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Blues Modal Harmony
The name blues modal harmony may confuse you at first but, have patience and let me explain a few things to help your guitar playing. You will have a greater appreciation for guitar music in general after reading this. When discussing which chords go together in which keys with students, I often have questions about why there are chords in some of their favourite songs (such as Major bVII... -
Memorizing Chords and Scales on Guitar
There are many guitarists out there that are deeply concerned with the notion that memorizing chords and scales on the guitar is a huge feat, and it is but, to learn all of them that exist is simply ridiculous. Guitarists tend to obtain an abundant wealth of knowledge of chords and scales and yet seem to have trouble connecting everything together. All the information seems to be floating around... -
How to Approach Improvisation as a Beginner
When dealing with improvisation with my students, I use a systematic method that begins with the basic concepts of improvisation and moves through the styles to the more advanced forms of jazz improvisation. I will give a brief overview of how to approach improvisation as a beginner in this blog, there are many ways and this is only one approach, but I have found some success with it. A... -
Learning Guitar 101: The CAGED System
You’ve just learnt your first barre chords and you’re feeling like a Guitar Hero. There’s nothing like the feeling of conquering chords you’ve been working on for hour after hour, week after week. That is until your band mate slides over and says: “Let’s take it down a major third”. What does that even mean? Now you’ve gone from Guitar Hero to Guitar Zero.This is where the CAGED system... -
Improve Your Guitar Playing By Listening To Other Instruments
After a few years, when you’ve built up your technique and improvising skills, you’re bound to hit a point where you feel that you’re not improving, or at least not improving as much as you would like to. You feel that while improvising you keep using the same ideas and techniques. You know how to sweep your CAGED shapes, various patterns to use for your runs, the latest tapping... -
Understanding Modes On Guitar
Understanding modes on guitar is a big topic when guitarists start expanding their playing. Can knowledge of modes make you more attractive to the opposite sex? Or increase the speed in your picking hand? Unfortunately not, but for those of us with a desire to expand our knowledge of music and to play more tunefully, they are a more than worthwhile topic of study. I have often been asked... -
The Importance of Studying Blues
The importance of studying blues and its most common 12 bar progression as part of their fundamental studies as guitarists, cannot be emphasized enough! No matter what style you want specialize, in the importance of knowing and being able to handle Blues and its harmony and improvisation within it should never be overlooked. It is the root of most of contemporary music such as Rock, Funk, Soul, Jazz and... -
Mistakes Guitar Players Make
Do you know how some guitar players practice most days of the week, work hard, and are passionate about their playing, but they always struggle to be able to play the way they want to? They are frustrated because they don’t improve fast enough, begin doubting their potential, or even feel discouraged or angry with themselves when thinking about how long it is taking them to become better guitar... -
How To Accelerate Your Guitar Playing
The first thing to do when deciding to accelerate your guitar playing in a certain period of time is to set short-term reachable goals within a long term goal. The long term goal here would be to advance your playing in a period of six months. In order to do this you must break up the long term goal into segments of short term goals and also, very importantly,... -
10 Jazz Musicians To Help Mold Your Playing
Here is a list of 10 Jazz musicians to help mold your playing and your overall jazz guitar. 1. Charlie Parker One of the most important Jazz musicians to study to shape your playing would be saxophonist Charlie Parker one of the founding fathers of the bebop era of jazz. Many musicians transcribe and learn to play his solo’s to delve into the style of Parker, his rhythmic language,...