Still trying to learn guitar...

...So I've started lessons. As mentioned in the passing (Who is your favourite guitarist) my first real tune was Johnny B. Goode. I thought I'd post videos of the songs I'm learning to play so I can get depressed about what I'm aiming for!

There are a fair number of versions of Mr Berry playing this on YouTube. Each one is different and every one is goode!

I think I have the basic chord sequence OK now. I'm working on making it sound more interesting by adding twiddly bits and I'm supposed to be working up to adding a lead solo bit (although that's still a couple of weeks away).

...But I still am nowhere near sounding like Chuck! Sigh! I'm away now to practice my duck walk.

Who is your favourite guitarist

I have now had four guitar lessons and week three was the best fun yet as I was given twelve bar Blues (in various keys) and Johnny B. Goode to practice for homework; my first real tunes. Excellent!

The finished product
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

What triggered this post though, was a throw away comment from my teacher, Les. He said something along the lines of, "If you said to me that you wanted to sound like your favourite guitarist, then...". I'm ashamed to say I tuned out of the next bit because I started thinking, "Who is my favourite guitarist?".

On the face of it, you would think it was a fairly simple question. If, for example, I was asked to name my favourite band, the answer, without a moments thought, would be, Rush. If I was asked for a favourite drummer, it's Neil Peart - no question. Favourite bass player - silly question. Nobody has a favourite bass player. (Or at least nobody important, so we can safely ignore them.) But favourite guitarist... I'm finding that tricky.

One issue is a question of style. Are we talking Rock, or Metal, or Blues, or... Here are some examples and contenders to make my point:

I still remember hearing Van Halen's debut album for the first time (I bought it on cassette!). I was simply stunned by Eruption - 1 minute 42 seconds worth of guitar genius. I'm still hugely impressed with it, so does that make Eddie Van Halen my favourite? Well perhaps. At least he might be until I listen to John Lee Hooker who is perhaps the complete antithesis of Eddie's finger tapping pyrotechnics but a single-note solo from Mr Hooker, accompanied by foot-stomping and moans can blow the flashier competition out of the water with its power and emotional depth. Then moving sideways to Chris Whitley, we have a sparse, almost discordant guitar sound that can be achingly beautiful. Or there's Stevie Ray Vaughan (who I first heard on a single by David Bowie), and Clapton, and Hendrix, and Page, and Young, and ... the list goes on. How are you supposed to pick a favourite?

If I pick a favourite today, it is likely to change tomorrow. But if you force me to pick one, just now I'd probably go for Joe Bonamassa. I like the way his solos flow naturally out of the music so they don't feel tacked on as an afterthought. He is steeped in the Blues but he knows his Rock and isn't afraid to experiment and explore other genres. And he is frighteningly prolific!

So, today, it is Mr Bonamassa. Tomorrow, who knows?

Does anyone else have this problem, or is it just me? Who is your favourite?

AC/DC Competition

I wrote about Justin Sandercoe's awesome AC/DC contest a few weeks ago (see Guitar Lessons: A New Challenge). I had a great time trying to learn AC/DC's Shoot To Thrill and, although I could barely play the opening two riffs, I decided to post a video anyway:

I will keep plugging away and hopefully post a complete version at some point in the future.

At the closing date there were 186 entries for this awesome competition. I haven't looked at them all (yet) and I don't envy Justin and the other judges' job: the standard is exceptionally high and choosing the winners will be extraordinarily difficult.

Before I tell you my favourites, I think it's worth noting how few women have entered - I've seen two so far. Also interesting is the number that appear to have been recorded in bedrooms - presumably family rooms are not ready for novice renditions of Rock classics! However, what's amazing is the number of very young guitarists that have recorded astoundingly good versions. (Although it's fair to say there are a reasonable number of fat old baldy blokes like me too!)

There are four prizes on offer. The main prize of a customised Iron Man themed Gibson SG is for the Best Performance. Choosing the best will be very difficult but my favourite so far is probably MyTwangyGuitar's version. His solos are especially impressive but I think it's a shame you only see the guitar. For that reason, I might be tempted to go for someone like FrankSenese who seems to be playing all four parts himself.

The Most Entertaining category might be easier as I have yet to see anything that comes close to billbailey88's mini soap opera:

I don't understand why more people are not watching and commenting on this video. For a runner up, I'd go for a real underdog: clickthelink92. They are clearly having a blast in this video - great fun!

The next category is Best Dressed. Many people have worked hard on the Angus Young look but I think I'd go for stouder18 for the sheer energy he puts into the performance.

Finally, Most In Need Of Encouragement. I hope this goes to one of the really young guitarists (assuming the rules allow them to enter). For example guitarman98100 who has only been playing ten months and yet he puts my efforts to shame.

So what do you think of the entries? Who do you rate and who would you have in the top spots?

Guitar Lessons: A New Challenge

I announced some time ago my intention to teach myself guitar using online and computer based resources. I even got as far as posting some video to show my progress so far (see Teach Yourself Guitar: Progress So Far...). That was in October 2009 and the more astute among you will have noticed a deafening silence from me about my progress since then.

The main reason is that I was pushed for time around Christmas and then I kind of lost heart. I am still finding the lesson in GarageBand on barre chords too tricky. I decided that part of the problem is that I am trying to get motivated but with no real goal in sight. I had decided that using some of the things I've already been practising but applying them to learning a tune might help.

I was on the point of buying one of the Artist lessons on GarageBand (Alex Lifeson on Working Man to be precise) when I saw a Tweet about an Iron Man 2 competition.

The idea is that Justin Sandercoe will teach you how to play AC/DC's Shoot To Thrill using video, guitar tabs and a specially recorded backing track. You video yourself playing the track and then submit your performance to YouTube. The winner receives a customised Gibson SG. Very Cool!



Now, I don't think I have any hope of winning. But. learning a tune, a recognisable tune, could be the incentive I need.

I'll keep you posted.

P.S. I don't know why I haven't been spending more time at Justin's site as it is a fantastic resource for guitarists of all levels.

The guitar prize that keeps on giving...

One of the best prizes I have ever won was from Rock Radio who gave me the chance to build my own guitar with Bailey Guitars (see for example Accreditation for prior learning?). Well, my prize guitar has won me another prize!

078/365: I win!
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

One of the immediate side effects of winning the guitar was it re-kindled my desire to learn to play (as I've mentioned before Teach Yourself Guitar: Progress So Far...). The desire is still there and half-hearted attempt to learn continues - another post about my progress (or lack thereof) is long overdue. As part of the learning process, I visited a number of online/tech based teaching schemes - one of which was LickLibrary. There is a staggering amount of stuff and a fairly active online community on the LickLibrary site. It has: video lessons; tracks to jam to; discussion forums; books; DVDs; competitions; ... I haven't purchased anything from there yet but I think, if I get better, I will eventually download some jamtrax and/or some lessons.

Although I didn't download anything, I did start following their Twitter feed and a couple of weeks ago I noticed a message from them asking people to send a tweet about their favourite guitar. The idea was, they would choose their favourite tweet and the winner would get "goodies worth over £100". So I sent the following:

@licklibrary My favourite guitar is the one my daughter made: http://is.gd/agr65 It's gorgeous: http://tweetphoto.com/14050920
11:48 PM Mar 11th via TweetDeck in reply to licklibrary

The winner was announced twenty minutes later:

Congrats to @DavidDMuir you win tonight's Twitter Goodie Pack. Direct Message me your name and address and we'll get it sent out to!
0:10 AM Mar 12th via web

Result!

To be honest, I'm not sure what a Pod is or why I'd need a bible for it and the books all look a bit to tricky for me at the moment. However, the Blues and the Nineties Rock books have stuff that I'm just about able to have a go at, so I'm looking forward to stretching myself and (hopefully) rising to the challenge.

Question:
What's the best competition win you have ever had?

Free Download Friday #33: Rodrigo Y Gabriela

I was very tempted to keep Rodrigo Y Gabriela for a When musical worlds collide post. I may still feature them again at some point in the future but I decided the downloads available were too good to miss for a Free Download Friday.

_Rodrigo y gabriela Live concert @AB Ancienne Belgique Bruxelles -9
Originally uploaded by Kmeron

Rodrigo and Gabriela are two Mexican musicians who are currently living in Dublin. They play a style of guitar that is normally described as flamenco metal. However, I don't feel this is fair to either flamenco or metal! What ever you call it, they are stunningly talented guitarists, playing a fast, percussive and powerful style on classical guitars.

I heard them on the radio ages ago and thought they sounded interesting but for some reason I did not seek out any of their recordings. However, when I went looking a couple of weeks back, I was pleased to discover three of their tracks were available on the rcrd lbl site. (I've talked about rcrd lbl once before and always meant to go an see what else of interest I could find there.)

The three downloads are:

1. Diablo Rojo
2. Buster Voodoo (Radio Edit)
3. Orion

Of the three, my favourite is probably Diablo Rojo:

What do you think? What's your favourite track?

Teach Yourself Guitar: Progress So Far...

Back in the middle of August, I said I was going to try and teach myself guitar using computer based and online tutorials. Initially, I said I'd report back in a month.

Unfortunately, progress has been slow. If I had been trying to match Ortis's achievement, I think I would have failed miserably! However, I thought I'd better show you where I am... prepare to be disappointed!

Mostly I've been using the Learn To Play feature in GarageBand. I think it's really good. Each lesson starts with the tutor taking you through the stuff you need to know (chords, strumming patterns, guitar tabs etc.) before giving you a backing track to play along to. So here are three videos, with some commentary. All constructive criticism gratefully received.



As I listened back to this video, I became aware of the way I was strumming. It was a chunka-chunka-chunka-pause, chunka-chunka-chunka-pause, chunka-chunka-chunka-pause,... style. The pause happened every time I changed chord. Clearly this isn't good. Yet I was completely unaware that I was doing it until I heard this video. I guess this is one place a where a face to face tutor would score over a virtual tutor as this would have been picked up much earlier.



A few weeks ago, I was browsing the Guitar Savvy site and I realise that when forming the D minor chord, my thumb was slipping down and lying along the neck instead of staying at right angles to it. Again, not good and again, probably would have been spotted by a face-to-face tutor. Another bad habit that has to be unlearned. And again, the pause in the strumming pattern just about every chord change. :-(



Disastrous! Constant, driving strum - fail! Muted strings to give cool, percussive sound in verse part - fail! Elbow not tucked in to avoid awkward wrist position - fail! Add to that my inability to play at anything like the full speed and the extreme pain caused by trying to play these power chords and we are talking unbelievably pathetic fail. Sigh!

So, am I learning anything? Am I getting better? I think so. I do like the GarageBand lessons. I especially like the way you can slow the playback speed down until you learn what you're doing. You can also put sections on repeat to practise them over and over again. It works. I'm enjoying myself. I think I'm getting better.

A feature that I haven't used yet, which may help me improve, is that GarageBand can record you playing along to the backing track. Given how much I learned listening to these videos, I think this is a feature I will have to use from now on.

Finally, I want to mention the guitar I'm playing. It's the one Daughter Number 2 built at Bailey Guitars - the one I won from Rock Radio. It is gorgeous to look at, sounds great (when played by someone that knows what they are doing) and easy to play - much easier to play that the Squire Stratocaster that I practise on. I cannot recommend Bailey Guitars highly enough.

Update: Just posted some reflections on the learning process on my Education blog.

Guitars, gadgets and great jobs

I wrote about the Gadget Show when I was considering what the best job in the world might be. (See my The best job in the world? post.) I suggested that, for me, the best job in the world might be to present on the Gadget Show - play with technology, mess about and occasionally blow things up. What more could a nerd ask for?

139/366: Three chords...
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

Gadget Show
I enjoyed the first couple of episodes in the new series but the one shown on Monday, convinced me that the Gadget Show was definitely the right choice for me. Why? Because the focus of this week's challenge was to learn a new skill online. Online learning! Now if that's not a Gadget Show topic for me, I don't know what is. And even better was the skill Ortis chose to learn because while Jason decided to learn to cook, Ortis wanted to learn the guitar! Again, suits me down to the ground. Online guitar tuition - been there, although as yet, not done that!

More on my attempts to learn guitar in a moment after a word about the challenge.

Gadget Show Challenge
Ortis won the challenge (his first win apparently) by playing with a Coldplay tribute band (called Coldplace) in front of thousands of people at a festival whereas Jason had to cook a meal for a top chef.

At first I wondered if the test was fair. Ortis only had to learn one tune; Jason had to learn to prepare seven dishes. However, the more I thought about it the more I decided Ortis was the worthy winner. Partly because Jason just couldn't do it - he even managed to use salt instead of sugar in his pudding! (Clearly he hadn't tasted it himself before serving. Tsk! Tsk!) Mainly though, I think Ortis deserved to win because he used the technology much more intelligently. When he was struggling with the chords for the song, he Skyped the guitarist from Coldplace who taught him how to use a capo. When Jason was struggling, he appeared to just keep following the same instructions to make the same mistake over and over again. Perhaps it was edited to make him look dafter but why didn't he go on a cooking forum to ask for help? Why didn't he send out a request to his personal learning network on Twitter? Why didn't he Skype his mum or someone else who could actually cook? In his favour he was using a outrageously desirable Modbook!

However, Ortis performed brilliantly. The expert criticised Ortis for being a bit static on stage but to be fair he was playing Coldplay not The Clash. :-) As I said, a worthy winner.

My own efforts
I have stated elsewhere my desire to learn the guitar using online lessons and have just started a semi-serious attempt to do so. I'm aiming for a minimum of ten to fifteen minutes a day with Garageband. I'll also dip into to some of the links from the Gadget Show lists as well as the excellent Guitar Savvy site which I recently discovered. To give you an idea of where I'm coming from, here's a link to a very embarassing video of me playing the guitar Daughter Number 2 built. She can play but refuses to play it in front of other people. Since someone had to try out this gorgeous guitar, I stepped in. Everyone else in the room was an experienced and talented guitarist (especially Mark Bailey the chap that ran the build your own guitar course) so my ineptitude was clear for all to see. In the video, you can almost hear the collective sigh of disappointment at how bad I was!

I will post another video around the middle of September to let you see how far I've got in a month. (Not very far I fear!) Will I reach the standard that Ortis managed? Only time will tell. :-)

Questions
Have you ever tried to learn something using only online resources? If so, what? Also, I'm still on the lookout for good online guitar tuition resources, so feel free to share those too.

---

It seemed appropriate to cross-post this to my education blog. Apologies for repeating myself if you follow both.

Les Paul: 9 June 1915 - 13 August 2009

Many people more qualified than I will write about the life of Les Paul, so I thought I would simply mark his passing with a personal recollection...

78 RPM
Originally uploaded by bitzcelt

I first heard Les Paul on some of my dad's 78s. He tried to explain ovedubbing to me but I don't think I fully understood at the time. In particular I remember being obsessed with Tiger Ragwhich I loved. I played that particular 78 over and over again.

Unfortunately, I also remember destroying a number of these precious discs through a mixture of foolishness and carelessness. Some I stood on, some I just dropped, but Tiger Rag I wrecked by spinning it on the turntable while holding a sewing needle in the groove to see if I could feel the music. (I was about seven at the time - old enough to know better but young enough to not be fully aware of the consequences of my stupidity.) As far as I remember, my dad reacted fairly well to the destruction of his records - much more calmly than I suspect I would if my daughters ever did anything as daft!

Finally, some thoughts about the Gibson Les Paul. The Fender Stratocaster is an iconic rock guitar and was probably the first type of guitar I noticed and identified when I saw it played on Top Of The Pops etc. I also remember being stunned when I saw the Flying V (being played by Michael Schenker if I remember correctly). However, as I got older (and wiser?) it was the look and the sound of the Gibson Les Paul that grabbed my attention. When I won the chance to build my own guitar, the sample specification they sent me was for a Stratocaster-ish rock monster, but it didn't take me long to decide that I wanted something more like the Les Paul. :-)

Joan Armatrading's Favourite Guitarists

I'm thoroughly enjoying Joan Armatrading's Favourite Guitarists programmes on BBC Radio 4. One more programme to go but the full list of guitarists she's talking to is:

1. Mark Knopfler
2. Bonnie Raitt
3. John Williams
4. Russell Lissack
5. Bert Jansch

An interesting range of guitarists and styles I think you'll agree. Try to catch them on Listen Again before they disappear.

My only problem with the programmes is they are way to short. At fifteen minutes long, they don't have time to properly explore the stuff they are talking about.

Let me know what you think of the programmes. If you feel like it, let me know who your five favourite guitarists would be.

Wanted: Online Guitar Tutor

I would like to be able to play the guitar but thus far I have failed to master much beyond the ability to form a few chords. As long as there is a reasonable gap between chord changes, I can just about manage to sound vaguely musical.

199/366: First try with an amplifier
Originally uploaded by DavidDMuir

I have made a number of half hearted attempts to learn to play. Probably the first time was when I was a teenager but the most recent attempt was connected with a competition win (I won the chance to build my own guitar). In the event, my daughter built it and I inherited her old Squire Stratocaster.

I hoped that combining a geek's love for gadgets with a desire to learn guitar might help, so I looked for online guitar lessons and tutor programmes that might help. Currently, I think my favourite is the Learn to Play feature that is built into Garageband. Brilliant! However I still haven't got very far because I spend too little time practising.

However, this summer (along with DIY projects, family holidays, reading some of the backlog of novels that I've built up, typing up some research stuff, etc...) I thought I'd have a go at ten minutes a day on guitar. Does anyone have any suggestions for (free) geeky guitar tools/sites that will help? All suggestions gratefully received.

Eric Clapton Drifting Blues 2008 Unplugged Live TV Recording

I got an email from one of the sites that I signed up for while trying to learn to play guitar... The chap sending the email says:

...you'd be surprised how easy it can be to play this way. All it takes is...

1. A little bit of "Blues in E" (lesson 8-1)
2. A little bit of minor blues scale (lesson 15)
3. A little bit of major blues scale (lesson 23)
4. A little bit of secret sauce (lesson 24)

Hmm! This is clearly a definition of "easy" that has thus far escaped me as I fail to learn to play. :-)

However, as Griff says, "it's Clapton... who doesn't have a minute to go watch Clapton do his thing?"

Enjoy... and then check out Blues Guitar Unleashed. Oh, and any suggestions of good online (preferably free) sources of guitar tutorials will be gratefully received.