Guitar Concepts DVD by Joe Dochtermann

Joe Dochtermann, author of one of my new favorite books on audio recording and production, was kind enough to send me his new DVD – Guitar Concepts – which is available for purchase on his website.

It’s always interesting to look at a person’s sophomore effort after hitting such a huge home run. Kind of like wondering what the Phillies were going to do after winning the World Series. (They sort of lived up to our expectations. Damn you, Yankees!)

Going into the review I had very high hopes for the DVD since his book on recording was of such high quality. Because I pride myself on always trying to focus on the basics, the fundamentals, any and every beginner or intermediate guitar method piques my interest.

So, with interest piqued, I dove in to see what Dochtermann had to offer us in the DVD world…

The first thing that struck me was the angle the video was recorded. I have never seen an over-the-shoulder camera perspective before. For the first few moments it seemed weird to me, but then it made perfect sense. It’s pretty much the best angle to see what the teacher is doing. Kudos to Dochtermann right off the bat for figuring this out.

I wouldn’t go so far as to call this a “basic” DVD, however; perhaps an high beginner DVD is the best way to describe it. This probably isn’t the DVD for you if you don’t know how to tune your guitar or hold a pick. Intervals, bending, and 6th dyads are covered right off the bat, so you probably need at least some playing under your belt before tackling the content here.

The Chord Shapes section was very good, especially the extreme close-up shots of the fingering. All of the basic chords are covered here, with the goal being to internalize them and burn the chords into your memory.

Chapter 2 – The Chord Scale Connection spends a lot of time in the major pentatonic world, with plenty of blues bends and feel. It’s apparent that Dochtermann lives in the blues rock world. I probably would have liked this section to specify pentatonics a bit more in the title, as it was slightly misleading to me at first. But, the information is good and easy-to-understand, so I’ll give him a pass.

Arpeggios and more chord progressions are shown in the subsequent sections, which really drive home the connection between chords, scales, melody, and arpeggios. It’s nice to see other guitarists spending time teaching this way; we’re a small minority, after all!

One of the chapters focuses on using the material taught by applying them to famous songs. The instruction is very good here, but I wasn’t too sure about the material; as great of a song Sultans of Swing by Dire Straits is, I don’t know how many young players are going to feel inspired by it. For my generation, yes, but for the younger kids perhaps not. He does, however, redeem himself a bit by teaching some Pink Floyd, which is absolutely timeless and good for all ages. AC/DC is on the fence for me, but it is pretty simple stuff. Dochtermann does a good job, however, of demonstrating and explaining both the rhythm and lead parts, so you get plenty of pointers!

I was pleasantly surprised at the last chapter – Guitar Setups. I have never seen anyone put this information on a DVD. It’s something of the guitar tech’s secret handshake, and most guys don’t really want to give away the information. So, I think it’s great that Dochtermann does share this information with us. For me, since I guess I’m a bit more advanced as a player, I found this section to be the highlight of the material covered.

Overall, I think this is a very good addition to the DVD instruction market, and Doctermann can rest assured that the sophomore curse hasn’t bit him in the butt. Another thing to mention is that each order also comes with the ability to download PDF files for the DVD material.

If you are looking for a somewhat beginner DVD that teaches differently, albeit effectively, then I encourage you to check out Guitar Concepts. Here are a few youTube examples from the DVD. Enjoy!

Guitar Concepts DVD by Joe Dochtermann is a post from: Fretterverse.com: Guitar Blog | guitar news & reviews, amps, effects, guitars, music theory, guitar lessons. If you are reading this on a site that is not Fretterverse.com, it's been ripped. Please come to the real Fretterverse.com.

Al Di Meola - alternate picking master

I thought I would take some time today to talk about some of the different ways guitar players pick when playing. It seems to me that many beginners may not have a complete understanding of these techniques and how to use them. Since I think it’s of the utmost importance for us “seasoned” players to help bring up the younger, less experienced players, I figured a primer on picking was in order.

In my mind there are three primary types of picking styles: alternate, economy, and sweeping. Let’s break down each one and get an understanding of what makes them unique and why you really need to know how to be able to do all three to become a truly versatile guitarist.

Alternate Picking

First up is the picking method that all new students will learn – alternate picking. The idea behind alternate picking is that each pick stroke is the exact opposite of the one before it. You can start with either a downstroke (you pick the note down, towards the floor) or an upstroke (you pick the note up, towards your head), and every next note you play is the opposite of the one it proceeds. I realize that’s a very academic explanation, so let’s rock ‘n roll it up a bit:

down, up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down, up, down, up

Better?

Alternate picking creates a very distinct sound and, if done correctly, really highlights the passage being played. John Petrucci, Al Di Meola, and Guthrie Govan are great alternate pickers. Having control over your alternate picking is of the utmost importance here, because you need to be able to play every note with the same dynamic as well as have the control to make certain notes pop out in a phrase when you want to.

The hard part for alternate picking – and one of the reasons why I suck at it – is when you have to move to another string. This is especially troublesome when moving from a low string to a high string. My recommendation? Come to love your metronome! Start slow, take your time, and be patient. It’s going to take some of you a while before you’re comfortable with it.

Economy Picking

Jimmy Bruno is an excellent economy picker

This is my personal bread and butter. I don’t remember how I latched onto it, but I’m most comfortable when doing economy picking. The concept here is that, when faced with moving from one string to the next, you continue your pickstroke to the next string without alternating. In other words, if the last stroke you made on one string was a downstroke, you continue the downstroke and play the next note on the next string with a downstroke. This allows you to smoothly maneuver across the strings and creates a somewhat smoother sounding line than with alternate picking.

A word of caution here; many players tend to replace the word “economy” with “lazy.” Just because you’re not picking every single note alternately doesn’t mean you should let your picking hand wander all over the place. With economy picking you need to be even more careful about the precision of your picking hand. Keep it consistent; don’t angle the pick awkwardly or dig into the string more to try and compensate.

Sweep Picking

Yngwie and Frank Gambale basically put sweep picking on the map. You would be hard-pressed to find a younger guitar player nowadays that likes heavy rock/metal and can’t play amazing sweeps. They are certainly impressive as hell to hear (and see).

Frank Gambale - sweep monster from Down Under

In sweep picking, you generally play an arpeggio with one note per string. You literally sweep your pick across the strings in the same direction. When playing from low to high you sweep the pick downward, and when playing from high to low you sweep upwards. The last string played in the sweep will generally have a turnaround of sorts (usually two or three extra notes) that allows the player to sweep in the opposite direction.

As with economy picking, when sweeping you really need to be aware (and careful) of the placement of the pick. You want to keep your wrist straight and the pick perpendicular to the strings. Bending the wrist or allowing your pick to slide around is going to sound bad and also present problems for you when trying to exit out of the sweep to another phrase.

What About Legato Playing?

Allan Holdsworth - legato phrasemaster

I know this question is going to come up, so I’ll quickly address it here. Legato playing is not a picking technique, it’s a fretting-hand technique. Yes, Holdsworth is impressive beyond belief, and I would absolutely give someone else’s left testicle to be able to play like him. But, it’s just not a picking technique, sorry.

I will certainly cover legato playing and Holdsworth in particular in other blog posts, fret not. In the meantime, you’re just going to have to practice the three picking techniques I mentioned.

Why Are All Three Important?

In a nutshell, because all three offer unique benefits, sounds, dynamics, and concepts. You can certainly specialize in one (that’s your “style” after all) but if you can’t at least do a little bit of all three then you are severely limiting yourself. Now, if you’re a blues player you are probably thinking that sweep picking is dumb. Remember, however, that sweep picking (as an example) doesn’t have to be a three-octave daedecaphonic hexatonic arpeggio; a simple three-string minor triad can also be pulled off with sweep picking.

Don’t limit yourself. Get a metronome and practice all three techniques. You’ll eventually gravitate towards one more so than the other two, and that’s perfectly fine. Just have enough tricks in your bag to pull them out when you need them.

Enjoy!

Picking Styles is a post from: Fretterverse.com: Guitar Blog | guitar news & reviews, amps, effects, guitars, music theory, guitar lessons. If you are reading this on a site that is not Fretterverse.com, it's been ripped. Please come to the real Fretterverse.com.

Finding the right teacher is critical

Once you have made the commitment to learn the guitar, finding a good teacher is critical to teach you the correct way to play, to keep you motivated and, most importantly, to teach you what you are looking to learn.

For day-one beginners what you are looking to learn doesn’t matter as much since most of the time you can’t even hold a pick correctly. For people with some experience or even advanced players, however, finding the right teacher is absolutely critical to your success.

It’s not all about the teacher, however. Most of what you need to look for really depends on what kind of student you are more so than what kind of teacher he is.

What Kind of Learner Are You?

I’m a visual learner. I learn the quickest and most effectively by watching someone do something first and then trying it myself with corrections from the teacher. Some people are do-it-yourselfers. Others learn best by reading the information out of a book. You first need to figure out which kind of learner you are. Keep in mind that you’ll probably learn best through a combination of all methods, but focused on your strongest attribute.

Once you figure out how you learn best, finding the right teacher becomes easier.

What Kind of Teacher Is He?

I have found that there are two basic types of teachers – expository and progressive method teachers.

Expository teachers have a general and wide-ranging teaching methodology, where the general idea is to expose (hence the name “expository”) the student to all kinds of different things to find out what the student gravitates to. My teacher Scott McGill is an expository teacher, for example.

My other teacher, Jimmy Bruno, is a progressive method teacher. Everyone starts from Day One and goes through the same material. Everyone learns at a different speed, of course, but all of his students basically follow the same formula from A to Z.

Interview Prospective Teachers

Um... can you teach me How High the Moon?

Don’t just dive right in with the first teacher you come across. Ask questions. Most importantly, figure out what kind of teacher he is (expository or progressive). Does that jive with how you learn? If not, don’t force it; move on and find another one. How he teaches and how you learn is absolutely integral to your success. No matter how great of a player he may be, if you have trouble learning in an expository environment you will fail.

Find out what his influences are and what he likes to play. If you want to learn jazz, don’t study with someone who thinks Cannibal Corpse is the greatest band ever. He may know a lot about jazz, but his head probably won’t be in the right place to provide you with the motivation and influence you need.

Ask him what he typically gives in a weekly lesson. Here’s an example of one of my Scott McGill lessons:

Scott McGill Lesson – 08/16/1991

If you don’t think you’ll have time to do this much, then you either need to lower the teacher’s expectations, or move to another teacher. Certainly, not every teacher will give you this much to work on, but the counter-argument is that if you want that much, your teacher should be able to give you that much.

Trial Lesson?

If you find a teacher you like, see if you can pay a few bucks for a one-time lesson, to see how it goes for you. Personality is also a huge plus. If you hate the guy, chances are you probably won’t want to practice or pay attention to what he is teaching. You guys don’t have to be best friends, but you should at least get along with him.

Don’t Waste Time

His or yours. If you really want to learn guitar but know you don’t have sufficient time to practice every week, don’t bother taking lessons. Seriously. There is nothing worse than a student who comes in week-to-week expecting new material but doesn’t practice at all in between lessons. Do yourself and the teacher a favor and just buy a few DVDs instead.

Keep An Open Mind

Once you do find a teacher you like, commit yourself to fully becoming their student. There may be times when your new teacher has you do things that don’t make sense. (We’re talking purely guitar here, folks; it should be obvious I’m not talking about a teacher who tells you all of your lessons will be conducted in the nude.) Have faith that your teacher knows what he’s doing – once you’ve found the right one – and that in time you will understand why he’s asking you to do what he’s asking. Sometimes it takes months or even a few years before the lightbulb goes off. Be patient!

Finding the right teacher can be the most rewarding experience in learning to play guitar. There are many, many special teachers out there just waiting to share what they know with the right students.

Finding the Right Guitar Teacher is a post from: Fretterverse.com: Guitar Blog | guitar news & reviews, amps, effects, guitars, music theory, guitar lessons. If you are reading this on a site that is not Fretterverse.com, it's been ripped. Please come to the real Fretterverse.com.

Ravi - Host of Learn Guitar in 21 Days

If you are a beginning guitarist, or someone who hasn’t even picked up a guitar yet and isn’t quite sure where to start, there is a DVD that can help you: Ravi’s Learn Guitar in 21 Days.

Developed by Guitar Lab and developed on the TrueFire platform, this DVD claims to be a sure-fire method for quickly getting the skills needed to play thousands of songs on both electric and acoustic guitar.

Can it be done?

The Introduction

The DVD begins with a lengthy but important introduction by the host – Ravi. Some important distinctions and goals are defined here; he’s not claimed to be able to teach you scales, arpeggios, and soloing. Ravi sets out a very specific goal of teaching you eight basic chords and strumming patterns, and how to play simple chord progressions that are found in many songs. This is at the heart of his claim that you can learn thousands of songs by the time your work with the DVD is finished.

Curriculum

Split screen video gives great close-ups

Ravi does an excellent job of explaining where each finger should go, how to position your fingers, and how to strum the chord. It’s a progressive learning model, so you will continue to reinforce previously-learned material at the same time as learning new material.

All of the chords are simple – C, G, Em, Dm, Am, etc. There are no surprises here, but for the beginning guitarist (as we all know) these are the most important chords they need to satiate that instant gratification part of our personalities. And the split-screen provides very nice close-ups of the hand and fingers, so the viewer knows exactly where the fingers need to go and what the shape is supposed to look like. The angles they chose to shoot at are great, too, so the viewer doesn’t have to try and look around the hand in order to see exactly what is going on.

Extras

The acoustic guitar view

As with all of the Guitar Lab DVDs, you also have access to a host of extras. In this DVD the extras come in the form of chord charts and a song reference guide. You can print them out and refer to them as you are going through the material, especially when you are practicing away from the DVD player.

But Does It Work?

So the question really boils down to whether or not a beginning guitar student can really learn to play guitar in 21 days. Well, I think the answer is both yes and no. It’s going to take longer than 21 days to really get the chords under the fingers and be able to move between them effortlessly, especially when playing songs. However, I do truly think that the curriculum has been set up well enough that after 21 days a dedicated student should have all of the chords memorized and with a little bit of effort be able to hack their way through most songs. Of course, there is also the caveat of each student’s ability to memorize the chord progressions and strumming patterns!

Overall, I think this is an excellent DVD for the beginning guitar student. You won’t get theory, you won’t learn how to read music, and you won’t learn any whammy bar tricks or pinched harmonics, but you will learn the fundamentals of playing guitar and how to quickly and efficiently start playing; that is the whole point, isn’t it?

Ravi’s Learn Guitar in 21 Days is a post from: Fretterverse.com: Guitar Blog | guitar news & reviews, amps, effects, guitars, music theory, guitar lessons. If you are reading this on a site that is not Fretterverse.com, it's been ripped. Please come to the real Fretterverse.com.

In 1981, Ted Greene published his book “Chord Chemistry” as an answer to our comping woes. Long considered the be-all-end-all, definitive resource, it’s been a long time since a worthy product has come to market to challenge Greene’s hold on the chord universe.

Enter Frank Vignola‘s “Inversion Excursion” DVD…

Volume 1 – Major Chord Inversions – is not a DVD that you sit back and watch for entertainment purposes; this is a DVD that you have your guitar in hand, actively playing and practicing along with. In just over 1.5 hours Vignola breaks down virtually every conceivable basic chord inversion you can think of in most of the available string groups. Bear in mind that we’re talking simple stuff here, folks; you won’t see piano voicings, large stretches, or exotic alterations. What you will see, however, are workhorse chords that will create an excellent foundation to jump off from.

The DVD also includes access to the material in PDF format, covering all of the fingerings shown by Vignola, as well as an “Improvisation Theory” PDF and MP3 audio file.

I find this DVD to be suitable for beginning guitarists, and also for intermediate-level players that need the occasional refresher. Though certainly not as comprehensive as Greene’s Chord Chemisty (still safe as the definitive resource for now) I think the Inversion Excursion series is off to a great start, and if Vignola continues along this path it’s going to be a major contender and, quite possibly, the go-to resource for learning chords.

Inversion Excursion, Volume 1: Major Chord Inversions – by Frank Vignola (DVD) is a post from: Fretterverse.com: Guitar Blog | guitar news & reviews, amps, effects, guitars, music theory, guitar lessons. If you are reading this on a site that is not Fretterverse.com, it's been ripped. Please come to the real Fretterverse.com.

The fundamental concept is to first learn five basic guitar chords – chords that everyone inevitably ends up learning first on the guitar anyway, and the chords you need  to impress the ladies by learning just about every song they want to hear you sing. The chords are, ironically enough, C, A, G, E, and D. (Go figure.)

The order of these chords remain constant and the scale shapes overlap, so as you move up the fingerboard you will remember that, as an example, A and G will always overlap. The chord shapes will change slightly as you move up the fingerboard to accommodate the change from open strings to fretted notes. As an example, the ‘E’ chord shape will translate to barre chords as you move up the neck.

Each chord shape is also associate with a scale shape, so you’re not stuck doing your best Malcolm Young impression while your other guitar-playing friend is  jumping around like Angus. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that!)

Though I think the method has a lot of merit, I find some of the scale shapes to be a bit inefficient. It’s a very minor criticism that is outweighed by the benefits of learning the system, especially for beginning guitar students.

There are a few books available on the CAGED guitar system. I will tell you up front that I have not looked at these products myself, so your mileage may vary, but I’m including links to them here in the interest of giving you a place to start if you want to explore this learning method further. If you are interested in learning how to play the guitar yourself, the CAGED method might be exactly what you need to get started. I may decide to explore the CAGED system further at a later date, but for now you can check these products out:

The C-A-G-E-D Guitar System Made Easy #1 (DVD)

The C-A-G-E-D Guitar System Made Easy #2 (DVD)

The C-A-G-E-D Guitar System Made Easy #3 (DVD)

The C-A-G-E-D Guitar System In a Nutshell is a post from: Fretterverse.com: Guitar Blog | guitar news & reviews, amps, effects, guitars, music theory, guitar lessons. If you are reading this on a site that is not Fretterverse.com, it's been ripped. Please come to the real Fretterverse.com.