Everyone knows there are only two ways to play guitar – sweep picking at 400BPM and David Gilmour guitar solos. That’s exactly why the argument of playing with either speed or feel exists, right? Because you have to pick one? Well good news, because John Petrucci is here to tell you that that’s not true!
Petrucci spoke on the “really silly” in an interview with Kill Guitar Rigs, saying “There’s so many players that [play with a wide range of style]; there’s so much music that exemplifies that. If it was just exercise-type drills, practicing, turned into a song — yeah, you might say that’s pretty drab and it doesn’t really go anywhere emotionally.”
“But most guitar players that can shred don’t do that. The good ones who could write have the ability to take the music anywhere they want to. And part of that — it is kind of like being a classical musician. If you listen to classical music and the symphonies and things that were made, all those musicians, they had to be able to have the skills to take the music wherever the composer wanted it to be.”
“And sometimes, that was to really sensitive places that took a lot of control and a lot of dynamic playing. And sometimes, it was really tactical places where you had to be on top of your game and be able to play these crazy lines. So that’s the way I look at it. It’s being able to do all of that, it increases your ability to be expressive, I think, as a musician, because you could take it to all these different places. And I don’t think they’re mutually exclusive.”
Petrucci recently launched his new company Tonemission, which you can check out here.
