The interesting thing, I can attest, is that it -- i.e. guitarface -- is completely involuntary and in my case at least impossible to prevent, even when playing jazz.
That said, however, there does seem to be a difference between jazz players who grew up during the rock era and jazz players who grew up before. The 'younger' players (not so young any more) have guitarface (e.g. Pat Metheny has a bad case of it) and the older players mostly don't. So my hypothesis is that if guitarface is regarded as unacceptable when you're first learning to play, you learn to override guitarface impulses. But if it's regarded as acceptable or even kinda cool, which it's been since the mid-sixties, and you thus don't develop this overriding mechanism early on, you are in the helpless thrall of guitarface forever.
Once piece of evidence for this is that the abovementioned 'older' players (now alas dying off) do often have guitareyes, since that much guitarface -- but not guitarcheeks or guitarmouth -- was acceptable when they were first playing.
The interesting thing, I can attest, is that it -- i.e. guitarface -- is completely involuntary and in my case at least impossible to prevent, even when playing jazz.
That said, however, there does seem to be a difference between jazz players who grew up during the rock era and jazz players who grew up before. The 'younger' players (not so young any more) have guitarface (e.g. Pat Metheny has a bad case of it) and the older players mostly don't. So my hypothesis is that if guitarface is regarded as unacceptable when you're first learning to play, you learn to override guitarface impulses. But if it's regarded as acceptable or even kinda cool, which it's been since the mid-sixties, and you thus don't develop this overriding mechanism early on, you are in the helpless thrall of guitarface forever.
Once piece of evidence for this is that the abovementioned 'older' players (now alas dying off) do often have guitareyes, since that much guitarface -- but not guitarcheeks or guitarmouth -- was acceptable when they were first playing.
Posted by Ted H. | Link to this comment | 07-22-04 8:12 AM
i don't think there's emo guitarface, or indie gf even. i'd love to see pics if i'm wrong.
Posted by Michael | Link to this comment | 07-22-04 2:45 PM
Robert Fripp doesn't have guitarface.
(Michael: that's because there isn't much notable emo or even indie guitar playing.)
Posted by ben wolfson | Link to this comment | 07-22-04 2:55 PM