NeilES335

As guitarists, we know that playing guitar is a physical activity, and as such we should take a few moments to stretch our fingers and hands to prepare for this activity. This will warm up our muscles, provide flexibility, and help prevent injury. In this video, Steve Krenz demonstrates 3 exercises to help you get ready to play your best; In addition to this; Steve has also demostrated several times on our Guitar Gathering Live Lessons finger stretching flexibility exercise devised by the great finger style guitarist PHIL KEAGGY. I word to the wise; go easy on this at first. it could take you a few weeks of consistant work on this to acheive all the exersizes completely, but you will definately notice a difference! You can download a chart explaining this below... Phil Keaggy Flexibility Exercise (2).pdf

Yes Thank you, I have seen that video.

I'm finding that a lot of jazz improvization is in Dorian (starting on the 2nd "degree" ie note) minor scale... it does take a bit of getting used to...

Woah...you have been busy🎸👌. More to my point after 'finishing' the course is more like a end of the beginning. I'm sure you've become an excellent player through all this hard work and study. All the best ; Neil

Some days when I don't get a chance to practice/play, I try to at least listen to some good music in the genre I'm interested currently in, read a bit of a guitar book or work on reading notation, or listen to a podcast like this one... something that is music/guitar related. It's quite interesting how much you can pick up without the guitar in your hand too.

@JDK1962 As you can likely guess I also have a ES335 (Gibson '63 RI) and I searched for this elusive 'jazz" tone as well. Steves guitar has very warm sounding hb p'ups and he uses a good tube amp mostly to get this tone. I have a digital Fender (gdec 30) which has some "jazzmaster" tone models that didnt sound too bad but I was not happy really. (too "boomy" bass) So I searched for a new amp, where really the tone comes from. I decided on a Fender '59 Princeton Tweed RI tube amp with the 12" Cannabis Rex (hemp) speaker. This produces to amazing clear clean warm tones I was looking for. I run the guitar volume full on and tone about 8 then adjust the amp to suit, roll off the treble, increase the bass. Even at low livingroom level (4-5) the tone is beautiful... Im loving it . So I'd look to the amp and speaker and maybe try some D'Addario Chrome Flat wound Jazz Light strings too. Some plyers are happy with A Fender Blues Jr. too, depending on the speaker choice. Their are some excellent digital ss jazz amps to like the Henrikson "The Bud" or "The Blue " or maybe (not my fav's) the old standby Roland Jazz Chorus or jc22. Check out Sandra Sherman's "Guitarversum" on YouTube lesson on Jazz guitars and Amp's for some good info on this topic too. Regards ; Neil

@Dan0725 Welcome Back Dan! We're sorry to hear you've had a rough time lately but also glad you're wife, and mom are well now, you're dong better, and you're back here with your guitar 👍. Learning guitar and Music is great therapy. Persevere with the LMG lessons and reach out if you need help and advice; there's always someone here to guide you if you need it. All the Best; Neil ps Remember to join us on our YouTube channel most Tuesday nights at 7pm for Live Lessons. There's a schedule posted here on the site.

@Texaspackerfan Congrats on the new Tele Danny! Retro surf green is cool... Although chickin'pickin' isnt really my cupa tea, I've been curious about Tele's for a while, but never played one. Even with the single coil pickups, I've heard they are quite versatile. Enjoy.

@Wim VD1 Thanks for your insight Wim. As you say, some of those "graduates" have tended to move on and aren't so active here now, but are very welcome. I've been thinking about "what now"... I do much better when I focus on a structured program, so I'm drawn to some other courses like you did (for me Truefire; Frank Vignola's " Jazz Studio" , or Sandra Sherman's "Guitarversum" on YouTube, for example). As my main interest has always been learning jazz guitar, (especially solo and chord melody arrangements ala my "guitar heros" Joe Pass, Wes Montomery) I'm going to work in that direction, while learning simple "Jazz Standards" arrangements. I wish Steve K would put out a "Jazz Course" as a follow up to the Fretboard Workout - Jazz Chords. These are beautifully produced. A combination of instruction and learning songs (like in the Song Hits) would be really great. I would buy that in a heartbeat (are you seeing this Steve? 🙂 ) Meanwhile I had collected a couple of good study and song books on Jazz guitar. I'd like to improve my soloing skills so I'm going to start on the highly recommended "Jazz Guitar 1" and other books by Jamey Aebersold. And then there are a few "left overs" from the LMG course, or points that could be improved too...We'll see where it goes! Kindest Regars; N

If you search this site and LIve Lessons you'll find an exercise called the "Phil Keaggy" Stretching Exercise. That'll work...

"There's no such thing as a bad notes, just bad choices..." - Jamey Aebersold (jazz musician an teacher to thousands)

Not a guitarist but.... I recorded a song called, I Fall to Pieces, and I was in a car wreck. Now I'm worried because I have a brand-new record, and it's called Crazy! - Patsy Cline

@costancr Changing chords quickly and smoothly comes with much practice and time. If you're having difficulty here, I suggest 2 things. Practice the chord shapes and changes "dry" muting the strings with your strumming hand. Change back and forth between 2 chords then 3 and so on as in the song, until youve developed the muscle memory to make the changes smoothly quickly and confidently. Then work on the strumming muting the strings with the fretting hand. Start with all downstrokes then add upstrokes at a slow steady tempo, using a metronome gradually increasing tempo. Then you can play 1 chord up to tempo with the correct rythm. Gradually then add 1 chord change back and forth , then two, three etc until you ca play the changes smoothly at tempo. Before long you'll be breezing through the song from memory. All the Best; Neil

If you're one of those persistant students who has "finished the course", you are obviously very committed to your guitar journey, and becoming a bona fide musician. For myself, as I indicated in another post recently, it really feels like a starting line vs. a finish line. "Ok...so now what?" So, I (and I think others) would be interested to know... What have you moved onto now? Learning songs? Another learning structured program similar to LMG? Individual private lessons? Picking up 'stuff' from YouTube? Are you now playing in a band or have a solo gig, or hope to? Do you have an end goal in mind as to where you'd like to be in a certain time? How about sharing some of your experience? I think there are those that would really appreciate it. I know I would. Kindest Regards; Neil

@sleepingangel Your smile tells it all Maria😁. Congratulations!

@Fretless That is actually a very intelligent approach... I usually do buy the best I can reasonably afford, once I've identified a real "need" for it. Having said that I do my best to not pay full price UNLESS the item is well worth it. ( I paid full price for a new "65 Princeton RI Tweed amp recently and don't regret it in the least!)

@Wim VD1 Well done on this one Wim! I'd say the chord melod is a bit daunting actually;-) I thiki'll stick with comping and playing the melody over it for now... chord melody for later. I'm listening to your Autumn Leaves ... great too... The chord melody arrangement I'm working on is by someon you likely know from YouTube; Sandra Sherman (Guitarversum.com) I think you'd probably breeze through this one... Here's the arrangement attached below... Regards; Neil PS; I'd love to hear what you could do with this BB King Style backing Track in A.... (its on my SoundCloud Channel - I didnt record this one) Autumn-Leaves-Easy-Chord-Melody.pdf

I can see how having a tablet for reading sheet music would be a real help. Would a less expensive tablet/reader do the job ok? I see some "deals" on off brand models this time of year...

I've been working on this Jazz standard by Duke Ellington. It's really a "must know" among jazz players of all instruments, with it's very catchy tune. I'm enjoying the process. So far I'm working on the lead sheet version, and later I'll get to the fingerstyle arrangement. I can see why Steve K included it in Song Hits, with it's classic ii V progression in the Key of C. The chord changes really aren't too hard on this tune, for comping. I learned the melody basically by listening, and just played it by ear, then I checked the notiation. Turns out I added a few notes; but hey, it's jazz! Playing it in time and up to 120bpm is a challenge though. I find you really have to know the song and the changes to keep up this tempo. I'm trying first to perfect it at 98bpm, then I'll go to say 110, then 120bpm, once it sounds decent. My goal is to have a repertoite of at least 6 Jazz Standard I can play solo guitar and chord melody arrangements to. (Moon River (check), Autumn Leaves (in progress) Satin Doll (in prgress), All the Things You Are, Sunny... for starters) Is anyone else working on this or completed it?

Maria; I think you'll find S18 >S20 may take more time than you can imagine right now... I'd strongly recommend you go through all the Fretboard Workout series as well (if you haven't already done so) , especially the Jazz Fretboard Workout, before tackling S18. This will take a while too, but make the S18 much easier. From there on, you are much more on your own than earlier sessions, which can lead you to many other resources and tangents.

@Wim VD1 Thank you very much Wim! You're very kind of you to say... It's been a pleasure seeing & hearig you and others develop into musicians. (I still have a way to go to catch up to you...;-) As you say, I really do enjoy playing now more than ever, always with the challenge of improving, or learning that new technique or song. I haven't recorded anything for almost a year now, so I hope to, as soon as my business settles down over the Christmas/NewYears period. I'll have to go back and figure out how to use the DAW again! and produce a decent recording! It's been my priveledge to provide support here on the Forum and Live Lessons as a small token of my appreciation for what I've received from Steve K. and the GG family. Kindest Regards; Neil

@columbo @Oldjock That is somewhat surprising about the Fishman Loudbox mini. I've played they in the store, and always thought they were great sounding. If I ever got an acoustic amp, that would (would have?) be my first choice. If the store won't do anything about it, I would certainly make an inquiry with Fishman. Overall I think they have a good reputation and would want to make their customers happy. At least they could correct the problem.

Thanks Maria! You will too... S17 isnt really that hard.... just a different way of playing scales... and more useful while soloing too. You'll get it! For me the key is listening to where the next note should be...is it a whole step or half? I think sometimes we get so hung up on patterns, that we forget our best judge is our ears.

This is so true Maria. I often go back to the early lesson in the LMG course and play through the exercises and songs again, even if they look somewhat elementary now. I found that even those that were difficult at the time are now quite easy, but occasionally I find something I could do better. So you're right, you do grow even if you don't think so.

Same here @sleepingangel Maria. Those lessons on Gibson.com were some of the best Steve's ever done. I wish they had saved them.(they would have made a great video dvd) I think it was there that I orginally heard /saw Steve Krenz, which led me to the "Gibson's Learn and Master Guitar" program. And here I am, finished the course about 7 yrs later.