Need your help!

[Robert]

I am putting together more instructional material, and I need your feedback. Please tell me what you would most like to see in an instructional DVD (or several). I will likely make more than one DVD, so there could be of course different difficulty levels, where you should know the material in the first DVD before you can really take advantage of the second DVD, etc.

You could mention how you prefer the material presented, how lengthy it should be, etc. Maybe there could be a jam video, where I play rhythm guitar and you play solo, then we switch after a while?!

The more you can tell me, the better! Thanks a lot! :)

[warren0728]

i think your first dvd should be all about SHREDDING!!!

just kidding....in my opinion instruction on improvisational playing would be great. I enjoy learning "licks" and stuff but to learn more about why licks work and how to create your own "on the fly" would be great.

My weakness (among many) is listening to a backing track or something and knowing where to play and what notes work well with where i am playing on the fret board.

I would love to be able to pick up my guitar....turn on a tune...and play along.

I know that is a tall order but ....you asked! ;)

THE BEST THING would be to have a fretters weekend where we all meet somewhere and jam with you as we learn! HHHMmmmm everyone wants to go to disney world so we could have it here!!! I bet flights here would be around the cheapest as flights anywhere else! we could dpo a seminar at Ron's Music Shack, dinner and a show at the House of Blues....

ww

ww

[Spudman]

I would like to see covered in some depth how to play different modes or scales or tonalities or whatever of a same set of changes. Like when some players are playing a pentatonic scale over a I-IV-V and then switch midstream into some wild jazz modes. How do you do that and make it sound correct?

[Guitar-Chris]

Robert, for me a mixture of scales (with some theory), licks and riffs would be great.

As i allready (ok, after 20 years ;) ) know the different patterns of the blues pentatonic scale, in the moment I'm stuck with connecting the different patterns, e.g. a lick that goes from pattern I to III, back to II and then to IV, if you know what I mean.

So a set of lessons could be a complete song, with chords or a riff, the solo usin 2 to 3 Patterns, and then again the riff, perhaps in differnet forms. So you have a better aim for doing the differnet steps (lessons).

So in the end you will have some kind of this:

1. Lesson: Some exercise in chords / riff
2. Lesson: the set of chords / riffs.
3. Lesson some exercise in 2 to 3 patterns
4. A short solo using the patterns.
5. The whole song.

And think of finding a cheap way for ordering your DVD from Europe :R

@warren: Ok, i would suggest we meet at the next Frankfurt Musik Fair in April next year. Then you can have a look at all that gear, and for me the flight is cheaper. :rolleyes:

[Robert]

Chris, I don't quite understand. By pattern, do you mean the "box" as in Pentatonic boxes?

Could you for each of your 5 suggestions expand on each, and clarify what you mean?

[Guitar-Chris]

Chris, I don't quite understand. By pattern, do you mean the "box" as in Pentatonic boxes?

Could you for each of your 5 suggestions expand on each, and clarify what you mean?

Hey, why do I write on an english speaking board? This makes things so complicated for me :o

Ok, I will give it a try.

Yes I use pattern as a synonym for boxes, at least I think so. So the first pattern is fom lowest E to highes E 1-4, 1-3, 1-3, 1-3, 1-4, 1-4, ok, the second pattern, 2-4, 1-4, 1-4, 1-3, 2-4, 2-4. and so on.

Now to the lessons:

1. Lesson: Some exercise in chords / riff
Perhaps the riff has 4 bars. You will teach each bar after the other, and perhaps an exercise to learn this bar (e.g. play it forward and backward, hey you're the teacher:p )

2. Lesson: the set of chords / riffs.
Show the whole riff

3. Lesson some exercise in 2 to 3 patterns
You have one lesson where you do an exercise in box 1. You can do things like this to other boxes /patterns.


4. A short solo using the patterns.
Use the learned patterns in a solo.

5. The whole song.
Play the whole song. Perhaps you will give the posibility to download the backing to play along.

[warren0728]

@warren: Ok, i would suggest we meet at the next Frankfurt Musik Fair in April next year. Then you can have a look at all that gear, and for me the flight is cheaper. :rolleyes:
sounds like a great plan to me!! got a website link? I checked airfare from here to super swedes neck of the woods during the time clapton is playing there and it was quite expensive....amybe we should meet in the middle!

ww

[r_a_smith3530]

I agree with what Spudman had to say. I've seen Duke Robillard do just that, start with the basic pentatonic box thing and then switch to those jazzy feeling mode changes, and it's not exactly easy to pick up.

[marnold]

I'd like to see that girl from Florida involved somehow :)

[warren0728]

I'd like to see that girl from Florida involved somehow :)
lol....there are lots of them here....just have to head for one of the coasts....

Hey robert...are those dvd's done yet? :D

ww

[ray82609]

What I would really like to learn is phrasing, I just don't know if it can be taught. I know the notes I just don't know when and how long, where to rest, etc.
-Ray

[ZoSo65]

Tab the work, on the DVD's and your site. I'm sure it would help a lot of people understand it a little easier.

[Tim]

St. Augustine Beach has tons of those girls, and they don't wear that T shirt about being flat. They are out there already getting their weekend tans. I just love the spring and summer time in Florida.

[tot_Ou_tard]

Tab the work, on the DVD's and your site. I'm sure it would help a lot of people understand it a little easier.
I second the TAB suggestion. I think taking someone bit by bit through some cool blues grooves would be nice. As others have suggested some explanation of how to jam (improvise) would be helpful!

[ZoSo65]

St. Augustine Beach has tons of those girls, and they don't wear that T shirt about being flat. They are out there already getting their weekend tans. I just love the spring and summer time in Florida.
Hmm, might just have to come down and visit ya' Tim! :p

[warren0728]

St. Augustine Beach has tons of those girls, and they don't wear that T shirt about being flat. They are out there already getting their weekend tans. I just love the spring and summer time in Florida.
me too tim...time to visit some of my clients on the east coast!

ww

[ZoSo65]

me too tim...time to visit some of my clients on the east coast!

ww
Clints with a "flat" t-shirt or "raised relief" t-shirts??!!! :eek:

[Spudman]

Ray

For phrasing practice singing. Then sing and play the same thing on the guitar, at the same time if you can. Like scatt singing that jazz musicians do. Try nursery rhymes or any little simple ditty like "Row Your Boat." Sing it and play it at the same time if you can.

Phrasing should or could be like talking or having a conversation. You use your musical vocabulary (licks, chops, whatever) and make sentences and stories by stringing them together. Just beware the run-on sentence. Take breaths. No breaths = no phrasing. Breaths are no notes ie. no playing, silence.

If you do exercises like this you will develop you own unique phrasing which to me is far more interesting than having someone else's phrasing. If you are identical to someone else then I could listen to either one of you and hear the same thing, but if I want to hear what you have to say then it is going to be with your phrasing instead and that is unique.

[Tone2TheBone]

Great tip Spudster......

[Robert]

Well, I wasted my whole Sunday evening trying to make a lesson on how to use certain scales over a blues. It came out like crap. I am discouraged! The problem is when I try to show how one can use the different scales, I end up mixing them up so much, plus adding other stuff in there, that I think it would make no sense to someone watching it. If I force myself to just show the one scale, it sounds very uninteresting.

What I want to get across is that one should avoid sounding like a scale player, and that's where all this get tricky. If I make it simple, I sound like a scale player - boring, and if I do "my thing" - it's hard to pick out when am I doing the scale and when am I doing triads/arpeggios/chromatic, etc. Am I making any sense?

Darn, it's a lot easier to not have to explain and just play!

[jpfeifer]

Hi Robert,

Maybe this is just a way of narrowing down what your lesson DVD should contain. Maybe you could make a DVD showing how several scales, triads, and arpeggio ideas come together to form your style of soloig for blues, and then use some of your favorite licks as examples of how these ideas meld together. This would be very educational, because it would show how all of these things could be mixed and matched to make soloing ideas, rather than just using one scale. (this is kind of the Jazz-way of approaching blues, in my opinion)

-- Jim

[Tim]

Robert,

Being a person who has waited for your scales demo, hopefully I can add a suggestion or two.

First and foremost, keep it simple and slow.

Start by just showing the Major, Minor, or Blues scale by itself. Then show the scale being played on the “I” chord. Then show the scale being played over a “I-IV-V” slow blues chord progression. This slow progression will allow your fingers to be seen.

Finally mix up the scale on the slow blues progression. Remember to keep it simple.

Save the triads/arpeggios/chromatic scales for advance lessens. Remember us new players have no idea how to play triads/arpeggios/chromatic scales.

[Robert]

Tim, do you mean you want to see how to play a certain scale like the major scale? The scale isn't very interesting, I assume you want to see how to use it to play phrases or ideas? Be as specific as you can.

Jim, I am stuck a bit. I see your point, and that would be a more advanced lesson I guess.

I was thinking about talking a bit and describing how I think when I play. The problem I run into is how to show it. I think for this to work, the viewer would need to know scales and arpeggios fairly well, or else it won't make any sense.

[aeolian]

Robert, I appreciate what you are trying to do and I realize it is hard to get it to come across understandable.

I'd like to see demostrations of how a certain mode goes with a certain chord progression. Perhaps showing how a certain mode can work with several different progression (may just 3 chord's worth). Or conversely how several different mode can go over the same 3 chord progression but deliver a different feel because of the mode change.

Good luck, and I love to see the results.

aeolian

[Justaguyin_nc]

I think Guitar-Chris had it right way back at the beginning... Do a simple 12 bar song start to finish to begin DVD-1..

I-IV-V In a few different keys maybe.. Explain the rhythm's and chords.. Different strum patterns and rests..

Maybe a brief example of the voicings at different locations also as this is becomming more of an interest to me but might be in your next DVD.. seeing the same chords played in a different way makes a song stand out and this is when I usually lose you in your lessons or progressions.. just from your fast movements that probably seem very slow to you.. such as playing a G7 in the first position then down one position barred etc....

Explain a few different scales to be applied over the chords..Minor, blues, dorian...maybe there is a Renman scale? one you actually use more then you think but add a few notes in..

show the arpeggios within the scales.. show maybe just the added notes from one scale to another and which to pick out ..

A fingering for the chords and the scale applied with as little hand movement as possible..

show the main notes root, third, 5th, 7ths? to match these chords and those outside the circle that would enhance the song and why it would??

Have the rhythm backing track to play a solo to.. have a bass to play rhythm to.. half speed and full speed.. so we could work on our timing..

And most of all.. Start the DVD with this song and Renman playing it in the Renman style complete... so we know what we are headed for...

:R

[Katastrophe]

Tim, if you've ever strummed a chord, you've played a triad (sometimes a couple stacked on top of each other in fact), if you've picked individual notes in chord, you've played an arpeggio, and if you've ever played all the notes, including sharps and flats in a row, you've played a "chromatic scale."

Advanced playing is nothing more than the basics refined, played faster (sometimes) and cleaner, with more terminology.

Fact is, if you've learned major scale, you've got a great deal to work with, as just about all music can be related in some way to a major scale, with the exception of atonal or some experimental type music...

Robert, I would think that each video should start with one concept, say, the Minor Pentatonic. How to build 'em, where they are on the fretboard, along with a few examples of some Pentatonic licks in the Renman style. Provide a jam track to play along with for reinforcement.

The next video can build on that concept by adding "blue" notes to the Pentatonic, explaining where they are, and why they sound good. Give 'em a few more simple licks to learn. Provide a jam track.

The next one can be more advanced with the theory, starting with the major scale, building chords, what intervals are (reinforcing the lessons in the previous two vids), and beginning on the modes.

The next can be more focused on using the modes in soloing, arpeggios, and keeping up with chord changes...

Anyway, that's my two cents (please adjust for inflation, internet pricing, and the ever rising cost of fuel, along with the international exchange rate.).

Whaddaya think?

[Tim]

Katasrophe,

I am most grateful for your comments. I guess I know more than I think I do. Yes I have done all those things, but never knew the correct name for all those different approaches to playing chords. Ok, I need to learn correct terminology. My confidence just went up 10%

Robert,

I agree with the other Fretters that have given their wishes. All I request is that you keep it slow in the beginning. I am progressing some on my soloing thanks to some help from Tremoloman.

What I need to learn is what note do you hit on the second and third chords? Does the note need to match the chord? For example on the E, A, B progression and going from E chord to A chord, should the first solo note on the A chord be the A note? And for the B chord a B solo note? This has been my major hang-up.