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You are here: Home / podcast / FGH-0021: Interview with English Fingerstyle Guitarist Richard Smith

FGH-0021: Interview with English Fingerstyle Guitarist Richard Smith

By Adam Rafferty 2 Comments

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/adamrafferty/FGH-0021.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:34:25 — 108.4MB) | Embed

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Summary, Episode 21:

Richard started playing the guitar at age 5 and has never looked back. Focusing early on with the fingerstyle guitar of Chet Atkins and Jerry Reed, he began transcribing classical music, Jazz, the gypsy style of Django Reinhardt, bluegrass, ragtime and the blues to Sousa marches.

Richard is a seasoned performer with thousands of performances worldwide to his credit – he’s performed in five continents – North and South America, Europe, Asia and Australia solo and alongside Tommy Emmanuel, Eric Clapton, Albert Lee, Dave Peacock, Martin Taylor, Brent Mason, Gary Brooker, Stuart Duncan, Bryan Sutton, Joe Brown, Ralph McTell and many others.

(Timestamps are for audio version of the podcast.)

  • 01:34 Welcome Richard!
  • 02:33 Richard talks about Networking and Booking
  • 07:43 Air Travelling with guitars – cases and backup guitars
  • 18:35 Youtube and the entertainer video
  • 20:24 CDs, t-shirts and packing lightly
  • 22:53 troublesome touring stories – “going commando” and the beatles
  • 26:53 Early influences of richard – Bert Weedon’s Play in a Day book
  • 30:12 Learning songs correctly, listening more deeply and try to make your playing sound like the record
  • 37:50 Richard Smiths Version of Scott Joplins “The Entertainer”
  • 42:30 Having a musical homebase, your fist influence and how it affects everything you do – and the flexability of Antoine Boyer
  • 49:42 “The One Thing” The Importance of keeping focused on the thing that sets you apart from others, but also try out new things to srtech as a player
  • 59:07 The code of Spotify and how to get into playlists
  • 1:03:39 Music “The Streets of Laredo”
  • 1:06:36 The number one thing you would tell all young musicians to do differently – being honest with yourself and Big Jim Sullivan’s advice
  • 1:16:57 The time, the tone and the groove – and the metronome
  • 1:24:15 How technique influences the phrasing and the pocket
  • 1:31:28 Ending credits & podcast contact info

Richard’s Links:

  • Richard’s Website: https://richardsmithmusic.com/
  • Richard on Facebook
  • Richard on Youtube
Richard Smith plays “The Entertainer”
Richard Smith plays “Struttin” by Jerry Reed

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About Adam Rafferty

I’m Adam Rafferty – a guitar player born and raised in New York City, and currently spending most of my time on tour playing concerts and coaching my guitar students online at StudyWithAdam.com

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Dave R says

    January 20, 2021 at 9:04 pm

    Great interview Adam. I watch many of the musician interviews such as Josh Smith, Dom Famularo and Joe Chambers. I’ve watched loads of Richard’s videos on youtube but never realised just what a fun guy he is. So much good advice and down to earth honesty – I especially loved his comparison of a spoken language to a musical language. He’s quite right of course. I hope you will be doing more guitarist interviews.
    By the way, the Beatles’ last gig was at Candlestick Park wherever that is.

    Reply
  2. G. Walsh says

    January 21, 2021 at 5:12 pm

    Thank you for a very interesting podcast with Richard Smith. I learned a lot!
    Great job, Adam!

    Reply

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