Bending, Tapping And Random Uncharted Slides.

All right all right.

I've seen the lessons, read the descriptions and listened to the music and now I want some answers.

I dont know if you get invited to a special all around the world guitar club when you get good enough to know these secrets but if its that way I'll wait but untill then I want to get in on the deal.

First off, bending. Right I know how to bend - I place my fingers on the string and move it untill it make another note. Fair enough, but when I do it it sounds boring and more like a crying cat then a cool bend. So how do I flavor the bend to sound better? Is it settings on the amp? Some cool vibrato technique Ive missed? Do you hit other strings before the bend or what is it?

Secondly tapping, when I do it soundsm ore like those old phone ring tones than a sweet solo technique. Same questions as earlier!

And lastly what I like to call RUS or Random Uncharted Slides. In the middle of a lesson or solo or whatever people just seem to slide in from somewhere down the neck without tabbing it out. Ive noticed it both sounds cool and looks so much cooler. So whats the rule here? whenever you feel like it? From where do you slide, just from feeling or..?

Allow me these answers and help me evolve

All the best!

Detailed Workout

Well hello again!

Its been a while, the green clothes keep me busy. Now I got a short short vacation and a few hours to burn on guitar.

I have at least 2-3 hours a day for almost two whole weeks! more than I have had in a long time. So anyhow, I picked up my guitar and I realised.. I suck. There's just no other way ti put it. Tried out a lot of the "beginner" stuff thats on here but couldnt pull it off. So after nearly trashing my guitar after failing to play "We wish you a merry christmas" I decided. I need a strict workout schedule.

So now Im turning to you because Im dumb, help me with excercizes to get me going again. Point me in direction on this site with lessons with good excersizes. I have tried but I failed.

So sum it up: help me divide my few hours a day into sections and help me fill them excersizes.

I hope Im not bargaining for too much here.

Cheers,

A very dishearted guitarist.

I'm Back ;)

Hai again,

didnt quite know where to post so did it here.

Just wanted to let you guys know that Im back harassing the boards

Currently though, Im in the army which is why I quit visiting the forums (and lessons) for quite some time but now I got some spare time and been playing quite much guitar recently and decided I needed a new subscriptions.


Anyhoo, off to browse the new lessons

Good News, Bad News And Worse News.

Hey all!

Just wanted to let you know why I've suddenly turned very inactive.

So I bring you the news.

Let's start with the bad news; my internet at home is messing up and wont allow me to stay online for more than 5-15 minutes at a time which makes watching videos a virtual pain in the ass. Go go ISP slaughter.

Worse news is that I got a lot of shiet to do in school which keeps me away from the guitar and writing theory lessons. But as soon as it calms down I'll be back with some cool lessons for you, so hang tight!

Now for the good news, my band got a gig! On this sunday we and 10 other bands get 5 minutes on stage to bring our music to the people! Its sort of a competition (but we didnt know when we signed up that it was lol) so wish us luck!

We will do a cover on the BOC song Astronomy. And tbh we do it reallt frickin good!

'till next time

Major Scale 101

Hello again fellow theory hungry dudes/dudettes.

Today I am going to give you what I reckon is the foundation of all understanding in music theory: the major scale.

The aim for this lesson is to teach you how to build a scale, learn 5 boxes of the major scale accross the entire fretboard and I have also included sound files for you to listen to how the major scale in G sounds!

Okey, so let's start! The absolute first thing you need to know is that there are 12 notes in the western style of music. Also, it's worth knowing that every fret on a guitar neck is a halfstep. And here we got the notes:

A A#/Bb B C C#/Db D D#/Eb E F F#/Gb G G#/Ab

After about two seconds looking at that list you'll notice that on some notes I actually have written two: A#/Bb for example. This is because if we raise an A a halfstep it becomes A# but, if we would lower a B with a halfstep it becomes Bb. Now these looks like different notes but they're not.

Easiest way to prove my point is by you picking up your guitar and play an A (5th fret on E string for example), now if we raise this a halfstep we get A# (6th fret). Raising another half step we get the note B on the 7th fret. Now you can see it quite clearly if we take the B a halfstep down it becomes a Bb on the 6th fret which is A# as well. Sounds complicated? it's not, just try it out.

Okey, great. Now we got our twelve notes and we want to make something with it. In this lesson we want to make a major scale out of it. Now the trick to constructing a major scale is knowing the formula for it.

And naturally I provide the formula being the good boy I am:

W W H W W W H

Most likely, what I just wrote up there made no sense at all if you're new to the theory scene. But don't worry this lesson is aimed for anyone regardless of prior knowledge. A big W means Wholestep and a big H means halfstep. So the formula above can be written out as:

Wholestep Wholestep Halfstep Wholestep Wholestep Wholestep Halfstep

If you feel that is easier to read. I tried to come up with a word play to remember the formula but it proved to be quite hard and the best thing I could come up with was:

Will We Have What We Would've Had

Which isn't really great but it does the job

Another way to think of the formula is in halfsteps, then it would look like this:

2 2 1 2 2 2 1

So if you have an easier time remembering numbers then this is the way to go.

Anyways, now we have our formula and some ways to remember it. Let's put it to some good use. For pratice purpose I have choosen the G major scale for this lesson and so we will look at the notes involved in the G major scale:

Here are all the notes again: A A#/Bb B C C#/Db D D#/Eb E F F#/Gb G G#/Ab

Now we start on G and apply our formula:

G A B C D E F#/Gb G

So we start on G, take a wholestep to A, then a wholestep to B etc etc. And then we get a scale of seven notes and one octave. And this is as easy as it is to creating a major scale.


Now that we know how to create a major scale let's look at the different boxes for major scales and listen to how it sounds played by me (warning: crappy recording and early morning guitar skills. but it serves it purpose).

Here is the first box illustrated and played. Root notes are as usual marked in blue.

 Gmajpos1.mp3 ( 39.29K ) Number of downloads: 1237



Second box:

 Gmajorpos2.mp3 ( 40.97K ) Number of downloads: 575



Third box:

 Gmajorpos3.mp3 ( 36.06K ) Number of downloads: 335



Fourth box:

 Gmajorpos4.mp3 ( 30.31K ) Number of downloads: 294



Fifth box:

 Gmajorpos5.mp3 ( 38.3K ) Number of downloads: 317




And there you have it. Now you can play the entire G major scale all over the fretboard (with some practice) and you can create your own major scales. And with the boxes I've shown you you can apply your newly written major scales to your fretboard. How cool is that?

Also stay tuned for a follow-up on this subject by our own Andrew Cockburn where he will show you the CAGED system so you can put your major scales into chords and form songs.