GUITAR COACH MAGAZINE : ISSUE 002

Issue 002

The FREE Interactive Guitar Magazine

Blues Special Songs, Riffs, Licks & Solos

Beginners Bootcamp Riffs & Licks Coaching Sessions Guitars & Gizmos Skills & Techniques

Blues Road Warrior

Eugene Hideaway Bridges

Play JJ Cale, Robert Cray, & Blues Brothers Step by step video lessons

Plus guitar news, features, profiles & cool new Apps.

MAGAZINE

Editorial enquiries: [email protected] Advertising enquiries: [email protected] www.guitarcoachmag.com

Issue 002

Features

Contents Note from the Editor What’s Hot & What’s Not! The Blues Debate The Blues: Then & Now Chord of the Month Nils Lofgren Interview; Part 2 Guitar Top 10s Quick Survey Songwriting & Detuning FAQs

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Relax and get into the correct postion to play. Plus an introduction to Fingerstyle playing

Coaching Session A great fun session, developing your improv skills, with our cool Blues backing track

Skills & Techniques The string muting, bass note picking strum. It’s got something for everyone!

Guitars & Gizmos Guitar Makers, plus the latest guitar Apps and tech stuff

Riffs, Licks & Solos From The Blues Brothers to Clapton - a series a classic Blues riffs and licks

Guitarist Eugene “Hideaway” Bridges, a native of New Orleans, with seven albums to his credit and three recent nominations from the Blues Foundation...

Dillon teaches The Blues...page 20

Lesson Videos, Tutorials and Tips Beginners Bootcamp

Eugene on the road...page 35

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Jimmy Dillon is an accomplished and awardwinning musician, singer, songsmith and teacher with an impressive record. ..

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The eJamming revolution...page 49 New technology that allows musicians to jam and collaborate anytime, anywhere...

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Editor’s note

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Hi and welcome to our Blues insprired issue... In this second issue of Guitar Coach magazine, we’ve gone for a Blues flavour with some of our features, articles and Coaching sessions. New this month, we’ve also got a survey for you. This is your opportunity to get the content you want every month. It only takes 30 seconds to complete the survey, so don’t miss this great opportunity to help shape Guitar Coach magazine to suit you! Also keep your questions coming for our FAQs.

Contributors

And finally keep submitting those ratings and reviews, as they are what will help us to grow our subscriber numbers and enable us to continue to publish Guitar Coach free of charge. So, have fun, and do let me know what you think about the magazine. Just email me at [email protected]

Jonathan Howkins Editor, Guitar Coach magazine

Many thanks to our contributors: Eugene Hideaway Bridges Jimmy Dillon The eJamming team Nick Benjamin Rikky Rooksby Harrison Marsh And to our writing team: Bob Cianci Graham Land Ben Vine Tom Rosier And our special thanks to: Andy Partridge of BandJammer Cover shot: Alyn Coates

Keeping it Free! We hope you enjoy this issue of Guitar Coach magazine and we look forward to bringing you much more great free stuff in the next issue.

All you have to do is either tell your guitar playing friends about it, ‘Like’ us on Facebook, or maybe Tweet about us :)

But we need your help :)

You help is much appreciated, thank you.

In order for us to continue to produce this magazine free of charge, we need to get the word out to as many people as possible - and to do this we need your help.

News

What’s Hot and What’s Not this month! By Tom Rosier

What’s Hot... Wes Scantlin, lead singer of Puddle of Mudd, could face jail time after a drunken encounter on a flight because the crew allegedly refused to serve the singer alcohol. Green Day release 3 new tracks from their up coming trilogy of Albums, Uno, Dos and Tre, the first of which is due for release later this month.

An eBay auction to support the Randy Blythe (Lamb Of God) Legal Fund for his recent manslaughter charge includes guitars and basses from Slash, Megadeth, Gwar and Five Finger Death Punch.

A 13-year-old girl's dream came true Wednesday at the Minnesota State Fair when she got to meet Motley Crue’s Nikki Sixx after the glam-rocker saw her anti-bullying video on YouTube. Prog Magazine holds its first ever award ceremony in London.

What’s Not... Eddie van Halen narrowly avoids death after trialling a diet containing too much cayenne pepper and nearly had his “stomach explode”.

A new scientific study has noted that pop music, over the last five decades, has gotten more depressing. A deadly spider which hid in one of Noel Gallagher’s guitar cases prompted an emergency quarantine while experts tried to catch the insect at Jersey Live Festival.

An LA store owner and music producer has received hate mail after releasing an album of "new" music from notorious imprisoned serial murderer, Charles Manson.

Guns N' Roses have hosted a new auction that includes their old clothes dryer for $110. Metallica frontman James Hetfield says there are too many rock bands, but the best will survive and keep the genre alive.

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Beginners Bootcamp – Guitar basics; Hand positions – Introduction to Fingerstyle

Boot Camp

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Playing Basics: Hand positions by Harrison Marsh

Any seasoned, acoustic guitarist will tell you about the perils of tendonitis and RSI, but it's not just the professionals that can suffer. The best way to avoid these issues is to get a correct and comfortable technique right from the start. There are a few rules with hand position that apply for both hands; firstly if it doesn't feel comfortable don't do it! New idea's may feel unfamiliar but avoid huge stretches or extreme wrist angles, becasue you will almost always find that there is a more comfortable way of doing things such as changing the fingering of that chord. Secondly, just like any exercise, warm up and warn down, ten minutes of scales or simple familiar exercises at a slow tempo before you start will increase your stamina, muscle memory and avoid any strains making playing uncomfortable. Though some famously heavy handed players may disagree, keep everything light. Firstly hitting the strings harder puts more strain on your hands and wrists and is unnecessary, and secondly one tell tell sign of an experienced player is a good understanding and use of dynamics. It's one of the beautiful things about guitar, and by playing quite lightly, there's room to increase volume and attack when you want a passage to sound more dynamic. Try this, hold a chord as you normally would and keep strumming it. Now without lifting your fingers from the strings, gradually decrease the pressure your using in your left hand until you start to get a buzzing sound. Now the amount of pressure you were using on that last strum before the buzz is the minimum amount needed to play that chord. Is it lighter than you normally hold the guitar? Thought so! Keeping this in mind makes

changing between chords smoother. A similar approach can be applied to the right hand. A good starting point for the left hand is to assume a "one finger per fret" hand position, i.e if your index finger is playing the first fret, your little finger should be hovering over the fourth. With your right hand, experiment to find your own comfortable hand position but avoid strain on the wrist and try and keep your hand loose. It can be tempting to tense up but not only will this be uncomfortable, your playing will not sound as smooth as you want it to. Finally, a few words on how acoustic guitars work. Strum an open chord, and whilst this chord is ringing out place your hand flat against the body just behind the bridge. You should notice that the sound has changed slightly, becoming slightly more muffled. The top of an acoustic guitar vibrates as you play as the sound waves flow through it. If your hand or wrist is contact with the top of the guitar you are going to deaden the guitar slightly. It's also going to limit your playing. You will notice in the video that my hand is hovering over the strings and each finger is resting on the string it's about to play, or just over the string that is ringing out. Lightly touching the string with your right hand finger will stop any note ringing and in turn stop notes ringing into each other, making everything much clearer.

Boot Camp

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Fingerstyle: Introduction by Harrison Marsh

Welcome to this introduction to finger style acoustic guitar; a playing style that has found it's way into every genre of music.

Whether it be as an accompanist or solo player, finger picking is a dynamic technique without limitation.

friend with your favourite finger patterns becoming automatic; just don't get stuck in the same few patterns!

Above, and in the video, I have laid out some simple exercises reminiscent of how I got into the style, over ten years ago.

The rolling arpeggio exercise uses the conventional way of showing which fingers to use as follows PIMA. P= Thumb, I = Index , M = middle, A = ring

These exercises are designed to be fluid, giving you a chance to put your own mark on them. Once you can play them to a standard you are happy with, take the same right hand patterns and apply them to any chord sequence you like, or start mixing up the order your finger pluck the strings in. It will take some time to find the right hand position that’s most comfortable for you and to build dexterity, particularly in your ring finger, which isn't used to doing anything. Repetition and time spent with the instrument is key here. Muscle memory will be your biggest

Mixing pinching, strumming and rolling techniques will give your playing rhythmic variety and depth. Experimentation is key to having fun and getting the most out of finger style guitar. Try growing your right hand finger nails out for a little more clarity and attack. Finally, to understand more about this technique, like many others, you have to study the great players of the style, whether it be classic blues players or modern acoustic soloists. Have fun.

Boot Camp

Fingerstyle Exercises

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The Debate

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The Blues: love it or hate it? For the Blues The Blues is a fundamental part of every piece of music you listen to. All of them. And I'm going to prove it to you. First of all, let's start at the obvious. The Beatles would have got nowhere without emulating their blues influences and bringing them to the mainstream. Don't deny it, it's the truth. And the Beatles had a tiny influence on popular music, wouldn't you say? Also they covered Chuck Berry songs. I can almost rest my case there... Yes, 12-bar can be repetitive and, dare I say it, boring, but the chord structure is a key part of every style of popular music that has arisen since. You may not like Chuck Berry, but it's artists like that which shaped the music you listen to every day, from metal through to punk and back out to classic rock and prog. The rock ‘n’ roll movement changed music forever. You can’t escape it. Just like you can't escape Lady GaGa on mainstream radio, or that terrible "Friday" song being played in offices around the world EVERY FRIDAY. Even if it is "as a joke". Even these diabolical excuses for songwriting stem from the basics. Three or four chords, basic structure and a hook. Punk music is simple, raw and influential. Three words you would also use to describe the blues. Because it is the blues. Three chords based around a pentatonic scale? Definitely blues.

"Metal's based on complicated chord structures and classical influences" I hear you cry. Well could they recreate that sound without distorted guitars pioneered by early blues artists such as Chuck Berry on "Maybellene" and multi-track recording which was innovated by blues legend Les Paul? I'll help you out - the answer is no. Oh and, by the way, if you hate blues because it all sounds like Status Quo then I have no time for you. You shouldn't have even been listening to Status Quo in the first place. What's wrong with you? Anyone who uses Status Quo to back up their argument is an idiot.

Against the Blues So, the blues may be the ‘godfather’ of popular music today, and yeah sure, without the blues we would not have rock ‘n’ roll, pop, punk and metal cementing its status as the backbone of the industry for generations of listeners, but the fact that it could even be blamed for a tiny influence on Miley Cyrus is reason enough to hate it, surely?! Now, for any abuse I give the blues there will always be those who argue that the blue’s has in-

The Debate

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The Blues: love it or hate it? fluenced everything, from distorted guitar to harmonic arrangements, but just because something influenced something else does not give it any worthy notoriety. Apollo 1 influenced Apollo 11, but I would hardly consider Apollo 1 a success, would you?! Have you heard THAT new country-blues song?! Of course you have!!! We all have!!! A million times, by a million different artists who all have the same southern-American vocal tone and 12bar blues arrangement. This is what I truly hate about the blues: the repetitiveness… repetitiveness… repetitiveness. It’s like pulling teeth, but the teeth are being pulled by a man who’s hair is a little too long, jeans a little too tight and belly is hanging over said jeans a little too much. Now I know that all popular music today is repetitive, and all music has to have a sense of repetition so that it is simply not just noise, but the blues… the blues just takes repetitiveness to a whole new level. I have even gone to the effort of using the words repetitiveness and repetitive to such an excessive extent to give you the same sense of repetitive hatred that I hear each time the sound of the blues worms its way into my poor unsuspecting ears. Below I have made a list of a few songs to help put my next point across a little better. Please have a listen to the following: Chuck Berry – Johnny B Goode The Beach Boys – Fun, Fun, Fun Louis Jordon – Ain’t That Just Like a Woman Chuck Berry – Roll Over Beethoven

Now the fact that one artist is in this list twice is almost pathetic. My point is: listen to the intro of each of these songs. Each are blues artists (apart from maybe the Beach Boys’, who are in that difficult 1960’s rock/pop/blues era, but for the sake of my argument they are blues), so already a similar sound is expected, but the same intro?! They’ve not even tried to make them sound different. Lazy! The blues is lazy! If I were to take Queen’s Don’t Stop Me Now solo and use it in my song would that be OK?! No, it wouldn’t! I’d never get away with it, because it’s not my solo, and because it is already well established as a part of a very popular song. But, then again, I would not have the audacity to attempt such a feat of pure, unadulterated plagiarism. And like I said, the fact that Chuck Berry is in here twice effectively copying himself is shocking. Calling him a musician or songwriter would be a crime. This surely makes him a lyricist with an endless backing track at best. Maybe they have the blues because they’re not very creative?! Now everyone is entitled to their opinion, and I could well be a misinformed cretin (which I’m not), but if the only positive aspect of a genre is that when you go to a Status Quo concert and miss your favourite song when buying a beer you can catch it again (another 4 times) later in the set, you’re certainly not onto a winner in my eyes. Join the debate and let us know what YOU think!

So, what do you think? We’ve all got our opinions, so let’s share them! Click either the Facebook or Twitter icons and have your say :)

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Blues; Now & Then

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Blues Locations: Then and Now

For this month's Blues edition of Guitar Coach Magazine we decided to take a look at some of the famous locations and cities that birthed the Blues, and what music they're famous for now. Memphis – Let's start with Tennessee. Memphis goes hand in hand with the Blues, from the very first Blues sheet music. “The Memphis Blues” was written down by W.C. Handy in 1912 and it has been the cradle for all blues music since. Some icons include B.B King and the entire call list of Sun Records. Today it is widely known as the birthplace of Justin Timberlake. Chicago – Became the birth place of the modern day electric blues from 1948. Now it is the driving force behind America's heavy metal scene. Montreux Jazz Festival started in 1967 for the likes of Ella Fitzgerald. Gary Moore, Eric Clapton and Deep Purple, who wrote “Smoke On The Water” there in 1971. Now it plays host to Queens of the Stone Age and even Wyclef Jean in 2009. New York - New York Blues was a type of blues music heavily influenced by jazz. It made New York a centre for folk rock music from the likes of Bob Dylan, new wave punk from the Ramones and the Velvet Underground.

Seattle – Played host to a huge Big Band scene in the 1940's, have since spawned Nirvana and Death Cab for Cutie. Great Britain – The U.K. first got to know Blues as a result of records being brought in through the dockyards and trade ships. Hitting it's peak in the 1960's and 70's with the likes of the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin and Eric Clapton. It's good to see the genre is alive and well today with acts such as Seasick Steve and the Jim Jones Revue. Detroit – With a strong blues scene in the 40's and 50's led by the bars and clubs of Hastings Street, it spawned the influence on R'n'B which led to Motown Records. Today, Detroit's son Jack White brings blues into the 21st Century with his bands the White Stripes and the Raconteurs. Los Angeles -  L.A. had a thriving blues community in the 30's and 40's. It has since exploded into a variety of genres, influenced by film, punk, metal and hip hop. Los Angeles has produced a fine array of bands ranging from The Doors, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Guns 'n' Roses and Sublime - to name but a few.

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Join me for a Special Webinar:

“The Magic Of Improvisation”

To register, just tap the button below Register Here: It’s FREE!

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Coaching session – Blues Improvisation

Coaching

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Your 20 Minute Coaching Session

Improvisation: Open minor pentatonic This month, Andy is going to introduce you to the art of improvisation. This particular session introduces you to the E minor pentatonic scale in the open position.

This particular session introduces you to the E minor pentatonic scale in the open position i.e. using the open strings wherever possible, and demonstrates the notes you can use to enable you to begin your improvisation journey. A level of scale knowledge is essential when learning how to improvise. We have had bucket loads of requests on this topic, which is why we have decided to produce a whole series of improvisation lessons, starting with this overview.

There is also a downloadable backing track for you to jam along with, so you can experiment with playing notes over the top, at your own pace. Next month, we will be using the same backing track to show you some techniques and lick suggestions you can use, that will enable you to start building up your improvisation tool kit. Hope you enjoy.

The notes of the Em Pentatonic Images from Guitar Toolkit (click an image for details on this App)

Coaching

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Improvisation: Blues Riff Improv session

Your Backing Track

“The Magic Of Improvisation” Enjoy this Free teaching Webinar with Andy Partridge of BandJammer.

Free Webinar: Register Here! The backing track chords: Emaj, Amaj and Bmaj Images from Guitar Toolkit (click an image for details on this App)

Guitar Chords

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Chord of the Month: D9 It’s strage isn’t it? A few days ago we were thinking what weird, perhaps complex, unusual chord should feature for this month. Should it have a long name? Should you have to use 4 fingers and a thumb to be able play it? Could we find one that had featured in some far out wacky seventies progressive rock album? Well – no. Because this issue of Guitar Coach is focusing on the blues our minds turned immediately towards a 9th chord. D9 in fact. Mainly because the key of D is one of the easier blues keys to master and therefore quite common for those of us who are starting out on our guitar journey. It also has an interesting shape when played in the open position. We will not be going into the theory aspect of 9ths, but we will be more than happy to answer any questions if you want to use the FAQ section of the magazine.

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The D9 Chord

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9th chords are known as extended chords (as are 6ths, 11ths and 13ths) and are commonly used throughout the funk, jazz and blues genres. Although we are concentrating on D9, the inversions of the chord can be applied to all 9th chords by moving the chord shape up and down the fretboard by understanding where the root note is fretted.

The 9th shape that we will focus our efforts on is shown below: The notes that make up the chord are: A string – D D string - F# G string – C B string – E Top E string - A When played using this shape, the root note is always on the A string – in this case the D (root note) is on the 5th fret. You can therefore move this shape anywhere on the fretboard to form other 9ths. When the chord is played this way it exudes a mellow blues sound and is commonly used at the end of a phrase within a song by sliding down from the fret above. For example, the 6th fret (Eb9) to the D9 chord. To illustrate this, we have used the D9 chord in one of the riffs in this month’s issue. You can see this illustrated and watch, listen and learn the intro to Sugar Mama by Nine Below. Similarly, many a song has been known to end using this sequence. The Doors’ Roadhouse Blues uses the F9 to E9 slide down to finish off their masterpiece and it is a great way to end a song that has been bursting with energy throughout. The slide down brings an apt calmness and finality to proceedings without cutting off everything with an immediate stop. Whoever first thought of this is a genius. If you are playing a standard 12 bar in the key of D usng the major chords D…A…G try substituting these majors for 9ths and you will achieve a totally different feel that is less edgy and feels more rounded and moody. Especially if you slow the tempo down.

Guitar Chords

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Chord of the Month: D9 Also try this chord sequence G7-C9-D9. Either in that order or as part of a slow 12 bar blues, each for a count of 4 i.e. G7 G7 G7 G7 C9 C9 G7 G7 D9 C9 G7 D9 (Letting the last chord ring and then repeat) The extra texture the 9th chords give the sequence is very noticeable when compared to the G7. The other great sound you can achieve with this shape can be achieved by plucking the A string, followed by the D, G and B strings and then returning back to the A string in reverse order. Andy teaches this as an aside after The Nine

Below Zero riff lesson – so have a listen and you will see exactly what we mean. Of course, as mentioned earlier in this article, other genres of music also make use of the 9th chord played in the position of the 1st chord diagram. To “get to know” your D9 chord it is important to use it in context with other chords. Examples you may like to check out are Shining Start by Earth Wind and Fire (C9, D9 and E9), Wheels by The Foo Fighters (D9, A, F#M, E) and last but not least, James Joseph Brown’s classic, Living in America (Bm, Am7 and D9).

Here are some other ways of playing a D9. The images are courtesy of Guitar Toolkit. Check out Issue 1 of Guitar Coach for the full review of this great App.

Tap here to check out Guitar Toolkit

Feature

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Jimmy Dillon: musician, songwriter, teacher by Graham Land

“Have fun with it” – The SF, California professional guitarist shares his wisdom or learning, becoming inspired and staying motivated

Background & Theory San Francisco Bay area guitarist Jimmy Dillon is an accomplished and award-winning musician, singer, songsmith and teacher with an impressive record. Jimmy backed up the likes of Bruce Springsteen, John Lee Hooker, B.B. King, Carlos Santana and Bonnie Raitt, among many others before embarking on a solo career and recording 4 CDs to date. A quick listen to just a small sampling of his repertoire reveals an eclectic mix of blues, rock, country and Latin styles. Just a glance at his homepage makes it clear that this guy is one active musician who continues to play a constant stream of solo and group gigs. Jimmy is also a passionate guitar teacher with a series of DVD lessons for acoustic, electric, blues and slide guitar. He spends his summers teaching kids how to play rock and roll at Blue Star Music Camps in Michigan and San Francisco and gives online lessons as well. Jimmy offers the following advice to aspiring guitarists who are struggling to learn:

“Don't struggle too much. Have fun with it. Get with some better players and listen as much as you play. Remember the 4 T's – Touch,Tone, Time and Taste. Play with finesse, passion and melodic sense. Don't worry too much about speed, scales, shred[ing]. Rather, make it count. Be a good rhythm player. 'Lead guitar' is so overdone.” We couldn't agree more. And for budding guitarists who may be seeking motivation, Jimmy recommends going to see live musicians for inspiration and mixing up what styles of music they expose themselves to. He believes this will help those learning guitar to “cross-pollinate” and “get out of the box.”

Influences and Favourites Among his favourite guitarists, Jimmy lists iconic names like Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Mark Knopfler, Keith Richards (“Keef Riffhard”), John Mayer and Pete Townsend, plus a slough of other guitarists both well known and well... perhaps a bit esoteric to the casual guitar player or guitar music fan: David Lindley, Derek Trucks, Buddy Miller, Harry Manx, Richard Thompson and slide guitarists Sonny Landreth, Ry Cooder and Leo Kottke. He's also equally forthcoming about his preferred instruments: “Clapton Strat with acoustic Baggs [pickup] in bridge. It does everything well. Martin OMC – workhorse, always reliable, great tone and playability. National Style O – super funky blues machine. Veillette Gryphon mini 12-string – beautiful for extra chimey stuff. James Trussart Silver Magnolia – great for electric slide. 1920s Chicago parlor guitar – incredible tone.”

Feature

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Jimmy Dillon: musician, songwriter, teacher About Jimmy Dillon's Rockin' the Blues Deluxe DVD course With his latest instructional DVD, Jimmy shares his secrets for playing the blues, from inventive chords, picking patterns, licks and tricks to open tunings, “internal melodies” and slide guitar techniques – all professional, yet “easy to use”. The Rockin' the Blues Deluxe course has been designed to suit advanced beginner guitarists as well as intermediate to advanced players who would like to lean more blues or incorporate it into playing other music styles. Jimmy sees blues guitar as the foundation for rock guitar. “I wanted to illustrate how the blues is the roots and the rest is the fruits. If you can get soulful and gritty with the blues, your rock will be better for it. Consider Clapton, Keith [Richards], Jimmy Page, Hendrix, [Jeff] Beck etc. – they were all blues informed.”

When teaching, Jimmy likes to keep things relaxed. “For me the journey is always changing….If I stay loose and free with it things go well. Not too rigid or pedantic.” A guitar teacher of 10 years, his favourite part of teaching is when the student experiences a breakthrough. “I like when there is an 'ah ha' moment and the student gets [it]. Often I learn as much as the student!” He adds, “My wish is to pass on what I've learned as a lifetime pro musician to aspiring players everywhere.” You can visit Jimmy Dillon's homepage jimmydillon.com for more information and to buy his music or DVDs. If you've got Spotify you can check out some of his solo CDs there as well as his work with San Francisco Music Club. Jimmy also recommends online guitar community www.guitarists.net for its “great vibe”.

Teaching Style The course consists of three one-hour DVDs, each containing 3-4 chapters. Jimmy uses his own songs as a platform to demonstrate blues techniques and styles. He believes that DVDs are a great teaching tool because they can be carefully crafted in order to make them just right. The student benefits from this care and the fact that he/she can revisit the lessons again and again.

Tap here for Rockin The Blues

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Skills & Techniques – Blues strumming: Johnny Cash

Skills & Techniques

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Skills: String Muting, Picking and Strumming Folsom Prison Blues Learning to strum is one of the first hurdles beginners will need to overcome. It can prove to be a frustration of many a guitarist , so it is always beneficial to keep such lessons interesting by learning patterns to specific songs. This particular strumming pattern is relatively easy to play, employs a couple of interesting techniques and, most of all is lively and fun! Folsom Prison Blues is an archetypal Johnny Cash rhythm and is there to hear on many of his classic recordings. It is a simple down, down up pattern played at a relatively high tempo, although not all the strings are always played and, to emphasise the rhythm, you can employ a softening technique with your left hand so the notes do not

sound. This creates a percussive-type sound which gives the pattern a level of distinctiveness. Not playing all the notes of a chord is a common technique employed by rhythm guitarists and it is worth trying this out for other patterns. Want to see more? Have a look at the video.

Skills & Techniques

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Skills: String Muting, Picking and Strumming

Addition Here’s the detail on how to play the ending to the strumming session :)

The Chords Chord digrams are taken from the Guitar Toolkit App. Click on one of the images for more details of this App.

E major

A major

B7

Feature

Nils Lofgren: Part 2 of our interview By Bob Cianci

Springsteen sideman/solo artist expounds further on his teaching/playing theories and more One-on-One vs. Online Teaching: As we learned in Part I of this article, Nils Lofgren’s online guitar school has been a solid success for the diminutive guitarist, best known as a sideman with Neil Young, and Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, as well as a solo artist of considerable merit. When asked to compare learning guitar face-to-face with a teacher versus online, Lofgren had this to say. “Sitting down one-on-one with somebody, which I have done, is nice, and it’s a great way to share, as opposed to not sharing. Sometimes when you’re with a teacher, he dictates the flow, and sometimes he’s going too fast for you. The nice thing about the online lessons, once it’s downloaded, and I encourage people to do this is, find a

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Feature

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Nils Lofgren: Part 2 of our interview play for the biggest audiences of his career. Since then, he has played a supporting role in the band, but the sometimes-spontaneous Springsteen occasionally throws a curve ball, like the night he gave Lofgren an unexpected extended solo on “Because The Night,” something we discussed in Part I of this article. “I started working on a solo for that song in my room at night, and sure enough, for the next forty shows, I never got to play the solo again! After the tour ended, we did some charity Christmas shows in New Jersey and Bruce asked me what I wanted to play. I did one of my songs, ‘Shine Silently,” and when Bruce asked me what I wanted to do for a second song, I said, ‘I want to play ‘Because The Night’ and play the solo on it!’ So, then I got to play this long piece I worked on. For the next tour, years later, I got to play the solo every night, crafting it, refining it, and experimenting. Some of it is tough for my hands, but every guitarist has some kind of physical limitations.”

lick you like, then shut me off! Work on that, and that may be the rest of your day. You don’t need to turn me back on. Just silence the teacher and really get into that one little lick. “Find things that engage and excite you. I’m a big fan of American football and basketball, and there are guitars all over the house. I learned a long time ago, if the guitars are in a closet or off in my studio, I won’t pick one up. But I have them around among the furniture, and will pick them up to play while I’m watching sports on TV.”

Playing With Bruce: Lofgren admittedly went through a self-described “blue period” in the ‘80’s, and jumped at the opportunity to join the New Jersey rocker’s E Street band, just after Born In The USA was released. That album skyrocketed Springsteen to the top of the charts internationally, and allowed Lofgren to

Out of curiosity, I went to Lofgren’s website and watched a clip of the aforementioned solo, and was suitably impressed with the sheer physicality and artistry of Lofgren’s technique, as he employed extreme bends, deft harmonics, fast-fingered triplets and straight ahead shredding. Always being a very animated stage presence, Nils capped off his solo with a forward somersault and spins. Trust me, it’s impressive.

Fab Gear: Lofgren has always favored Fender guitars, although he’s been known to pick up a vintage ’52 Les Paul Goldtop, a Telecaster, and a Rickenbacker on occasion. His main axe is a ’61 pre-CBS Stratocaster-he has another as a spare-with replacement pickups and the finish stripped to natural wood. With Bruce, Nils straps on Fender Jazzmasters with heavy gauge 13-56 strings, and also uses a Gretsch Black Penguin or Black Falcon on occasion. He uses and endorses Takamine acoustics, and also treasures an old Martin given to him by Neil Young years ago. Lofgren uses Fender amps

Feature

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Nils Lofgren: Part 2 of our interview on the road exclusively; currently two Twin Reverbs, although he has also used Vibro Kings and Super Reverbs.

Present & Future: Nils Lofgren is a proactive exponent of self marketing. His website, www.nilslofgren.com, is a treasure trove of information that lists all his activities, as well as everything the guitarist offers for sale, including recordings, online teaching courses and various merchandise. A new project Lofgren is excited about these days is, Blind Date Jam, a concept that sprang up over the years based upon very casual and informal downtime jams among musicians. Lofgren realized that us average folk never get to hear some of this oftentimes memorable and spontaneous music. The concept was to plan nothing in advance. Bring your instrument, and whatever happens “happens,” as they say. The first edition of Blind Date Jam is available for sale on Nils’ website, as one might expect, and features Lofgren jamming with pedal steel guitarist Mike Smith. The music is highly inspired and quite moving.

The new Album The new album, Old School, covers a variety of topics including desperation, self-doubt, true love, departed friends, holding on to your dreams and the world gone mad... along with a tribute to the late, great Ray Charles.

"These songs reflect characters with some radical feelings and beliefs," states Lofgren. "They're definitely thought-provoking." "Old School has many different types of songs and feels... some rough, bluesy tracks to haunting acoustic songs," continues Lofgren. "There's some interesting and controversial characters in these songs and I look forward to everyone's reaction." The album is available directly from his web site www.nilslofgren.com

From a 2009 interview written by this author and published in Premier Guitar, Lofgren summed it all up.

“If you find yourself challenged, frustrated and pushing yourself to learn to play, don’t forget to enjoy the gift of music. It has to be fun, too. I find myself consciously separating myself from all the hard work simply to enjoy playing music, and I do it on a regular basis.” by Bob Cianci.

Tap Here To Visit www.NilsLofgren.com

Guitar Coach Magazine 28

Guitars & Gizmos – Guitar Top 10’s; Covers – Guitar Apps; Garage Band – Nick Benjamin, Luthier

Guitar Top 10’s

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Top 10 covers: that are (debatably) better than the original! by Ben Vine

Me First and The Gimme Gimmes – Hello http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oI0d-kOxb4A

Starting this list we have an explosive punk cover of “Hello” by Lionel Richie. Me First and The Gimme Gimmes are a punk cover superband with members from NOFX, Lagwagon and Foo Fighters, and approach the track with the same tongue in cheek ferocity that has earned them a huge cult following. The guitar solo that comes out of nowhere and three part harmonies at the end deserve special mentions.

contributed massively to song choices on the whole of the American IV: The Man Comes Around album. The track, which was one of the final releases before Cash died in 2003, received huge critical acclaim and is now seen as one of his best recordings. Trent Reznor himself, although at first wary of the idea of Johnny Cash covering the song, described himself as “deeply moved” when he first heard it.

White Stripes - I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVN_h7zO54k

The Specials – A Message To You, Rudy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cntvEDbagAw

Jack White is famous for his blues and soul influences, with his other projects such as The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather bringing dirty delta blues back to the forefront of the music scene. However, The White Stripes are also well known for their country, soul and blues influence. Their cover of Dolly Parton's “Jolene”, which is regularly played in their live sets, almost made it onto this list. However the Burt Bacharach/Dusty Springfield classic “I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself” holds it's own on a great album that includes the classic “Seven Nation Army”.

The Specials debut album opened with this cover of Dandy Livingstone's rocksteady hit, and the single went straight into the UK top ten. The heavy influence of ska and reggae on the British punk scene was highlighted by the two tone movement and The Specials led the way with direct covers of reggae bands such as Toots and the Maytals and Prince Buster also featuring on the same album. “A Message To You, Rudy” was the most prolific and is undoubtably more well known than the original.

Johnny Cash – Hurt http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmVAWKfJ4Go

Trent Reznor's song “Hurt” is widely believed to be about self harm and society, but in 2005 the Nine Inch Nails track was propelled to new heights as it was covered by the legendary Johnny Cash. The cover was chosen by producer Rick Rubin who

Children Of Bodom – Oops I Did It Again http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGtXlBbWeB4

Children Of Bodom are a finnish death metal band. Covering Britney Spears. I think these two sentences are more than enough to allow them a place in this list.

Guitar Top 10’s

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Top 10 covers: that are (debatably) better than the original! The Beatles – Twist and Shout

Nirvana – Where Did You Sleep Last Night

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgd46QiHz4I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcXYz0gtJeM

“Twist and Shout” was originally a release for R&B band the Top Notes, but the production of the song by Phil Spector was despised by the song's writer Bert Berns. As way of revenge, Berns produced the second version by the Isley Brothers. Only a year later The Beatles recorded their version for their UK debut album Please, Please Me. Their version made it into the US single charts twice, both in 1964 and 1986, off the back of the film Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Surprisingly this makes it the longest running US Top 40 hit for The Beatles with a total of 23 weeks. John Lennon's voice deserves a special mention as one of the finest early rock vocal performances.

In 1993 Nirvana visited MTV's studio to record an unplugged episode with all their well known hits. However they ended the set with an American Folk song called "In The Pines". Rebranded as "Where Did You Sleep Last Night", the track is possibly the single most amazing vocal performance Kurt Cobain ever gave. Recorded just five months before he died, it is seen by many as his final performance, with the screamed final verse sending shivers down the spines of the most hardened rockers to this day.

Alien Ant Farm – Smooth Criminal http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDl9ZMfj6aE

In 2001 Alien Ant Farm burst onto the scene with their cover of the Michael Jackson classic “Smooth Criminal”. They quickly left the scene again after failing to make their second album gain any attention, but they left us with this explosive pop punk cover. The driving guitars, finger tapped solo and intermittent Jacksonesque shouts, this track is definitely a legacy they can be proud of. Even if there's nothing else. And there isn't.

Muse – Feeling Good http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOEZMjuoIEY

“Feeling Good”, originally made famous by Nina Simone, was covered by Muse in 2001. The neoprog band made the song their own using their classical music influences to form the track into a masterpiece. Now probably played more often than any other version on the song in film, TV and on radio, a true testament to how a cover version can be done just right.

Jimi Hendrix – All Along The Watchtower http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AuxJH2Mj30

We considered not including this song as it’s so common on "greatest covers" lists. However, when the original artist admits its better than their own and changes the way they play the song from that day onwards, it's hard to ignore it. It's also hard to forget exactly what Hendrix did with the song, as its so well known now. He took the original, rehashed it, changed the way it was sung, added ridiculous guitar solos and then shoved what was left through a psychedelic wormhole. What comes out the other side is a different song and a brave interpretation for a fan so enamoured with Dylan, he used to keep one of his guitar songbooks in his gig bag at all times.

Guitar Apps

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App of the Month: GarageBand by Tom Rosier

Now I don’t think that the inclusion of this app is a surprise to anyone, and it may even be an app that you have used in the past.

GarageBand’. This feature allows you to pick from a multitude of instruments and place them within an XY axis of volume and complexity, which edits the volume and complexity (obviously) of the samples selected. This can allow you to create a backing track for your audio in a matter of seconds. Great for when an idea comes to you quickly and you want something to back it up to give you an idea of what the finished article could sound like, and has high enough quality audio samples to actually be the finished article if you so wanted.

GarageBand is multi-track recording software which will allow you to record you guitar playing to create songs

But I certainly think that it is important enough in the iOS environment to deserve a mention, and a quick scan over some of the features you may not be aware of.

Tap here to check out this App

In basic terms, GarageBand is a DAW (or digital audio workstation), a program for recording live audio and MIDI data into a program for mixing, but the latest update for GarageBand is a multitude of products rolled into one, but for the purpose of this review I will try and place emphasis on the guitar-specific features. Firstly, as stated above, GarageBand is multi-track recording software which will allow you to record you guitar playing to create songs, which is not only beneficial for song writing, but also tracking your process as you learn guitar. The quality of the audio input is surprisingly high and the depth into which you can edit your audio is pleasing to say the least. Now not all of us have the opportunity to play with a band, or indeed the time. GarageBand has a fantastic feature that is aptly named ‘Magic

It then has the Smart Guitar feature, which allows you to pick from the following styles of guitar (Acoustic, Classic Clean, Hard Rock or Roots Rock guitar), which are all loosely emulated versions of everyone’s favourite guitar tones. This feature is actually very cool. Using the iPad’s touch screen you can play the notes of your chosen chord vertically, ensuring that you’re always in tune. This can also be recorded into the multi-track recording section of the App, meaning you can layer up your parts and really get your track sounding the way you want it. The Guitar Amp is probably the most interesting addition the GarageBand app. It’s a truly brilliant

Guitar Apps

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App of the Month: Guitar Toolkit idea. 20+ guitar amp emulations in the palm of your hand. You will require hardware like the Amplitube iRig or Alesis iO Dock to take advantage of this, but when connected the sound possibilities are endless. There is no other way you could even comprehend having an amp collection like this in your house, and the emulations really are of very good quality for what they are, and each with dedicated controls to get your sound just right. You even have an output using both of these devices, so if you really did want to, you could use these amps as an input into different recording software. Not strictly necessary, but very handy if you wanted to take your recordings to the next level in terms of audio quality.

piece of recording software that will do you nothing but favours, and the flow of the app is splendid. For $4.99 I can’t really see where you can go wrong on this one!

Garage Band is not only a great tool - it’s also great fun creating new sound setups with a range of amps and effects pedals.

Along with these features, the GarageBand App also comes with a chromatic guitar tuner, which is always handy and means that you don’t have to leave the app to go to another tuning app that you may have installed. Not a great tuner, but not a bad one either. It does the job! A nice little touch within the app, is that once a mixdown of the track is complete, you can share it amongst your friends on a multitude of social media platforms. So you can show your friends how much you’re improving and rub your abilities in their face a little. Again, not a completely necessary feature, but a nice touch nonetheless. The last feature I am going to look at in GarageBand (though there are many more I could go over) is the Jam Session feature. Brilliant idea. It is a little bit of a shame that it works over Bluetooth instead of wi-fi, but a step in the right direction for sure. The Jam Session feature lets you jam with someone using the app via Bluetooth, meaning that you can be playing and recording separate instruments and work on arrangements of songs together, and the beauty of it is that you can have up to four people in the session at any one time. Overall this app has come on leaps and bounds since its first version, and at present it really is ahead of the curve in terms of iPad recording. Combined with the iRig or iO Dock you also have a

Value for money: Functionality: Ease of use: Looks: Total:

Tap Here For Details Of Garage Band

Guitar Maker

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Engineer and artist: acoustic guitar maker Nick Benjamin

Luthier Nick Benjamin is, in many ways, a true traditional artisan when it comes to making handmade, custom and individual guitars. The label “limited edition” falls far short of describing what is produced in Nick's small, oneman workshop in an old brewery in the town of Lewes, southeast England. Armed with an engineering degree, Nick approaches guitar making like an engineer, as well as a musician and craftsman: “I think of myself as an engineer […] but the sound is an artistic choice.” Customers should find this combination assuring. He further explains that both “accuracy and quality is what I'm looking for in the way I'm building.” According to Nick's homepage, the historic town of Lewes “is unusual in the world of guitar making in that a small 'community' of makers exists here; each working separately but supporting one another and sharing ideas.” Nick averages around one guitar per month (though he makes six at once – you do the math!) and to date has only made about 130 instruments. Each of them unique. Coming from a family of designers, engineers and

musicians (his mother was a flautist), Nick built his first guitar, a classical model, in 1990 at the age of 17 in his bedroom at his parents' house. After honing his skills on more classical as well as electric guitars, he moved on to steel stringed models, using what he had learned under the tutelage of two local guitar makers. For those beginning guitar making, Nick explains that the traditional Spanish construction style can be an ideal starting point, due to its efficient style requiring few tools. The progression to modern methods of guitar construction generally involves the adoption of many specialist tools and fixtures: the steel-string guitar, in particular, requiring additional neck reinforcing inserts which necessitate at least some use of power tools. Making six guitars at once, Nick finds, is the perfect method. “when I make six guitars they're all different, but I do each process on all six at once. I actually find this improves the quality of the instruments.”

And who exactly is buying Benjamin guitars? Nick's customers are mostly keen amateur players in search of a different guitar with a unique sound, as well as professional guitarists who de-

Guitar Maker

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Engineer and artist: acoustic guitar maker Nick Benjamin Photos: The Benjamin JOM77 with unique scoop design. Newton Faulkner on stage at Glastonberry playing his Benjamin.

pend on simple, work-ready instruments of very high quality. Though authentic and traditional, the modern acoustic guitar needs to be able to be played anywhere from the living room to the arena stage, so Benjamin guitars are designed and built to be extremely compatible with amplification so that they sound great plugged in or fully acoustic. Besides standard steel string models, Nick offers baritones, twelve strings, Terz (smaller, higher tuned), nylon string guitars, Venetian cutaway and the signature “Benjamin Scoop” cutaway models, among others.

Why choose a unique, handmade guitar? Nick is not trying to reach an exclusive or elite market, but instead offers a personal experience to his customers. Acquiring a Benjamin guitar is like going on a journey. There is the element of the unknown – not in terms of quality, but of precise characteristics. There is the anticipation, choosing the woods, model and decoration schemes, interacting with the maker – and that's just the pleasure of the process. At the end the customer gets a beautiful guitar. “It's a double sort of pleasure, if you like,” Nick explains. In an age of mass production and uniformity, he firmly believes that a musical instrument is something that can still be very personal.

tional woods for guitar making, “a symptom of deforestation and the overuse of resources,” according to Nick. But these “newer” woods can be extremely close to traditional timbers in terms of sound and colour, as well as offer some great qualities of their own. American black walnut and cocobolo rosewood are some of Nick's favourite additions to his arsenal of tropical rosewoods, ebonies and spruces. Sustainability, if you'll pardon the obvious pun, is key to the future of acoustic guitar making. Properties of the wood are crucial. An average acoustic guitar will have a soundboard made of a soft wood like spruce or cedar, which are light and strong timbers. The main body – the back and sides – should be strong and dense, providing weight and strength, making rosewood, mahogany and walnut ideal woods. Different weights of wood can be used to create different sounds, ranging from deep and dark to light and airy. The neck of the guitar needs to be strong and is usually mahogany due to its strength, stability, sound and the fact that it's easy to carve, whereas the bridges and fingerboard have to be hard and are therefore usually ebony or sometimes rosewood.

Some notes about wood use:

Keep in mind when buying a custom ordered, unique handmade acoustic steel stringed Benjamin guitar you are paying for something special, personal and worth the wait. Nick's prices start at £4,000 (the cost of materials plus a month's skilled labour and workshop rental). Fancy taking a journey?

Luthiers are now being forced to use non tradi-

http://www.benjaminguitars.co.uk/

And what makes a guitar unique? The main differences lie in the choice of wood, instrument size, shape, features, etc., but all of Nick's guitars sound like a Benjamin.

Feature

Eugene “Hideaway” Bridges:

Blues Road Warrior “Let the blues be blues. Get to understand it. Take time to learn before you try to change what ain’t broken.”

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Feature

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Blues Road Warrior Rising blues star credits father for education & inspiration Guitarist Eugene “Hideaway” Bridges, a native of New Orleans, with seven albums to his credit and three recent nominations from the Blues Foundation, lives the life of a nomadic musician, traveling throughout the United States, Europe and Australia, spreading the blues gospel far and wide. The 49year old son of bluesman Hideaway Slim, is distantly related to Tina Turner, formerly known as Anna Mae Bullock. “I got my guitar skills form the Bridges, and my voice from the Bullocks,” says Eugene.

“I remember when I was two years old singing myself to sleep to the sound of things my daddy would play. The riffs he played were always in my head, so one day, I took my plastic spade and put elastic bands on it. My dad saw that, so he set me down and placed his guitar in my hands and started to show me a honky-tonk riff, and that was my start. I looked within myself to find other sounds that were in my head. “Daddy showed me the Jimmy Reed riff and what you call the 1-4-5 card in blues. We called it your 1st, 2nd and 3rd change and the open E tuned guitar, and that was the end of my guitar class! I was two, about to turn three when I played back up for him. Along the way, you see things and do things that are a real good teacher in life. I always played what was inside me that was needing to come out. I was blessed with this music, and you can’t learn this from a school or a teacher. Someone cannot teach to you. It is in you, or it is not. “Daddy led by talking to me about life. To be a good leader, you must learn how to follow and hear what the song is saying to you, what the singer is trying to say, and play that together. When I was seven, daddy says to me, ‘Are you

gonna’ practice?’ I said to him, “I know how to play my guitar.” He said, OK, play your guitar, now play something different, and on and on like that. Real soon, I run out of things to play! “He said, ‘See. You don’t know it all. Take that guitar and put it away. Don’t touch it until I tell you.’ I had the ‘Big Head’ at seven years old! If he didn’t stop me, I would have been walking around today thinking I am the greatest! Daddy was teaching me that I knew something and it was good, even great, but I did not know it all. He was teaching me to always learn, always keep looking, keep paying attention, as there’s so much to learn, but only if you open your mind.” The elder Bridges continued to use his common sense technique to educate his son in positive ways. “Daddy would teach me to listen to the sounds. Let the guitar talk to you and to the people. I used my guitar to say what life was saying to me, to hear what the singer was saying, and finding a way to accompany that. You have to find it yourself and earn it yourself.”

Feature

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Blues Road Warrior

The Church Influence: Like the vast majority of African-American musicians, Eugene’s father was influenced by the gospel music and sermons he heard in church. His family belonged to the First Church of God in Christ in New Orleans, and Bridges senior found inspiration in the guitar playing and singing of Reverend Utah Smith. “Daddy played like Elder Smith, and I played just like daddy. Names like B.B. King, Jimmy Reed, TBone Walker and Lightnin’ Hopkins was all just names to me as a boy. Daddy would play the records and learn from them, and when I heard daddy play, it was full of these guys, but putting himself into it. This is how people say I sound like B.B. King when I never played a B.B. King song. “B.B. King was the guy that had a way of teaching without even knowing he was teaching. B.B. set a way of having many people on one stage working together. I would not only see the forest, but the tree and all the parts; how the drummer is the

time keeper, how the bass holds a dedicated groove, how guitar, horns and keys work together, each doing his own job to make that sound full and real.”

Today’s Blues Scene: The life of a traveling blues musician has never been easy and it’s no different today, as the blues has a tendency to exist in hills and valleys of popularity. Many would say it is way down in the valley right now, with other types of music taking precedent.

“A popularity contest is the first thing that comes to me, and that is why I have to let the music speak for itself. I will only play for the ones who want the real music and not the games. I am so sick of the haves and have-nots game. What you put in is what you get out. If a gimmick is what the people want, then there’s a lot to go and see, but if my music is something that speaks to you in any way, I will only play where my music is welcomed.”

Feature

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Blues Road Warrior Eugene’s latest album: Rock And A Hard Place

Many blues players have complained that getting work is harder and harder and drawing crowds has gotten tougher over the last several years. “In the USA? I wouldn’t know. (Bridges spends most of his time playing out of the USA-author). I hear some of the bands talk about people and having money troubles is a big reason, but I was signed on a record label when I went to France in 1995, and agents have me working all over the place. “Blues and hip-hop is all the same. Between the 1950’s and 2012, the beats have changed, but if you write down the stories to a blues song and words to a hip-hop song, you’ll see they are saying the same thing. You can’t just drop in and sing the blues or hip-hop and get away with it. You have to live it to understand it, be a part of it, and then, you must have something to say once you get in the door.”

The Blues Evolves: Lots of critics talk about the blues evolving, but Eugene has other ideas. “Blues is what it is. It doesn’t need to evolve. If you don’t like it, don’t buy it or listen to it. You can’t take an old Ford truck and turn it into something shiny and flash it out and make it fit what you think someone wants to do with it. Let the blues be blues. Get to understand it. Take time to learn before you try to change what ain’t broken.” By Bob Cianci. Photos by Alwyn Coates

Get Details Of The Album Here

Our Survey

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Riffs, Licks & Solos – Blues Brothers, Sweet Home Chicago – Robert Cray, Phone Booth – JJ Cale, Call Me The Breeze – 9 Below Zero, Sweet Mama

Riffs, Licks & Solos

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Blues Brothers: Sweet Home Chicago Written by Robert Johnson and released in August 1937, this song has been recorded by countless artists.

The intro to the song has also had many versions, but Andy has chosen to teach the one released by The Blues Brothers, with the guitar being played by the late, great Steve Cropper.

The Riff. Its greatness is not its simplicity, more the way the double stops, vibrato and pauses effortlessly link into one another, making it immediately memorable. It can be employed as a generic riff to countless other 12 bar blues songs and so will help you enormously when jamming with others. Just make sure you play it in the right key!!!!

The sound. I believe this is one riff that sounds great clean and bereft of effects. But, like all these things, do what you want with it once you’ve mastered all the small parts and can put your own stamp on it.

Riffs, Licks & Solos

Blues Brothers: Sweet Home Chicago

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Riffs, Licks & Solos

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Robert Cray: Phone Booth Now this isn’t a riff, it is the beginning of Robert Cray’s beautifully played solo from his hit Phone Booth

Why Choose This?

The Sound

Andy really wanted to bring you something different and, in just a couple of bars, you can make out the distinct Robert Cray soloing style. This particular solo is played over the A minor pentatonic scale but has a unique feel all of its own, using pauses and vibrato amongst the “clipped” way some of the notes are played. It is something new to learn and takes you off the main highway to, hopefully, experience and learn something slightly diverse, but bluesy all the same.

I’d keep it as clean as possible, perhaps with some gain control. If you have a strat, you’re halfway there already. If not, experiment away!!!

Difficulty Probably the most challenging of this month’s riff videos. But it will show you what you can do with a basic scale – even though it is only a taster to the complete solo

Riffs, Licks & Solos

Robert Cray: Phone Booth

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Riffs, Licks & Solos

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JJ Cale: Call Me The Breeze Why J.J.Cale? As you have probably gathered, Andy is a massive J.J.Cale fan, which has prompted him to give you a brief insight into the type of riff he plays in between lines when he is not singing. Known for his great touch, feel and timing, J.J. Cale manages to project an almost laziness to his playing whilst still making it have passion, often with jazzy overtones. Many a guitarist can reproduce the notes, but not in the same way that characterizes his style.

What will this riff give me?

How will it help my playing?

This one small riff is played after the first line of the first verse has been sung and variations of the same “set of notes” all played with a different emphasis occur throughout the song. What is important is the way he emphasizes gaps, plays notes when you least expect them and most of all, when he chooses not to play at all.

It is in the key of F# but, like most blues patterns, it is easily transposed to other keys. As far as this riff is concerned, learn it with the video and then play along with the whole song, adding your own variations by using the same notes but playing less or more of them, adding in pauses and, of course, in a different order. This really is a fun thing to do and will develop your jamming and ability to improvise.

Riffs, Licks & Solos

JJ Cale: Call Me The Breeze

Meolody Line tab

Lead Lick tab

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Riffs, Licks & Solos

9 Below Zero: Sugar Mama Who recorded it? Nine Below Zero are an English Blues band who were at their height in popularity in the early 1980s but continue gigging to this day, having built up a cult following throughout Europe.

Sugar Mama is a departure from their normally hi-energy style, but is an introductory riff that the majority of us would consider pure blues.

The Riff This is a particularly great riff to learn if you are apt at both singing and playing – especially on your own. It can easily be transposed to any key and is full of simple hammer ons, pull off and slides. The end of the riff ends with a sliding chord (Eb9 to D9) again, a classic blues “move” and rolls effortlessly into the verse. The techniques used in the riff itself are not too difficult to master; the key here is being able to

learn the structure of the riff and remembering the changes. Once you have learned it, use it as a warm up before you start playing – whether that be at a gig or in the comfort of your own home – because it won’t stretch your fingers too much, but will definitely get the blood flowing through your veins.

Sound For gigging, give your guitar a tiny bit of gain, distortion and reverb, to try and imitate the sound of Dennis Greaves’ 1976 Burgundy Gibson ES 335cr. Clean, but with a growly overtone!!!

Riffs, Licks & Solos

9 Below Zero: Sugar Mama

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Feature

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eJamming: The Premier Online Community For Musical Collaboration

New technology allows musicians to jam and collaborate anytime, anywhere. At the expense of showing my age, this writer never dreamed of jamming with other musicians thousands of miles away when I started playing music in the late 1960’s. There was no Internet, of course, and the only way to make music was to sit in the same room with other players. Well, it’s a new day with new technology that allows anyone with basic computer skills and equipment to play music in real time with others thousands of miles away: very hip and definitely cutting-edge. eJamming is the brainchild of music business entrepreneur Gail Kantor, a former backup singer for Bette Midler, producer, manager and professional fundraiser, and Alan Jay Glueckman, a screenwriter, lyricist, producer and director, with credits in movies, records, television, theatre and the Internet. These two, along with technology and entertainment professional Bill Redman, launched a prototype of eJamming in 2007, and were first recognized within the technology industry in 2009. But it wasn’t until 2010 that they conquered the problem of “lag time,” with the introduction of what they refer to as 3.0 software, featuring 16 bit 44.1 kHz live audio streaming. With this cutting edge technology in place, eJamming has become, in the words of Alan Glueckman, “The premier online community for musical collaboration, from writing, to recording, to live jam sessions, with musician members/sub-

scribers logging in from around the globe. It sounds like the other player is in the room with you.”

Who Uses eJamming? We asked Alan who eJamming is for and how it can benefit different users, and he responded that ejamming is for, “musicians looking to jam with old friends and band mates, or to meet new musicians they can play with. It’s for bands to rehearse, create, play and record together rather than lugging their gear to a rehearsal space, although it’s never meant to supplant a live rehearsal. eJamming is for musicians looking to form new bands by meeting musicians and auditioning them live, for teachers and students to work together online, and to provide a place for students to practice together in a virtual practice studio.”

But why not just use Skype to jam together? “People have told me they’re not happy using Skype because of the way it feels. It’s very delayed, whereas, eJamming eliminates the latency or lag time issue. There are other technologies that purport to offer online jamming, but none offer the real time, high quality audio and lowest latency experience that eJamming offers, because we’re “peer to peer,” rather than server mediated, which

Feature

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eJamming: The Premier Online Community For Musical Collaboration means eJamming has half the latency of serverbased systems. And we offer the same high quality audio as CDs.”

Getting Started with eJamming Simply go to www.ejamming.com/learn-more and sign up. Once your email is verified, then download and install the software. After receiving a “Welcome to eJamming” email, you will receive information on how to set up eJamming, as well as a link to tech support, www.ejammingtechsupport.com, which contains detailed information and how to perform tasks such as unblocking ports, allowing eJamming through your firewall, and configuring the audio signal stream through your computer. The eJamming support website contains pictures and step-bystep instructions how to do everything necessary to get started. The cost is only $9.95 per month after a 30-day free trial, $24.95 for three months, or only $89.95 per year. It obviously pays to go for the long haul.

And Musicians Said… Dustin Bogue of the group Brasher/Bogue is a loyal eJamming participant. “Playing guitar is in a lot of ways a lot like having sex…Granted, it’s fun even if you’re flying solo, but it doesn’t compare to doing it with other people! “A musician at any level will readily tell you, playing guitar is a lot more fun when you are accompanied by another picker. You can share songs, theories, chords, licks, stories, ideas, etc, with each other. That is how we grow. It isn’t always easy to get together with other players, and a lot of people don’t have a large circle of friends to call on if they have the urge to jam. Quite simply, eJamming makes it possible. “The day I found eJamming, I knew it was going to change things for us in a big way. Since Andy (Brasher) and I first started writing and performing together, our two biggest obstacles have been time and distance: not enough time and too many miles between us. eJamming has literally

bridged the gap on both accounts. Each time we get together to write online, we are just amazed that we finally have this tool. We write and rehearse probably three to four times as often as we did before we found eJamming.” Andy Brasher chimed in, “As a writing/touring musician, balancing home life and work life can be a challenge. Especially if you’re like me, and you live in one state and most of your musical accomplices live in another. Dustin and I have been making music together, writing and recording since 2007. Until we discovered eJamming, getting together consisted of taking turns driving two hundred miles and spending a few days away from home. This could be very taxing. Now that we’re on eJamming, we can write, play, or record at a moment’s notice without having to dedicate gas money and a couple hours on the road in order to create together. We are able to work more often and from the comfort of our own homes. The control panel is super easy to use, and the setup was simple. With tech support’s help, we were up and running that day. “

And Now, Get Ready For… It won’t be long before the company offers eJamming STUDiiO ®, which will integrate live video along with audio, and ejamming TEACH ® for students and teachers, featuring enlarged video, notation, plus other teaching tools. And finally, eJamming JAMCASTLE ®, where musicians anywhere in the world can use eJamming STUDiiO ® as a live performance capture device and stream those performances live to smartphones, Surface tablets, computers and iPads, for fan access everywhere in the world, 24/7. All these developments are on the verge of reality, according to Alan Gleuckman. Stay tuned… By Bob Cianci

Try eJamming Now!

Guitar Coach Magazine 51

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Altered Tuning

Guitar Coach Magazine 52

Altered States Rikky Rooksby talks about the opportunities a little re-tuning can offer songwriters.

Think of songs such as Led Zeppelin ‘Kashmir’, The Rolling Stones ‘Honky Tonk Women’, Joni Mitchell ‘Big Yellow Taxi’, Bad Company ‘Can’t Get Enough’, Stephen Stills ‘Love The One You’re With’, The Beatles ‘Dear Prudence’, Coldplay ‘Yellow’, Nick Drake ‘River Man’, Bob Dylan ‘Mr Tambourine Man’, Neil Young ‘Cinnamon Girl’, and Crosby Stills Nash and Young ‘Suite: Judy Blue Eyes’. What do these songs have in common? All were composed and inspired by a guitar that was not in standard tuning. Altered tunings are now an accepted method for creating great new guitar music. Up to the 60s they were largely the province of folk and blues guitarists, but the spread of musical influences from folk protest songs and electric blues into chart pop and counter-culture rock in that decade took them into the musical mainstream. By the end of the 60s headliners such as Bob Dylan, The Who, The Rolling Stones, Joni Mitchell, CSN&Y were writing and recording songs with them. When Richie Havens walked out on stage at the Woodstock Festival, on August 15 1969, to face a quarter of a million people, he did so – amazingly - with a guitar in altered tuning. Since those days, altered tunings have been utilized by acoustic and electric players alike in many popular genres such as folk, college radio rock, indie, hard rock, grunge, New Age guitar and many more. It is true that thousands of great songs have been written by guitarists in standard tuning. As a tuning, EADGBE is an excellent, musical compromise that provides readily playable chords for most keys and chord types. In some keys – notably C, G, D and A, and their relative minors A minor, E

minor, B minor and F# minor – enough of the basic chord shapes have open strings to produce a pleasingly resonant sound for little physical effort. In addition, it is easier to have a key change in a song written in EADGBE.

However, going beyond the familiarity of standard tuning opens some exciting musical doors. Songwriters can find much inspiration in altered tunings. This is chiefly because perhaps the majority of songwriters who compose on guitar do so by finding emotionally-charged chord changes. Altered tunings provide these by the bucket-load. An altered tuning defamiliarises the fretboard. With the turn of a peg or two it removes – either partially or completely – the standard shapes and patterns which a songwriter can find through habit and which, at times, fail to inspire through being over-familiar. An altered tuning has the potential to make commonplace chord sequences exciting again because they sound different when voiced in new shapes. It can also offer a songwriter the chance to broaden the harmony of his or her songs through bringing in other chord

Song writing

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Altered States types in effective shapes. Even the simplicity of an open major tuning, where a single finger barre creates a major chord, makes simple major changes sound new.

For a songwriter’s in-depth study of altered tunings (complete with a selective chord dictionary) see my book How To Write Songs in Altered Guitar Tuning

For a songwriter, fiddling with the tuning is as much about the generating of inspiration through defamiliarization as it is about the altered tuning even being audible in the final song. The objection, ‘But you could have done that in standard tuning’ can be countered with, ‘Yes, I could have but I didn’t until the idea came to me. And it didn’t appear until I re-tuned the guitar’. If you have only played in EADGBE retuning the guitar and finding familiar shapes no longer work can be daunting. An easy method for dipping your toe in the waters of altered tuning is the singlestring change. Re-tuning a single string can be enough to ‘refresh’ ordinary chords and the sound of the guitar. Try ‘drop D’, where string 6 is detuned by a tone from E to D, or ‘top drop D’ where string 1 goes down by a tone.

How To Write Songs In Altered Tunings Rikky Rooksby is the author of Backbeat’s series for songwriters which comprises the best-selling How to Write Songs on Guitar, Inside Classic Rock Tracks, Riffs, The Songwriting Sourcebook, Chord Master, Melody, How to Write Songs on Keyboards, Lyrics, Arranging Songs and How to Write Songs in Altered Tunings. Visit his webpage at www.rikkyrooksby.com

FAQs

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FAQs Here’s a short selection of the most popular questions sent in by you this month. Please keep those questions coming and I’ll try and cover as many as possible in the next issue. Question: After taking a 2 year break from playing the guitar (because I became frustrated) I immediately came up against my old enemy, the string bend. When I bend and or bend and release a string I keep hitting the string above with my finger or finger nail. Have you any tips to help stop this happening?

I totally appreciate the frustrations you are experiencing and, as far as string bending is concerned, there really is no substitution for practice. Having said that, here are a few tips I have picked up over the years which I hope will help. First of all, make sure you are fretting the note correctly. In other words, you can hear the pre-bend note clearly and you are playing it with the tip of your finger. This will ensure you do not have to adjust your finger position on the string or, indeed, apply unnecessary additional pressure to keep the note sounding. This will cause an immediate bend fail. Next try bending the string up just one step (one semi tone) or even less very slowly. Whilst doing this, look at where your finger or nail is starting to hit

Question: Guys, I love your magazine and, as a beginner, have one question for you, which I am sure will be easy to answer. How do I know when it’s time to change my strings?

Well, quite simply if the strings have a dull color, sound dead, muted, become discoloured or are hard to tune, then it's time to change them. You will only realize just how dead they have become until you here the brightness and clarity of a new set when you replace them. As a beginner it is especially hard to know when you should change strings as you will not tend to notice the dulling of the tone i.e. not realize the sound has

the hit the string above so you can make some adjustments. Such as: If your nail is toughing the string above (apart from keeping them short) you will probably be fretting the string with your left hand too close to the nail. If your finger is touching the string above causing it to sound when you release the bend your will be bend your fretting finger needs to be nearer the tip. Once you have the fretting finger in the correct position you will contact the string above but it will not sound – well most of the time anyway. You should then be able to bend the strings a full step without any unwanted noises and hindrance. Apart from that, just keep practicing so you refine your technique until string bending becomes second nature.

changed. You will probably be having too much fun and concentrating on learning to think too much about the sound. With experience you will know when that time has come. The timeframes often depend on your own body make up and how much you sweat or what chemicals are released from your hands and fingers.

Continued over page...

Ask Andy

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FAQs

Question: Although I haven’t been playing the guitar long I have a continued thirst for knowledge. What does it mean when it says to tune down or move your fretting finger a 1/2 step or a full step?

Question: Although I do not want to learn too much theory, many tutors believe it is essential you learn your scales. I definitely think it would help, especially when I progress enough to learn solos. To get me going and, in the simplest terms possible, please could you tell me the basic difference between a major and minor scale?

Guitarists who sweat more, spend hours upon hours playing or fret the strings aggressively or with excessive force will all have to change strings more often.

All I know is that I change mine after every gig due to excessive moisture being expelled from my body causing the sound quality to “die” immediately after I have finished playing.

In order to fully understand the answer you need to have a basic knowledge of note intervals i.e. what notes exist. These are Ab, A, Bb, B, C, Db, D, Eb, E, F, F# (or Gb) and G. If you play one of these notes and move to one of the notes next to it in the sequence, you travel half a step. For example, E to Eb or E to F. This also equates to moving one fret; so every time you move from one fret to an adjacent fret you travel a half step. If you move two frets, you travel a full step and this is the equivalent of playing a note that is 2 steps away in the sequence, for exam-

ple, E to F# or E to D.

Well, this sort of follows on from the last question, in so much as you need to have some knowledge of the notes and intervals.

whole step to G, then a whole step to A, then a whole step to B, then a half step back to C (only a half step between B & C as well).

Let’s start by looking at the C major scale. The first note will always be a C (this is known as the root note) and follows the following pattern.

So the notes in the C scale are: C D E F G A B C. The example above is executed on the A string to make it easy to follow, but you would normally use different strings to play a scale.

Starting on the C note (say on the 3rd fret of the A string) you go up a whole step (2 frets) to D then another whole step to E, then a half step to F (only a half step between E & F), then a

A similar method is used when you tune down a half or full step. Standard tuning is E-A-DG-B-E. When tuned down a half step, it is tuned to Eb-Ab-Db-GbBb-Eb. Each string is tuned a half step lower. When tuned down a full step, it is tuned to D-G-C-F-A-D. Different ways of tuning a guitar is a completely separate topic, but I daresay your thirst for knowledge will require this explaining as well at some time!!!! Good stuff – keep up your interest.

Continued over page...

FAQs

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FAQs One suggestion is shown below: C - 3rd fret A string D – Open D string E – 2nd fret D string F – 3rd fret D string G – Open G string A – 2nd fret G string B – Open B string C – 1st fret B string. To get the natural minor scale

(C minor) you would flatten (reduce the note by one fret) the 3rd, 6th, and 7th notes in the scale, giving: C D Eb F G Ab Bb C Hopefully this has helped you understand the difference between a major and minor scale. You should now have enough knowledge to learn any major scale and convert it to a minor scale and be able to start learning and improvising some solos. Look forward to hearing how you progress.

Any guitar questions? Contact Andy with your questions and we’ll include as many as we can in the FAQ section of your next issue of Guitar Coach magazine. Simply tap the contact button below and email your question. Thank you!

Tap Here To ‘Ask Andy’

Reviews

Guitar Coach Magazine 57

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With many thanks to: Eugene Hideaway Bridges, Jimmy Dillon, Nick Benjamin, The eJamming team, and Rikky Rooksby Articles written by Bob Cianci, Graham Land, Ben Vine, Tom Rosier, Harrison Marsh and Andy Partridge Special thanks to; BandJammer www.bandjammer.com for video contributions