Information About Dean - Sherborne teacher -

(1 review)

Personal Description:

I have been teaching guitar for some 25 years covering all styles and areas up to and including all Grades both for electric and classical, drawing also on my own experience as a performer and composer on the instrument (4 official album releases).

Tutoring Experience:

I trained and worked as a classroom teacher after my first degree so can add that I know about the techniques of communicating a skill to a student, as well as proficiency on the instrument (not all good players make good teachers!) I also teach bass up to intermediate standard. In the past decade 70 of my pupils have achieved grades-but we needn't be looking at grades at all if that is not your inclination.

Tutoring Approach:

There are core skills and areas of knowledge for each type of playing (fingerstyles, picking, chords, pick and strums, and in classical rest stroke, free stroke, etc.) and I use example pieces that embody these, in what, after such a long time teaching, seem to be the most successful way or easy for the student to pick up. A little bit of 'theory' as we go along doesn't do any harm: it helps techinically and musically to know what you're doing as you're doing it! With classical if we're largely following grades I can supplement the existing syllabus with other examples to help round out the student's knowledge.I prefer to use ABRSM when it comes to classical grades and Rockschool for electric.
Within all this I believe it is of the greatest importance to foster the student's own creativity as well as basic facility with the instrument.