Adam Rafferty

Should You Use Classical or Fingerstyle Guitar Technique?

I get a lot of emails asking questions like :

“I play classical guitar and I find it hard to play with a thumbpick.”
“I studied classical guitar for years and I just can’t get the groove right.”

A great classical guitar technique is a thing of beauty – and I worked on it for a long time.

However, for “African” based music, you need an entirely different “touch”. The “groove” is built into the “touch”. You can’t separate the two.

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Music, Matter and Form

By Adam Rafferty 5 Comments

Last night I was getting my daily dose of spiritual musings from one of my favorite thinkers, Alan Watts.

He brings up a point which I think is specially suited to musicians looking to “improve their skills.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7Iw9W3vVQw

Discipline, Daydreaming and Your Musical Mind

By Adam Rafferty 16 Comments

Recently I read a post by Seth Godin about the “laboratory” vs the “factory” mentality and it really resonated with me.

Seth went on to encourage creativity in a laboratory / discovery / scientific spirit.

In the laboratory:

we are dreamers
we don’t know how things will turn out
we don’t know or care if we can “sell” what we are making
we may not even know what we will find
we allow time to search

The lab is all about discovery and exploration.

In the factory:

we are “task masters”
we do what works, over and over so that
we can sell more
we tighten up the speed, efficiency and costs involved with producing our stuff
we don’t waste time “searching” for a different way

The factory is about predictability and production.

As I Began to Love Myself: Charlie Chaplin on his 70th birthday

By Adam Rafferty 26 Comments

(Note – a reader just alerted me that this may have been written by Kim McMillen, and somehow was attributed to Charlie Chaplin…well, whoever wrote t – it’s awesome. Enjoy!)

As I began to love myself I found that anguish and emotional suffering are only warning signs that I was living against my own truth. Today, I know, this is AUTHENTICITY.

As I began to love myself I understood how much it can offend somebody as I try to force my desires on this person, even though I knew the time was not right and the person was not ready for it, and even though this person was me. Today I call it RESPECT.

As I began to love myself I stopped craving for a different life, and I could see that everything that surrounded me was inviting me to grow. Today I call it MATURITY.

As I began to love myself I understood that at any circumstance, I am in the right place at the right time, and everything happens at the exactly right moment, so I could be calm. Today I call it SELF-CONFIDENCE.

How to Do Outrageous Musical Marketing

By Adam Rafferty 9 Comments

I’d like to give you something to think about based on my real life results in terms of getting gigs, magazine coverage, and excellent word-of-mouth promo.

There is zero BS here. Enjoy and please comment!

Concept 1: Do musicians have to market themselves?

You and I are running businesses, we are not only artists.

A hard pill for many of us musicians to swallow is that we all need to market ourselves.

If this makes you shiver, feel un-artistic, or think I am a fraud – WAKE UP! Any business, no matter what their product or service is, has to market themselves.