Crossroads Duel: Eugenes Trick Bag

No, I'm positive Macchio can play the guitar to some degree. I remember seeing a video with an interview with him, and he was going over some scales on an acoustic.

when i first saw that seen i was so amazed, but if u watch it 80% of what both Vai and Macchio play doesnt match up with the music at all

If your interested in solo's like that learn Pganini's 5th caprice, thats what most of it is ripped off from, oops i mean based on

I'm sure most of you know that when shooting scenes for a film, the music & audio tracks must be dubbed. This means even if you're PLAYING & WRITING the music yourself, you still must perform to a pre-recorded audio track while shooting the scenes. This is why you'll see things that appear "out-of-sync" with the audio you hear while watching the film.

Even if 'Vai' (shot in a film) knows the parts he recorded note-for-note, it's EXTREMELY difficult to have every little finger motion (at relatively fast playing speeds) match up to the precision your auditory & optic nerves can detect; after the film has been edited. Remember, such movies are produced for the entertainment value of the film, NOT for the precision of "musical instructions" they could offer.

I've heard many discussions regarding the usage of "Paganini's 5th Caprice" in those scenes. A while after transcribing from "the 5th" I had a chance to see [this scene] again. There is VERY LITTLE taken from that caprice. Only one of the introductory passages which includes a bit of an arpeggiated cadence was used in that scene (a few measures or so of the second octave period).

I still think it's cool though!


~JSV

I believe that Macchio uses a different tune in the guitar. If you listen carelly you'll hear that the tone is higuer than the normal tunning. And the guitar have only 21 frets, he plays the tone of the 22 whithout bending... That's why I believe he uses another tunning...

It's obvious from Machio's fretting that he can play guitar to a degree , but certainly not enough to play that solo at the end of the duel (specialy when Vai's around).

If you're sick minded enough like me to watch the video thoroughly and analyse Machio's fretting , you'd notice that he's just moving his hands around the positions he should play , but his fingers aren't moving right (as Vai) ... Even that legato line before the solo starts looks funny when he plays it.

Your almost completely right JSV. Arlen Roth was hired to be the guitar coach to Ralph machio. He also directed the guitar scenes in the movie to. Here is a direct quote by Arlen Roth about the movie. " the end scene actually features the playing of Via (sped up sometimes) Bill Kanengiser (classical) Ry Cooder and me. The rest is all me, and the classical is played by Kanengiser." Also did you know that Ry Cooder was actually supposed to play the part that Via played in the movie untill he was droped by the director of the film. Well there is the whole official story of who played what. If you want to read more about the scenes and direction of the file go to this website and it will tell you everything you need to know about the music in the movie. www.fast-rewind.com.

The arpeggios are 100% sweep picked. Vai plays them using the OPEN A to maneuver between the arpeggios. Open A on the first Am chord, open A on the third A7 chord and last chord Dm. This is the way Vai plays it