Welcome to my website. I am a guitar teacher and performer who offers guitar lessons in Montreal. I hope you enjoy my recordings, tips, articles and reading about my life as a musician.

Listen To Me Play

(Listen To Other Recordings Here)

Recent Updates

April 3, 2008: A video of 9 year old Kaito playing Farewell to Nova Scotia has been added to the Videos Page.

February 26, 2008: Added a section to my Buying a Guitar article concerning neck width and radius. It can be found here.

February 25, 2008: Added a video to my Buying a Guitar article in which the sound of a cedar and spruce top guitar are compared. It can be seen here.

February 12, 2008: Added the article: Should Left-Handers Play Left-Handed or Regular Guitars?.

January 26, 2008: Two videos of Jamie Madill playing Sor have been added to the Videos Page.

Lessons

Most students take a single one-hour lesson per week but I also offer 30 minute lessons for young children. I feel that lessons of one hour are the optimal length of time to cover the necessary material. 30 minute lessons can be better for young students under the age of 10 as they may have trouble concentrating for one hour although this is not always the case. I teach students of all ages, at present I have students who are retired and several under the age of 10, the youngest being 5 years old. Parents are welcome to watch the lesson. My current rates are $20 for a 30 minute lesson and $35 for a one hour lesson.

Location

I teach in the Plateau region of Montreal near the Sherbrooke and St. Laurent metro stations, McGill University and downtown.

Teaching Philosophy

The first thing one has to learn to become a good musician is how to play your instrument properly. While this may seem obvious enough, it is surprising how neglected this approach is especially in guitar teaching. Many teachers teach the guitar by simply teaching songs at the very beginning without teaching the technique required to play them properly. This is a sink or swim approach and even many of those who swim, i.e. manage to learn to play the songs, develop a poor technique in doing so which will have serious consequences later on. My approach is to teach the technical basis first and then teach the songs that can be played with this technique. This approach may initially take a bit longer, i.e. you won't learn to struggle through your favourite Beatles song in the first lesson, but develops a sound foundation upon which to build. Within 6 months a student taught using this approach can play far more music far more competently than the one in the less structured approach.

I also believe that a student has to have some degree of self-motivation and the lessons must be enjoyable. Younger students may need some positive reminding/encouragement from their parents to practice but if they don't want to practice, I do not believe that the teacher or the parents should force them to. One hears many stories of people who have had bad experiences with teachers who were very strict, critical and demanding. I think music should be a positive and not a negative force in someone's life. If a person enjoys playing the guitar and enjoys their lessons this will motivate them to practice far more then external pressure. If they do not enjoy playing guitar, then it is better that their energies are spent elsewhere. By the same token, I think the student should be the one who chooses what type of music he wants to play. It is my job to ensure he plays the guitar well (which requires learning some standard songs/exercises) but once a level of competency has been attained it is up to the student to decide what musical direction he wants to explore. Many of my students, however, end up trying musical styles that are completely different than what they first intended to learn.

For a more detailed description of my approach to teaching, please read the article, My Teaching Method.

Styles

As a performer I primarily play classical guitar although I have played a wide variety of styles in my long career as a guitarist. I teach all styles of music from classical to rock to blues to jazz. Many of my students are learning several styles at the same time, playing both heavy metal and classical, for example. I also teach both acoustic (classical and steel-string) and electric guitar. The electric guitar has a different sound than the acoustic but there is little difference in how it is played. Again I have several students who take lessons on both the acoustic and electric guitar.

Languages

I speak four languages, English (my native language), French, German and Russian. At present I only have students taking lessons in English and French. I have taught guitar in German when I lived in Germany but have not yet taught in Russian.

Short Bio (click for Longer Bio)

I am a classical guitarist active as a performer and teacher in the cities of Ottawa and Montreal. I hold degrees from the University of Ottawa, the Hochschule fuer Musik Franz Liszt; Weimar, Germany and the Hochschule fuer Musik Koeln; Cologne, Germany. My teachers have included Bruce Holzman (USA), Patrick Roux (Canada), Thomas Mueller-Pering (Germany) and Zoran Dukic (Croatia). I have performed in Canada, USA, Germany, Netherlands, Czech Republic and Russia.

Contact

You can phone me at (514) 287-0810 or contact me by e-mail. Until I get a website e-mail set up, please write me at the following e-mail address: michaelmurrayguitar@yahoo.ca Note that the address is .ca not .com.

I will be teacher at this year's Guitar Summit in North Hatley, Quebec, Canada from August 3rd to 6th. www.theguitarsummit.com