They aren't, but guitar players need to work on something else. I teach private lessons - if you are serious about improving your playing get in touch!
Train ear method... Shut your eyes Slide a hammered note up to anywhere then bend until note sounds right Then from this position, improvise with eyes kept shut. When the notes are sounding a bit robotic, slide down the Fretboard and repeat. The slide up and down force the ears to participate and throws you into a Fretboard position that may be uncomfortable.
It might not be that these experienced players cannot end on a 4th, or on an off-beat… it is just that they have never been asked to do it and to think about doing it. This is not a question most are really asked. As an experiment, ask your student to stand up and walk a straight line with contra-body arm motion. If they ask what that is, tell them that their arms swing so that their left arm swings forward as their right leg steps forward and vice verse. 9 out of 10 people will get this completely wrong… and all these people have been walking since they were toddlers. This is the natural way people walk, but ask them to walk that way and they engage their brain over muscle memory and they get tripped up. So, this is more a processing error than an inability, and not really a fair test of the ability to hear how it sounds to end on a given tone, or with a given syncopation.
What’s interesting is that if you go to a conservatoire or music school that’s serious about jazz language and improvisation, this stuff is taught all the time. Drummers have no problem emphasising any division of the beat as they learn that concept as a key part of their education. What I have found is that guitar specific education, apart from in a select few very expensive schools, disregards the importance of ear training both melodically and rhythmically. These sorts of challenges shouldn’t be that difficult (there’s much harder similarly themed ones I give my students) as your ear is the absolute most important tool you have and can be trained to an extremely advanced level with deliberate practice.
Train ear method...
Shut your eyes
Slide a hammered note up to anywhere then bend until note sounds right
Then from this position, improvise with eyes kept shut.
When the notes are sounding a bit robotic, slide down the Fretboard and repeat.
The slide up and down force the ears to participate and throws you into a Fretboard position that may be uncomfortable.
It might not be that these experienced players cannot end on a 4th, or on an off-beat… it is just that they have never been asked to do it and to think about doing it.
This is not a question most are really asked.
As an experiment, ask your student to stand up and walk a straight line with contra-body arm motion. If they ask what that is, tell them that their arms swing so that their left arm swings forward as their right leg steps forward and vice verse. 9 out of 10 people will get this completely wrong… and all these people have been walking since they were toddlers.
This is the natural way people walk, but ask them to walk that way and they engage their brain over muscle memory and they get tripped up.
So, this is more a processing error than an inability, and not really a fair test of the ability to hear how it sounds to end on a given tone, or with a given syncopation.
What’s interesting is that if you go to a conservatoire or music school that’s serious about jazz language and improvisation, this stuff is taught all the time. Drummers have no problem emphasising any division of the beat as they learn that concept as a key part of their education. What I have found is that guitar specific education, apart from in a select few very expensive schools, disregards the importance of ear training both melodically and rhythmically. These sorts of challenges shouldn’t be that difficult (there’s much harder similarly themed ones I give my students) as your ear is the absolute most important tool you have and can be trained to an extremely advanced level with deliberate practice.
Another truly great guitar lesson! Thank you for taking the time.
Great lesson! Where did you get that leg rest? This is the one I want but I don't know if its from sweetwater or amazon.
I grabbed mine from Amazon - lifesaver if you are tall!