They have produced a high quality video series with a A -List guitarist from the west coast named Devo Carillo. He has shared the stage with greats like Carlos Santana, Jerry Garcia and the Jefferson Airplane in some of the greatest venues – the Fillmore, the Winter Gardens and the Avalon Ballroom.  He is also a very active guitar instructor.  Here is a free lesson from one of these songs.

http://tinyurl.com/7lxtsop

Like our Guitar Leads Master Volume and Learn2Jam Guitar Soloing Method, this is focused on classic rock songs… so I wanted to make sure you had a change to take a look.

http://tinyurl.com/7emulq2

This lesson is from Will’s rock guitar home study course called Monster Tapping Techniques where he teaches you how to master incredible tapping techniques using double-stops, combined scale patterns, arpeggios, pedal points, octaves, tapping harmonics and more.
This goes way beyond the regular Van Halen tapping stuff.

In this video with tablature on guitar tapping mechanics, Will demonstrates combining string bending with fretboard tapping.

http://tinyurl.com/79nfh5e

The app will be FREE and so will the first 10 lessons.  Thereafter will be charging a very small monthly subscription fee to continue to receive these riffs. Since this is a new product with new development cost, the will be a charge for existing customers.  However, the good news is that if you buy at launch there will be a big discount for early subscribers.

This whole mobile app technology is new to us… so we will be providing you with more details as they become available.  Stay Tuned!

In this video with tablature and an audio sample, I teach you how I use simple power chords to create compelling melodic movement.

http://tinyurl.com/d7czwf9

This first video is from his home study course called “Mastering Lead Guitar” where he teaches time-saving shortcuts to achieving great lead guitar technique. Since we worked on alternate picking last time, check this video where he explain what pick works best and why. Choosing your pick is IMPORTANT. It has A LOT to do with the way you sound!

 http://tinyurl.com/7ot9uuh

Here is a second video lesson from Will in which he show you one of many different approaches to being creative with arpeggios. It contains both video and tabs.

http://tinyurl.com/8425doq

Each package will consist of  Song Surgeon Pro, the Guitar Leads Master Volume and a 2 Gb mp3 player.  Each of five winners will receive ALL three of these items. 

Song Surgeon Pro -  The best-in-class slow down software for both Mac andWin.  It not only provides distortion free audio with key and tempo changes but a host of other useful features.   There are two videos on the drawing page that illustrate some of these other features for you.

Guitar Leads Master Volume – This is a massive library of 425 guitar riffs a practice segments from more than 80+ classic guitar songs.  These riffs are provided at full speed and half speed and contain accurate tabs for you to follow and play along with.

2Gb Mp3 player – A generic mp3 player similar in design to Apple’s iPod shuffle.  We include the USB connecting cable and ear buds.  You can load your guitar music onto this mp3 player, or create your own using Song Surgeon and then save it to this player.  Turn it on, put your ear buds in, grab your guitar — and you’re ready to start jamming.

To enter the drawing all you need to do is REGISTER on this page.

http://songsurgeon.com/page.c233.169.html

The drawing will be one week from today…so don’t miss this opportunity, go there now and register for this bundle of goodies. You can’t win unless you register!

I like to use a football analogy when it comes to basics… if you don’t tackle and block well, if you don’t protect the ball, if you don’t  implement and MASTER the basics.. you dramatically reduce your changes of winning.   The same is true with most things… and certain it’s true with guitar.  To be a good player you must MASTER the basics.  And even if you think you have, it never hurts to get a quick refresher course.

Ok, for today’s BIG guitar lesson (multiple videos), shows you a hot lead guitar solo AND the rhythm guitar that goes with it.  There’s normal and slow speed video demonstrations for the leads and rhythms, jam tracks and complete tablature notation.

If this lesson is too challenging, don’t worry! There are A LOT more lessons coming your way that vary in size, shape and difficulty level including stuff for beginners, that Will we be providing in the future. 

http://tinyurl.com/7dpdr7m

http://songsurgeon.com/cabs/guitar_slow_down

This week, we are going to continue this theme by looking at another example.  We’ll take a well know song, played at a speed that almost no one can follow… and slow it down to the point that you can easily follow it.  If you’ve heard Van Halen play Ice Cream Man, you’ll know just how fast this guy can play.  However, after running this song thru Song Surgeon and slowing it down to 20%, you can see how manageable it becomes.

http://songsurgeon.com/cabs/guitar_slow_down

Stay tuned for next week’s newsletter.  I will be announcing a drawing contest and giving
away more than $200 bucks of goodies to each of 5 winners.  In addition, I will be demonstrating a new twist on backing tracks.  These will be variable tempo and key tracks
and they allow you set the tempo and key.

For today, I have two videos from our guest instructor.  In this first video with tablature and fretboard diagram, our guest instructor shows you one of many ways to link different scale patterns together for playing hot lead guitar.

http://tinyurl.com/72up8dd

This second video lesson provides you with a an alternate picking technique.  It’s a “less is more” approach when you attack the strings with your pick.

http://tinyurl.com/6vrlfbj

http://songsurgeon.com/cabs/guitar_slow_down

http://guitar-1.com

Also.. don’t forget about our mega library of guitar riffs, with over 425 classic rock riffs from 80+ songs.  And if that isn’t enough… there is no set price for these… YOU name your price.

http://www.guitar-leads.com

Most of you have seen or heard my name.  Tony has been the musician behind the lessons, and I have worked with Tony as the marketing guy.

Don’t worry, I am not going to try and take Tony’s place and teach you guitar. However, what I hope to do is to provide you with some quality material from other guitarists I know.  Believe me I have plenty of things to do.. so I have no interest in wasting your time or mine with junk.

Let’s go ahead and get started:

The first guy who I am going to borrow some material from (with his permission of course) is Will Landrum.  Of all of the teaching guitarists I know… Will is one of the best players.  He has agreed to allow me to share with you some of the material he is using with his online students.  Below are two teaching videos from Will:

Palm Muting and String Silencing
http://tinyurl.com/7f2kcaq

Strumming and String Isolation
http://tinyurl.com/7zkpfta

If you are more advanced in your playing and what something more challenging, then I would recommend this video tutorial video Tony put together several months ago, on using geometric patterns to your advantage when learning to take solos.

Anchor Points and Geometric Patterns
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5B6GAPTp940&feature=related

http://www.songsurgeon.com/page/ssweb.html

NIGHT & DAY Difference! Both fantastic! Both fill a need! The electric guitar is nothing without its pickups. You can’t hear any sound without them. The single coil pickup, traditionally thought of as being found on the FENDER STRATOCASTER guitar, is made in such a way that it has a distinctive, clean, crisp and thinner sounding tone than the Humbucker pickup. Some good examples of what Single Coils sound like are heard on the songs: “Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress” by THE HOLLIES, “That’ll Be The Day” by BUDDY HOLLY and many of the early songs by THE BEACH BOYS like “Surfin’ USA.”

The Humbucker pickups are typically thought of as being found on Gibson guitars, such as the Les Paul model and the ES 335 model. They have a fatter, more dense sound than the single coil pickup. Some great examples of what a Humbucker pickup sounds like, are found on CARLOS SANTANA’S “Black Magic Woman”, BLACK SABBATH’S “War Pigs” and THE DOOBIE BROTHERS’ “China Grove.”

Humbucker pickups were developed because of the way that single coil pickups were made and the problems that were inherent in their design. They would “Hum” when played near florescent lighting or if the amplifier was plugged into a wall socket that was noisy due to bad electrical grounding. Humbuckers are essentially 2 single coil pickups that share a large magnet at their base. Each coil of a Humbucker is wrapped differently, so that the RF (radio frequency) signals they create cancel each other out. The only purpose in creating Humbuckers was to “buck” the hum that single coils created. However Humbuckers did not, and do not, sound just like single coils without hum. Since a much larger magnet was used and there were 2 coils of wire, the Humbucker created a much louder signal.

Today, with the advances in electronic technology, we also find guitars that have single coil pickups that do not buzz (Fender Lace.) You can also find guitars that have a combination of both single coil and Humbucker pickups on them, such as certain Fender Telecaster models. This is a nice option that can give you many combinations of sounds. I suggest you go to your music store and check them both out before committing to one type or the other.

Hopefully this little intro to the differences in these two pickup configurations, will encourage you to audition the two styles. With Christmas coming I suggest you hurry out and make your choice! I also would like to wish you all a Happy, Healthy and Holy Christmas season and New Year.

As I began to search for a really good topic for this week’s newsletter, I thought I would take a look at what the other guitar courses are saying out there. I even checked out “i-phone/i-pad” and “Droid” guitar apps. Quite frankly, what I learned was stunning and sad! You see, there’s only so many ways you can package and re-package the same old guitar instruction. For example, you may have heard of the “CAGED System” of understanding chord/Barre chord usage. Once you have learned that concept, you’re done learning it. Once you learn how to play a hammer-on or a pull-off, you’re done learning it. Once you learn the notes on the fretboard or are able to play complicated chord fingerings, again, you’re done.

While that stuff is important the question is: What do you do with these techniques and knowledge? Do you become frustrated because you have to go through months of theory in order to play the lead to “Mary Had A Little Lamb (the nursery rhyme?) Where have you gotten? What’s the real goal? What’s the next step?  

After learning the basics referenced above, it will normally take years thereafter for a guitarist to get to a point where they can think on their feet fast enough to learn how to improvise when taking a solo.

And….  THAT IS THE NEXT STEP 

Even if you learn the lead to “Hotel California” (a lead I absolutely love to play and respect as one of the best) it will not help you take solos on your own. So you see it’s just not any solo or song, but 4 very specific ones.

So, how can you learn to play improvisational solos in THE QUICKEST AMOUNT OF TIME? The answer to that question is simple but not obvious to see.  It took me 40 years to understand something that I knew back in 1975 and then a couple of additional years to develop it into a simple soloing system.

You see, I’ve played and continue to play as a full-time, professional guitar player/singer. I’ve played 1,000′s of songs. And after almost 40 years of playing and taking solos, a BOMBSHELL of a realization went off in my head a couple of years ago..It was this fact:  There were 4 songs that have LITERALLY changed my life.

They changed my life because after I learned them, I was able to IMMEDIATELY gather what I needed to solo on any song I wanted. And because of that, I auditioned for and got the spot as full time lead guitarist for one of the nation’s busiest Rock groups. Because of that, I’ve travelled the country playing with and opening for acts such as: The Beach Boys, Faith Hill, Tim McGraw, The Pointer Sisters, Edgar Winter, The Temptations, The Four Tops, Ray Charles, The Dixie Chicks and on and on. Because of that, I have over 13 released CD’s and live my childhood dream of being a full-time musician — All because of four songs.

You know what else??  I knew these songs and was already using this system back in 1975 – I just didn’t know that’s what I was doing. That’s how I ended up being the guitar player in the 5th Division Army Band instead of an Avionics mechanic that I was drafted for. 4 Songs!
 
What do you want to do as a guitarist? Would you like to be able to just sit in your house and jam along to a CD? Would you like to get good enough, quick enough to join a band and be their lead player? Or maybe you just want to learn these four songs to catapult you into the next level, as I was blessed enough to get to.

You need the knowledge/tools and you need the chops to do it and then when the opportunity comes…you’ll be ready.

So, if you want to play solos that you make up yourself, if you want to take what you know already and use it to its maximum potential, don’t waste another second. Commit right now to take that NEXT STEP to getting where you deserve to be as a guitar player. It took me 40 years to figure out that just 4 songs can change your life. It did for me and now I want you to have those actual songs and the instruction to go along with them so that they will change your guitar playing life too.

But wait there is more…

In order to help you say yes to what is already is a bombshell of a deal…I am going to throw in a 2 GB Mp3 player (valued at $49) to all purchasers. 

Here is what you will get:

~~> Learn2Jam                               $79       ($68 savings)
~~> GL Master Volume                   FREE.   ($97 savings)
~~> 2Gb Mp3 Player                       FREE      ($49 value)

That is a whopping $214 in discounts and free gifts.

Learn2Jam will make a great gift for you or another musician in your life, and you can either KEEP the Mp3 player for yourself, OR include it as part of the gift and make a BIG impression.  

To get this entire package you MUST use this special link below. When you click this link the page you land on will display a window showing you the FREE mp3 player

http://guitar-1.com/sc/order/  

If you don’t see the picture it that our inventory of this item is depleted and  though you still get the 40% discount and FREE copy of the Master Volume, the MP3 player won’t be included.

p.p.s. An unsolicited customer comment:

Just want to say I enjoyed the Learn to Jam Course. I have a lot of CD courses from others. Some I picked up and played once or twice and they are still sitting on the shelf. With yours I’ve played the CD’s so many times now, I feel like I know you.

I’m an intermediate player but I think your course is very unique in that you approach the subject so that even a beginner can understand. I love the old school rock and roll and blues. In fact I have the SG just like the one you are playing.

Just a note to say thank you for a great course. If you should come up with a follow up course let me know, I will be interested in purchasing it.

R. Robinson