Carl Johnson

5/19 Lesson - A Little Forgiveness

2008-05-19T22:39:00.000-07:00

Warm up - spider - great job.
remember to do the finger gym as well at home each day

Speed: we worked on the metal speed drill on the 12th fret.

Aural training - hearing different chords

major 7th - jazz sound
Dominant 7th or just 7th - barber shop quartet or bluesy
minor - dark
minor7 e.g. Am7 - open, optimistic?
6th - like a choral group (play a G with an open high e string)
C2 - add a D to a standard C chord
C9 technically requires the other notes in the triad (root, 3rd, 5th, 7th and then the 9th). check out C9 forms here

Singer/Songwriter
It is a crime to neglect your singing talent. This song will help you play some dynamic chords and sing at the same time. Have fun with Forgiveness by Patty Griffin.

Rhythm and Tabbing exercise. This song has 4 chords see if you can figure them out!
I Believe in Jesus

Next Week

Do your best with playing and singing Forgiveness
Practice your favorite 2 minor pentatonic forms over the blues mp3 i sent you
Strum your brains out and chart out I Believe in Jesus

5/12 Lesson

2008-05-13T06:10:00.000-07:00

Review the 30 minute practice. With a busy schedule you won't have an hour a day to practice so we are tuning your guitar workout for 30 minutes a day. Here's the how and why that will move you steadily towards guitar virtuosity!

warm up with the finger gym
Rhythm exercise
Minor Pentatonics - play two forms
Aural training - play along with your ipod
Inspiration - listen to guitarists on pandora.com - Tommy Emmanuel

5/5 Lesson

2008-05-05T22:35:00.000-07:00

Since we couldn't meet f2f, here's what we would have worked on.

Organizing your practice time to reap the biggest reward:

I highly recommend you check out Justin's website. In particular his tips on practicing are very good.

Play a little everyday. This is key. Your muscle memory will improve, your fingers will get tough and you will improve much faster.
Always practice to a beat. If you figure out Band-in -a-box great. Playing with a metronome is a drag...
Play slow and clean, get your fingers perpendicular to the frets and play the notes with your finger as close to the top of the fret as possible.

If you have 60 minutes: (set a timer or you will forget to switch, write down in your practice book what you did each session - it will keep you honest and will help you re-focus the next day)

First half

Finger Gym - 10 minutes
Pentatonics - 10 minutes - alternate forms 1-2, 1-3, 1-4, 1-5
Major Scales - 10 minutes - experiment, improvise, play melody lines

Second Half

Rhythm - 10 minutes - Work the right hand and get funky. Long train running, Strumming fast and smooth on simple chord changes. Its about the right hand!
Jam - 10 minutes - Fire up the blues tracks or play a song that you know the chords to and play along. Imitate the melody line, make up your own melody, have fun. This will begin to train your ear to listen for chord changes.
Work out and learn songs - 10 minutes. If there is a song you like and want to learn how to play, chart it out yourself. I recommend you get the lyrics online but figure our the chords yourself. Bear in mind that the guitarist might not be playing chord patterns all below the 3rd fret.

If you have 30 minutes:

Finger Gym - 10 minutes
Pentatonics - 5 minutes
Major Scales - 5 minutes
Rhythm - 5 minutes
Jam - Chart - 5 minutes

4/28 Lesson

2008-04-28T21:50:00.000-07:00

Nice soloing tonight!

1a. It showed that you practiced form 1 to 2 pentatonic transitions. When improvising don't be shy to use techniques such as the hammer ons and the double-note lick we practiced.

1b. I gave you a new form of the major scale that meshes well with form 2 of the pentatonic. The pentatonic (5 note) scale is simply the major scale in this form less the 4th and major 7th notes.

____________1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
major ______C D E F G A B C
pentatonic _C D E G A C

Here is an example of the A Major pentatonic

Improvise between the major and pentatonic forms. this is what is going on in Comfortably Numb.

1c. Practice a great way to string pentatonic forms together at:

2. Download the trial version of band-in-a-box. Its good til July 1 and will be a great way to practice at tempo over a virtual band. For This exercise start by playing the 12 bar blues.

A great video tutorial that you can play along to can be found here

3. Listen to some guitarists and start to identify styles you like. the best way to get very good is to emulate players you like. You will find that they tend to use certain scale forms and you will begin to identify lines that the play variations of. David Gilmour is a case in point.

4. Learn the first three phrases or lines of of the solo in comfortably numb. If you want learn as many as you can. So much of what he is doing is the way he plays the notes. Much of his style comes from his use of sustain - so using a pod or even your amp cranked up will help.

5. What the World will never take. Strategy for learning the tune.
a. download the chords - look at them and use your chart to figure out the chord family and hence the key.
b. learn the rhythm part FIRST. this will help you know the landscape of notes and will guide you when you are improvising.
c. play back the lines of the solo and hum the tune. From the scale form pluck out the notes til they match what you are humming.
d. repeat the line until you know it then move on to the next line.
e. string the lines together and try to play them all in a row along with the CD.

6. Make sure to play your scales and call out the notes on the fretboard. you should be able to identify all the major home notes. E G A B C D F - common sharps will be F#, C# - know these as as well.

4/21 Lesson

2008-04-21T21:36:00.000-07:00

Wow - you are doing so great. Here's the gist of tonight's lesson.

Pentatonics - learn to move between forms. Move whenever you feel. Remember to identify the root note in each form. this will give you a base to let your hand find it's home position.

Day 1 - Form 1 - 2-1
Day 2 - Form 2-3-2
Day 3 - Form 3-4-3
Day 4 - Form 4-5-4
Day 5 - Form 5-1-5

Identify the notes game - We chose A-C-D-E-G (A Pentatonic). Exercise - play each note on each string in as many places as you can find it. Remember the fretboard starts over at the 12th fret; so 15th fret is really just like the 3rd fret. this will take the mystery out of playing so high up on the neck.

Comfortably Numb solo - You actually learned this faster than I did this week. As always here's what to do with a solo.

1. Determine the key by knowing the chords and bass line under the solo. In this case the chords are:

D -> A -> D -> A -> C -> G -> C -> G -> A
The notes in the first part of the solo (not in order) are G F# E D C# B A. Hmm what major scale contains these notes?
The second part of the scale plays C and G chords. Hmm you can't have a C chord in a D scale, ahh he changes to either a G or a C scale. But he plays a F# in the second phrase. F# that is not in the key of C it must by G. This will clue your hand in to what position to be in and what notes are *legal*.

2. Learn and memorize the phrases (or lines) of the solo in chunks.

Each line will have a starting and ending note. these are your home notes and the notes between are the stepping stones. (think F# -E -D in the 3rd phrase). Keep these in mind as you play each phrase - they will ground your solo and help it sound musical.

3. Listen to what the artist is doing with the notes and try to emulate it. As you progress you will borrow and combine styles of various players but for now imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Gilmour's first F# in that solo gives me chills - its as if he is singing through his fingers. Becoming a great musician involves becoming a great musical listener.

Right handed exercise - Play long train running (Gm7 on the 10th fret) and get jiggy with it. The right wrist should be flopping around and loose. Go for smooth then increase the tempo. Practice the different up/down patterns and shape each strum to sound more musical.

As always practice a Form 1 of the minor scale and do your chromatics. Next week I will give you the really tough chromatic exercise that will feel like guitar boot camp.

Great job Rebecca - you are doing amazing.

4/14 Lesson

2008-04-15T08:46:00.001-07:00

4/14 Wrap up:

Chromatic scale (use all 4 fingers, descend 1 fret at a time, play slow and clean) Skip a fret to practice stretching the fingers.
2 string scales - practice the transitions from string to string when playing any scale. Repeat the notes on the two strings until your fingers begin to remember.
Harmonics - 12th fret will resonate the best, then 7th then 5th. Pluck the note hard and remove your left finger at the same time to let the note sustain. Find Roundabout on Youtube and see if you can play it.
Palm muting - This is a version of a harmonic using your right hand near the bridge. You will hear the notes continue to sustain even with your palm on the strings when you find the right spot. this is a popular way of changing the tone of a chord.

Song: Your Grace is Enough

Listen to the way the guitar notes sustain over each other. this is the clue that led me to play the riff on the b string with the open e string.
Know the underlying chords and bass line. this will lead you to the key which will in turn lead you to the right notes. The part just moves up and down a a scale.

4/14 Exercises:

Play the chromatics up and down the neck. skipping the fret and playing near the nut will really stretch out your fingers. Play slow and clean.
Practice form 1 and 5 of the pentatonic. Stretch goal: Say the name of the note as you play it. Do this with the A and D pentatonics.

4/7 Lesson

2008-04-07T08:58:00.000-07:00

4/14 wrap up

Major and Pentatonic - form 1 scales
Finger transitions between chords. goal is to minimize finger travel. watch out for pulling on the strings when fingering your chords. come down as straight as you can using the arc in your fingers. this will keep the notes in pitch.
Song - Purple Haze - Goal is to play this simple pentatonic based riff with as much feel as you can get.
String bending - Practice push and pull vibrato with each finger. Especially your pinky. Flashy leads often cresendo with the high note ringing out. guess which finger's job is to play the really high notes?

4/7 Exercise

Pentatonic scales form 1 and 5 - will be the beginning of a never ending relationship with the 5 basic forms of the pentatonic.

I have charted out the 5 forms of the G pentatonic but remember you need to be able to play the scale from any fret. Start with the main keys you will be asked to play in. E, G, A, B, C#, D. So you would play the E pentatonic in all 5 forms, then G in all 5 forms then A, etc.

This alone will make you into a great soloist. Don't worry about speed. When you get bored, improvise with the scale. Listen to David Gilmour from the site I sent you. He is the master of the melodic pentatonic solo.

Comfortably Numb solo
Comfortably Numb Tab

Pentatonic 5

2008-03-31T09:27:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite forms. Its easy to switch between form 1 and 5 to really move around the fretboard.

3/31 Lesson

2008-03-31T09:06:00.000-07:00

3/31 Exercises

Major Scale Form 1 - up/down from 2nd to 12th fret muscle memory, visual note recognition - 10 min
Major Scale Form 1 - fool around with variations using at least two strings to play a melody line muscle memory, visual note recog - 5 min
Pentatonic Form 1 - up/down from 3rd to 12th fret muscle memory, visual note recognition - 10 min
Listening - Listen for multiple guitar parts - (play like the radio)
Listening Listen for multiple guitar sounds and FX (sound like the radio)
Learn a song - bring 2 songs on mp3 to the 4/7 lesson (learn real songs)
Major Scale Form 2 up/down from 3rd to 12th fret 7-Apr 10 min