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Well as you read in NeilES335 post he had a "new guitar day" well I had one sort of the same day via Neil.. we were tossing back and forth the Long and McQuade 'scratch n dent' inventory blow out listing (Think Guitar Center but better,, and you can rent high end guitars (ie Gibson J454 or Martin D28) for like $130 month) they put together their inventory, each store has selected what they would like to move.. not all deals are great. you might get $150 off a Gibson Les Paul or something like that.. and apparently there is some sort of line up policy I didn't' know of but good thing Neil found out. I just happened that Neil doesn't live too far from me or the store we shop at and it had at least 2 interesting guitars to look at. Neil lined up early in the morning 2 hrs before the store opened so he could get his number to enter when they did. he called me about the Epiphone Sheraton he thought I might like .. actually I was thinking of an ES-137 .. but the Sheraton is a very good deal. the Sheraton is the Chinese version of the Gibson ES-335.. very similar in all respects so he grabbed the Sheraton for me on Friday and some how managed to get them to toss in a hard case for it.. so the deal got even better. (now how to tell the wife about another guitar ) Neil had both guitars till I could get over on Sunday.. Neil has probably played this Sheraton more than I have at this point.. but Neil thinks I need to learn how a cat runs across a fret board. at least if I make a mistake in guitar.. I can call it Jazz... (I'm even too lazy to take my own pictures.. so I used the ones that Neil sent me ) Your guitar was made at the Qingdao Plant (Epiphone), China on July, 2014 Production Number: 1479 FEATURES Body Body shape: Double cutaway Body type: Semi-hollow or chambered body Body material: Laminated Top wood: Not applicable Body wood: Maple Laminated Body finish: Gloss Orientation: Right handed Neck Neck shape: '60s SlimTaper Neck wood: Maple with walnut Joint: Set-in Scale length: 24.75" Truss rod: Standard Neck finish: Gloss Fretboard Material: Rosewood Radius: 12" Fret size: Medium jumbo Number of frets: 22 Inlays: Block and triangle Nut width: 1.687" (42.8mm) Pickups Configuration: HH Neck: ProBucker 2 Middle: Not applicable Bridge: ProBucker 3 Brand: Epiphone Active or passive: Passive Series or parallel: Not applicable Piezo: No Active EQ: No Special electronics: Volume controls with coil tap Controls Control layout: Volume 1, volume 2, tone 1, tone 2 Pickup switch: 3-way Coil tap or split: Coil tap Kill switch: No Hardware Bridge type: Fixed Bridge design: Tune-o-matic Tailpiece: Stopbar Tuning machines: Grover Rotomatic Color: Gold Other Number of strings: 6-string Special features: Pickups, Vintage "Large Clipped Ear" with Mother of Pearl "Vine" Inlay Case: Sold separately Accessories: None Country of origin: China

Hey everyone, I just put up a PDF covering 100+ chords that you need to know. You can get all the info here... THE CHORDS YOU NEED TO KNOW Let me know if you have any questions. Learn all you can! - Steve

Two children on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation are going to have the opportunity to learn guitar. Let me digress for a moment. The Pine Ridge Indian Reservation is Shannon County, South Dakota. According to US statistics it is the poorest county in the United State. Just a couple statistics: per capita income is $9,286. 1 in 4 children, yes 1 in 4! , is born with fetal alcohol syndrome. Each year a musician friend of mine, Larry Dunn, puts on a benefit concert, The Toy Drive for Pine Ridge, to get toys donated for Christmas for the kids on the Pine Ridge Reservation. If you want more to read about Larry and his efforts you can do so here. Every year I go with Larry to deliver the toys and what a heart warming experience it is. I'm not sure how the conversation came about. But @PatIam and I were discussing about some of these kids having access to a guitar and learning to play. Actually, what we were discussing is how unlikely it is for that to happen. We all know about Pat's repairing guitars. Immediately Pat said, "Why don't you let me send some guitars along?" And just a few days later guitars showed up up for me to do just that! Here are two children, that if not for Pat, would never have the opportunity to learn. I took for each of these a Hal Leonard "Method Book 1" and TrueFire has a "Learn Guitar 1. First Steps for Beginners". I need to check to see how they are doing! Pat, both these kids said to tell you "Pilamaya"! (Thank you in the Lakota language>) Aroja Thunder Bull: Jace Fire Thunder:

I started Session 19 some 6 weeks ago and today I managed to play through Steve's chord tone exercise from the bonus materials ("Building a solo from the ground up" ) for the first time without having to stop the DVD :-) This exercise goes through a chord progression several times, and the task is to play the root, 3rd, 5th or 7th of every chord in the progression. My initial approach was to try to use my memory and theoretical chord knowledge in order to find the right note to play, but that involved too much thinking and slowed me down so much that I could not keep up with the video. This approach was not going to work for me, so I had to look for another way. On this guitargathering forum, @matonanjin then recommended the book " Chord-Tone Soloing" by Barret Tagliarino to me (Thanks again for this, Ron.) This resource is full of exercises on major and minor scales, arpeggios, modes and the CAGED system. For some weeks now, and out of this book, I have practiced major and minor triad arpeggios in the 5 CAGED positions, in combination with 2 modes (Ionian and Dorian). This approach of memorizing note patterns using the muscle memory is really effective and beneficial. Knowing the position of the root note of the chord is now sufficient for me to find the 3rd and 5th without further thinking, and get me through Steve's exercise. Over the next weeks, I will start to put the 7th chord arpeggios and the Mixolidian mode my practice routine as well. All of this really feels like a huge breakthrough to me. I thought soloing was for people with a special talent, but now I figured out that I can actually learn this and get a long way by using the chord tone approach. I realize it is going to take months of practice to get all of these arpeggios and modes under my fingers, but it has started to pay off already. Wim.

"NEW" guitar day! Very chuffed to show my "new" Gibson Memphis ES-137 Classic Heritage Cherry Sunburst! Hand carved Flame Maple top, back and sides, (even the neck) Trapezoid Mother of Pearl in lays with special "C" market at the 12th fret. Gibson 490 R and 498 T pickups..This guitar, a 2004 model is in amazing 9.5/10 condition, and plays superbly! Warm creamy jazz tones all the way to snarly singing blues... and everything in between. It is described by some as being the perfect blend of a Les Paul and and ES -335 ... It is a semi - hollow, BUT, the centre block is mahogany, (not maple) ,to increase sustain and reduce feedback. The centre block does not touch the solid top, which gives this guitar extreme resonance and sustains like crazy! There's a full description; https://goo.gl/fQ3XAo I bought it mostly for the "jazz tones"(ala ES175, CES-4, L-5 etc.) but it's so versatile, any serious player would love it for any style! Will this take #1 spot over my beloved ES-335? We'll see... I spotted this on a 'Blow Out Inventory Sale" at our largest music retailer, Long and McQuade. I lined up at 8:30am on the first day of the sale, to get a number, to get a chance to buy it... I was 14th.. Fortunately, I was the 1st to speak for this guitar and they kindly put it aside for me. When I was "demo'ing" it, a couple of other guys wanted it too and hung around to see it I took it... NO way guys... this ones mine! And the price... well, you wouldn't believe it if I told you! What a gem. Special thanks to Greg Voros and BWillard (our resident Gibson expert and passionate collector) for their valued opinions on this. I was also pleased to pick up a superb deal for my friend EracerTeam_DougH, a beautiful Epiphone Sheraton Natural, with gold hardware, also at a superb price. I 'll let him tell you about that...

Here's my contribution for this month. The song is 'Angel' by Sarah McLachlan. I recorded a single, live take direct to mp3 via a Zoom H2n recorder that was standing on the desk in front of me. I then uploaded it into Logic Pro and tweaked the gain and EQ and added bit of reverb and compression. (p.s. when I say 'single, live take' it was by no means the first :-) ) Ian

From Taylor guitars, how to recognize the symptoms. SymptomsofaDryGuitar.pdf SymptomsofaWetGuitar.pdf

Hey gang, We will be referencing the Chords You Need to Know chord charts tonight so take a moment to download them. THE CHORDS YOU NEED TO KNOW Chord Charts. Thanks and see you tonight! - Steve

@Texaspackerfan, how are you doing in Session 19?

I would run out of names too quickly. Ben

Beautifully done Ian, I have never head that one before. Great playing and singing.

Nicely done @IanD very good. I like that song but here in the US they use it on an TV advertisement for ASPCA and they show a bunch of sad dogs and cats while it is playing so it always makes me sad when I hear it.

Fantastic cover Ian. Great acoustic vibe. ???? Mark

Hi Paul, @AcousticM I use studio one as well. If you have itunes you can use it to convert your mp3 to a wav file, studio one only uses a wav file format. If you have itune, click the file header and go to convert, but make sure you select the file first. If you need more help just let me know. Danny

Hello Paul, 1. The only 2 ways that I know of getting MP3 files available for people to listen to on this forum are how I have done above, by dragging the file into the "drag files here section" or by putting them in Soundcloud and copying the link in the browser of the page containing the song that you want to share. For anyone who does not know about Soundcloud it is free to join and you get a limited amount of space to load and keep your songs.The limited amount of space in Soundcloud (for free) is the reason that I have started embedding MP3 files into the forum using the first method. 2. I do not have any experience with Studio One but I did a quick search on the internet and I found this answer to the file formats question: "I think you need to convert your files to one of those audio formats I think. They are mp3, ACC or WMA. You can try Mediabuddy tool for it." I personally use this online media converter as it was recommended to me by BobF_ on the L&M forum http://media.io I am glad that you are getting in to home recording Paul, please reach out to us if you need any help. Perhaps some of the folks reading this will be able to supply you with better answers than I can.

Sounding great guys. Ian

Wonderful! I love it! - Steve

Great job on this everyone! Really coming together. I have 2 questions im hoping someone can answer. 1. Have you found a way to play the mp3 tracks in the browser without having to download them? I know you asked about that earlier 2. I downloaded a couple of the tracks so i could try playing the rhythm along with the drum and bass track, but when i tried to import them into my daw (Studio 1) it says not compatible file? What type of file should it be im wondering? And how would you convert it if you need to? Will the daw program do that? Im just newb to Studio One and lots there to figure out for sure. Any help appreciated, thanks.....Paul

Sheraton II was my first semi-hollow jazz box. It’s a cool looking and good sounding guitar. It’s as versatile as the ES-335: rock, blues, jazz, you name it. I think it may inspire you to turn into a bit of a jazz cat. Well,… Neil vows to make sure of that. I’m rooting for the both of you.

Great job Mandy.

@matonanjin that is simply wonderful. I have a huge soft spot for children, especially those that grow up in difficult circumstances. You can see the joy on their faces that you guys provided. You get back what you give in life. God's bless you two.

Beauty Neil. ENJOY!

A beauty Neil. Enjoy your new baby.

What a beautiful thing to do, Bravo to all of you. One member of our guitar family said they had guitar straps that were never going to be used again, my thought when I saw the post was to suggest they give them to Pat for the guitar's he donates but I failed to suggest it at that time, this is a good time to pass this thought along, to give them to these children. [ sorry can't remember who has them, maybe they'll step up when they see this thread ].

This is another good point that I almost noted earlier about trying to have a perfect strumming pattern. Thus, instead of being "fluid," you may become mechanical/robotic. There are some things that may or may not be taught in a book. For instance, and I play several of these at a Rest Home, parts where you don't have time to play the entire chord because of the quick chord change along with the tempo. Usually, for me, it's three (3) chord changes within three (3) to five (5) words. And seems like it's usually "G" (open chord) for me. Have seen Steve Kaufman (bluegrass player) do this on a DVD course by playing (not singing) only the three (3) high strings: G, B, & E holding down the third fret to get the ''abbreviated'' G chord. Also, I can play barre chords but since singing solo is focusing on melody then I just play the "cheater/abbreviated" F chord. Please remember that you are singing melody and not bass to solo. So , , , so what if you miss a few bass notes in a chord? You and the audience are listening to the melody. Now, remember in the LMG course about strumming? You may not play every string but keep strumming. Also, there's a certain freedom in soloing. Relax, focus on singing the melody, and enjoy the freedom.

If I called my guitars anything, it would be "Patient". Patient for putting up with my attempts to play them.........

Stu, Most folks would tell you that its an "upgrade", but its not always the case.. Some super bright sounding instruments actual balance out well with a piece of plastic for the saddle. Hard to believe, but true. I would do it on your Martin, but only the saddle. The saddle is heard on every note that's played on the guitar, the nut is only heard when you play the strings open. -Greg V.

Some weeks ago, I recorded an accoustic version of Misty. So I thought this would fit here as well.

Currently, my recording facilities are not favourable and I’m still focusing on practicing jazz etudes, but since the theme is fitting I thought I’d use my old recordings. This is really old stuff. I recorded those almost 5 years ago for a couple of initial monthly challenges. It’s kind of funny for me to listen to these amateurish attempts today. I really should take some time to rerecord them to find out if I’m still dying of laughter listening to them. “Blowing In The Wind” Bonus track “Yesterday” should probably stay home.

Here's my submission. I saw a guy do this arrangement on YouTube and I really liked it. KG_What a Wonderful World_February 2018 challenge.mp3

I hope this month Has as many contributors as last month, what a great turnout! Thanks for taking the time to keep it going uncle hammy and thanks for this months challenge Watson43. I Hope this is ok.. it’s an electro-nylon played through a Roland mobile AC amp. The audio was recorded live outdoors, direct to the mics of a Zoom H4n. The loop was created live on a boss RC3. It’s a little promo vid I made for my wedding services. It was recorded in my garden a couple of weeks ago. There are lots of timing mistakes, bum notes, and I even wandered off at one point. But you don’t have to be perfect for people to enjoy what you do. ??? Mark