No more soloing alone
Monday, January 14, 2008
One of the hurdles on my road to guitar playing proficiency has always been lead guitar; playing solo's, licks or whatever you want to call it, with its involvement of individual finger movement sometimes at blinding speeds sounds scary enough for any guitar player to want to put it off for as long as possible. But I figured if I'm gonna be a good guitar player, I'd best just get this thing handled as quickly as possible.
I started out by just studying some existing guitar solo's and trying to play them on my own. I think the first solo I ever tried to play was the one from Stairway to Heaven. I actually got pretty far until the bit where it gets blindingly fast (for my taste at least). Other solo's I tried came from songs like Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix, Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd and Lady Writer by Dire Straits. There must have been way more than those that I've at least tried my hand at, but these were the ones that stood out as the ones I really, really tried to master. It got frustrating when I realized I couldn't really play any of them adequately, no matter how much I practiced. There was just too much speed and accuracy involved.
Being full of faith that the internet would provide me with all I needed, I naturally had to look for some online resource that would teach me the skills I needed. Some free lessons like those at Ultimate-Guitar.com are nice, but really aren't much more than text and some tabs. I needed something immersive; something that would grab me by the hand and make it as easy on me as possible. I figured if I'm gonna actually pay for something, it damn well better be good.
A few searches later I ended up with something called Jamorama Lead Guitar. The site claims to contain more than just a pretty ebook and some tracks to play along with, which a lot of programs tend to do (more on the content later). For $30 I thought it would at least be worth a try, especially with the whole money-back guarantee and all.
The package included lots of videos (43 to be precise), an ear training program called GuitEarIt (can't believe how much this actually helped my hearing), Jayde Musica, which playfully attempts to teach you how to read sheet music (though I'll admit I put this one off for a long time), some neat lessons that teach you to control your fingers and tackle chords and riffs in a relatively short time, some jam tracks to play to, and some more stuff on the side. The entire collection, I soon found out, was enough to keep me busy for several months.
While it may sound true for some that a teacher is the ultimate way to go in terms of making progress with your playing, Jamorama Lead Guitar makes it awfully tempting to at least try it on your own. For the record: The package focuses mainly on lead guitar, so other areas like chord constructions and music theory are barely even being mentioned (which may be a good thing if you want to keep your focus on lead guitar and nothing else).
It may still be a little soon to make a complete conclusion about this product, but if my sudden progress with lead guitar is any indication, then Jamorama Lead Guitar is definitely taking bringing me closer to my goal. I would say that, if anything, the program will definitely help you improve your soloing skills, and if you find you're having trouble with getting those lead guitar parts down, I recommend you to take a look at this thing:
Jamorama Lead Guitar
If you have a question, feel free to leave a comment. I look forward to hearing some of your own impressions.
I started out by just studying some existing guitar solo's and trying to play them on my own. I think the first solo I ever tried to play was the one from Stairway to Heaven. I actually got pretty far until the bit where it gets blindingly fast (for my taste at least). Other solo's I tried came from songs like Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix, Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd and Lady Writer by Dire Straits. There must have been way more than those that I've at least tried my hand at, but these were the ones that stood out as the ones I really, really tried to master. It got frustrating when I realized I couldn't really play any of them adequately, no matter how much I practiced. There was just too much speed and accuracy involved.
Being full of faith that the internet would provide me with all I needed, I naturally had to look for some online resource that would teach me the skills I needed. Some free lessons like those at Ultimate-Guitar.com are nice, but really aren't much more than text and some tabs. I needed something immersive; something that would grab me by the hand and make it as easy on me as possible. I figured if I'm gonna actually pay for something, it damn well better be good.
A few searches later I ended up with something called Jamorama Lead Guitar. The site claims to contain more than just a pretty ebook and some tracks to play along with, which a lot of programs tend to do (more on the content later). For $30 I thought it would at least be worth a try, especially with the whole money-back guarantee and all.
The package included lots of videos (43 to be precise), an ear training program called GuitEarIt (can't believe how much this actually helped my hearing), Jayde Musica, which playfully attempts to teach you how to read sheet music (though I'll admit I put this one off for a long time), some neat lessons that teach you to control your fingers and tackle chords and riffs in a relatively short time, some jam tracks to play to, and some more stuff on the side. The entire collection, I soon found out, was enough to keep me busy for several months.
While it may sound true for some that a teacher is the ultimate way to go in terms of making progress with your playing, Jamorama Lead Guitar makes it awfully tempting to at least try it on your own. For the record: The package focuses mainly on lead guitar, so other areas like chord constructions and music theory are barely even being mentioned (which may be a good thing if you want to keep your focus on lead guitar and nothing else).
It may still be a little soon to make a complete conclusion about this product, but if my sudden progress with lead guitar is any indication, then Jamorama Lead Guitar is definitely taking bringing me closer to my goal. I would say that, if anything, the program will definitely help you improve your soloing skills, and if you find you're having trouble with getting those lead guitar parts down, I recommend you to take a look at this thing:
Jamorama Lead Guitar
If you have a question, feel free to leave a comment. I look forward to hearing some of your own impressions.
Site Launch
I've been playing guitar now for around two and a half years. The whole time I've managed to do without a teacher, convinced that the material online (free or otherwise) would get me through it somehow. Well, to a certain degree, it did; I've definitely reached a level of guitar playing that I wouldn't have thought possible when I had just started. But then again, I'm clearly not yet where I want to be.
It's every musician's dream to excel in his instrument. From the day I started I envisioned myself playing licks like the pros and impressing everyone around me with my wild skills. After almost three years, I'll admit this hasn't happened yet. Far from it. But is the absence of a teacher really the only reason I haven't progressed as much as I wished I had? I don't think so. You can look around on any guitar-related forum and find out quickly enough that many have gone before you without any contact with a teacher whatsoever, and still attained a very respectable level of skill.
Now we all know the formula for achieving success in these kinds of things; it's the answer you'll get to the question "how do I get better at playing guitar?": Practice, practice, practice! I'm sure few of us will disagree with that, but by now I've found out that how you practice is at least as important as whether you do it at all. And this is where guitar learning software comes in.
Over the course of the last year or so I have tried and tested a large number a guitar learning programs available online, free or otherwise. It is my intention to review as many of these as I can, as accurately as I can. This is one man's journey through the world of online guitar resources.
I hope you enjoy your stay at GuitarWise.
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