Backing Track: Smooth idea in C#Dorian/E Lydian.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7UMlcfNIno

This backing track is simply two chords. C# Minor and E Major 7. This ensures that you can easily practice modulating between Dorian (C# Minor) and Lydian (E Maj7) ideas.

To download this backing track follow this link: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15967191/C%23%20Dorian%20E%20Lydian%20Smooth%20backing%20track.mp3

Beginners: Introduction to playing the Guitar (part two)

In this second part of my beginner lessons for playing the guitar we will put what was learnt in the first part into context. Playing single chords can be fun in itself, but it's nothing compared to actually putting those chords with other chords and bringing us closer to our goal, which is creating music.

This lesson will aid you in the daunting task of changing chords, and will bring your into the wonderful world of rhythm.

Let's start of with a very simple excersise in chord changing.
This will use the D chord, the C chord and the E chord.

Look at this diagram:

What this diagram means, is that you play the D chord four times (note that there are 4 "slashes"), the C chord four times (again, look at the slashes) and then the E chord eight times (to ensure you keep correct timing think of this as two lots of four strums).

Play each chord for the same amount of time (it may help to have a metronome or go to a website such as metronomeonline.com going so that you can play a chord each time the metronome clicks) to keep the rhythm even.

For this excersise I would recommend using all downstrokes (meaning you pick towards the floor).
At first it may feel awkward and hard to change the chord position, but if you keep practicing it will get much easier.

Some other chord progressions that sound good for this excersise are:

A G D D

Am C E E

Dm G C C

Em C D D

Also try to put your own chord progressions together, work out which chords sound good with each other!
If you feel comfortable changing chords at a steady pace with down strokes try adding some up strokes in (meaning picking towards the ceiling).

Some common picking patterns are:

Down Up Down Up etc etc.
This is an alternating pattern where you move your picking hand up and down as you play the chords. This can feel more natural than all downstrokes (or all upstrokes!)

Down Down Up Down etc
This pattern gives your playing a bit more of a spontanious dynamic, often heard in "campfire" songs.

Try out your own picking sequences, mix down and upstrokes together to find some interesting sounds.
I hope this is of some help!

Thanks for reading.
Next lesson we will have a brief look into scales.
If you have any questions, please comment on this blog post, email me at rory.guitarist@gmail.com or get to me at any of my networking sites:
http://www.youtube.com/roryrockssocks
http://www.twitter.com/rerellison
http://rorybutler.tumblr.com/
http://www.myspace.com/roryrockssocks

Backing Track: Calling Card style jam track in Gm.

This jam track is very reminiscent of Rory Gallagher's song "Calling Card".
It is in the key of G Minor and in the time signature of 12/8 and is based around two chords, a Gm7 and a Cm. So the G natural minor or minor pentatonic works well throughout the backing track. But it can add a nice flavour if you play in C Dorian over the C Minor chord.

The backing track, similarly to the song has various stops which last for one bar. These stops are every 11 bars. So if you count as you play you'll effectively be able to pre-empt these stops and work some cool licks into them.

To get this backing track follow this link:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15967191/calling%20card%20backing%20track.mp3

Enjoy!

Backing Track: Funky riff based jam track in Dm

Here's my first backing track, it's a fairly simple riff based groove in the key of Dm.
The Dm pentatonic works well over the majority of it, but mixing it up with some modal playing can sound good.

To stream the jam track here click on the video above (blogger doesn't have any audio embedding options) or to download follow this link: http://www.supload.com/listen?s=VNxTGA

I will hopefully find a better method of uploading/streaming backing tracks before I do my next one.

Enjoy.

Review: Tonerider Superlush Chorus

Tonerider have made quite a name for themselves in the past few years due to their budget yet high quality pickups. However not many have heard of their line of effects pedals, which boast a similar charm to their pickups.
They all cost roughly £50 and appear to be clones of popular, more expensive alternatives. The Tonerider Superlush Chorus which I am going to look at today is no different. The Superlush chorus is allegedly based off the Japanese made BOSS CE-2 of the eighties, which go for over £100 used.

The appearance of this pedal may seem a bit "early 90s office computer", but behind the looks is a simple two knob, one footswitch set-up. The two knobs are Rate and Depth, as with the BOSS CE-2. The pedal also claims to be true bypass.
The pedal is very simple to operate, though this is not to say that the pedal doesn't produce a great variety of tones.
This pedal has a very wide range of chorus sounds available. With the subtlest of chorus sounds being accessible with both knobs turned low, or more intense "leslie" style sounds with them turned up and every point in between.
The lack of an overall "level" knob ensures that the subtle sounds are subtle and the intense sounds are intense, which can be a bit annoying if you're looking for a different sound. Though a bit of tweaking with the knobs can easily find a good compromise.

This pedal is great for enhancing clean sounds, adding some flavour to fusion licks, getting 'that' grunge tone, any chorus sound you could really want.
The only real qualms I have with this pedal is the jacks are a bit tight and the footswitch is a bit stiff. Though I think this is just a case of needing to be worn in a bit.
Overall this pedal is definitely a great chorus. One that I feel will sit on my pedalboard for a very long time, unless the price of an Analogman Chorus comes my way, I doubt I'll replace it while it's still working.

To hear this pedal in action, check out my video demo of it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_Vw6asqMaU

Lick: Non-linear sliding lick.

Here's a lick which deonstrates soething which I've been doing a lot in my playing recently.
It mainly focuses on using slides in a non-linear fashion which can produce quite an interesting sound which works great when trying to incorporate a slight jazzy or "fusion" feel into regular rock or blues playing.

While the video of this lick isn't the best in terms of tone or quality, it gives you a feel for the lick.

Here's the tab and notation for the lick:

I've written and performed this lick in C# Minor but I suggest anyone who uses it learns it in whatever key they're most comfortable in (or as many keys as possible to get the most out of it).

Thanks.

Rory.

Beginners: Introduction to playing the Guitar. (Part One)

In my experience of teaching and knowing beginner guitarists, and even remembering the horrors which came with being a beginner guitarist, there is very little precise help for them on the internet!
Well. There is, but it's relatively hidden, I find that many beginners will search on youtube for "beginner guitar lesson" or something similar to find an "Expert Village" or similar video which teaches the C chord.
This is all well and good, but isn't the best approach for teaching beginners!

What I shall be writing here will be a set of simple beginner lessons which will teach any beginner the basics of playing and understanding scale and chord diagrams, all major and minor open chords, the pentatonic scale, and understanding TAB (which may be looked down upon by many musicians of other instruments or older guitarists, but is a sure-fire way to get learning songs quickly, standard notation can come into play at a later date!) to start learning songs.

This first part of the lesson will cover Major and Minor Open Chords.
This may sound a bit daunting at first, but is actually quite simple.

First we'll tackle the term "chord". A chord is generally more than one note played at the same time.
Though of course, not just any two, three, four, etc notes played at the same time will make a pleasing sound.

This is where the terms "major" and "minor" come in.
To describe these two terms in the simplest way possible:
Major chords are often described as "happy" sounding.
Where Minor chords are seen as "sad" sounding.

Though by now you're probably aching to actually play the guitar!
We'll start with what are called "open" chords, which essentially means that these chords use some of the open strings.

The Major open chords are as follows:

Don't worry if these seem confusing to you (or if you're wondering why I've neglected the letters B and F) I shall walk you through it all.
These diagrams represent your guitar neck. Each vertical line is a string (the left side being the thicker strings, the right side being the thinner strings) and each horizontal line is a fret (except for the thick black line which is the nut of your guitar).

To give a bit of a clearer example, we'll take the A chord. The dots that sit behind the thick black line are open strings, meaning you play these strings without fretting any note.
Then you'll see the three dots which are all on the second row of blocks. This means that you need to hold the second fret of these three strings.

Now, if you play all those strings which have a note on them in the diagram, you should have an A chord. This is where you should be able to hear the "happy" sound that I previously mentioned, which should hopefully match your mood as you've just played your first chord! Congratulations.

Now do this with the other major open chords.

After you're comfortable with these we'll move onto the Minor open chords.
These are as follows:

These should be a lot easier for you as you will now be comfortable with understanding chord diagrams (hopefully! If not, please complain at me for not being clearer and I will help you to understand these!).

Also. As a note, to save time when writing chords down, all of these major chords are simply named after their letter (so "A Major" will just be called "A"). With Minor chords it's very similar, though you put an "m" afterwards. (So "A Minor" becomes "Am")

But as you may notice, there is still no "B" or "F" in either Major or Minor open chord sets. This is simply because there are no open chords for B, Bm, F or Fm!
These will come a bit later if I choose to continue these lessons into more advanced chords.

Next lesson I will write about putting these chords into use, so that you can create music, which is the best thing about playing the guitar!

Thanks for reading, and I hope I helped!

If you have any questions, please comment on this blog post, email me at rory.guitarist@gmail.com or get to me at any of my networking sites:
http://www.youtube.com/roryrockssocks
http://www.twitter.com/rerellison
http://rorybutler.tumblr.com/
http://www.myspace.com/roryrockssocks