This is a great article that originally appeared in the August 2011 issue of Premier Guitar Magazine.

“5 Rutbusters That Will Change the Way You Play”.

LINK TO: 5 Rutbusters That Will Change The Way You Play

For me, I found that a string gauge change yielded the most dramatic impact on my playing. Going from 10′s to 9′s was HUGE.

I had to get over the idea that “Real Men Play 10′s” and instead embrace the fact that “Real Men Play Guitar” (and the heck with what their string gauge is….)

By the way, I am a bending freak now!

Check out the article and tell me what you think!

Guitar Master Class is “Cutting Edge” guitar education.

If you have visited their site you already know what I mean. If not, and you are looking for quality online guitar lessons – check it out now!

Guitar MasterClass - GMC

GMC is a online guitar lesson site with video instruction tools, a knowledge base with articles about guitar players and bands, gear reviews, theory lessons, a workshop, a chat room and a message forum.

There are over 2,300+ lessons in variety of genres and skill levels online today that can be played through GMC’s innovative and interactive video player. Regardless of your playing ability, you are sure to find instructional material to improve your skills.

Consider it your online guitar instruction university!

Instructors from all over the world have posted lesson material that cover Jazz, Country, Blues, Classical, Funk, Rock, Metal and more. Users can communicate directly with the instructors and other subscribers to receive personal feedback on their progress.

GuitarMasterClass.net is a superb choice for beginner, intermediate and advanced players. The site incorporates an outstanding user experience through the use of professional video presentation. You will also find text descriptions, tab, practice tracks and even downloadable files that work with products like Guitar Pro 6 (Windows/Mac/Linux) and TabToolkit (iPhone/iTouch/iPad).

GMC is a member based (subscription) service that provides multiple membership options ranging from 1 month to 12 months.

Bottom line, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT!

UPDATE – BE SURE ENTER THE CONTEST FOR A CHANCE TO WIN A SIX MONTH MEMBERSHIP TO GUITAR MASTER CLASS – A $150.00 VALUE!

The world is full of guitar instruction books.

Don’t believe me?

• A search on Amazon.com for “Guitar Instruction Book” returns 5,442 titles.
• “Guitar Chords” returns 3,771.
• “Guitar Scales” finds another 779!

So why do we need more study books? We don’t. What we need are new perspectives and creative ideas to learn from. Guy’s Publishing Group has delivered on both counts.

Last summer, I posted a review of a breakthrough guitar chord reference book titled: “Guys Grids”. If you missed that post, check it out: Guy’s Grids: A Master Class in Guitar Chords.

The much anticipated follow up to Guys Grids is now available!

Guy’s Scales, Modes, and Arpeggios is a comprehensive and integrated presentation of all of the most commonly used guitar scales, modes, and arpeggios in all regions of the fretboard.

Every guitarist knows that playing a solo is a skill that requires a strong working knowledge of scales and arpeggios. This book delivers that information in a very user-friendly format that guitarists of all levels will be able to follow with ease.

The book begins with a simple but well executed 5-page study on music theory and is followed by two-page spreads that show the fingering patterns and the corresponding standard notation. The fingering patterns are presented in a grid format, with each horizontal row showing scale patterns, arpeggios and chords all being played in one region of the fretboard. Then, each vertical column displays the same set of information in seven different regions of the fretboard. In the appendix, Guy presents a comprehensive set of triad studies which follow a similar grid format.

“I wrote this book because I needed a comprehensive resource on scales, modes, and arpeggios and I could not find one that I really liked… What really sets the book apart is its thoroughness and clarity. I believe that it will soon be recognized as the definitive resource book on scales, modes, and arpeggios.”
- Author Guy McRoskey (a guitarist)

Make no mistake, I am very impressed with this book. The print quality is superb.  The paper quality is thick and sturdy and yet the book is thin enough to fit inside your gig bag. One thing I really love is that Guy addressed a pet-peeve of mine with most other guitar instruction books by using a spiral binding so the book would lay flat while you are using it. Thank’s Guy!

The book is available directly from the company website for $14.95 and through select retailers. I’d suggest you order one before he realizes he under-priced this encyclopedic reference tool!

To learn more, visit www.GuysGrids.com.

Want to learn the guitar fretboard?

Even for guitarists of many years experience, true mastery of the fretboard is elusive, yet understanding the layout of the guitar fretboard is crucial for really unlocking the potential of the guitar.

A comprehensive knowledge of the guitar fretboard will enable you to understand and learn scales more easily, improvise more fluidly, find notes faster, read music more easily and play with greater confidence.

I am not sure if this is a limited time offer or a permanent link, so CLICK HERE as soon as you can to download your FREE copy of Fretboard trainer!

I am always on the lookout for new guitar related web sites. There are thousands of them out there and it’s a full time job keeping track of the new ones!

While it’s true that any web site focused on the guitar will grab my interest, some of them will hold my interest longer than others.

I think I found one of those today.

Click on the image to link to Guitar Scales V2.

It appears that the site is still in development, but the product that is online now is absolutely killer. Virtually any scale you can imagine is available – Pentatonic, Major, Minor, Dorian, Chromatic, Mixolydian and more.  Did you know there was a Persian scale?  I counted 58 variations in all – viewable in any key you want!  You can configure the display to show dots or notes. You can even set it up for alternate tunings.

Best of all – it is 100% free!

Looks like I may be selling all of those scale books I own on eBay…

If you know of another cool guitar web site, let me know!

I don’t know about you, but “Blues Music” really moves me. I’m talking about slow, bendy, stirring, bluesy blues. I love the way it sounds and I love the way it makes me feel. It’s both electrifying and inspirational.

When it comes to “feeling” the blues… Ronnie Earl is the master.

Ronnie plays music that penetrates your heart. He refers to it as “spiritually uplifting music that heals” and I totally agree. I have all of Ronnie’s CD’s — totaling 249 songs and 23.7 hours on my iPod. Hey…a couple more tunes and I can have a 24-hour Ronnie-Fest!

Here is the opening clip from “Blues Guitar With Soul” the only instructional video Ronnie made. It was originally released on VHS in 1995 and re-released on DVD in 2005.

It’s a timeless recording that worked in 1995 and still works today. Enjoy!

Joe Bonamassa treated some of his fans to an evening of music and dialogue at the Guitar Center in Hollywood, California.

A lot of the session was recorded and posted on Guitar Center TV & YouTube.  You can FOLLOW THIS LINK to see the entire video list.  My favorite session was Joe playing slide and talking about his major influences like Ry Cooder, David Lindley, Johnny Winter and Warren Haynes.

Check out this wicked slide playing:

This blog was never intended to be a “Guitar Lesson” site. There are lots of those already and I do not want to re-invent a wheel that is already rolling along quite well.

(Coming Soon! A new category that reviews some of the better instruction sites I have seen)

That said, this post is designed to be a “Print Me” kind of post for those of you who want to play lead guitar (read:scales) but hate the thought of learning theory.

So here goes — a simple look at the most common scales known to man… the Minor Pentatonic Scale and the Blues Scale. The key is to FORGET about learning the entire scale and instead MEMORIZE the movable pattern positions.

Here they are:

The Five Minor Pentatonic Positions
A pentatonic scale consists of five intervals (notes) taken from the natural minor scale:
Root (1st), (3rd), (4th), (5th), and the (7th).

The Five Blues Scale Positions
The Blues scale is nothing more than a minor pentatonic scale with an added flat 5th note, which is commonly called the “Blue note.”

There… now that’s not so hard is it?

Everybody has to start somewhere, even if that somewhere is sitting Indian-style on the floor in your bedroom, plucking out an awkward first chord and feeling like a dork. In fact that’s what stops most wannabe guitarists before they’ve even begun: The initial agony of knowing nothing just doesn’t match up with the imagined ecstasy of ripping into a guitar right off the bat.

But the fact that even Frank Zappa got his start fooling with chord books and that John Mayer was subjected to a year of guitar store lessons is somewhat heartening, right? This collection of quotes imply that not only does their love of music bind these amazing guitarists but also their complete and utter dedication to learning guitar. As Judas Priest’s Glenn Tipton said, “I gave dedication a completely new meaning.”

Stroll on over to Gibson Lifestyle to read the rest of this superb post by clicking HERE.