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#16
11-02-2004, 12:46 PM
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waynep,
just on the fingerpicking, I'd too suggest you work through MH's book first....at least to the point of being able to comfortably Travis pick the basic patterns through easy and not so easy chord changes.......just to get a familiarity (sp?) and feel for putting fingers to the strings accurately and in a 'meaty' way...(meaty meaning in a way that generates a strong and confident tone).... my experience is that most folks get a better start on fingerpicking if they start with patterns...something predictable and very repetitive...gives your hand a lot of practice very quickly.... if you just start with 'simple generalized fingerstyle pieces', then each little part of each tune might require some different skills...and you *might* find yourself practicing each song 8 million times to just 'get through it'...and not really develop any *particular* skills along the way....I don't think I worded that well...there is a point in there.... Taylorgyrl.....make sure you understand that the Mastering the Guitar series is a series of MUSIC READING books...regular old musical notation....(yes it does include TAB here and there but it is primarlily a series of books that teaches MUSIC READING on the guitar)....if you're not interested in reading music you don't want these you would DEFINITELY NOT just want the books...the accompaniment adds a lot to the series... the *first portion* of the *first book* in the series is *to me* a bit....a bit...well...it could have maybe been better somehow... after that...it blows any other publisher's series of basic music reading books out of the water...(opinion)... again, only if you're interested in learning to read music.... I'm not 100% sure what a DVD is.....? is it boom-box cassette tape vs music CD VCR tape TV thingy vs DVD is that the right analogy?
__________________
Indeed, there is something in the current DC/NY culture that equates a lack of unthinking boosterism with a lack of patriotism. As if not being drunk on the latest Dow gains is somehow un-American. - Arianna Huffington May 11, 2009 
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#17
11-02-2004, 01:23 PM
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Yea I am planning on continuing the MH books for sure . . . . before I go to other fingerstyle things.
I learned how to read music in my piano, clarinet and trumpet days so I have that part down. The part I dont have is playing the music that's on the paper on my guitar! 
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Wayne Taylor 714ce, 410R, Big Baby
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#18
11-02-2004, 10:09 PM
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I checked out the MB Mastering 1A book + CDs today at GC. I think my skill level is beyond this book and am not that interested in sight reading on guitar. But having said that, it looks like an impressive method book and seems to cover a great deal. I checked out the "Beginning Fingerstyle Guitar" from National Guitar Workshop and it looks pretty good though it overlaps with the MH book and it doesn't really teach "real" songs.
Tg
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#20
11-03-2004, 08:25 AM
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the National Guitar Workshop's Fingerstyle books are good (opinion)...
it is frustrating in that they could be a whole lot better... in the Beginning book they waste too much darn space on stuff that would be better off placed in other books...some space on some theory, some space on chords...some space on basic technique, etc...would be better off putting that all in something called preliminaries or something er other... they should devote more space to the things that they do cover well...(the section on intervals of a 3rd, 6th, and 10th for one)...all opinion... but all in all when you compare the total cost of the Beginning and Intermediate books to the cost of lessons...it seems good value to me...the same money would only buy you two or three lessons at most... FYI, the character of the 3rd book in the series (Mastering) is a bit different (to me...all opinion).....there are some very good exercises in it..... but at some point, one of the best things to do is just get your hands on TAB of the players/songs you like and start picking them apart... try to play passages as written... try to play those passages (as possible) in other areas of the neck... try to play those passages (as possible) in other keys... that way you get much more practice than just what is on the paper.... any particular piece of TAB is awfully darn finite... find more self-instruction within it.... we're all self-taught....
__________________
Indeed, there is something in the current DC/NY culture that equates a lack of unthinking boosterism with a lack of patriotism. As if not being drunk on the latest Dow gains is somehow un-American. - Arianna Huffington May 11, 2009
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#21
11-03-2004, 11:51 PM
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I agree that the NGW books offer a lot of great study material but I too see a lot of repetition of basic theory in many of the beginning books in the series. The other thing I don't like about the series is that you only get bits and pieces of exercises and not entire songs to learn. Even when you get entire songs, they are ones written by the authors. The Fingerstyle book had some of these features yet this one had many more full songs to play, usually "in the style of" different artists.
Tg
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#22
11-04-2004, 05:44 AM
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I'm starting up in "Mastering the Guitar" as well, as part of my skill building. Right now I'm probably an intermediate level strummer with some reasonable arpeggio skills. I really want to grow in the area of single note work.
I know there are several good series out there but what helped me decide to commit to this series was: 1) Use of both standard music notation and TAB. 2) The upper skill end of the series is fairly high ( as if I'll ever get there) 3) It has CD examples support of many of the excercises. 4) I wanted something systematic ( but not for primarily classical players ). 5) It seems to touch on quite a variety of genres and I'm fairly ecclectic in my musical tastes. I may pick up the Mark Hanson materials as well. It seems that in this thread people have been seeing them as complementary to the "Mastering the Guitar" series. I hope this thread keeps resurfacing as those of us working through this material encourage one another and get tips from some of the wealth of experience of the forum.
__________________
A Strummer "Let's lute the city", said the minstrels. Oftentimes the only result I get from a thought experiment is a messed up lab.
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#23
11-04-2004, 07:37 PM
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Quote:
Tg
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