Technique: String Bending

September 13, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, doug aldrich, guitar, guitar lessons, jimi hendrix, joe satriani, lead, music, slash, solo, steve vai, string bending

String bending is awesome. I won’t bore you, (rather, myself), with the physics of string bending, but the gist of it is when you make a guitar string tighter the pitch becomes higher, just like when you tune a guitar, or add a tighten-up a new string. This can be useful when you want to reach … Continue reading Technique: String Bending

Natural Major & Minor Scales

August 27, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials

Scales represent almost the entire make-up of music. In strictly diatonic compositions all chords will contain notes from the same scale. Likewise, any instrument or vocal melodies will be in that same scale. The most common scales in Western music contain seven different notes. Tabbed below are the Natural Major and Natural Minor scales, (often … Continue reading Natural Major & Minor Scales

Memorizing The Fretboard

August 14, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, flamenco, fretboard, guitar, guitar-based theory, jazz, memorizing, memory, metal, music, music theory, notes, rock, theory

(I've stolen an image from http://www.CortGuitars.com for this. So there.) These are some tips and tricks to help you memorize the fretboard. Memorizing the fretboard will help you to instinctively know where to go in order to voice different chords. The first step is to remember the order of the open strings, which is as follows, (from … Continue reading Memorizing The Fretboard

Hammer-Claw Finger-Picking Technique

August 7, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, claw, country, finger, finger-picking, guitar, hammer, hammer-claw, jazz, music, picking, rock, technique

Hammer-claw finger-picking is a technique used in country, jazz and sometimes blues music where the guitarist plays with their fingers rather than a pick. In this style your thumb is the “hammer” and your fingers are the “claw”. Your “hammer” is intended to play the bass strings, (E, A and sometimes D), and replicate the job … Continue reading Hammer-Claw Finger-Picking Technique

Example Song #3 – 7th Barre Chords in Gm

July 31, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, cambridge, guitar, jazz, learn, learn to play, learn to play awesome guitar, rock, strings, teach yourself, teacher, tutor

This track is intended as an exercise for students who have recently been introduced to 7 Barre Chords. Once they are familiar with the shapes this track is a good way of learning how they’re used in practice. You’re playing mainly 7 barre chords. The Basic 7 Barre Chords lesson will be a useful reference … Continue reading Example Song #3 – 7th Barre Chords in Gm

Example Song #2 – Open 7th Chords in C

July 31, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, cambridge, guitar, jazz, learn, learn to play, learn to play awesome guitar, rock, strings, teach yourself, teacher, tutor

This track is intended as an exercise for students who have recently been introduced to 7 Chords. Once they are familiar with the shapes this track is a good way of putting them into practice and using them between chords they’re already familiar with. You can review the Basic Open Chords and Open 7 Chords … Continue reading Example Song #2 – Open 7th Chords in C

Example Song #1 – Open & Barre Chords in F#m

July 31, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, cambridge, guitar, jazz, learn, learn to play, learn to play awesome guitar, rock, strings, teach yourself, teacher, tutor

This track is intended as an exercise for students who have recently been introduced to Barre Chords. Once they are familiar with the shapes this track is a good way of learning how Barre chords can be used in a song. Students will be playing Barre Chords along with the Open Chords they’re already familiar … Continue reading Example Song #1 – Open & Barre Chords in F#m

Barring 7th Chords

July 24, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, cambridge, guitar, jazz, learn, learn to play, learn to play awesome guitar, rock, strings, teach yourself, teacher, tutor

This lesson focuses on Maj, Min and Dom 7th barre chords with roots on the E and A strings. Dim and Aug 7ths will be covered in another lesson, (although in the Open 7th Chords lesson, you will find one barre chord for the Dim7 rooted on the A string), as will roots on other strings. Compare the following … Continue reading Barring 7th Chords

String-Skip Tapping Lick

June 26, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials awesome, blues, cambridge, guitar, jazz, learn, learn to play, learn to play awesome guitar, multi finger, rock, string skip, strings, tapping, teach yourself, teacher, tutor

This is my ultimate looks-cool-and-also-sounds-good-too lick. Ditch the pick, put 2 hands on the fretboard, prepare for nonsense. I’d suggest being familiar with tapping, avoiding / muting string noise, and having a reasonable amount of hammer-on dexterity and finger strength before looking at this one. Here is the tab for this lesson, including performance directions, … Continue reading String-Skip Tapping Lick

7th Chords in the Open Position

June 25, 2012May 30, 2015 LTGuitarist Music Tutorials 7th chords, awesome, blues, cambridge, guitar, jazz, learn, learn to play, learn to play awesome guitar, rock, strings, teach yourself, teacher, tutor

A 7th Chord consists of any triad, plus the note immediately before its octave. For instance, a Major chord would have a Root, a 5th and a Maj 3rd; A Maj7 chord would have these three, with the addition of the Maj 7th. A Min7 chord would have it’s Root, 5th, min 3rd, and min … Continue reading 7th Chords in the Open Position