Guitar Practice - A Confession

Ok so I have a little confession to make. I play guitar quite regularly which is cool. I learn new tunes occasionally and jam with friends or backing tracks as well. I also write original material a fair bit and create guitar licks and lessons too. What I don't do is abide by a regular structured guitar practice regime including scales, chords, rhythm etc. I'm going to try and change that. While there are excellent musicians on both sides of the practice question in the past a diligent practice routine has improved my playing and fostered greater creativity. So in that spirit I'm going to share with you a new warm up exercise that works on left and right hand synchronization and string crossing. It is written in eighth notes. Try strict alternate picking and work slowly until you can play it correctly to a metronome. It is a variation on some of the left hand permutations but randomized ( to some extent) and spread over multiple strings.
Happy Practicing.

Drop Tuning Guitar Lick

Today's guitar lick is in a drop tuning used by rock and metal players. I was learning a tune off the new Black Label Society album "Order of the Black" where Zakk Wylde uses this tuning. It is a drop tuning from low to high A E A D F# B for best results use strings made specifically for this low detuned type of music ( I admit I didn't here but they do sound a lot better and hold their tension well). The guitar lick is played over a backing track in the key of D Minor and uses notes from that scale.

A little Pentatonic Chromatic Chaos

This tiny guitar lick is based on the minor pentatonic scale shape but ascends the guitar neck in chromatic steps finally settling in the D Minor Pentatonic scale first position. It is played using alternate picking and in a 16th note rhythm.

Blues Guitar Solo in G - Lick #5

The final lick in our basic blues guitar solo in G. The backing track is from Pete Anderson called "Talking My Baby Down". It is one of his contributions to the blues guitar backing tracks for the King of The Blues competition. Used with permission. You can download the backing track and chord progression here: http://gc.guitarcenter.com/kingoftheblues/tracks/ To hear some of Pete's great blues guitar playing check out his website:http://www.peteanderson.com/ Thanks to Pete for letting me use this great track.Our final guitar lick is played over the G6 and Eb9 and D9  chords in the 11th and 12th  bars in this 12 bar blues. The lick begins with a double stop and uses hammer ons to spice things up a bit. The solo ends by playing the chord shapes in the last bar.

Blues Guitar Solo in G - Lick #4

The next few guitar licks will be put together to form a basic blues guitar solo in G. The backing track is from Pete Anderson called "Talking My Baby Down". It is one of his contributions to the blues guitar backing tracks for the King of The Blues Competition. Used with permission. You can download the backing track and chord progression here: http://gc.guitarcenter.com/kingoftheblues/tracks/  To hear some of Pete's great blues guitar playing check out his website:http://www.peteanderson.com/ Thanks to Pete for letting me use this great track.
Our fourth guitar lick is played over the  Amin7 and Adim/D9 chords in the 9th and 10th  bars in this 12 bar blues. The lick begins with a descending chromatic passage starting  on the seventh of the A chord the G note.

Blues Guitar Solo in G - Lick #3

The next few guitar licks will be put together to form a basic blues guitar solo in G. The backing track is from Pete Anderson  called "Talking My Baby Down". It is one of his contributions to the blues guitar backing tracks for the King of The Blues Competition. Used with permission. You can download the backing track and chord progression here: http://gc.guitarcenter.com/kingoftheblues/tracks/  To hear some of Pete's great blues guitar playing check out his website:http://www.peteanderson.com/ Thanks to Pete for letting me use this great track.

Our third guitar lick is played over the  G6 chord the 8th and 9th bars in this 12 bar blues. The lick begins by carrying over the root note for the fisrt bar and then adds a chromatic flourish based around the G Blues scale.

Blues Guitar Solo in G - Lick #2

The next few guitar licks will be put together to form a basic blues guitar solo in G. The backing track is from Pete Anderson  called "Talking My Baby Down". It is one of his contributions to the blues guitar backing tracks for the King of The Blues Competition. Used with permission. You can download the backing track and chord  progression here: http://gc.guitarcenter.com/kingoftheblues/tracks/  To hear some of Pete's great blues guitar playing check out his website:http://www.peteanderson.com/ Thanks to Pete for letting me  use this great track.
Our second guitar lick is played over the  C9 chord the fifth and sixth bars in this 12 bar blues. The lick begins by leading into the C9 chord a half step above the chord and then employs notes from the G Blues scale finally resolving to the G note which is the fifth of the C chord.

Blues Guitar Solo in G - Lick #1

The next few guitar licks will be put together to form a basic blues guitar solo in G. The backing track is from Pete Anderson called "Talking My Baby Down". It is one of his contributions to the blues guitar backing tracks for the King of The Blues Competition. Used with permission. You can download the backing track and chord progression here: http://gc.guitarcenter.com/kingoftheblues/tracks/ To hear some of Pete's great blues guitar playing check out his website:http://www.peteanderson.com/ Thanks to Pete for letting me use this great track.

So our guitar lick today is meant to be played over the first four bars in this 12 bar blues. In this case the chord is a G6. The guitar lick is played with pick and fingers and  starts off with the G note played on the high E string is held down while the pinky slides from the C to Db ( the blues note - flat fifth). Then there is a repeating lick played within the notes of the G Minor Pentatonic Scale.

Review: Jeff Loomis "Extreme Lead Guitar"

I really didn't know what to expect when I opened up this 2 DVD set. I'd never listened to Nevermore and although I was aware Jeff Loomis had a solo cd had never listened to it. I have to admit that a little part of me was expecting a mishmash of treble laden dissonance and little if any melodic sense. Happily I was very wrong indeed and my misconceptions entirely unfounded. The guitar tone throughout the DVD was stellar. Really beautiful - every note was articulate and the sound cut through the mix well. To my ears Mr. Loomis studied a lot of Yngwie Malmsteen not only because of his clean arpeggios but his vibrato was so great.

Rockhouse in my opinion has been very progressive in it approach to instruction not only recruiting cutting edge musicians who also teach well but by providing access to their website where you can download backing tracks for the exercises and compositions on the DVD - as well as enjoy the other lessons and membership benefits.

Jeff Loomis  is a great instructor on this two DVD set clearly breaking down each section and explaining his reasoning behind scale and chord choices. Not only does he demonstrate scales, riffs and leads but he imparts knowledge that will allow the guitarist to begin to utilize these concepts in their own playing.The DVD covers scales that rock and metal players may not be well versed in such as the whole tone scale. the diminished scale and an Yngwie favorite the Harmonic Minor scale. The scales are demonstrated with reference to Jeff's music. Next there is a technique section that discusses arpeggios, string skipping and more. The final section of the DVD has a breakdown of several complete leads that are well explained and presented in regular and slow speeds.

The DVD's include a tab ebook that is 58 pages and has tab for all the exercises, riffs and solos on both DVD's. The tab is very accurate and easy to read but I did miss the standard notation to assist with the rhythmic values. Although the slow sections of the DVD certainly demonstrate the rhythms adequately.

Fans of Nevermore and Jeff Loomis who play guitar will love this DVD set. It provides great insight into the playing technique and song composition and will teach you some great music. Guitarists who like Metal or just admire great playing will also benefit from this disc. The songs are really very melodic and although they employ some progressive scale choices and techniques the riffs and solos are very pleasing to the ear while still being metal.  I really loved this DVD set and now have got to get down to practicing some of the great material it presents. For more information on this visit:www.rockhousemethod.com

Tried and True Beginner Blues Guitar Licks

Beginning guitar players sometimes have the temptation to delve right into rock or metal playing without considering the foundations upon which much of this music rests - the blues. I think some basic foundational knowledge of the blues makes even the best rock player better and for the beginner I think it is a great jumping off point for learning rhythm, scales and improvisation. Like any great music true mastery takes years of dedicated practice but there are some great basic blues guitar licks that will bolster the mojo of even novice guitar players. There is no video example with this lick but I'll try to answer  any questions or comments. Here are two standard blues phrases in the Key of A using eighth note triplets. Triplets receive three notes per beat so count these 1 and a 2 and 2 etc.

Noodlin for a PRS - Jamplay contest

This is a contest entry for a PRS from Jamplay.com. Noodlin over a backing track in C ( although I used an F# lots because it sounded cool to me). Cheers.

Guitar Exercise - Fretting Hand Permutations

This is an alternate picking guitar exercise using two 3 note left hand permutations 134 and 124 in combination. The notes are  16th notes grouped in sextuplets. Use strict alternate picking throughout.

Blue Noize - Guitar Noize Blues Solo Contest Entry

Just thought I'd share my contest entry for the guitar noize "Blue Noize" blues guitar solo contest. It's an improvisation on the backing track provided by jamtrackcentral.com. A bit rambling at some points but there are definitely sections I like and hope you will too. Thanks for listening.

Fretboard Exercises - Permutations

Next week we are going to look at some guitar exercises and licks based upon four and three finger left hand permutations. This first lick uses a sextuplet pattern and two three finger permutation that each use two overlapping notes as you can see from the tab. Our first video next week will begin by building on this lick.