[Ask] I'm a Guitar Teacher (Round 2)

Not really using MSN TOO MUCH but if you msg I'll get it in a few days as I check periodically.

Oh, and for ANYONE who has some questions I'm going to set up a new MSN so you guys can reach me with your questions.

I'd start with 3 chords. Lets go with E minor, A minor, and a G Major.

**Watch your left hand as you make these chords, your left hand strength comes in a "can crushing" sort of posture. You want to press the strings with the tips of your fingers and not the pads, come DOWN on the string as straight as you can, not sloppy at an angle.

Get comfortable with these few chords, just practice re applying the chords.

**When you do, pluck out each string SLOWLY AND ASSESS THE SOUND YOU ARE MAKING. Can you hear each string clearly? Success! If not , one of two things are happening - You arent fretting correctly, or your finger is muting the string beside it due to sloppy positioning. Aim to press right behind the metal bit (fret) and with a decent amount of force. More on this later

WHEN you can make those chords CLEANLY (not at any speed, just comfortable) you should go ahead with more

At the same time we will develop scale playing

learn the pentatonic scale in one octave, open position




Applying the same left hand principles, you will slowly apply alternate picking. More on this later.

Let me know how this goes we can talk more

Id love to help! I need a BIT of an idea of where you are at, and what you are seeking to acheive! If you have at least a vague idea of where you wanna go I can help you shape that shit out and get there. More clarity and we can get this shit goin!!

Yep gettin you to where you wanna go with music.

Chord construction?

Are you talking about like

Major - 1 3 5
Minor - 1b3 5
Maj7- 1 3 5 7
min7 - 1 b3 5 b7
Dom7 - 1 3 5 b7



?? Let me know if thats what yo uare looking for and we can talk about it. You should know the above before proceeding though

That doesnt start until Jan , I have to finish school, then moving to Toronto to start that adventure. There will be some way that I'll set up so you can follow us along in our struggles. In terms of personal growth, I'm on my grind on the guitar as an instrument, but have had some very potent creative outputs. Im working on getting a website where you can listen to ALL my music I've ever done. expect it in 2 months. Expect the practice house in Jan.

Thanks for paying attention, I hope we can both learn something.

I'm back for you my luvs.

Tunings are where you should learn about yourself. Think of a chord you like, then put your guitar in that open tuning. Then maybe the same notes but in a different voicing. Try a few open tunings like that. Then go for something more unorthodox. What's a Koto, how is it tuned? Tune your guitar for a whole tone scale. Alt tunings can make you return to the beginners mind attitude since you have all the creative force youve gained, but your muscle memory is no longer useful, it makes you listen.

so

-Try your own open chords.
-Tune unorthodox , like a Koto would, like a whole tone scale, maybe with lots of repeats for a droning effect
-You DONT have to tune lowest to high. Then your arpeggios can become very fresh if your strings arranged in a new pitch series.


This is your world to discover, you can learn so much here.

Ahh. Ok, we will do one hour together a day.

10 minutes of small warm ups - Alternate pick the open strings, 4 times each, the switch strings, slow and in even tempo. 1 E A U 2 E A U etc etc. These 10 minutes here are about re teaching yourself the basics of guitar here. So, play single notes with the left hand. Picture the energy flowing to the tip of your finger. Try this:

We know what a clean note sounds like, we know what a buzzed note sounds like. Make a buzzed note on purpose. Say, 3rd fret of the low E string. Buzz the note so you hear a bit of the actual note and some buzz. Ok good, now press just a hair harder. You get the clean note. Guitar is a lot more about finesse than strength. Do this every day to remind yourself that you should NEVER struggle with the instrument.

Also in these 10 minutes, review note names. Do the 1st 3 frets on your first and second day the next two days do the next 3 frets, etc.
,
20 minutes on scales. Start with two octave scales. What is most important here is that you pay attention to proper left hand technique, and apply STRICT alternate picking, not going fast at all. Make sure everynote is clear, and occurs with VERY LITTLE EFFORT. TOTAL RELAXATION!!

then 30 minutes on songs. Take your iron man solo , lets learn the rest of it. Here's the catch, spen 15 minutes on just 4 bars of the solo, and divide that further by 7 minutes on each 2 bar sets. TAKE THIS SHIT SLOW. The goal here isn't to just learn the notes, its to be patient , be relaxed, and play cleanly. AVOID TEMPTATION TO PLAY FAST

Then the other 15 minutes is the same thing but on a different song or section.

This should get you on a track which will bring up more questions soon enough. Please ask if you have any questions or ideas about this schedule!!

Ok, so you gotta go in on the WHY of music. LOADS OF FUN MAN. The rewards are infinite and forever.

Here's your task.

This week, twice a day for 2 minutes, you will review your note names.


A A# B C C# D D# E F F# G G#


The week after that, apply this to your first string, all frets up to twelve

So your e string is like this

fret 1 = F 2 = F# 3 = G etc etc.

For every fret you go up, you advance one note , starting on E as the OPEN string.

For each week after, you will do the next string as well as all previous. In about a month from now you will know all the note names down cold and be ready for the nitty gritty of it all .

A month? That doesnt add up you say. Well I trust you will get carried away by your progress once you start to see the patterns. Plus you get a freebie cuz two strings are the same. Let me know if ANY of this is unclear but trust me when I say

YOU MUST KNOW THE NOTE NAMES COLD. Or youll just be stuck as shit again. Do this then lets talk.

Ok , get good at making chords, Learn these types so you can play them rooted on the 4th, 5th, and 6th. Then lets talk more...

AWESOME The classical is SO great for teaching us about music and ourselves..

Ok, the right hand we label

P = Thumb (pulgar)
I = index
M = Middle
A = Ring finger (annular)


put the I M A fingers on strings 3 2 1 respectively. P will go on string 5 for now


First arpeggio

P I M

So just pluck P, then I, then M, even tempo, one after the other, over N over.

then when you feel good

P I M I

so up and back again

P I M A

all fingers

P I M A M I

all up and down


DO THESE SLOWLY . DO NOT RUSH. REMAIN FUCKING CALM haha.

Now, the right hand is a very important force in the classical style. Close your first. Open it. Watch again this time, close it, open it. - THATS how you will pluck the strings. Many people try and get underneath and pull. This gives a harsh tone. PUSH through the stings as if they werent there, just as if you were closing one finger on your hand, then reset comfortably. Let me know if this makes sense. It's not easy to have good right hand technique.

Flamenco? Do you mean like, real flamenco stylez? The hardest part is getting it in your ear, the rhythms are very foreign to us and grouped in ways that are uncommon. Maybe you could link me to a youtube of what you mean by flamenco, there are many definitions this days. What part of it do you like?

Thanks man I appreciate it. Good job stickin to it BOSS HYPE SWAG SHIT MAAAAN!!

Here's something you can practice - Can you count?

1 2 3 4 with a down strum on each count.


EZ PZ


1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +

Now we do twice as many strums. Say "1 AND 2 AND 3 AND" and you are going Down Up Down up.

EZ PZ

Now to divide a beat further

1 E A U 2 E A U etc "One EEE AND UH two EE AND UH etc"


So now we have a way to count four strums to a beat. So, grab a piece of paper

write

1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4


and at your whim, write Es As Us (not too many to start! very few..) and assign a direction to strum above each . Try and land on the number counts with a downstrum. With this method you can expose yourself to new strums, while writing them in a way that is logical and can be dissected instead of having to rewind a tape over and over.

Let me know how this goes, or if it doesnt make sense.

Can you read sheet music?

Do you have desire to?

Ok here we go, BARRREE CHORDDSS

Before you fuck with that, this excersize is needed.

5th fret.

Barre two strings. Finger nice and straight, dont strain, only apply whats needed. Can you do this confidently? Ok

Move on. Barre three strangs, Same applies. Keep adding strings until it gets a bit messy. We need to identify what the problem is. Are you pushing hard enough ? Are you nice and tight behind the fret? Try rolling your finger different sides to see if the strings are getting stuck in your knuckle creases.

As you progress at this, go back to barring just two strings. heres the rub - WHILE barring , use finger two to play the 6th fret of your first string. NOW see if your barre is still working. Good? Ok, move over a string so its on the 6th fret of the 2nd string. Both notes sounding clean? Then add a string to the barre. Keep going. After you get good at this, do the same, but with your 3rd finger reaching for the 7th fret, then repeat the process.

Do this for 5 minutes a day for about a week. Hey, thats not too much to ask right? Let me know how it goes .

Do you know any thing about keys, and what chords go in what key and why? Knowing a bit of how music works can REALLY save time transcribing since you have thoughts on how the music is likely to be moving, even if your ear is having troubles.

Learn your major scale if you dont know it, because EVERYTHING relates back to it. then boot up this app:

http://www.good-ear.com/servlet/EarTrainer

Or if you are willing to do a small download, this program is VERY comprehensive and highly reccomended as it charts your progress and has little lesson plans

http://www.earmaster.com/

Just get the trial.

Take it slow. At first, your ear can take only so much training. Dont do more than 5-10 minutes. Dont move on until you you are scoring upwards of 80 percent.

WHILE using one of those programs, take REALLY small melodies and figure them out. BEFORE you aim to play them on your guitar, sing them out loud. You HAVE to sing , even if you dont like your voice get over yourself, just sing. We want to connect what we hear to our hands, and singing is the connecting force in that.

So take Eleanor Rigby by the beatles say, and just get the first part of the vocal melody

"IIIIiiiiii look at all the lonely people!" . Just figure that out. Look how it relates back to the key. If you dont know how to do that, ask me more questions and we can learn.

The mistake to make here is to bite big pieces. NO NO NO . Just a measure here, a measure there. Dont worry about doing more than 2 measures of fresh material a day. Take it slow, enjoy it. You are basically training a magical skill, its pretty fuckin cool to slowly take stuff out of the air and make it real. Wow.

Let me know if you need more on this or I'm unclear on what you should do.

Ear training tools
Real Life transcribing (SHORT MELODIC FRAGMENTS)
How does it relate to a scale


oh shit, just saw you are interesting in fingerstyle. I'm going to draw from an earlier answer I gave

****
Fingerstyle shit is really great and enables your guitar to sound more like a piano, very full even when playing alone. First things first

the right hand we label

P = Thumb (pulgar)
I = index
M = Middle
A = Ring finger (annular)


put the I M A fingers on strings 3 2 1 respectively. P will go on string 5 for now

Do the following two arpeggios for a week to ten days before advancing. DO THEM SLOWLY and relaxed.
***
First arpeggio

P I M

So just pluck P, then I, then M, even tempo, one after the other, over N over.

then when you feel good

P I M I

so up and back again



Then move onto these for two weeks while playing the old ones.
******

P I M A

all fingers

P I M A M I

all up and down


DO THESE SLOWLY . DO NOT RUSH. REMAIN FUCKING CALM haha.

Now, the right hand is a very important force in the classical style. Close your first. Open it. Watch again this time, close it, open it. - THATS how you will pluck the strings. Many people try and get underneath and pull. This gives a harsh tone. PUSH through the strings as if they werent there, just as if you were closing one finger on your hand, then reset comfortably. Let me know if this makes sense. It's not easy to have good right hand technique.

This can be hard to explain over text but I'm on the slow process to get equipped to put up videos for all yall.

http://www.stormthecastle.com/classical_guitar/Collection/120studies-for-right-hand.pdf

Even if you can't read sheet music , I can still explain how to use those to understand the information.

IF you can play 120 of those cleanly at a decent tempo, you are doing well. There are a lot of cool right hand things you can do that dont come up in the regular rock ballad dust in the wind type thing

Do you like this piece at all? It's fairly aggressive and prettty cool, maybe you'd like to learn something like this

Ok gonna talk a bit about your left hand here.

I'm seeing your 4th finger (pinky) is completely stiff about half the time. Worse yet, look at say about 16 seconds, and even more so at about 29 seconds. Where are your 3rd and 4th fingers going? The guitar is over that way >>>!!! hah. Seriously though, what in your head you might be thinking "I cant go faster, I need to practice going faster" is actually "I need to make my fingers have less work to do for every note" . One way to do that is to minimize the distance, which right now in your technique is a decent amount.

Even if you are thinking "my pinky? I dont use it much anyway!" Well, while I think if you want to have the skills you seek you have to, there's another thing with the pinky sticking out like that. That means you are tense. That little bit of energy that is required to pick the pinky up is just adding up, fatiguing the hand when it shouldnt be. It's like walking around with your arm all day. RELAX.... Here's how

Here's two things I see that beginners rarely get taught with / without a teacher , they both pertain to the left hand.

Dont squeeze to hard

** guitar is a finesse instrument, rarely a strength thing, like golf, say. Here's how we want our left hand technique to go. Imagine you are crushing a can. Open, close, open , close. That's the sort of muscle group we want to engage while using our left hand. Imagine the energy going to the finger tips. Use the finger TIPS not the PADS to press down on the strings. always come DOWN on the strings as best you can, behind the fret nice and close.

Now to the squeezing thing, how hard is too hard?

Well try this, play a single note on the low E string (the big boy). Ok, nice and clean. Now, release pressure and pluck until you get a bit of a crunch sound , but can still hear a bit of the actual note. It'll take a second to find this sweet spot. Ok, now, push just a HAIR BIT MORE in pressure. THATS what it takes to press a string down. Just a bit more then pushing down a key on your keyboard. The problem is, people get exciting and CRUSH the fuck out of their guitar. Plz dont ; ) . The first thing you do when playing is start with about 30 seconds of this buzz technique, to remind yourself that its a relaxed pursuit, not one of strength.

fewf, ok good.

The other thing?

Space Case Left Hand Syndrome

wtf?

Well basically you'll be playing something and have the left hand just flyin off the fretboard, ESPECIALLY FINGERS 3 AND 4 (ring and pinky) . This is the cause of so much inaccurace because the fingers have to travel so far to get to the next note. No we dont want this. Here is your drill to be done after the above:

Play the chromatic scalenow, DO NOT LIFT A FINGER UNTIL IT IS NEEDED AGAIN. So, I play finger 1 2 3 4 , then as i switch strings to place finger 1, I will not lift fingers 2 3 4. finger 1 lands, then finger 2 has permission to leave since it is needed else where. I call this THE STICKY FINGERS DRILL.. It's not how you ACTUALLY play, but it will fuck with your head and teach your fingers not to stray far from home.

Fewf.

Let me know if this doesnt make sense. I'm working on some videos once I get equipped. GL HF

As for your tuning thing well.... dont use a floyd rose >_<

For some left hand ideas, read my above response. Here's some things to keep in mind with left hand technique

Your hand should curve nicely, as if you were holding something like a can, or something phallic or whatever hhaaha. You want the fingers to come straight down on the strings , so that you play with your finger tips, and not the finger pads. RELAX! Relaxtion is speed and comfort.

Let me know if you want more music ideas, you should be able to find the sheet music for that piece with not too much effort.

Here's how you'll get faster.

What you need:

A fucking metronome
a fucking big heart and lots of ATTITUDE!!!!

hah ok like so:

you pick a speed on the metronome you can play confortably, like VERY relaxed , it should feel a bit boring. Say you can play your scale at two notes a click at 72 BPM. So, we will go four notches down to 60 , play your scale 3-5 times. Then, move it up two more notches to 66, repeat, then up to your comfort speed of 72, then you go 2 past to 80, then finally to 88.

So,

60 - 66 - ((72)) - 76 - 80

Slowly you will find that your comfort speed can be moved up to 76, and the whole thing shifts over one. DONT rush the process though, only when 76 really feels comfortable do you move up your whole system two notches. This is how I've found the most surefire way to gain speed.

If you're interested in improvising the scale, you should start by just going for it. Say you like Rock N Roll by Led Zeppelin . Try and use your ear to figure out where to base your minor pentatonic scale. (in this case its A...) then just start messin with those notes. Turn it up loud and start muckin them

BEND THEM!!!
SLIDE THEM
SHREEEDD THEM!!!

Just have fun with it. Only through having actually experience with the problem can I guide you farther. So just fire up some tunes you like and solo over them. Try playing LOTS of notes, try playing VERY few notes and LISSSTEEN!!

So important to LISTEN.

Ok, if you need help figuring out which key a song is in , just let me know what a song or two and I'll help you out. GL HF

Cool, thanks for sharing your ideas.

Quick question Adam, do you know how to harmonize the major scale to find out what chords fit in what key? I'm going to help open up your ear to some new sounds if youre willing. Lemme know and we can keep rollin. While I dont really believe about assigning emotions and stories to everything you're doing, it can help for some people.

Hey Marine

Q1:
Well obviously my first thing is START SMALL. SMALL AND CONSISTENT VICTORIES WILL PULL YOU THROUGH.

Plan out your picking, write down what the right hand has to do, and write down what the left hand has to do. It seems anal, but this is the kind of work that has to go into learning a complex piece. It ends up saving you days upon days and maybe more than months of time depending on the difficulty.

Now my little secret here:

Don't practice the same thing every day.


You'll come up with 3 different schedules that look something like this

day 1 :
PART A broken into Parts A1 A2 A3 A4
with 15 minutes being spend on each one. Obviously you start very slow. (scroll down to see my metronome method, this will be the cornerstone to your practise after you figure out how to play the small licks you will be working on)

day 2:
PART B broken into 4 parts, same deal

day 3:
40 minutes (or whatever same ratio of time in relation to how long you have) is spent on pure technique. Not especially working on the song. Practice picking open strings, sweeping, all that. In the most BASIC FORM so you can clean up your technique. You'll need to have monster technique to pull this one off, but it's VERY VERY possible. Remember that. It's just a guitar, you can do it. Just be patient and honest. Dont cheat yourself.

The other 20 minutes of this day are spent reviewing the previous two days. NO NEW MATERIAL CAN BE LEARNED HERE. Just VERY SLOW and steady review. There should be no speed, no tension, no goals. Just a casual, relaxed review of what has been done. Rinse and repeat





Here's my metronome method as talked about earlier:


you pick a speed on the metronome you can play confortably, like VERY relaxed , it should feel a bit boring. Say you can play your scale at two notes a click at 72 BPM. So, we will go four notches down to 60 , play your scale 3-5 times. Then, move it up two more notches to 66, repeat, then up to your comfort speed of 72, then you go 2 past to 80, then finally to 88.

So,

60 - 66 - ((72)) - 76 - 80

Slowly you will find that your comfort speed can be moved up to 76, and the whole thing shifts over one. DONT rush the process though, only when 76 really feels comfortable do you move up your whole system two notches. This is how I've found the most surefire way to gain speed.

SEXY LEXY hahahaha what fun.

glad you gave your sausage fingers a good ... grillin hahhaha. It's awesome to look back and say "Shit, Im actually getting better"

Well, the pentatonic scale is kind of the starter for a lot of soloists. I'd grab a song you like, then start playing a one octave pentatonic scale in the right key over it . If you are unsure about how to figure out what key a song is in, feel free to ask me.

First, just start by playing one note every four beats. It'll seem a little empty but what you want to be doing is really hear how the note sort of meshes (or maybe sounds out of wack!) with the chords behind it. Dont think TOO hard, just listen and enjoy.

Then,

Switch notes every two beats. Things are a bit more interesting now.

then,

Every beat play a new note. This shouldnt be TOO fast for your hands, but your head might get tripped up in remembering where the scale is. No big deal, this is a new kind of practice! For the mind and the hands.

OK OK FEWWWF.

Now, go back to the one note for every four beats. And listen again. You may be a bit bored. Start to HEAR (but not play) how you might fill in those extra spaces. Is it a soaring bend? A small and subtle vibrato on the same note you just played? Maybe the note in your head is a little lower sounding, try and find it with your fingers .

Most importantly, ENJOY. This is just the first step to getting familiar with the differencing between joining together with your instrument versus merely playing it. Instead of using it to reach the end, it is the means.

Now I dont expect a rebirth or anything, at first you'll probably feel really shy about this, not sounding as good as the next guy or whatever. Dont let your ego tell you what to do, your musical pursuit doesnt owe your ego a damn thing. So chill out, try it some more. maybe try a different tune. Then, for today, that's enough. Slowly you're going to build the ability to hear what you would want to play in your head, then being able to translate it into your hands onto the fretboard. Like FUCKING MAGIC BRO!!!!

Let me know if you need more specifics or are having troubles. This is just one kickstarter I use for an aspiring soloist

Continue through with the method. So, make your comfort speed 92, and everything else gets shifted up one. So, your top speed now is 100, and your low safety speed is 84. I'm proud of your patience and you should be too. Keep pursuing this method and you will soon see that no speed is too quick as long as you get to that goal in a controlled and relaxed way.

You. Can. Do. It.

Hey there

Ahh, in regards to your sectioning question. I would take a couple weeks or so to get the first half or third of the piece in a VERY SLOW and playable condition. This isn't USUALLY how I'd suggest learning music as one can get into the habit of just practicing the parts theyre good at, but you should sort of think of this tune as 2 or 3 seperate tunes since it is a pretty substantial one to learn. So for two weeks or so do that sectioning thing I talked about in a way you see fit, moving nice and slow. Then, when you can play the begginning sections (doesn't matter if you can really connect them together or not yet, so long as you can play the sections cleanly and SLOWLY)

So divide that tune into 3 seperate sections, and then apply what we talked about to each one . So you work on small parts of each third until you can sort of noodle your way through each, then you begin to practice using the three larger sections.

I'd just spend about one minute a day on vibrato. The trick is to open your ear up to how you want the vibrato to sound, and connecting your fingers to that sound, since the actually physical motion of it isn't all that hard.

Just so you're aware - there are two (some say three but..) main types of vibrato.

Vibrato one - It's just like bending , then releasing to your original note (or close to it) and repeating in an even way. Practice doing this both SLOW AND WIDE, FAST AND WIDE, SLOW AND TIGHT, and FAST AND TIGHT.

Vibrato two - I like this one more, it's usually more subtle too. You apply pressure to the string and sort of pull it left and right instead of up and down. So, you are actually pulling on the string to make it tighter when you move left, this raises the pitch, then when you push the string to the right you slacken it a bit and the pitch lowers. This one has the benefit of going both ABOVE and BELOW the target note, so it has a sort of richer more even sound, though if you want a really wide vibrato this probably isn't the best choice. Same deal with how to practice.

The thing with the airplane is - THINGS CAN GO WRONG. If you aren't prepared to damage the guitar then you'd probably be better of packing it tightly in something with packing foam and sending it by courier. When I take the plane, there have been times with a little fuss I can get it on the plane with me (some airlines are better/worse than others, some are used to it and have a little closet for things like that on the plane). Other than that, things CAN happen if it goes in the cargo hold. I saw a guitarist once, and he landed the day before the concert and his next snapped off at the body and had to borrow someone elses guitar.

Oh no worries Scyper! I'm doin the best I can to hopefully guide y'all down some new paths.

Hmm, well it depends on your goals. On one hand, if the only music you desire to play on the guitar is mostly power chords, then I dont blame you for not wanting to explore higher techniques or ideas because they don't really apply to your music (this isnt a bad thing! you should always just play what you enjoy). On the other hand you could take a chance and try and broaden your musical palette.

I would look to some barre chords for something for your hands to do. How is your alternate picking? You should get it to the point where you can do 16th notes at 120 two octace scales. (16th notes mean 4 notes for every click) Where are you at with that?

To get the mind going, I would learn the note names on the fretboard for each string up to fret 12. I would take a few days to learn what notes actually exist. When you are comfortable with that apply it to your first string. Take 5 days to learn your first string (spend only two minutes a day on this!) then take another 5 days to learn the second string WHILE maintaining the first string. After a couple weeks you'll have the whole fretboard down for the rest of your life cold.

Why bother? It's going to open up shortcuts in where/how you play chords and licks, as well as help you to begin to understand ways to make riffs and solos.

1)Yes, either by shaving the nut (hahaaha) or adjusting the truss rod. This is typically a non-expensive adjustment at any music shop
2)More so on an acoustic than an electric. It sort of depends on how well your ear is atuned to the subtleties of tone. Good tone is a bit like wine I guess, where most people will just say "well, it tastes like wine and gets me drunk so it is good wine!" where other people practically make a career out of understanding how to feel all the ingredients in the wine.

Bottom line here - If you like the sound of the cheap strings, just play them! If you think it could sound better, splurge on a pack and see if you notice the difference (ideally make recordings so you can do a side by side comparison).

3)The disease is the cure haha. Just play . After a few weeks of regular playing (something like 15 minutes on most days) itll go away. If it is still really hurting, it's an issue with your left hand technique .

Here's a C+P when this problem was

guitar is a finesse instrument, rarely a strength thing, like golf, say. Here's how we want our left hand technique to go. Imagine you are crushing a can. Open, close, open , close. That's the sort of muscle group we want to engage while using our left hand. Imagine the energy going to the finger tips. Use the finger TIPS not the PADS to press down on the strings. always come DOWN on the strings as best you can, behind the fret nice and close.

Now to the squeezing thing, how hard is too hard?

Well try this, play a single note on the low E string (the big boy). Ok, nice and clean. Now, release pressure and pluck until you get a bit of a crunch sound , but can still hear a bit of the actual note. It'll take a second to find this sweet spot. Ok, now, push just a HAIR BIT MORE in pressure. THATS what it takes to press a string down. Just a bit more then pushing down a key on your keyboard. The problem is, people get exciting and CRUSH the fuck out of their guitar. Plz dont ; ) . The first thing you do when playing is start with about 30 seconds of this buzz technique, to remind yourself that its a relaxed pursuit, not one of strength.

Recently been practicing Wonderful Slippery Thing by Guthrie Govan and Asturias by Albeniz arr. Segovia (in addition to Cliffs of Dover), and came across a technique question for each song:

For the tapping lick that occurs at 1:23ish, there are quite a few hammer-ons out of nowhere...and for some reason I can't seem to get them to sound out loud and clear. My right hand tapping will get as loud as a plucked note even if I only use moderate finger strength, but even if I make sure I'm fretting next to the wire and even if smash my fretting hand fingers to sound the notes it still doesn't get to the same volume, especially with the pinky and ring fingers. Are there any general tips for achieving even dynamics in this case?

For Asturias, there are a lot of chord shapes that require a partial barre of the lower strings while also having the top strings open and ringing out...and for now my problem seems to be that whenever I pluck the open strings, e.g., B on the B string, while doing a barre across E and A on the A and D strings, any pluck of appreciable volume causes the string to touch my barring index and get muted. Does that seem to be more a problem with not achieving enough of a kink in the index finger to leave enough space (and solved with gradual practice over time, since it seems a bit uncomfortable like full barre chords were at first), or should I be aiming to pluck more lightly?

And more theory related: is it worthwhile to learn the maj/min/dom/dim/aug triad shapes and the inversions before moving onto 6th/7th/altered/extended chord shapes, if my end goal is to be able to improvise with and without a pick? I want to make the fretboard "transparent" to me, and have started off by learning where all the natural notes are, but am not sure where to go from there...

Thanks!