Do you have natural talent for guitar?

Talent is a BS word IMO. You can say Adele is a talented singer. Sure... but maybe she was not naturally talented but spent 10 years tuning his voice to where it is now. So is she talented or a hard worker? Who knows? Anyways saying that someone is naturally talented is same as saying "it's so much easier for you to be good than it is for most people" so in a way it is not a compliment.

And what is this talent? Goodness? Because think about Dave Grohl... the guy played drums on Nevermind and never took a drum lesson. His technique sucks and he knows it but he made millions playing drums so everyone knows they have nothing to say. Then he gives up drums and starts singing and playing guitar. Once again not the best guitar player nor the best vocalist. Now he's the front man of the world's biggest rock band Foo Fighters. Could you say he is talented? Or is he a hard worker?

My point is: music, greatness, talent etc. can not be measured.
 
I've thought about this long and hard now since the question was first posted.

Firstly, there are people out there with no musical ability whatsoever. This is called congenital amusia and affects between 1-4% of the population. I believe that anybody without this can learn to be musical to some degree. I have had experiences with people with this for whom programming a sense of pitch was laborious and took many painstaking hours, and the success of these efforts were questionable to say the least.

The sum total of my professional musical education is that I have taken ten classical guitar lessons in my life after I did my LCM Electric Guitar grade 8 and it has never hindered me in learning music. I learned to play by listening to Metallica records and figuring out solos one note at a time. I learned banjo by playing Irish music that I knew in my head. I learned fingerpicking from the get go and as a result have no problem learning difficult songs (Tommy Emmanuel) by applying myself. I can play Classical guitar to a high level (Asturias - Albinez, Recuerdos de la Alhambra - Tarrega, La Ultima Cancion - Barrios Mangore), electric to a high level (Bleed - Meshuggah, Necrophagist, Decapitated, Megadeth) and acoustic to a high level. I couldn't understand why others couldn't until I thought back to what I used to do as a kid, tapping out rhythms with my feet and hands at age 7 while listening to Metallica, singing in school at 6, scratching my fingers on the sofa in an imitation of what John Williams did on the South Bank Show Special at 9, drumming my left hand fingers backwards and forwards after seeing Shine (specifically Flight Of The Bumblebee).

Some people are musically inclined (genetically) and may play more than one instrument. Others may have an affinity with a specific instrument and choose to specialise. I have yet to see Steve Vai play banjo or saxaphone.

I have come to the conclusion that not everyone is as driven as we all are, musically, and not everyone is driven to the same level. If you can play an instrument, love doing it, and desire to get better, then you are talented musically. You have the aptitude to have gotten this far. This can be lost in an environment such as this where we have world class players in our midst rather than be any form of false modesty. The degree to which you fulfill your talent (genes) is affected by your environment, but numerous studies have shown that nature rules over nurture in most things.

As for measurement, it's a useful exercise, but comparison isn't. Just because it cannot be measured doesn't mean it doesn't exist or matter. After all, happiness cannot be measured, love, sadness, anxiety.... chemical reactions are just one part of a bigger mechanism, as any neuroscientist will tell you. Are we bothered we may not love as strongly as the next guy? Are we affected by the fact that our depression doesn't match up to someone elses experience? Are we that immature?
 
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We've all heard the player that wants to play lead, thinks he can play lead, but in reality every lead note he plays come off like the guitar hasn't been intonated in many moons. Compared to that guy I'm talented. When it comes to shredding, sight reading music and having deep music theory discussions......I feel pretty much talentLESS.
 
I'm pretty sure most that play the guitar and find it real easy have a naturel talent this is what's instilled within a person. The other thing that can be coupled to this is the naturel musical ability to create songs which I'm not very gifted at.

I can sit down and listen to a tune that's not extremely difficult and can play it with in a few listenings. Most will say that I have an ear for music. On the technical side of things I couldn't tell you what modes were being used in the solos and in some cases even the key in which it was written in.

In the end I don't really care as long as I can sound and somewhat play it like some of the studio recording that I love to listen to I'm happy.
 
I have developed some skills on guitar and other instruments and have a solid grasp on theory, but my actual natural talent is for making music. There are a zillion other people with more musical talent than me, but I have "some" (Thank you, God). Guitars and other instruments are ultimately just power tools to me. If I were stuck on an island with nothing more than an accordion, I'd still feel just as compelled to play music of some sort.
 
Not at all. I grew up in a very non-musical home and only really became interested in my teens. People around me seemed wild about my supposed natural talent when I picked up the guitar, but were ignorant to or just plain ignoring the fact that I practised for pretty much a minimum of 6 hours every single day. Any hack can pick up some fancy tricks with those kinds of hours.

All that said, I don't even know about the idea of "natural talent". Is there some kind of genetic reason for some being better at it than others, or is it more to do with the environment? Again, I was raised in an entirely un-musical house. If I'd grown up with my dad, I'd have had all kinds of great stuff in my ears on a regular basis... but instead I grew up with... pretty much nothing (in terms of music specifically... no disrespect to my wonderful hard-working mother). Fairly sure that however many years later when I pick up an interest in music and an instrument, that's gonna have an effect. Music is a language. When you're young , you pick up languages fairly easily with enough exposure. Completely different when your try later in life though...
 
Nope. When I started guitar, I couldn't fret a note. Seriously. For a week all I could play was different pitches of "thump thump thump", but I was determined. My friend and I had a mantra "It's not about skill. It's about dedication." That gets me over every brick wall I hit.
 
If there were no such thing as talent or giftedness then anyone who took the time could become a great musician....i just don't believe that's the case. Notice I said musician, not technician. We aren't talking about muscle memory and repetition. Talking about music. You'll never convince that certain aspects of being a great musician can just be learned. I'm also not talking about being able to mimic what another person does....but about it flowing from inside of you.
 
Clark Kent said:
And what is this talent? Goodness? Because think about Dave Grohl... the guy played drums on Nevermind and never took a drum lesson. His technique sucks and he knows it but he made millions playing drums so everyone knows they have nothing to say. Then he gives up drums and starts singing and playing guitar. Once again not the best guitar player nor the best vocalist. Now he's the front man of the world's biggest rock band Foo Fighters. Could you say he is talented? Or is he a hard worker?
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As I was typing my original response I was thinking of established musicians that I thought oozed natural talent. I decided not to go there because I don't know them personally and it would be just my perception. But Dave Grohl was at the top of that list. I'd say that he has a lot of natural talent. Just read what you typed. That alone says something. But by saying that doesn't mean that I think he's a slouch and just coasts. He's obviously a very driven and hard working individual and it shows.
 
jlynnb1 said:
If there were no such thing as talent or giftedness then anyone who took the time could become a great musician....i just don't believe that's the case. Notice I said musician, not technician. We aren't talking about muscle memory and repetition. Talking about music. You'll never convince that certain aspects of being a great musician can just be learned. I'm also not talking about being able to mimic what another person does....but about it flowing from inside of you.
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Music is a language. If you can learn a second language, you can learn music. However, if you don't have any original thoughts, nobody is going to want to listen to you speak in any language.
 
Sidivan said:
Music is a language. If you can learn a second language, you can learn music. However, if you don't have any original thoughts, nobody is going to want to listen to you speak in any language.
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it's one thing to speak a language, it's another to be a poet in that language. It's another thing for creativity to flow in that language. I don't think that's apples to apples....
 
Narzugon said:
As I was typing my original response I was thinking of established musicians that I thought oozed natural talent. I decided not to go there because I don't know them personally and it would be just my perception. But Dave Grohl was at the top of that list. I'd say that he has a lot of natural talent. Just read what you typed. That alone says something. But by saying that doesn't mean that I think he's a slouch and just coasts. He's obviously a very driven and hard working individual and it shows.
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I like Dave Grohls work. This is not sour grapes by any means, but it helps when your dad is a president at Geffen records.lol.
 
Sidivan said:
Music is a language. If you can learn a second language, you can learn music. However, if you don't have any original thoughts, nobody is going to want to listen to you speak in any language.
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Not necessarily. Language acquisition has a specific part of the brain dedicated to it. Music doesn't. While language does require other parts for the physical implementation (speaking or signing/writing) the understanding of language is centred. the understanding of music and the parts of the brain involved in actively listening are not centred.

The most that can be said for definite is that language analogies work very well for music.
 
DNW said:
Not at all. I grew up in a very non-musical home and only really became interested in my teens. People around me seemed wild about my supposed natural talent when I picked up the guitar, but were ignorant to or just plain ignoring the fact that I practised for pretty much a minimum of 6 hours every single day. Any hack can pick up some fancy tricks with those kinds of hours.

All that said, I don't even know about the idea of "natural talent". Is there some kind of genetic reason for some being better at it than others, or is it more to do with the environment? Again, I was raised in an entirely un-musical house. If I'd grown up with my dad, I'd have had all kinds of great stuff in my ears on a regular basis... but instead I grew up with... pretty much nothing (in terms of music specifically... no disrespect to my wonderful hard-working mother). Fairly sure that however many years later when I pick up an interest in music and an instrument, that's gonna have an effect. Music is a language. When you're young , you pick up languages fairly easily with enough exposure. Completely different when your try later in life though...
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I take it that your Dad is/was musical? If so, it can tell us that the genetic component of music skill acquisition overrides the environmental.

There are many studies that have been done with twins where their mental development owed far more to genetics than to their environment.
 
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