I personally love to hear melody and hooks in solos as well as lyrically slow/wide vibrato and story-telling phrasing capped off with shredding licks that make you want to fall to pieces.
Music is a language, it comes from your soul and your body. I`m not hung up on technique or theory; that`s why I love Santana as much as Vai. What they play just comes from the heart.
When you hear generic music, you can bet the composer wasn`t inspired, rather they were stringing riffs together and trying to impress.
One I stopped procrastinating and making excuses and decided that I really wanted to make an album that I would be the first in line to buy - an album that really excited my heart.
A great solo works like a powerful and moving speech. Something that grabs your attention, keeps you interested, tells a story, and wraps up leaving you feeling like you got something from it.
I`m very fortunate in that I get to tour and play live quite a bit. I`m also happy to say that my fan base continues to grow, so considering the state of the music biz these days I`ve got no complaints.
Regardless of the economic slowdown, people tend to want to download a lot of their music for free, thus leaving artists without income that would be generated through royalties from CD sales.
Where did they all go? Quality conscious, savvy collectors are grabbing up the last of `em.
Most of the songs were the result of me sitting by myself in my living room and fiddling around with the bass guitar, completely directionless - which is the setting I find most conducive to songwriting.
I wanted to be very careful not to have a CD that seemed to ramble on endlessly. I wanted to put out a CD that the listener could listen to front to end and feel musically satisfied when it was over.
I`ve been exposed to music throughout my whole life, basically because my parents were such fans of music. I`ve been a huge fan of the guitar since as far back as I can remember.
I have found that by recording and adding a few "cover tunes" to my CDs as well as my originals, has helped get folks online to discover me. After they`ve listened to my arrangements of their familiar pop tunes, they may decided to check out my original music, too.
Dan McAvinchey is a guitarist and composer living in Raleigh, NC.
He believes every musician or composer has the power to write, record and release their own music.
His 1997 CD release on Guitar Nine was entitled "Guitar Haus".
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