Pulgar: Volume I

Description

A COMPREHENSIVE, METHODICAL, STEP-BY-STEP TEACHING METHOD OF THE PULGAR TECHNIQUE FOR FLAMENCO GUITAR

The pulgar plays a critical role in the flamenco guitar technique space. However, if you try to find a comprehensive bibliographic reference to pulgar you will be vastly disappointed. These references are either fragmented, incomplete or very few exercises are proposed or offered for practice. These small available collections of exercises are not sufficiently large for a student to practice and effectively learn the pulgar techniques.

The present two-volume, book series refer exclusively to pulgar exercises. In these two volumes, I have tried and provided ample material, taking into consideration the particularities of pulgar practice. Particularities, such as the force of the stroke (the simultaneous stroke of more than one strings is necessary), the precision of the stroke (since the pulgar can strike different adjacent or remote strings) or the delicacy of the stroke (the mastering of striking one, two or more strings simultaneously).

In this book, I have tried as much as possible to give sufficient material within different variations, so that boredom and fatigue that emerges from the monotonous repetition of one or few exercises is eliminated.

Basic formulas of exercises are proposed and off these, plenty of variations are described. I believe the greater the number and pool of exercise variations there are, the better the student learns, since it reawakens interest and jolts enthusiasm. The message, I want to convey to the readers is that, “it is better to perform 100 exercises, a single time rather perform one exercise 100 times”.

As mentioned, the contents of these book series refer to the pulgar in flamenco guitar space. Many of these exercises can benefit the classical guitar student learning the pulgar techniques. The student is asked to choose those exercises that upwards to downwards (from the 6th to the 1st string).

Also, many of the exercises offered are open to different interpretations with the insertion of fingers i, m and a and the combination of the pulgar exercises with these fingers. In other words, many exercises can be performed with the fingerings pi, pm, pa, or ip, mp, ap.

In some chapters this is briefly noted. Upcoming work will include these proposed i, m and a finger combinations of pulgar practice exercises.

Flipbook