Jazz is complex. If musical styles were subjects in school, then Jazz would be Mathematics. Do you think this is so? Many readers probably share this view. Jazz is usually considered an advanced style, something that you learn after you’ve successfully progressed through and mastered some of the `lesser’ styles of music. However, lately, I’ve [...]
October 26, 2010
Back in early 2001, I moved from my native country of The Netherlands to England. The reason I moved was because I had accepted a job there, which I was very excited about. I ended up living in a shared house with three other housemates. This turned out to have a grave effect on my [...]
October 13, 2010
A huge aspect of guitar mastery is the proper use of dynamics. Dynamics can add a great deal to your ability to move the audience, sometimes literally: play something soft and gentle to draw people in, or play something loud and brash to get people jumping up and down in excitement. The essence of creating [...]
October 9, 2010
What is the most important thing to do when you learn to play something new? The answer is, you break it down into small pieces that you practise individually. That way you can spend a lot of concentrated and focused effort on a small part, which — because it is so small — allows you [...]
September 15, 2010
This is the — for now — final post in the Slash guitar lesson series of articles at The Lone Guitarist. It is a guest post by Dr. Matt Warnock of Guitar International Magazine. I often have students and players come to me asking about which books they should buy in order to learn how [...]
August 17, 2010
In my previous post I talked about the source of improvisation, your inner jukebox. Your inner jukebox fuels your ability to improvise, it is your inspiration, it is the tool by which you express yourself as an individual. If you can tune into your inner jukebox, tap into the musical ideas that it generates, and [...]
August 16, 2010
I believe that true guitar mastery can be directly judged by a player’s ability to improvise. You can learn all the technique you want, know all the theory, be able to play any song beautifully -no matter how technically difficult- with all its dynamic subtleties, and to me you’d be merely good. But to be [...]
November 15, 2010