking you don't want a lot going on in any room you plan on recording in. Try finding such a room in a house with 5 kids, 3 of whom are little, and two of whom are infants/toddlers.
• The Microphone - As I mentioned earlier, I'm relativity inexperienced when it comes to recording acoustic guitar so as I become more adept at the process I may start using an omni-directional microphones, who knows. As of now however I've had far greater success with condenser mics. In rare instances where I've mic'd up my amplifier instead of playing direct I definitely stick with the omni mic's and while some people tell me to use them for acoustic recordings I've never been able to produce anything of even mediocre quality with them. As far as mic placement is concerned...in my busy and loud house I keep my mic close to my guitar.
• Boosting And Effects - For a recording novice like me, getting a full and warm sound from my acoustic guitar just isn't possible. Sure I could put new strings on before each recording, strum harder, get a better guitar etc. but my sub-par acoustic recordings are more a result of inexperience than anything else. For the time being I use a virtual compressor in my recording software and...believe it or not a harmonizer pedal. Turns out if I turn the harmonizing aspect all the way down on the pedal it produces a very nice reverb-ish type of effect which boosts my input signal considerably and without any noise!

Image courtesy of samsontech.com

My Latest Acoustic Recording

Last night I took a break from running scales and instead spent my practice time recording acoustic guitar. I played two covers from two of my favorite bands and threw in 2 of my own compositions for shits and giggles. I recorded this sitting at my desk with my condenser about 6-8 inches from my guitar. You can ignore my horrific vocals on the first part of the track. I was having a bit of fun. I quad-tracked each song for fullness.

• Track 1 - Charisma by KISS
• Track 2 - My own song from the early 90's
• Track 3 - No Excuses by Alice In Chains (got the drum track on YouTube)
• Track 4 - My own song from 2009

Putting My Acoustic Recording Skills To The Test

If you'd like Corona guitar lessons or just want to talk music in general be sure to hit me up on any of these social media platforms. Take it easy and keep playing!

A New Riff

I normally run scales between 1 and 2 hours a day. I often stay in practice mode just to keep pushing myself but every so often I get an idea that makes me put the scales away and I go into creative mode. Here's a new riff idea that will likely become a whole song at some point in the near future. I apologize for the video quality as I was recording at night and since I hadn't planned on doing so I had no lighting set up. I just tossed one of my old dynamic mic's in front of my Marshall and went for it. For those who might be wondering I'm tuned to dropped C# so it's C#, A♭, D♭, F#, B♭, E♭. 90% of the time I'm tuned to E♭ standard.

In addition to writing music I also give Corona guitar lessons and teach all throughout the Inland Empire and Orange County. If you're interested be sure to hit me up!

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Building Calluses

My fingers hurt.remarked the elderly woman in Happy Gilmore after the corrupt orderly announced arts & crafts was being extended by 4 hours. Although the woman's complaint in the film was meant to be humorous many guitar students complain of finger pain too, especially in the beginning. Building up callouses take time, patience, and above all consistency. Those students whom practice infrequently or don't practice at all will always return to their guitar knowing that 1, they won't be able to play very long and 2, that their fingers are going to be very sore when they're finished playing.

How Long Does It Take?

Corona guitar lesson students should expect their finger tips to be very sore for the first week of play/practice. The longer and harder students play, the faster and tougher their calluses will be as well...something to keep in mind. Students should never overdue it of course and stop before the discomfort becomes pain. I often recommend that brand new students play 2 or 3 days in a row and then take a day off to allow their fingers to callus up. Practice in the early going can be as short as 30 minutes and as long as an hour. It really depends on a students pain tolerance and desire to play. Take a day or two off after playing for days and hours on end actually helps fingers to build calluses faster.

Fading Away

Extended breaks in play and practice will result in the breakdown of calluses. Everyone's body reacts differently but students tend to notice calluses disappearing as soon as 3 days after having last played. Nothing deters novice guitar players like pain and discomfort in their fingers, especially those who play acoustic guitars. Of course there are going to be times where a student isn't able to play for an extended period of time and may lose their calluses partially or completely. Illness, work, family, school, and other things in life may make playing or practicing difficult but if a student can sneak in just 15 minutes a day they'll keep not only their calluses from fading away but will keep their muscle tone in their hands, arms, and wrists too.

If you have questions about calluses or guitar lessons feel free to hit me up anytime. You can contact me either through my website, Facebook, and/or Twitter. Play often and play hard!

"My Fingers Hurt"

Guitar Scales: The Seven Basics

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There are a great many different guitar scales. They range from very simple to unnecessarily complex and pretentious. Students taking Corona guitar lessons may have a great number of these scales forced upon them by ostentatious instructors. While guitar scales are incredibly important not every student needs to know and master every guitar scale. Moreover some students will need to learn fewer scales than others. Being forced to learn too many guitar scales can lead to both frustration and burnout as the more advanced scales are intimidating to novice guitarists.


Scales Everyone Needs

There are 7 basic guitar scales that I encourage all my students to practice and utilize regardless of their goals. These 7 scales not only help strengthen hands and fingers but will also help students become familiar with their fret boards. More importantly however, these scales are all encompassing and will give learners a well balanced tool set. Of course students with lofty goals and those who want to play certain style's will learn more complex scales down the line but everyone starts with these seven.

• Chromatic Scale - The chromatic scale is sometimes referred to as "the spider" because it simply requires a guitar player to follow a 1, 2, 3, 4 finger pattern both in ascent and descent. This scale is primarily used as a warm up exercise prior to playing or a lesson. It teaches accuracy and develops coordination.

• Minor Pentatonic Scale - This scale is one of the most commonly used across music. It's simple yet can be used to great effect in many different genre's of music, especially rock and metal. This is typically the first scale students play competently and begin phrasing with. This scale is played over minor chord progressions and can be played in slightly "off" positions to give a piece of music a slightly outside type of feel.
• The Blues Scale - As the name implies the blues scale is heavily associated with blues music. Like the minor penatonic scale though this scale is also used heavily in rock music and is only slightly varied from the former. I generally teach two variations of this scale; those being the root on the sixth and fifth strings.
• Natural Minor Scale - Along side the minor penatonic, the natural minor scale is the most oft used scale in rock music. It's use can also be heard throughout nearly every other genre however. This scale teaches students how to change frets during a scale and gives pinkies a good work out. This scale is sometimes known as "Aeolian Mode".
• The Major Scale - In order to teach students the difference between minor and major tones I often refer to the major guitar scale as "the happy scale". The scale is friendly to beginners but has a great many uses throughout every conceivable genre of music. Whether a student wants to write pop music or become a jazz musician, this scale will be of great use to them. Moreover the 5th string root version of this scale is a real workout for new students.
• Dorian Mode - I teach my new students Dorian Mode mostly because it provides their hands, wrists, and fingers with one hell of a work out. Dorian Mode is part of the minor scale family and can be used in many different types of music, especially jazz, funk, and fusion.
• Mixolydian Mode - Part of the major family of guitar scales, Mixolydian Mode is taught in order to push students coordination development and accuracy. Most beginners find Mixolydian Mode to be the most challenging of the basic set. When the scale is rooted on the 5th string it's also played exactly like Dorian Mode on rooted in the 6th string.

I encourage my students to begin each practice session with a 15 minute run of the Chromatic scale as a warm up. From here I recommend each student play the aforementioned scales in 10 minute sets and to play as long as duties and stamina allow them too. Over doing it, especially in the beginning, leads to burnout and overly sore hands and fingers.

If you have any questions about guitar scales or are interested in learning how to play guitar feel free to contact me! I teach people of all ages how to play guitar without inundating them with useless information and techniques.