I don’t know you personally, but since you’re here, I already know two things about you: you’re a guitarist and you’re a shred guitarist. Well, nice to meet you. I’m happy to talk to you.

To be honest, I am tired of reading on YouTube or in Facebook groups the usual phrase: “Better one note played slowly and with heart than many notes played fast but without heart!”

This phrase has always bothered me. It doesn’t make any sense and it’s astonishing that people are still repeating it in 2024.

My first guitar teacher, the one who made me love shredding (hello Dario!), used to say instead: “Better many notes played with technique and heart than one note played badly because you don’t feel like learning”. Now that’s a sentence I like.

On the other hand, we have hundreds of examples: Steve Vai, Satriani, Petrucci, Jason Becker, Andy James, Marty Friedman and so on... All six-string heroes who combined crystal-clear technique with a ‘real’ and deep musicality.

It may sound childish, but the way I see it, we shred guitarists are the true bulwark of the electric guitar.

Firstly, because we are the ones spending hundreds, thousands of hours in a chair, facing the wall, with the ever-present ticking of the metronome in the background.

Secondly, because we are the ones who are truly searching for a personal style. A style that sets us apart from the crowd and can make us stand out in the shred guitar scene.

On that note, I would like to tell you my brief story.

Being a typical guitar nerd, I spent my teenage years locked in my room practicing. My friends used to go out, play football, PlayStation. I never did.

(Or hardly ever - I admit to a couple of nights stuck on Red Dead Redemption).

Instead of going out, I was there, obsessing, studying traditional shredding techniques. I sawed my fingers off at alternate picking, sweep picking, legato, string-skipping, etc. 

But one fine day three years ago, I looked in the mirror and said to myself: I failed. I have failed.

Sure, I had gotten good. Probably better than 97% of the guitarists in the world (c’mon, that’s a random percentage, but you get the idea).

At the same time, things were going pretty well with my melodic death band (Black Therapy). We were performing a lot and going on long European tours with bands like Wintersun and Dark Tranquillity.

(As you can see from this photo, taken at the end of the 30-date tour with Wintersun, a month travelling around Europe in an Iveco van leaves indelible marks on one’s mental health. I am the first on the left.)

I would say things were going well, but I was dissatisfied. I felt I had failed.

Why? Because I had become good, but my teenage heroes (Petrucci, Andy James, Angel Vivaldi, etc.) were still two steps ahead. My alternate picking was not like Petrucci’s. My legato was not like Guthrie Govan’s.

So, I made a drastic decision: to change my approach and create my own technique. A technique that would automatically make me number 1 (or almost) in the world.

From that day on, my obsession shifted, and I spent thousands of hours studying and developing a rare technique: 8-finger tapping.

What is 8-finger tapping? It consists of using all the fingers of the right hand to tap on the guitar strings, greatly expanding the melodic and tonal possibilities of the guitar.

Taking my cue from Jennifer Batten, Daniele Gottardo, etc., I can say that I have been able to develop my own personal style and my own tapping.

Maybe some people won’t like it (especially those of the ‘better a slow note etc.’ school). But in the end, who cares? I can now say that I am happy with myself and that I have achieved some of the goals I had in the solo guitar world.

Of course, I continue to learn every day. The metronome still keeps me company and I am always looking for new licks, phrasing etc. 

But I no longer feel like a failure at the instrument.

Using the 8-finger tapping technique, I have achieved some results that I am proud of: I composed my first solo EP called ‘Kadath’.

- I created a tapping arrangement of Jason Becker’s ‘Perpetual Burn’ (an arrangement that the American guitarist himself shared and published on his personal page.)

- I have given several masterclasses in 8-finger tapping.

-  And finally, I decided to create a video course on 8-finger tapping to share and teach my technique.

If you want to learn a rare and original technique used by very few guitarists in the world, take a look.

The course will take you from the basics to the highest technical level of 8-finger tapping.

As I said, I already know two things about you: that you are a guitarist, and that you are a shred guitarist.

The two things I don’t know about you are whether you are interested in standing out from the crowd, and whether you really want to learn.

If the answer to both questions is yes, then my course is for you.