Honest Feedback Is the Secret Weapon Every Guitarist Needs

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Have you ever hit a plateau in your guitar playing despite hours of practice? The missing piece might not be more practice videos or tab books, but something far more valuable: honest assessment and feedback.

Steve Stine delves into why receiving quality evaluation of your playing is absolutely essential for guitar progress. Drawing from decades of teaching experience, he explains that without proper assessment, guitarists often develop blind spots—technical issues or inefficient approaches they simply cannot see themselves. As Steve puts it, "You don't know what you don't know," which perfectly captures why external feedback is irreplaceable.

The discussion explores practical aspects of finding the right assessment source, whether through formal lessons or trusted musical friends. Steve emphasizes creating a comfortable environment where you can play without performance anxiety, selecting someone whose opinion comes from a genuine place of wanting to help rather than criticize. He shares his approach to giving constructive feedback—focusing on one or two key areas rather than overwhelming students with a laundry list of corrections, and using the "compliment sandwich" method to keep motivation high while addressing areas for improvement.

Whether you're struggling with picking technique, finger positioning, or playing through complete songs, targeted assessment helps identify the specific adjustments that will make the biggest difference in your playing. Steve invites listeners to explore the GuitarZoom Academy, where personalized assessment and structured guidance create a roadmap to help you achieve your specific guitar goals. Ready to break through your playing barriers? The right feedback might be all you need.

Links:

Check out the GuitarZoom Academy:
https://academy.guitarzoom.com/

• Steve’s Channel → https://www.youtube.com/user/stinemus...
• GuitarZoom Channel → https://www.youtube.com/user/guitarz0...
• Songs Channel → https://www.youtube.com/user/GuitarSo... .

Episode Transcript

Steve (00:00):
Hey Steve Stine, from Guitar Zoom here Today.
What I would like to talk toyou about is the importance of
getting assessment about yourplaying okay, getting actual
feedback of your playing so youknow whether or not things are
moving forward in the optimalway.
Now, how do you get feedback?

(00:20):
Well, or assessments of yourplaying.
Guitar lessons is one way.
That's really great If you canget into some guitar lessons
with an instructor that you feelcomfortable with and is
available for you to.
I mean, that's half the battlehere, right, making sure that

(00:49):
you find someone whose opinionis not stained for some reason
in a negative connotation,that's really there to look at.
This is where you were lasttime.
You showed me what you weredoing with this and now this is
where you are now, and let'scompare those two and see where
you're at with things, so youknow whether it's an instructor,

(01:10):
whether it's a friend or arelative or something like that.
Finding some way for you to getassessments of your playing is
really important.
Now, in order to be able to dothat, you've got to be
comfortable with playing infront of somebody, which again
means that you need to findsomeone that you feel
comfortable being around,oftentimes with guitar players.

(01:31):
I find that people get really,really nervous when they have to
play in front of other people,and I totally get it.
That happens if you can findthat right person and you can
put your trust in them and youagain really recognize that what
they're doing is for yourbenefit.
Their assessment has your bestinterests in mind.

(01:52):
You can take that to heart andit's not an offensive thing If
somebody says to you you know, Ialways think about the
compliment sandwich, if you willwhere you can say something you
know nice about person and thenyou can give them some
constructive criticism or adviceon something assessment, if you
will and then say somethingthat is positive again and that

(02:15):
tends to work really well.
But I also think just peopletend to trust me that I'm coming
from the right place when I'mtrying to give them advice or
assessment on their playing,because I have no stake in the
game.
Right, it's not about me.
I want them to get where theywant to be and in order to do
that I need to be completelyhonest with them.

(02:35):
If there's something about whatthey're trying to do Now when
I'm giving assessments, I don'tgive them 35 things that they
you know that could useimprovement.
I try and narrow that down.
So what's?
What's the bigger picture ofwhat it is that you're trying to
do here?
Right, you're trying to playthrough this scale and it's
struggling.
Okay, is it a picking thing?

(02:56):
Is it a finger?
A string switching thing?
Is it a fingering thing?
Right, get something like thatwhere we can say, hey, you know,
one of the things I'mrecognizing as I'm watching you
play is it looks like you'rekind of struggling with this.
Can we talk about that a littlebit more?
And you know, play that againfor me.
And I want you to really beaware of what it is that you're
doing right there, slow it downand really think about how that

(03:20):
feels and how that sounds whenyou play it.
And then you tell me what youthink and then they'll do it
again and then they'll say, yeah, that feels like I'm kind of
struggling right there.
It's kind of like I'm tensingup.
Okay, let's start there and seewhat we can do to try and fix
that.
Now, if there's somebody that Iknow practices a lot, then we
might go into a couple of thethings that we could try and

(03:41):
remedy along the way as well.
If there's somebody thatdoesn't practice a lot.
That might be enough for themto try and focus on, to try and
redevelop, because they probablyhave five other 10 other things
that they're working on as well, other than this conversation
that we're having, and I can'tforget about all that stuff,
okay, this is why, the more Iknow about their journey and the

(04:01):
more I know about what theirgoals are and what their plan is
and what they're working on ona daily basis, it helps me to
assess more properly whatthey're going to need to be able
to achieve those goals and howmuch time they actually have
available.
So I think assessment issomething that is really, really
important, and it doesn'tmatter what it is, whether it's
assessment of your work at your,your work at a restaurant, or

(04:25):
your assessment of of how wellyou're doing in you know real
estate or you know whatever, orcarpentry it doesn't make any
difference To have someone tellyou you know I always use the
analogy of like learning how toplay pool or darts or something
like that you can watch videos alot and that's great, but you
never really know whether or notwhat you're doing is maybe.

(04:47):
You don't know what you don'tknow, so there might be
something missing in there thatcould optimize what you're
trying to actually do.
You know, raise your shoulderup a little bit when you, when
you throw the dart, or you knowturn your wrist just a little
bit or try and straighten.
I think about that with golfwhen I was trying to learn how
to play golf, like all theselittle things that you can do
that make a significantdifference in the, in the bigger
picture.
But unless you're working withsomebody, how would you know?

(05:09):
Like you're just kind of, youknow, watching the video or
listening to the thing, orreading the book or whatever it
is, and you're trying to do ityourself?
Now again, sometimes that worksgreat.
There are certain elements thatyou'll be able to do perfectly
on your own, and that's awesome,but there's some things that
you probably won't, and that'swhere assessment becomes very,
very important, okay.
So what I want to remind you iswe have a thing called the

(05:32):
Guitar Zoom Academy.
Okay, it's a program that youcan check out if you'd like to,
and it is chock full ofassessment.
You know, that's the thing.
We set you up with a game plan.
We figure out what your goalsare, what your struggles are,
where you'd like to be, let'ssay, a year from now.
What your North star, if youwill, is what I'd love to be
able to do.

(05:53):
This I've always struggled withthis thing, or you know, there's
something missing here that Iwould love to be able to make
this feel or sound a certain way.
Or I'd love to learn to playsongs all the way through.
It could be anything.
So we sit down with you and wemake a plan, so you have an
actual roadmap to get from pointA to point B, and then we start
working together, okay, on adaily basis if needed,

(06:16):
interacting with each other, andone of the key elements of that
is discussion, conversation,assessment of your playing, of
your thought process, that sortof thing to make sure that
you're really getting where youneed to go.
So, anyway, take care, staypositive.
Think about what you could doto try and find somebody out
there that you could work withand get true assessment of your

(06:36):
playing in a positive.
Think about what you could doto try and find somebody out
there that you could work withand get true assessment of your
playing in a positive,encouraging and useful way to
get you to where it is you wantto be able to go All right, so
I'll talk to you soon, okay.