Archive for: September 2007

You might think you’re hopeless at playing by ear, but this lesson is well worth persevering with:
Ear Training - From the mind to the fretboard…
“The key to developing a good ear is to come up with your own meaningful associations. You need to make it real. One of the best approaches is to associate each interval with a familiar tune. For instance, when I hear a major 3rd, I think of the “Star Spangled Banner”. At the beginning, the words “say can” are a major 3rd apart. Likewise, I have a unique association for the perfect 5th. I think “Top Gun”. Remember that really nice, melodic guitar instrumental in that movie? The one played by Steve Stevens? Those first two notes are a perfect 5th apart. “Star Wars” may be more familiar. The first two notes of that famous theme are also a perfect 5th apart. So you get the point. Each interval needs to be personal for you. They need to evoke a response.
When you are correctly identifying a majority of the simple intervals, it is time to move on to more difficult exercises. Ultimately, you want to end up at the “chromatic intervals up/down” exercises, which you will see after clicking the “Intervals” link. Furthermore, you should deselect the “fixed root” option, so that you become accustomed to identifying intervals accross a wide tonal range.”
Ear Trainer

Technorati Tags: playing by ear, developing a good ear, chromatic intervals

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Find the guitar chord that suits your purposes with this great free tool.
The Chord Generator by Jim Cranwell has over 3 million chords in 14 different tunings.
Here’s the description:
“There aren’t any actual complete chord diagrams stored anywhere in this program (except on this help page). Every chord and variation is generated via an algorithm. Some variations work great for some types of chords but might not even give a result for others, so you might have to check all the chord variations to get a chord that you feel comfortable fingering, (the vary check box changes the vary drop down into a whole ‘nother set of variations). If a chord gets computed and has all the needed notes included in it but,it is not using all of the strings (like diagram), it is still a valid playable chord, just don’t use the x’d out strings (or increase the stretch). If a chord gets computed and doesn’t have all the notes included in it, it will get the six XXXXXX zap and won’t be displayed, and although there is an increased chance of this happening sometimes in alternative tunings, it is quite rare because the program automatically runs through all the different variations if it doesn’t find something at the variation you have tried.”
If you think you’d like to use this tool, click the link, but be warned - it can be addictive!
Guitar Notes Chord Generator

Technorati Tags: guitar chord, Chord Generator, chord diagrams

I’ve found a great article on using guitar music scales you already know to write totally new scales. Anybody who is interested in widening their knowledge of the guitar by experimenting should take in this article by Brian Huether.
“Most of us are content learning the Pentatonic and Major Scales and we use them as the basis of our lead playing. These scales alone inspire infinite creativity. In the same way that we can form arpeggios from these scales, we can also form new scales from them. In essence, we can re-invent scales!”
Reinventing Scales

Technorati Tags: guitar music scales, Pentatonic and Major Scales