11
Over at “A Guitar Teacher’s Lesson Notebook” (a blog), Robs interpreted and published chords and rhythms (strum patterns) to a bunch of songs:
http://www.heartwoodguitar.com/WordPressBlog/?p=103
Some of the songs include
07
I’ve spent time working on a MS Windows program that I will eventually release as open source. The program isn’t spectacular — it is a hierarchical ToDo list. This means that you can have sub-tasks. I like this type of tool while I work (as a programmer).
Anyway, it got me thinking about something… Millions and millions of programmers work on open source software software each day. Some of the most notable open-source products include (but are not limited to) FireFox (the web browser) and OpenOffice (A Microsoft Office Compatible Office suite). These two programs, I imagine, have hundreds of people working on them; thousands of programmers are willing to work on free products. Given this, then why isn’t there free music? There should be thousands of free songs!
Perhaps there is? Perhaps I’m not looking in the right place? Either way, it probably isn’t wildly known else I’d have stumbled upon it by now…
I wrote my aforementioned program as a practice piece. Something to hone certain skills and to see what I could produce. I guess what I’m trying to ask is: do musician or bands create and record songs and release them for free for the same purpose? Or perhaps with the idea of getting feedback from the public in order to improve or perhaps just to hear how one sounds on a recorded and mixed song?
I know that Jonathan Coulton did something like this. He spent, I believe, a year releasing a song a week on his blog for free. You can still download those songs.
Do you do things like this?
I suppose some people do this on YouTube, doing covers and stuff. But I’m looking specificity at original material?
31
The Fender Custom Shop has announced plans to release a David Gilmour Strat. For those who might be under a rock ( 
) David Gilmour is a Guitarist for Pink Floyd. I love listening to Pink Floyd play and furthermore, I love the guitar in their songs…
Shine On You Crazy Diamond is the song that is coming to mind right now; wonderful guitar licks in that song. Wonderful song overall, also.
As a quick summary, it appears there will be two editions of the Fender Custom Shop Guitar. One will be priced at $3999.99 and the other “relic” one priced at $4799.99 (MSRPs, I assume).
As much as I’d like to have one, I won’t be buying one of these due to price (and how clumbsy I am). I chipped my electric guitar the first day I had it.
26
As I said in one of my later posts, I’ve taken a new direction – a new focus if you will. I’ve been following along with the book “Mel Bay’s Modern Guitar Method Grade 1,” playing the pieces and learning things in the order the book suggests.
Currently, I’m practicing on the the E note, F note and G note on the first string and the B note, C note, D note on the second string. I’m playing a few pieces from the book trying to practice my accuracy as well as my ability to read music (which, to me, is one key in this new quest).
As I was playing the first couple of songs (if I can call them that) from the book, I wasn’t sure if they were sounding like the should. I know that I was following the metronome properly, but I wasn’t sure if I was always hitting the right note at the right time. When you are first learning, so much is going on that it can be hard to ensure it sounds right… How can you tell [if sounds right] when the music is on paper?!
I remembered that I have a tabbing / music notation software called TuxGuitar (The team recently released version 1.0) which will actually play what I tab out. Now, at first, this might seem kind of stupid, but I swear it is working — it is helping.
The computer will always hit the right note at the right time. It is almost liking playing with another guitarist, but one that will never come out of time or make a mistake. Basically, like it is politely correcting you. Furthermore, as I’m playing along with the software I can listen to the notes that are played, and I instantly know via comparison if I’ve just played the correct note or not. When I play the wrong note, I can stop and figure out what the correct note is and work through the mistake.
Below are a couple of the songs that I’ve been playing in the TuxGuitar 1.0 format. You can give it a try.
26
I can’t believe I missed this, but the TuxGuitar team has released the first whole version of their software. I’ve been using their software for a while but it has been listed as 0.9.1 as they’ve been completing the software.
TuxGuitar is a lot like Guitar Pro. You can tab out different songs or different tracks and it will play back the song that you’ve tabbed.
Below are some screen shots that I quickly took [Click on them to view big versions]:
Give TuxGuitar a try… It’s Free!
19
I’ve been considering signing up for a course with “MusicianUniversity.com” for the past few days. However, I’m kind of on the fence and would like some feedback from the public…
Has anyone taken a course with Musician University? If so, I’m looking to learn about your experience and your thoughts on the course you took.
I’m specifically interested in taking the course called: “Guitar Songwriting: writing Songs, Riffs and Chord Progressions”
I’ve been working on the song for my wife (as it is known) and I have come to a road block with the progression / song… I’m not sure where to take it or what to do next. I’ve come up with a few things, but ultimately I simply don’t yet know enough to write a song — at least a song worth keeping. Anyway, this is why I’m interested in taking the course…
Pretty much any feedback or thoughts would help. Thank you in advance!
Quick follow up update: tsubibo found this link: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080415072326AADYEe
The post is asking about a Better Business Bureau for the Netherlands, which is where MusicianUniversity.com is based out of. According to the post, the user has been trying to get a refund, presubmably because they didn’t feel that the services were to par.
If someone can counter this, I invite you to leave a comment at the bottom.
I am going to try to check out a local community college for what I’m looking for… I’d rather play it safe then waste valuable time and money…
14
IG of IG Blog was kind enough to pass the award of E for Excellent to UnderstandingGuitar.org. The award works like this (from what I understand, I’ll appreciate any corrections).
A blogger receives the award from another blogger (who has received the award already).The receiving blogger is then to pass the award to ten other bloggers. Pretty simple right?
Problem: At this time I only routinely follow six blogs… They are on the far right under Other Blogs… No matter your skill level, I encourage you to check them out. They are all chock-full of information. If you know of another blog that you read and respect — particularly in the “Beginning Guitar” genre, please share!
In keeping with the spirit of the award, I will list the sites following this along with my thoughts on the site. (No particular order) Unfortunately though, at this time I can only list six…
I know a lot of these sites have already won this award… But if I didn’t pass it back, I’d have no one to give it to!
If I find more sites to give this award to, I will update this posting.
28
My wife and I were watching VH1’s “100 Greatest songs of the 90s” on Christmas Day (don’t ask why, were are boring people) and during a few of the many hours of watching the show they are interviewing MC Hammer, and eventually my wife makes a comment: “MC Hammer is taking himself way to seriously.”She was right; his demeanor was very “I’m so great” (my wife’s and my opinion) and in between the interviews, they are cutting away to his one single (that I know of) “U Can’t Touch this” and he is dancing around in huge-way-to-baggy pants. Additionally, during the interview he was wearing a vary nice suit and sunglasses-very business-like. It was very humorous.
Sometime later, they also had Vanilla Ice. Though, I’m sure many people doesn’t necessarily wants to admit it (and to tell you the truth, I’m not sure why) everyone enjoyed at least one song of his, if not more. (probably more!)
Anyway, Vanilla Ice was very cool and relaxed during the interview. He didn’t act high and mighty. He was dressed as I would expect for a person of his occupation (yes, he is still a writer/rapper). He seemed to enjoy the reminiscing.
I felt that both Vanilla Ice and MC Hammer got in to and out of the spot light in very short times. MC Hammer, quicker than Vanilla Ice, and yet it seems that MC Hammer took his “success” a bit more seriously during that show then he should have. (Perhaps that is just how the interview was cut…)
Anyway, today I was thinking that this probably applies to how you practice guitar. You probably shouldn’t take yourself too seriously. You should definitively correct mistakes and what not (see post: “Call for Public Opinion – Mistakes“), but you are still learning! You have to expect to make mistakes. If you don’t make mistakes you can’t improve!
I think that if you take yourself too seriously, the increased pressure that you are putting on to yourself will only hinder your efforts at learning; this will only frustrate you during your efforts (leading you to eventually give up on it)
20
This will be an unusually quick post for me — I just want to share two links that I found quickly.
One thing that I need to do to vastly improve is my ability to strum the guitar. I’m very mechanical when I play — I don’t have that “sense of music/rhythm” I guess you’d say and it just doesn’t sound right at all. It been frustrating but it has been getting better, but still, I want to improve. So I decided to look for resources on the internet.
I found this, and I think the teacher/author does a wonderful job giving some example strum patterns. The video (click the person in the rocking chair) is probably the best place to start. The link is: http://www.grouptherapy.guernsey.net/strumming.html. I’ve not gotten in to the MP3s yet, but imagine they’d also be useful.
And the second link is: http://www.guitar-lessons-central.com/guitar-strumming-patterns.html
This has more videos and different patterns, though it looks a bit more complicated.
Enjoy!
Update: Josh, (see the comments) also suggested: http://www.heartwoodguitar.com/WordPressBlog/?p=5
Aside from some strum patterns, the author posts his interpretation of full songs. Such as Pink Floyd’s”Wish You Were Here” – One of my favorite Pink Floyd Songs.
