Talk:Guitar Craft

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[edit] My own personal observation from actually attending a Guitar Craft course

Having attended a few Guitar Craft courses, my own personal experience points away from designating Guitar Craft as a cult in the destructive sense that most people associate with the word. Specifically:

1. I was not asked/required to accept any of the ideas presented uncritically or to revere Robert Fripp as some sort of infallible leader or messiah.

2. I was not asked/required to turn over my life savings to Guitar Craft or Robert Fripp, or to cut off contact with my family, or to regard anybody outside of Guitar Craft as evil or "wrong."

3. I was not asked/required to give up, modify, or otherwise change any pre-existing religious convictions. I have never witnessed anybody else being required or pressured in any fashion to do so. One participant on a course I attended made it known that his religious convictions required he leave in order to observe Sabbath on a Saturday, one day early of the official end of the course, and he was not discouraged, restrained, or prevented in any way from leaving to make his religious observance.

4. I was never forced to stay against my will or otherwise prevented from leaving the course grounds if I decided to leave or thought it necessary to do so.

5. I was never forced to stay awake for days on end (i.e. one of the common brainwashing tactics ascribed to cults in popular culture).

So, in light of my own direct observation, I do not believe Guitar Craft fits the profile of the "mind-control cult" so feared by many.

Whether somebody has a bad experience on a course, has a fantastic time, or anything in between is very individual. For me, a Guitar Craft course is definitely a means to explore group dynamics, and that is part of my reason for attending over the years, as working amicably within groups has been a longstanding personal issue for me. I've witnessed far more destructive group dynamics in school, in rock bands, and in the workplace than I ever witnessed on a Guitar Craft course.

I also liked the music made within Guitar Craft and wanted to learn how Robert Fripp was able to pick so well. And I'm now a much better guitarist than I used to be.

--Orffyreus 23:27, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sources?

Can sources be provided for the claims of brainwashing & being a cult?

  • [1], [2] and [3] are examples of what I was originally referring to. Note that neither I nor the authors behind those links are really claiming that GC is a cult - for starters, the courses are of short duration only, then you go home - but the devotion felt by some to "the leader", isolation from the outside world, and talk of "completely rebuilding a person", led to the opinion that GC has some cult-like aspects that potential attendees ought to be aware of before getting involved. - Stereoroid 18:16, 17 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Destructive group dynamics

See psychologist Dr. John D. Goldhammer's book, "Under the Influence - the destructive effects of group dynamics" for the ways "brainwashing" and "cult" might be applied to Guitar Craft in general and to its satellite operations in a handful of locations around the world. In an appendix titled "Marks of a Destructive Group," Goldhammer lists two pages of attributes, most of which describe aspects of Guitar Craft. For instance: authoritarian hierarchical control; centralized power structure; control of information within group environment; discouragement of criticism of group, system or leaders; effusive praise and flattery for leaders; fear or feelings of guilt about the prospect of leaving the group; feelings of superiority and exclusiveness; group mission is more important than the individual; group doctrine repeated over and over; group leaders are looked to for answers involving personal choices in life; large power gaps between leaders and followers; the group has its own cliches, jargon and slogans that become simplistic explanations for complex situations; need permission of leaders for everything the group does; nongroup ideas receive silence, ridicule or condemnation; public testimonials, confession, witnessing; secrecy between members or between different levels of group structure; the need to be like leaders or others in the group; there is a group explanation for everything . . . . Pitothenth 03:37, 11 July 2006 (UTC)

Sounds more like the average office environment than any Guitar Craft course I've ever been on. Are you basing this comment on personal experience?

Yes. Pitothenth 19:29, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

In a nice Ironic twist, Steve Ball - a veteran Crafty - has actually had "Under The Influence" recommended to him for reading. [4] Stereoroid 16:11, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Success

"The success of the courses in revitalizing a student's guitar playing is debatable" attempts to measure that success by fame and fortune. The key to the statement is in the quote. Nowhere is anything stated or implied that one will go on to be rich and/or famous. In fact, the bleak, harsh realities of a musician's life are often discussed. Guitar Craft is not and never has been presented as a path to fame and fortune.

  • "The success of the courses in revitalizing a student's guitar playing is debatable"? I wrote that line originally, which makes no reference to "fame and fortune", they were furthest from my mind. I'm a musician myself, and I do not measure the vitality of my musicianship by fame and fortune - a good thing for my sanity! Stereoroid 16:00, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

The proof is in the pudding, as the saying goes. So i followed the links to the guitar craft musicians web sites to hear and see what they do. I could not find any example of someone who can get around on the instrument, or display musical insight and creativity, any better or even on a par with players who are expert in the traditional methods and tuning. Until they can produce a few players on the level of a Parkening or a Conti, they have nothing to support their claims. (User MCN 17:02, 7 March 2008 (UTC))

"The success of the courses in revitalizing a student's guitar playing is debatable. The reader is invited to compare the skills and musicianship of the catalog of guitarists found through Fripp's label, Discipline Global Mobile to those of Segovia, Parkening, Conti, and Pass."

I've deleted this paragraph altogether. As it stood it was inappropriately phrased and more appropriate for this discussion page, where it's quoted it above. The paragraph appeared to be designed to lead the reader to a specific qualitative judgement, which is NPOV. The previous incarnations of the paragraph were little better.

All sorts of things are debatable, and a subject's susceptibility to debate alone isn't worth mentioning.

The reader might take the invitation to assessment as implicit in the inclusion of links to performers' websites. Certainly, anyone who is interested in making an assessment will follow those links, as User MCN did. As far as I know, none of those groups play classical guitar music or bebop, so it's unclear why those specific comparisons were made, other than that the author of the paragraph didn't find anything there that they liked as much as Joe Pass. As far as such argument goes - an admirer of Mr Fripp might suggest that he is a musician of such quality, another would disagree, and we would simply be in disagreement, which is more the realm of Usenet. Alternatively, someone might compare the playing of Johnny Ramone to that of Segovia and find Segovia's ability to rock out somewhat wanting.

Incidentally, again as far as I know, DGM's roster is currently limited to King Crimson and other projects immediately connected to Robert Fripp, and thus would not reflect the general work of GC players. El pendulo (talk) 01:13, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Some points on Guitar Craft

I write as someone who has had a lot of experience of Guitar Craft courses over the last few years. That is to say I'm a self-confessed Crafty.

I have been attempting to rewrite something in this article with little success. The sentence "Students are roughly grouped into Levels as they enter a course, with Level One for new students. Graduation is based on a personal assessment of the student by the instructors" is wholly incorrect, and I will delete it. However, my attempts to write a replacement for it have started to become overwrought.

There is no allocation of applicants to courses (that is to say "students are [not] roughly grouped"), although courses may have requirements of previous experience. A person's attendance on a course depends on their own assessment of what they need from the course. In this sense there is no ranking of individuals into Level One, Level Two and so forth except as relates to a specific course. It is common for people to attend a number of Level Two courses, for example. For more experienced Crafties, the work in the kitchen is of equal or greater value.

The Level One courses used to be the introductory courses to Guitar Craft, and are all directed by Fripp, but since 2002 it has been a requirement for all applicants to Level One courses to have attended an introductory course first.

In addition, there are other courses - Performance Projects, for example, which often involve series of concerts by the group The League of Crafty Guitarists - depending on what is needed.

In the past few years much of the activity in Guitar Craft has been in Europe (particularly Germany and Spain) and South America (particularly Argentina), although participants on these courses regularly come from all over the world. Grangousier