“Home Recording” used to be a term that petrified musicians. Not least because it required huge amounts of equipment to even consider. Before computers, it was virtually impossible, but as technology has changed, dabbling in recording is a realistic option for most guitarists, songwriters and even full bands. Can the results ever stand up to a studio recording?

Most home recording setups are a simplified version of a recording studio setup. Instead of going into a studio and having microphones running into preamps, a mixing desk and then to the computer, a home setup will usually be a microphone running to an audio interface and then to your computer. The audio is picked up in a DAW and then edited or ‘mixed’. Some home recordings are even done on USB microphones. 10 years ago, this would have been virtually unthinkable, but companies like Blue mics have actually done a very good job of making the switch to USB. It takes a huge amount of the hassle out of things, and means recording can take place anywhere.

Examples of Home Recording

Bon Iver – For Emma, Forever Ago.

Perhaps a seminal moment in the world of DIY musicianship. This album was recorded in a cabin, where Justin Vernon worked on the project in solitude, tracking to an old version of ProTools LE software. Though it has a slightly lo-fi feel, no listener in the world would instantly recognise that this was not recorded in a studio, and the environment in which it was recorded shines through in an album with a definite ‘tone’ running throughout. One of the first examples of home recording breaching the mainstream.

Tame Impala – Currents

A more modern example of home recording is Tame Impala’s ‘Currents”. Lead singer Kevin Parkers home studio is described as more of a storage facility for his equipment, but was turned into the perfect recording space for this well-polished album.

Beck – Odelay

Never one to shy away from innovating, Beck was home recording in the mid 90s. He used the home (and equipment) of electronic producers the dust brothers to record and mix much of his seminal, sample-based album “Odelay”. Incredibly, the primitive computing technology available to him meant that many of the ideas for the album are said to have come to him whilst waiting hours for his projects to save on the computer.

Tips for Home Recording

The short answer to the question of “can your guitar (or vocals) sound as good in home recordings?” is surprisingly a resounding yes. That said, recording studios exist for a reason and are still preferable if you have the time and money. To record at home, some decent equipment and attention to detail are needed.

Recording at home…with the right gear, you can get great results.

Home recordings should consider acoustics. Treating your room with acoustic panels, or even buying a vocal isolation shield or shoving it full of duvets will do a decent job! Use the best microphone/s available to you, and investing in a decent home studio setup can pay off in the future. Even something as minimal as a good condenser microphone and audio interface can do wonders. Finally, brush up on your DAW or music software. There’s no use in getting good home recordings if you have no idea how to mix them, multi-track and present them into a finished song.

We live in a liberating age for guitarists and musicians, and the idea that a song recorded in your mom’s basement can reach the charts should give every DIY musician the inspiration to learn how to record and produce.

Can Your Guitar Ever Sound as Good in Home Recordings? from MyRareGuitars.com

Guitar’s strings are usually durable enough to withstand months after they need to be changed, but don’t think that a popped string is the only reason why you should do that. Re-stringing your guitar should be done more often, as you won’t be able to clean the neck, and so on.

Anyhow, “why” you should restring your guitar is another topic, let’s stick with “how”. We’ll discuss several easy steps which will help you learn this crucial guitar maintenance method – you’ll be using it for as long as you play, so you might as well pay attention.

Step 1 – Find a suitable spot where you will re-string your guitar

Plainly put, you could restring your guitar virtually anywhere, but that’s not recommended for beginners. Why is that? Well, every time you take a string off, you’ll also have to put it somewhere where it can (and more often than not “will”) be misplaced, not to mention the hardware. 

Apart from that, re-stringing also means “re-tuning”, so, unless you have a tuner handy, you might as well want to find someplace really quiet. 

Step 2 – Prepare the tools needed to re-string your guitar

Let’s put it this way – there’s a fast method which simply involves changing of your guitar’s strings, and there’s a thorough method which involves cleaning, tuning, and wire cutting. Depending on which method you want to go with, you’ll need different gear. If possible, go with the “thorough” method whenever you can, as the health of your guitar should be more important than getting lazy. 

Anyhow, the list of tools you need is as following:

• Strings – if you’re a complete beginner, you might want to get an extra pair, as you might pop a string before getting the job right.
• A piece of clean cloth – you’ll use this to clean the fingerboard and other key points.
• Wire cutters – unless you want your strings to dangle from your guitar’s head, you’ll want to cut the excess parts.
• (Optional) Guitar Cleaning Tool – most beginners don’t have this tool, which is why it’s optional. 
• (Optional) Tuner – There are different ways to tune your guitar, so consider a tuner only if you can’t think of any.

Step 3 – Lay your guitar down on a comfortable surface

Even though it’s pretty self-explanatory, it wouldn’t hurt to mention that hard surfaces are hazardous for your guitar’s neck. Obviously, you’ll want your guitar to be supported by anything soft and cozy – pillows might do the trick (note: most beginners go with the easiest solution – laying the guitar down on the knees. There’s a world of reasons why you shouldn’t do that, but the most important one involves it falling off and getting ruined).

You don’t need to think about anything in particular during this step, as all you have to do is secure the neck without limiting access to other places. For example, if you used a pillow and it’s too bulky, you might need to press it down in order to get to guitar’s head. If you want to avoid this, use smaller objects as support. 

Step 4 – De-tuning and machine heads

The machine heads are also called tuning keys or tuning gears. These hardware pieces are used to tighten or loosen the tension of the strings, which is simply called “tuning”. Now, before you could re-string your guitar, you have to de-tune it. By de-tuning we mean “spin the heads so that the string get loose”. 

You’ll have to repeat the process for each string separately. Keep in mind, you should de-tune your guitar slowly, as quick movements might damage older machine heads.

Step 5 – Removing the pins/unlocking the mechanism from the bridge

Depending on the type of the guitar, you should either remove the pins (acoustic guitar) or unlock the mechanism (electric guitar) from the bridge.

Acoustic guitars have safety pins for each string which serve as “anchors”, keeping the strings “at bay”. On the other hand, electric guitars have a locking mechanism (typically guitars with Floyd rose), or none at all. If the latter is the case, un-screwing the machine heads would be sufficient, so this part could be skipped. 

Step 6 – Placing the strings

The only proper way to place the strings is to start at the bottom of the bridge. Pull the strings out from the package as you place each one, and start with the E1. Consult the list below for detailed explanation:

• Place the string in the pin hole and cover it 
• Lay the string on the metal bridge bar so that it sits neatly in the groove
• Apply slight tension with the hand that holds the pin (hold the string if it’s electric guitar)
• Pull the string slowly across the length of the fingerboard in the direction of your guitar’s head
• Put the end of the string through the machine heads, press it down the fingerboard as you do
• Tighten the machine heads without releasing the pressure on the string
• Keep tightening liberally until you feel the tension between your finger and the string, but do so slowly else it will snap (note: don’t overdo it – you just need your strings to be slightly tense, you’ll deal with tuning later on). 
• Repeat the process with other strings (E1, A, D, G, B, E)

Step 7 – Tune in

Now that you’ve placed the strings in place, it’s time to tune the guitar. Choose the tuning as you see fit (standard tuning is E, A, D, G, B, E, just like the name of the strings). Most musicians can tune their guitars by ear, but if you’re having difficulties, you can use a guitar tuner. 

In case you don’t have it, try figuring out the E1 string tuning by ear, and proceed with other strings, keeping in mind that the fifth fret of your E1 string should sound exactly like the open A string (and so on, with the exception of the G string, which should be fretted at the 4^th fret instead of 5^th). 

Conclusion

Re-stringing your guitar is a standard maintenance procedure. It might appear hard at the beginning, but you’ll get better and faster with time. Most beginners tend to get confused with a step or two, especially the tuning part, but don’t get dissuaded even if you don’t nail it in your first try. In the worst-case scenario, you’ll just pop a string or two before you get it right.

Author bio

I’m Anh Vu who has worked sound technology industry for 10 years now. Today, I am an affiliate blogger who likes to educate my audience more about sound technology. Visit to headphonesunder100center.com to find all information about music that you need.

How to re-string a guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Photo courtesy of Shutterstock

If You Want to Be a Guitarist …

Once you have fallen in love with the guitar and what it can do, there is really no single
correct way to learn to play. Some of the most famous guitar players taught themselves, by
listening to their favourite guitarists. How do you do that? How can you just pick up a guitar
and learn how to play it?

Here are five tips for the beginner guitar player:

Tip No. 1. Learn About the Instrument First.

The guitar has a long history of development, with some scholars saying that the modern
guitar is an ancestor of the Lute or the Greek Kithara. Others say that the modern guitar
developed from the Egyptian Tanbur. Whatever the truth is about the guitar’s history, there
are many types of guitar. Acoustic guitars, classical guitars, steel string guitars, flamenco
guitars, electric guitars. There is a type of guitar for almost every type of music that can be
played.

It is important to learn about the instrument that you are going to play. Beginner players may
need to learn about the parts of the guitar from the head-stock to the sound-hole to the
bridge. It’s necessary to learn how to string and re-string a guitar and to learn which kind of
strings your new guitar will need.

Beginner players also need to learn how to keep their guitar in its best condition. This means
learning how to clean it and where to keep when it is not in use.

Tip No. 2. Learn the Chords.

It is said that there are 2,341 chords in total that can be played up and down the neck of the
guitar. For beginners, the most important chords to learn may be the open chords. These are
the chords from C to B that can be played without the need to barre the strings. By learning
to play some chord combinations in varying keys, the beginner player will get a sense of how
songs can be create. They will also learn some of wonderful songs that have already been
written. A sense of rhythm starts to develop naturally as the beginner player strums the
chords.

Tip No. 3. Learn Some Strumming and Finger-picking Techniques.

Most guitar players develop their own sense of rhythm and a strumming style. This is part of
the creativity that grows as a person learns to play any musical instrument. The beginner
guitar player needs to learn coordination, or how to fit the chords he/she has learned into the
rhythm of the music. This means fitting chord changes into a key signature such as 2/4
timing, 4/4 timing, 3/4 timing, 6/8 timing. There are many timing patterns that music is played
in. It’s a good idea to learn some simple finger picking patterns early on as well. This can
give the beginner another way of hearing timing, as well as extending their technique and
flexibility.

Tip No. 4. Learn Some Songs and Easy Pieces of Classical Music.

Learning songs is a good way to bring all the techniques together.It makes all of the more
technical learning worthwhile. As the beginner player learns how chords become songs, it is
also a good idea to learn the individual notes of each string up to the first three frets at least.
By doing this the guitar player learns which notes are in each chord. The first barre chords
that the guitar player will learn are usually the barred F Chord and the barred G chord. These
chords are played on the first and third frets respectively. This ties in with learning the notes
of the first three frets.

Tip No.5. Practise Every Day.

For people who love playing the guitar this will not be difficult. Practice is important, not so
much because practice makes perfect, but because practice leads the guitar player forward.
There are many songs and many pieces of music that can be played on the first three frets of
the guitar. Frequent practice opens the keyboard up to the player. Suddenly, you understand
that riff by one of your favourite guitarists. Suddenly you can play some licks that you never
thought you would be able to play. Unless you actually dislike playing the guitar, which is
highly unlikely, practice is not a chore. It is the time when you sit down and have fun with a
guitar. Well, maybe practising scales is not a lot of fun.

So those are my top five tips for beginner guitar players. Going through the five stages of
learning could take up to two years. In those two years a beginner player will be well on the
way to being a good player. My last tip is to listen to great guitar music as often as possible.

About the website

http://guitarreviewed.com is site that offers lots of information about acoustic guitars to those
who wish to buy a first or even a second instrument. The review of each guitar includes a
photograph of the guitar, followed by a description of the guitar’s features, its price and the
things about the guitar that were either Liked or Not Liked.

About the Author

Hi, my name’s Joe. I was born in the 1980’s and was inspired by rock musicians such as Eric
Clapton, Jeff Beck and Carlos Santana. I also like the sounds of Classical Guitarists such as
John Williams. I write the acoustic guitar reviews on Guitar Reviewed and I sit down to play
the guitar every day, because I love the guitar.

How to Learn to Play the Guitar: for Beginners from MyRareGuitars.com

Issue 17

“You are what you eat” is an expression we all know and understand as truth. Simply put, if you want to live a healthy and balanced life, you need to eat a healthy balanced diet. That said, the expression can be used with a much more metaphorical meaning for a number of different things. Your experiences, your friends and what you surround yourself by play huge parts in the person you are. Often you have no choice but to live through something that can change you for the better or worse. On the other hand, there are many things you have the ability to choose from that will have an impact your life, or at least some aspects of it. Music is one of these things.

For a musician, what you listen to plays a large role in what you end up creating, whether you are trying to or not! We are like sponges. We hear something we like, it soaks in, and later on it leaks out in our writing, playing, and the tones we decide to create. I can recall more than a few occasions where I’ll be listening to a track, and then hear a riff that sounds almost identical to something I’ve written without having any intention of doing so.

Keeping this in mind, you can actually increase your guitar “vocabulary”, and, in a roundabout way, improve your guitar tone without even having an instrument in your hands.

Here are some things to consider:

1) Listen to various genres

Even if you know the style you want to play or create, try not to limit your listening to that genre.

The most famous and signature guitar tones out there were not created by someone re-hashing something that had already been done, but by blending a variety of influences and sounds. Tony Iommi didn’t have a metal band to listen to for inspiration and look what he created! You’ll find that different genres call for different tones, and you will grow to appreciate subtle nuances that you can incorporate into your own playing and writing.

2) Try to isolate the guitar

The overall sound of a song is comprised of all the instruments mixed together. So, sometimes when you try and recreate a tone while playing by yourself you can over compensate in some areas. Adding extra gain, treble or reverb are a few examples. It might sound great alone, but throwing that into a band situation may just make everything sound muddy and convoluted. You’d be surprised to hear how some of your favourite songs’ guitar tracks sound on solo! It’s tricky, but try going back and forth between isolating the guitar in a song and then listening to the whole mix.

3) Study and analyze different players

Ask two guitar players to play the same riff with the same guitar and each will sound different. Did they just play a hammer-on or did they slide to that note? Was that the open D string or the A string in the fifth fret? How fast is their vibrato? What is their note selection and phrasing like?

These are all things that every guitar player does slightly different from another, resulting in a unique play style and tone. Usually you will be able to find repetition in a player, and if you can tap into that then you can expand your repertoire in no time.

Put it this way: your guitar, your amp, and your foot pedals are all inanimate objects. Sure, they will sound different depending on what they are and how they’re set, but it’s you who is actually telling them how to sound.

Tips on Tone – Issue #17 from MyRareGuitars.com

When I was out doing my Christmas shopping this year at the local toy store, I saw a woman pass by with a cart almost filled to the brim. She stopped in the aisle in front of me, grabbed a boxed up quarter sized guitar from the bin, and put it in her cart. She couldn’t have been stopped for more than 5 seconds – enough to see the price tag and then carry on. Now, that’s all well and good if this was simply a toy guitar, but this was a fully functional six string acoustic with a brand name.

Such is the way the world runs: convenience over quality. We microwave manufactured food instead of cook fresh food, we watch over compressed movie streams online instead of buy a video, and we buy guitars from the toy store instead of a music shop. All of these have something in common: they’re cheaper and easier than the alternative. The downside? Well, low quality movie streams hardly give you the experience of a blu-ray, and too much manufactured food will eventually kill you. Many would argue, however, that they don’t know if their son or daughter will “be into” playing guitar and therefore justify spending a “safe” amount. Here’s the problem with this:  going with that “safe” purchase may turn out to be the sole reason that someone gives up playing the guitar.

A guitar set up is a service done to a guitar to ensure it is playing the way it should, including everything from setting the action (distance from the strings to the frets) to the intonation. (Overall tuning of the guitar across the entire neck). Yes, the manufacturer should have done this before shipping too, but a set up isn’t permanent. Changes in weather and humidity, as well as string tension affect the guitar’s set up, and who knows how long that guitar has been sitting in that box since it was last looked at.

String action that is too high will simply make the guitar harder to play. Action that is too low can cause an annoying sound called fret buzz when you play, or even make it so notes don’t sound at all. Intonation that isn’t correct will make it so that even when your strings are tuned, somewhere on the neck they’ll be out of tune. Fret ends can be sharp due to differences in humidity, causing the wood in the neck to literally shrink.

What does this mean for the new player?
Well, they won’t be able to say “man, this action is too high”. They’ll simply think that playing the guitar is too hard. Or if they get fret buzz, they’ll think they are playing it wrong. Ultimately this will lead to discouragement, and they’ll associate playing with a negative experience.
When you buy a guitar from a music store, the guitar will (or should) have been inspected and setup by someone at that facility, and if there are any issues with the instrument soon after purchase as far as set up goes, they’ll adjust it for free. The toy store doesn’t have anyone who can do this for you. If you need to get this service done, it’s going to cost you another $40+. Not to mention the fact that often times these guitars can only be set up “so far.” Many don’t have adjustable truss rods in the neck, meaning that once the neck starts to bow, you can’t really save it unless you want to pay far more than the instrument is worth. The solution to all of this is to invest in a good guitar.

Getting a “good” guitar doesn’t mean it has to be expensive. You can find great entry level guitars at music shops for low costs that are guaranteed to be set up, ready to play, and will last a long time. Sure, you may end up spending a little more than you would at the toy store, but you’ll be avoiding the potential hassle of extra costs. More importantly, you’ll be giving your aspiring guitarist a tool that won’t be inherently discouraging and annoying to play, which will give them their best shot at learning a musical instrument.

What Makes an Entry-level Guitar “Good”? from MyRareGuitars.com

With that said, it would sound wrong for me to tell you that thousands of guitar players around the world complain after their instrument has been worked on by an individual who has had more experience adjusting guitars than any other technician in the world. In fact, she’s so bad that every single instrument she graces with her finesse ends up needing to be worked on again to fix what she’s done. The worst part? She may be working on your guitar as you’re reading this.

We all know her as Mother Nature, and if you’re just entering into your winter season like we are here in Canada, you’d better keep a watchful eye on your prized six strings.

Changes in temperature and humidity will do a number on your guitar if you don’t store it properly. The cold, dry season of winter is not the best climate for any stringed instrument. Not to mention, flipping on your electric heaters at home only make the problem worse. Investing in a humidifier to put in your guitar room is a worthwhile purchase, and mini humidifiers are available to carry around in your guitar case. Storing your guitar properly is a good way to avoid potential repair and setup costs; repairs such as the one I’m writing this article about…sharp fret ends.

A sharp fret is the result of the moisture content in a guitar neck’s wood decreasing due to dryer climates. A lower moisture content means that the wood will literally shrink, causing the frets to stick out over the fingerboard edge. This of course means it will be very uncomfortable to play, and in extreme cases, you can actually cut your hand.

To remedy this, you’ll need to file the fret ends down to size. This is a delicate task, since you:

• Want to get rid of any “fret overhang”
• Want all the fret ends to look good, and look the same
• DON’T want to damage the wood.

Below is my method for taking care of your sharp frets.

First, you’ll need a flat file to get all the protruding edges filed back into place. The best, safest tool you can use for this in my opinion is one such as this:

These are “Fret End File Blocks” that have a flat file mounted inside them at a pre-set angle. This ensures that every fret will be taken back the same distance, at the exact same angle. The danger of trying to file back the fret ends manually (without experience) is that you risk slipping and damaging the neck, and it’s possible to file the bevels at too steep an angle. Not to mention, it can just take a really long time!   If the fret begins to slope too near the strings, it’s a lot easier for the string to slip off the neck when playing. Most block angles are pre-set somewhere around the 35-55 degree angle range, with 45 degrees being a good midpoint. Many are adjustable so you can set an angle you want.

The method to using the file block is relatively simple. Remove or loosen off the strings, place the tool on the neck and slide it back and forth. Don’t push too hard against the frets, the tool will do a good enough job on its own. It is good practise to set a number to count how many times you slide it back and forth (say, five to start) and stop to check the frets between each set.

When you’re done this process, you may feel that the frets still feel sharp. Make sure that you are feeling the fret from the bottom of the fret as opposed to side to side. A fret that feels sharp from side to side but not from bottom to top means that you’re done your job with this flat file, and it’s time to move on to the shaping file.

This fret end file is the tool to use for smoothing out your beveled edges. You can use a three corner file, too – just be sure that at least one side is ground down flat and smooth. You need to be able to glide this file along the neck, so a file that has grit on each side is just going to end up tearing the wood.

With the flat side of the file against the finger board, place the file against the fret’s beveled edge. You want to use the length of the file, so place it where the fret meets close to the tip of the file.

The method you’ll want to use here involves a couple different motions with your arm and wrist. You’ll be sliding the file forward:

… while also turning the file inward, and curving or “rolling” it over the fret end. It’s kind of similar to turning a door handle while pushing the door open.

Only slide the file in one direction, and again count the number of times you file. Start with three strokes on each side, then check the fret end. You should have something that looks similar to this when all’s said and done:

The last step is to buff and polish the frets to get rid of any file marks you’ve just made. For this, I find a rotation of “fret erasers” from stew mac do a great job. Start with the lowest grit, then work your way up to the highest. You can use sandpaper as well, but for that you’ll want to put some tape down to protect the fretboard. If you go this route, you shouldn’t need anything abrasive – maybe just 400 grit to start, working your way up to 600.  When you’ve finished with that, a quick polish up with steel wool will make the fret look fantastic.

That’s it! It takes a bit of practise, but your hands will be thanking you the next time you slide them down the neck!

Happy Playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 14 from MyRareGuitars.com

Now, these are all things that are easily noticed and rather simple to change. You can remove fluff, you can use a different pick, and you can practise a different playing style. Some things, however, go unnoticed and can be simply “accepted” for the way they are. Each string is wrapped around a machine head, where it then goes to lay on a nut. When you fret a note, you are pushing the string down so it makes contact with a piece of metal fret wire. At the body of the guitar is a saddle that cradles the string before reaching its ball end where it is held in place.

The size, shape, and quality of each of these components has an effect on how that string vibrates just as different picks and annoying fluff does. The thing is, when you pick up a high end guitar and play it, the “wow” factor you get from its sound is a combination of everything that that was put into its construction. As such, it can be hard to identify exactly what you want in a guitar without trading out components and listening for yourself. Trust me on this though: if you take a guitar with a plastic nut and play an open E chord, then remove the nut and put on a bone one, you’ll hear the difference right away. In this article I’ll talk about some of the examples I listed above, and things to consider when thinking about tone and your playing. Let’s start at the top…

1. The Machine Heads

The most important part about sounding good is playing in tune. While falling out of tune isn’t always a fault of the machine heads, they’re definitely a main contributor. Proper stringing methods combined with a good quality set of pegs is the best way to keep a guitar in tune, and taking it a step further would be to invest in a set of locking tuners.

Apart from tuning stability, you may actually notice a tonal difference from a tuning peg that is built better than another. A peg that is well made will have all of its inside components fit securely, and the mechanism will operate smoothly. Tight fitting, well-built parts make for a much smaller risk of rattling noise, and transference of vibrations from the string to the wood will be superior.

Plastic heads on the tuners definitely add a cool look and vintage vibe to the guitar, but over time these can be notorious for breaking and crumbling off of their posts. To me, that’s a little too much vintage vibe. If you’re set on going the non-metal route, be sure to go with a good quality reputable brand – but even then don’t expect them to last forever. 

2) The Nut

After the machine head, this is the first place the string rests on the guitar. A good nut is one that is made of a high quality material, and is cut to the right size. You don’t want your strings to be lying on the first fret, or too far away from it. Nut slots that are not filed properly can cause fret buzz, make it too hard to play, or even cause strings to slip / get caught resulting in tuning problems. The idea is to use a hard material that won’t decay or chip under string tension, while still being something reasonably easy to cut into shape.

A solid choice for good nut material would be bone. Many players agree that a bone nut yields the best sound compared to others, and luthiers are happy because it is relatively easier to work with than some of the other options. Synthetic materials exist that have been manufactured to mimic bone density like TusQ, and as such behave similarly. Other materials you can use are metal, graphite, wood, and ebony. Graphite is a good choice for instruments with tremolo systems, as it allows the string to move a little more freely. Using a pencil to draw into the nut slots of a non-graphite nut is a trick you can use to simulate that benefit.

Keep in mind that when you fret a note, you are effectively cutting off the string between your finger and the nut. Therefore, the effect that the nut material has on your overall tone is minimal compared to the effect it has on open notes. Some guitars come with a “zero fret” installed which was originally intended for quick instrument production. It’s far easier to file the nut down far enough for the strings to simply rest on the zero fret than it is to get the string height at the nut right without a zero fret.

Perhaps a side effect of this style is that the zero fret may equalize the tone from your open notes with that of your fretted notes. The string sits on “fret zero”, so even when not holding anything down, you get the sound of a string against a fret rather than just the nut. No matter the route you go for material, if you’re looking to replace a nut try and have someone custom make one for your guitar. It’s extremely important that this piece is done right!

3) The Frets

Technically you could use a variety of different materials for your guitar frets, but, unlike the nut, most guitars use either a “nickel-silver” or “nickel-steel” compound. Different levels of hardness can be achieved by adjusting the percentages in this compound. For a high quality fret, you want a very hard fret material. Harder frets are of course more difficult to work with for the luthier, but they will last longer by reducing the amount of fret wear caused by your strings.

What’s more important when it comes to your frets is their shape and size. This is one component that really boils down to your playing style. For quick and easy play, a tall and wide fret is very handy. The taller the fret, the less force you need to apply to make the string meet it. This can be a double edged sword if you aren’t used to tall frets. Yes, it will make playing fast runs easier, but it will also make playing notes sharp easier as you will likely be pushing too hard out of habit. You’ll need to adjust your playing a bit to really benefit from taller frets.

Wide “jumbo” frets are well-liked because they tend to be easier to bend strings across, help greatly with vibrato, and typically feel smoother when sliding up and down the neck. As a bonus, the fret won’t wear as fast as a thin fret as the string spans across a greater surface area.

For the true “vintage” feel, you’ll want a thinner fret. For some, it is easier to play a guitar with thinner frets due to extra space you’ll have between them. As the string makes contact with less surface area with these, intonation should be more accurate here as well (as long as the frets are seated properly!)

No matter the fret size you go with, proper maintenance of them is key. When your frets become worn (and they will), you will need to get them crowned and possibly levelled. Fret buzz, dead notes, string grinding and poor intonation are problems that can be avoided by proper care of your frets.

As always, experiment! Try things you may not have and see what works for you.

Happy playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue #16 from MyRareGuitars.com

For every guitar player there comes a time where a guitar they know and love gains a new “battle scar”. Whether it be from a fall, a knock, your pick, your belt, or a throw, signs of wear and damage appears that you can choose to try and have fixed, or leave as a story to tell.

Occasionally, damage can occur that will require a fix. Today I’ll be going over the steps to carving and replacing a piece, that, if damaged, can render the guitar unplayable. Not only that, but simply changing it out for something made of a different material can have a major impact on your tone and sustain.

Replacing a Guitar Nut

Small cracks and chips in the nut can grow to the point where you literally lose a piece of the nut. Improper filing can cause strings to sit too low to the neck or too close to each-other. While filing nut slots and gluing pieces back together is possible, there comes a time to consider putting in a new one. You can get pre-fabricated nuts, but in order to have one that is fit specifically for your instrument, you’ll have to cut it yourself.

Before you begin, you’ll have to…

1) Take off the old nut.

Here I am using my fret hammer and fret setter to gently tap the nut out of its seat. Note the lacquer that curves up towards the front of the nut – it may be wise to carefully score along the edges with a modelling knife to prevent chipping the paint. If the nut doesn’t move at first, don’t smack it. Keep tapping gently until it comes loose.

With the nut removed, you’ll want to file off the remaining glue to make sure you’re gluing the new one to the original wood slot. Once the area is clean, you can start work on the new piece!

2) Fit your nut blank into the slot.

The first thing you’ll need is a nut blank of a material of your choice. Nuts come in all kinds, but for tone quality and ease of carving, I would suggest going the route of bone or TusQ (synthetic material made to mimic the density of bone.)

Success! A new nut!

Not yet. Obviously this blank is too long and wide to fit in the slot, so there is lots of work to be done. First things first, you’ll want it to at least fit in snuggly. Sticking a piece of sandpaper (110, or 220 grit if you want to take it slower) to a flat surface, sand the flat side of the nut that meets the fingerboard until it slides in so it is flush at every edge. Make sure you check periodically so you don’t overdo it.

As you can tell, a lot of nut material had to come off of this one to make it fit! Once it did though, it was nice and snug…

3) Size it up.

With the nut in place, you’ll want to make all your guidelines and measurements necessary so you’re confident when it comes time to cut. The first thing you’ll do is just trace the contours of your fret board onto the nut with a sharp pencil.

So, this is the outline of your fret board. For the actual nut height, you obviously don’t want to shave right down to this line. Next you’ll need to measure the height of your first fret.

The height I measured on mine was about .034”. To factor in the distance between the top of the fret and the bottom of your strings, add about .030” to whatever your fret height is. This total, (0.064” for me) is how much you want to add to the line you had drawn across the radius of your fret board. This is how far you can now file or sand down the top of the nut, while using the fret board radius line as a reference point for shaping a radius to your nut.

Next you need to mark where you are going to cut your string slots. It is vital that your strings are spaced properly so they are not falling off the edge of the neck, not too close together, and not too far apart. One millimeter off is noticeable when playing, so make sure you repeat every measurement until perfect.

The first two strings you’ll mark will be the outer E strings. Instead of measuring in from your markings on the nut, for this step you want to measure in from the bevels of the first fret. Again, you don’t want the string to slip down off your neck when playing. A general rule is to make your mark 1/16” in from the fret bevel on each side.

My ruler here isn’t marked in inches on both sides, so the best way to accurately get this measurement was to press the millimeter side right up to the nut, and use the edge to measure 1/16”. Make sure your nut is placed in the slot so your pencil marks line up with the fret board contours before you mark your lines.

Once you’ve got these two outer lines marked, you need to draw on the remaining four. The absolute best, and easiest way to do this is to use the “Stewmac String Spacing Rule”

It works with a few different slots in a ruler that you basically just have to line up with the two lines you’ve just drawn. When you find two that line up, the lines in between are pretty well placed for you.

The alternative approach would be to measure the distance (in mm) between the two marks you just made, and divide it by five. For my nut, this would have been 38 divided by 5 to give me 7.6. This number is the equal distance between each string. The trouble with this method is that, of course, some strings are thicker than others, and in order to be exact, you would need to factor that into your equation. You can get pretty good results without doing that, but it’s very time consuming and there is a lot of double checking involved as you make your cuts. As you may be able to tell from the picture, I didn’t have the “string spacing rule” on hand and went without, all the while wishing I could’ve used it!

Cutting the slots.

When your pencil marks are all in place, you can begin to cut your guide slots. Clamp the nut into a vice, and using your thinnest nut file cut starter grooves along each line. Go slow to ensure you don’t slip!

With small cuts made, you can use your sized nut files to cut the correct sized groove for each string. Don’t cut too far down yet, just enough to allow the string to sit comfortably.

Next, you can place the nut back in its slot and place the strings into their respective groove. Check to make sure everything looks good as far as string spacing and height from the first fret. This is the part where you’ll either breathe a sigh of relief or mumble a curse of frustration.

If everything looks good, you can cut your nut slot depth. Take the measurement you used before that was your fret height plus .030”, and stack up some feeler gauges to total that number. Place it along the side of the nut, and file each slot down with the proper sized file until it touches the feeler gauge. Make sure you file in a downward motion towards the headstock to allow for a natural slope of the string.

Shaping, polishing, and gluing!

It’s almost done! If you breathed that sigh of relief before, don’t think it’s easy sailing now though. Be cautious making the next few steps to completion.

From here, you can shave off the edges of the nut up to the original lines you made around the finger board, and then contour and polish the nut with increasing grits of sandpaper (I used 220 followed by 320). After sanding, you can polish it with a general polishing compound. I like a product called “ScratchDoctor”. When all’s said and done, you should have something that looks like this:

Lastly, you can glue it on to your guitar! Just a few dabs both in the slot and on the nut will do. No need to lather it all over. When in place, put the strings into their slots and tune up to pitch, wipe off any excess glue, and let it dry.

Voila, a new guitar nut:

Happy Playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – issue 13 from MyRareGuitars.com

The Minimalist 

We had to start somewhere. The very first electric guitar was, of course, as simple as it gets: a neck, a small body, one pickup, and one volume control. Over the past eighty-something years, manufacturers have made additions and changes to their guitars to give more options to those who want them. You may think that if two, three, even four pickup guitars with all the bells and whistles are available, why would anyone ever settle for something with just one? Yet, many companies are still making one-pickups, and there’s only one reason for that… people still buy them!

There are definitely some advantages to owning a single pickup guitar, and there are those who argue the “less is more” idea in this regard. Here’s a few things to consider about this design:

1. Rock Out.

Just plug in, and play. There’s no second guessing anything here: you have your one pickup turned on full, and you’re always getting pure guitar tone through the amp. If you enjoy playing a style of music where all you ever need is that shrill, loud, bridge-pickup sound, then why not have a guitar that gives you exactly that?

2. No “Crutches”

You don’t have the option of switching pickups, rolling off any tone, or pushing / pulling any knobs. Everything you get from your amp is from you. Playing a single pickup guitar forces you to physically play different if you want to sound different. Having a good sense of dynamics is key, and exercising the use of different picking styles can get you a variety of tones you wouldn’t think possible from just one bridge pickup. Mixing these ideas with good use of your volume knob can easily turn a single pickup guitar into a multi-functional beast.

3. The “Rumours”

There’s a few arguments out there that suggest what’s going on inside a single pickup guitar, or rather, what’s not going on, can ultimately affect its tone. It is a fact that the magnetic field used by pickups to amplify your strings also has a small amount of “pull” on them. I’ve had players come up to me with a complaint that their guitar has a weird out of tune, double note effect when fretting notes all the way up the fret board. The simple fix is to lower the pickups – they were pulling too hard, interrupting the string’s vibrations. So, with only one pickup, perhaps it can be assumed that less force pulling the strings allows it to vibrate better, and longer. That translates to more sustain, which is always a sought after quality in a guitar.

4. Easy on the Workbench

If your single pickup guitar’s electronics start having problems, it won’t take long to fix it. When you open it up, you’ll see that there’s virtually nothing to it. One pickup, one volume control, and one input. That’s it. It will take no time to identify the culprit, fix it, and get back to playing!

The Everything-ist

It’s a natural thing to want to move forward, and it’s no different for guitar makers and players. It didn’t take long for the electric guitar to evolve, and have the number of options you can see on some models today. Below I’ll list some of the things that you can find on guitars with “way too many” knobs, and try to dispel some of the confusion surrounding their functions.

1. Blending Pickups

This is obviously something you can’t do with a single pickup guitar. Typically, with your toggle switch in the middle position on a 2 pickup guitar, both of your pickups are “on” creating a “blended” sound from both combined. If your guitar has independent volume knobs, you can then increase or decrease one pickup’s volume to further change how your guitar sounds. Better yet, some guitars come with a “blend” knob, which will fully sweep from neck to bridge pickup so you can hear everything in between, and dial in to that tone you’re looking for.

2. Coil tap / coil split

These are two different features that are commonly referred to as the same, or mixed up. While both change how your pickup sounds, each does it in a different way. A coil tap is used on single coil pickups, and works by essentially reducing your pickup’s full output. Think of it this way: your pickup is a magnet with copper wire wound around it thousands of times. When electricity passes through that whole distance of wire, it means you are getting your full output (unless your guitar’s volume is turned down). A coil tap takes the signal from an earlier point in these coils, thus reducing the overall power of the pickup. It will give you a softer, more “chimey” tone that will remind you of the old Fender sound.

A coil split is a function that refers to humbucking pickups. It allows you to cut out one of the two coils in the pickup to leave you with a single pickup sound, which is great if want to have the best of both worlds from one guitar.

3. Switches

You can have switches on your guitar that can have virtually any function. A kill switch that will essentially turn on or off your guitar’s output, a phase switch that will flip your pickup from being “in phase” to “out of phase”, or even having independent toggle switches for any number of pickups on your guitar.

It comes down to the kind of player you are. Do you want one instrument that can handle anything, and are you able to handle everything included on the guitar? Or do you want a guitar that can do one thing really well? Either way, I recommend giving both a try before dismissing them without playing. You might surprise yourself!

Happy playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue #15 from MyRareGuitars.com

Sometimes, however, we can be thrown for a loop. There’s the rare occasion where we hear something through our speakers that makes us second guess what we’re hearing, and wonder if it’s even a guitar making those sounds. In this issue, I’ll talk about three (perhaps lesser known) techniques and devices that have been used to create strange, cool, and even iconic sounds by many great players of the past and present.

The E-Bow

For those who thought that a guitar pick or your fingers were the only method of setting your guitar strings in motion, you’re in for an interesting surprise…

For those who want to try something other than a pick and still sound good, (sorry Nigel) there was a device invented in the late 1960’s that could be used in place of a guitar pick that created a sound that mimicked that of a bow on the strings. Aptly named, the “E-Bow” (short for electronic bow) works using a magnetic field that slowly brings the string into vibration.

This means there is no pluck, hit, or attack – you simply get the “hum” sound seemingly from nothing. There are different ways you can use this; single string guitar solos sound really cool while under this effect, and you can even glide the E-bow across the strings while holding a chord to create violin-like arpeggios. The trick is finding the resonant “hotspots” on your string. Depending on the location you place the E Bow over the string, you can create a few different sounds. If you want an idea of what this thing sounds like, check out Steve Hackett’s playing in “Carpet Crawlers” or David Gilmour’s in “Take it Back”.

The TalkBox

You may have heard this sound before and either thought there was some kind of effect added to the singing, or that it was a simple guitar “wah” pedal. Peter Frampton would tell you otherwise!

The TalkBox is similar to a guitar effects pedal, except for the fact that it’s your mouth that’s ultimately altering the signal. The unit takes the guitar output from the amp, and sends it through a plastic tube that the guitarist holds in their mouth. When the shape of the mouth changes over the tube, so does the output sound coming from the tube. That sound goes through your mic and voila! The talkbox sound. You can use this effect to literally sing the words of songs and have them sound robotic and electronic, or you can just shape different sounds to make a unique effect. It definitely comes in handy – especially when your mouth is moving around while you’re soloing anyways.

Have a listen to Joe Walsh in “Rocky Mountain Way”, Peter Frampton in many of his songs but especially “Do You Feel Like We Do”, or for an example in heavy rock music check out the solo in Tool’s “Jambi”.

The Kill-switch Effect

                  For those of you who may not know what a kill switch on a guitar is, it is usually a control that comes in either the form of a button or a toggle that simply cuts out all output from your guitar. The original intention for this would be, of course, to limit stage noise when not playing. Simply flip the switch, and there’s no hum from the guitar amp! Just remember to flick it back on when it’s time to play. Though this was the original intent – many rock guitarists now see a function like this more so as an effect, thanks mainly to guitarist Tom Morello.

While fretting notes with your left hand, you can rapidly flick on / off the kill switch to create a more “intense” sounding tremolo effect. Instead of your output fading in and out quickly, it’s literally shutting off and on. You can use this technique on its own to create an interesting effect, or add other signal processors into the equation to mimic other instruments.

No killswitch on your instrument? Not to worry! If your instrument has two pickups each with independent volume controls (like a Les Paul configuration), you can simply turn one pickup all the way down and quickly switch the toggle from neck to bridge pickup to get the same effect. You can hear the effect in action in a lot of Tom’s work as well as a few other artists who have adopted the technique, but to hear a couple good examples check out “Know Your Enemy” for a sound that’s almost harmonica-like, or the solo in “Bulls on Parade” that sound like a DJ scratching a vinyl. Both songs are by the band Rage Against the Machine.

Unconventional, but cool! Sometimes it’s refreshing to think outside the box – you never know what you might come up with.

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue #14 from MyRareGuitars.com

Having a few loose parts on your guitar won’t make you spin out or crash, but it can definitely lead to poor functionality in a variety of ways. When you strum your guitar it’s not just the strings that move. Everything moves in resonance, and if something isn’t fastened to that whole moving piece, chances are it’s going to rattle.

Loose electronic components are a separate issue – they can cause rattling, but what’s worse is continued turning of controls that are loose can lead to wires being ripped off inside. Below I’ll list a few common parts that can come loose as well as a few quick, safe ways of fixing them. Before I get to that though, it should be mentioned that it is common practice to ensure all screws on the guitar are securely fastened. Any one of them has the potential to cause a bad rattle.

1. Strap Buttons.

These can be a nuisance for loosening over time, and can potentially cause an annoying rattle sound when you play. That, and if they are loose enough, they will spin around easily causing them to lose their hold on your strap. Bad thing to have happen when you’re on stage!

Sometimes a little twist with a screwdriver will tighten them right up, but it’s also common that the screw will have made the hole a little bigger from constant pressure from the strap. A quick and handy fix for this is to remove the screw, and use a toothpick (or a few) to fill the hole. If your guitar is a hollow body, you’ll need to add a little wood glue to the mix so you don’t turn your guitar into a maraca.

2. Saddles

These are common culprits because most are designed to move for intonation and string height purposes. Ensure that all your string height screws are fully and securely making contact with the base of the bridge, and that each saddle is in its proper place. A bridge that does not allow you to raise / lower each string separately (like the one pictured above) is a different story. If a saddle is rocking back and forth on its track here, you have a few options. First, you can try moving it forward or back to see if either way fixes the problem – though this could cause intonation issues.

Second, with the saddle set properly in place for intonation, try squeezing a piece of paper or cardstock between the saddle and the groove it’s in. It may not be pretty, but it will hold the saddle still. Lastly, you can replace the saddle or bridge.

3. Machine heads

Basically the same idea as the other screws on your guitar, make sure everything is tight including the nuts and washers on top. Try holding the tuning keys when striking a string to see if it stops a rattle. If everything seems tight and it still rattles when you don’t hold it, there may be something loose inside and you’ll need a replacement piece.

4. Volume / tone controls.

You can tell when one of these is loose when you turn one and it seems to go beyond its full rotation. This is either due to the bolt not holding the pot in properly, or the knob has come loose from the pot. The first step is to safely remove the knob.

Use your fingers first! Don’t attack the knob with a pair of pliers as you can easily damage it or slip and damage the body. If you can’t get it yourself, here are a few handy tools:

Flat shoelace.

I used to use one of these before I had the tools I have now. They’re pretty durable, and can usually slip right under the knob. Just fit it under, grab both sides of the lace, and gradually apply lifting force.

ESP Multi Spanner

This tool is great for both turning various sized bolts and prying a knob off. Again, start gentle and slowly lift off the knob. Be sure to lay a shop towel or something soft underneath when you use this as it is metal and can potentially scratch your guitar.

Schatten knob and bushing puller

This is for when you need the “big guns”. It can apply more pulling power than you’d ever be able to yourself and it does it in a surprisingly safe way. The base of the device has a smooth rubber edge that protects the body, while the lifting system is very strong and moves only as fast as you can turn the key.

If you were able to pull the knobs off easy, chances are they just aren’t hugging the pot tabs tight enough. To fix this, you can first try to separate the tabs a bit with a flathead screwdriver. Be gentle, the metal isn’t the strongest in the world and is prone to breakage.

Another method would be to wrap a small amount of aluminum tape around the pot tabs to make for a more secure fit.

If the knob was sitting firmly on the tab, you’ll need to tighten the bolt holding the pot. Don’t rush in and do that! As I mentioned earlier, turning a loose bolt can also turn the pot inside, risking disconnection of wires. Using a flathead screwdriver again, you can hold the pot in place while tightening to ensure nothing moves inside.

If the knob is fastened to the pot tabs using a set screw, be sure to line the set screw up with the gap in the tabs when placing it back on and re-tightening. If you align it anywhere else, you’ll just push the tabs back together and have a loose knob again.

5. Input Jack

These come in many different styles, but all are prone to coming loose. We’ve all seen the jack that has “disappeared into the guitar”, which is just a byproduct of the bolt that holds it coming too loose. Just like with the volume and tone controls, you don’t want to tighten this unless you can firmly hold the component on the inside. Many styles of jack will allow you to easily access it on the inside. If this is the case with your guitar, I urge you to do this so you can physically hold it while tightening the bolt.

If it’s not so simple to access, such as a jack that leads directly into the body with no plate, use your 1/4″ cable. Plug it in, hold the cable tight, and then proceed to tighten the bolt.

Hope some of those might be helpful! Don’t let yourself get too “rattled”.

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – issue 12 from MyRareGuitars.com

1. Know your parts.

Sure, spontaneity has its time and place, and often a lot of things that make the final cut of a song are things that have been written or jammed out on the spot. That said, having a solid grasp on your songs and the parts you are going to play means you get more time to focus on tweaking tone rather than making mistakes or writing as you go. In the studio, time is money! The more takes you can bang out, the bigger the pool you have to choose from when piecing things together.

2. “Magicians” can only go so far…

 As I said, there are some extremely gifted individuals in the recording industry. However, as a wise man once said, “you can’t polish a turd.” If you enter the studio with a guitar that hasn’t been restrung or set-up in months, your recording is already doomed to mediocrity. Here’s an example: take a black marker, and a brown marker. Draw two lines. Do they look different? Yes, they are different colors! By the same token, let’s say you’re using two different guitars on your recording – one that’s set up properly and one that hasn’t been touched in months. Even if they’re both bang-on in tune in the open position, chances are the intonation on one is going to be all askew. It’s going to be the brown marker, and there’s nothing you can do to change that other than use the black marker again. Or just get the guitar intonated.

3. Then tune. Then tune…

This should be obvious, but keep your guitar in tune! Check your tuning before and after each take to ensure nothing has slipped out. As a general rule, if you’re recording with another guitar player, bass player etc. be sure to use the same tuner they used. Different tuners can vary ever so slightly in their readings, and discrepancies are far more audible when played back than when played live.

4. Layering

“The wall of sound” as it’s so famously described! You’ll want to double track a lot of your guitar parts – especially your rhythms. It can sound pretty powerful just using the same guitar and settings, but for a thicker sound try using a different guitar. Two different instruments can add a more “live”, or “real” sound to the mix even if it’s the same person playing the parts. If a second guitar isn’t available, or you simply enjoy the feel of one in particular, try switching pickups or rolling off some tone. The idea is to add depth and thickness to the guitar track, so you may as well make it sound like two guitars!

5. Distortion

If your songs played live involve a lot of distortion, that doesn’t necessarily mean you want to match that amount on the recording. Too much distortion can take away from articulation drastically and just make for a jumbled sounding mix. You’d be surprised how big of a sound you can get in a recording with a much smaller amount of distortion – especially with the layering technique I talked about in point 3!

6. Mic Placement

Your ears work a little bit different than microphones. When you listen to a guitar played through an amp live, it’s not just the guitar and the amp that are vibrating. You’re making the room move, too, and depending on where you place your mics you can pick up some of this room sound. If you’re looking for straight, tight, pure guitar tone then you’ll want to use a close-miking technique to capture just what the amp’s giving you. For a more airy, ambient and open sound, try a more distant mic. If your cabinet has multiple speakers, it’s a good idea to choose one to mic up. Find the speaker cone, and see what it sounds like depending on where you aim the mic. You can also try using more than one microphone on the same speaker in a different location, or even try miking a separate speaker. The closer to the center of the cone, the harsher and brighter the tone. The further out, the opposite! Try it out!

7. Signal Processing

We all love a nice slap-back delay and wet reverb, but it’s a good idea to record your guitar as dry as possible without any effects. You’re going to be EQing your guitar tone after it’s recorded, and you’ll generally want any changes like this to be done to just guitar and not the effects. You can easily add these on after the fact. If you’re like me, and you absolutely have to hear some effects when recording (if you sound better, you play better!) then you can have the effects sent to your headphones but not to the recording track. That way you hear what you want without potentially compromising anything.

These are just a few things to consider when trying to get the best guitar sound possible in your recording. There’s lots more to keep in mind, but it’s good even to have the basics down. Best of luck in your studio adventures!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 12 from MyRareGuitars.com

Not exactly. Sure, a guitar’s color is really just for show – but the construction and design of both the guitar’s neck and body do have an effect on your sound. Last time I talked about some of the woods that can be used in a guitar’s construction, and here I’ll talk about a couple of the ways it can be put together to both look and sound unique.

The earliest form of the electric guitar wasn’t far off from the acoustic. After all, the original intention was to simply find a method of effectively amplifying the guitar’s volume so it could compete better on stage with other popular instruments of the day. Eighty-five years later, we still see this original design in use all over the world: the semi-acoustic.

“Traditional” looking semi-acoustics retain the aesthetics of the acoustic guitar. The Gibson ES-150 was the first commercially successful of this type: a very large, thick and hollow guitar that was widely used in jazz ensembles.

When referring to the tone of a semi acoustic, the most common word you will hear is: feedback. Depending on who you are, this could be either a very good or a very bad thing! When your guitar and amp levels go up, these guitars are notorious for that high pitched growl that (if not desired or controlled) will make your ears bleed. When they were invented, there was no need to set a guitar to the level that induced such sounds. Once they were discovered as a culprit of feedback, alternative construction methods were sought out (which I’ll talk about later) while certain individuals embraced their “faults”.

Charlie Christian, Joe Pass, T. Bone Walker, Chuck Berry, John Lennon, B.B. King, and Eric Clapton are just a few notable examples of musicians who made great use of the semi-acoustic guitar. The first two I listed were two of the earliest electric guitar players to live. Their use of the instrument is one way that it can still be used well today: jazz. The earliest guitar tones heard in jazz, rockabilly, blues etc. were done using a semi acoustic. If you are looking for the warmest, roundest yet most “chimey” tone you can find that really holds a “vintage” appeal, then make sure to invest in one of these. On the contrary, if you’re looking for a hard rock, gritty snarl that will give you ample feedback whenever you need, this is the easiest way to achieve it. Not to mention: if you already own a solid body guitar (or are in a band with another guitarist who does) you can create some pretty thick sounding tones when layering a semi acoustic with a solid body.

Designers and luthiers are always looking for ways to make things better, and that’s why when feedback became an issue, they looked for other options. This is when the solid body electric guitar began to surface. The idea was that without the resonating air space that came with the hollowbody guitars, feedback could be reduced. Long story short: it worked, and the solid body electric guitar is now the most recognizable design that can be associated with the words “electric guitar”.

The obvious benefit of the solid body guitar is that it allows you to crank your level and gain to heights you wouldn’t be able to with a semi acoustic without getting nasty feedback. That’s not to say you can’t get any. Look at Jimi Hendrix and Steve Vai – both are masters of controlling overpowered equipment. Another benefit is that the guitar is not as delicate. If you’re one to throw your guitar around, or are prone to dropping things… a solid body is less likely to break on you. You might say it’s pretty solid.

More options tend to come with solid body guitars. For example, the “Set-neck” construction was really the only design used before the birth of the solid body. Neck-through guitars and bolt-on guitars came later, and offer other subtleties in tone and functionality. The bolt-on, for example can be removed or replaced on a whim, while a neck-through guitar is commonly regarded as the best design available to achieve the most sustain. Another advantage of the solid body is that they tend to be easier to work on. Most semi acoustic guitars don’t feature a back panel, so in order to get at their electronics you have to pull everything through their pickup cavity or their F holes. Many solid bodies do feature a pack panel, and the ones that don’t tend to have their electronics mounted to their pick guard. It makes life a whole lot easier for you or your technician!

All in all, there’s a couple things to consider when deciding between these two options. Do you want to play heavy and loud without the fear of unwanted feedback? Do you want to maintain the dynamics and subtleties of your guitar while sacrificing headroom? As always, listen to your heroes and then listen to yourself. Test things out, and see what you like! If you still can’t decide, then just do what every guitarist ends up doing: buy one of everything!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 11 from MyRareGuitars.com

A wise man once said “measure twice; cut once”, and the same goes for drilling holes. Placing the Bigsby in the right spot will have been all for nothing if you slip, and either scratch the body or drill in the wrong spot. It’s for this reason that I’d like to back up a bit. If you’re worried about ruining the finish, you may want to tape off the body where you’ll be drilling before lining up the Bigsby. In my photo example here I marked my drill spots on the body of the guitar, then covered them with tape.

This works if you want to save tape, but it means you’ll have to line the Bigsby up again and re-mark your drill spots on the tape.

Whichever route you go, you’ll need to use a thin marker to slip in the middle of each screw hole you see on the Bigsby. With the marks in place, you’re safe to make your pilot holes! From here on out, the installation of the Bigsby is simple – but you’ll still have to be careful with the drill no matter how much you’ve taped up your guitar. Be sure to use a drill bit that’s smaller than the screws provided, and start off slow. As a final confirmation of alignment, after you’ve drilled the first hole, screw the Bigsby down to just that one hole. From here, you can still rotate the Bigsby if it may have tilted a bit during the drilling process. After you’ve made any necessary corrections, you can safely drill the rest of the holes and fully attach the Bigsby to the guitar.

The first time I added a Bigsby unit to a guitar, I found the stringing process to actually be trickier than the installation! One thing you may wonder is when to put the included spring under the arm. It’s really up to you, I’ve done it both before and after stringing with relatively similar ease. The benefit I find with adding it after is that the pins you loop the string ball ends over are slightly easier to reach without the spring.

To start, bend the string at the tip. This will allow you to thread it easily underneath the rotating bar without scratching the finish:

From there you can pull the string all the way through until the ball end lines up with the bar with the string pins. Now you can bend the string again at the ball end, to make it easier to loop it around the bar:

When you’ve got the ball end on, it becomes a game of tension. Unlike a guitar bridge, the pin is not going to just hold the string on unless you pull hard on the string until it’s tuned up to pitch. You may want to physically hold the ball end to the pin with your finger until you can get a good grasp on it.

The first time you do this modification may take a while, and the stringing process definitely takes some practice. After you’ve done it once though, you’ll have no problem doing it again. With a little bit of research and know-how, you can make all sorts of changes and upgrades to an already great instrument. I hope you can take something away from this article, and perhaps even gain the confidence needed to turn this:

into this!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – issue 11 from MyRareGuitars.com

If you’ve ever got (or thought about getting) a tattoo, you can probably remember the heated debate that went on in your head. What should it be? Where should it go? How much do I want to pay? Will I even want to look at this 30 years from now?

Any form of permanent modification should be something that is long thought out, and carried out by someone who knows what they’re doing. The same can be said for modifications done to guitars. While just about anything is possible to change or fix, just about anything is possible to mess up too.
In this article I’ll go over the process I use to put a little “spring” in your “string”, to change “still” to “thrill”, and move from “turf” to “surf”. This one’s all about the Bigsby tremolo system, and how to add one to your guitar.

The Bigsby was perhaps the earliest iteration of the now widely known “whammy bar”. It works by wrapping the strings around a cylindrical bar, which is then rotated by pushing a lever or “arm” down to loosen the strings. This creates a drop in pitch. A raise in pitch can be achieved by lifting the arm, thus rotating the bar in the opposite direction to tighten the strings.
With proper installation, you will have a great working tremolo unit that keeps your guitar’s tuning very well. The Bigsby is not meant for extreme drops or raises in pitch, but rather subtle vibrato.
The first thing you’ll need to do is figure out which Bigsby hardware model you want. There are various types, some that come attached with a tailpiece and some that just fasten right on top of the guitar. This decision is mostly based on aesthetic appeal, but make sure there’s enough room on your guitar’s body if you want a larger Bigsby. For hollow body guitars, find out if you have a center block inside the guitar that you will be able to mount screws to. If it does not, you may have to go with a tailpiece Bigsby such as the B70, or B3. Here’s a picture of a B70 followed by one of a B50 that mounts directly into the face of the guitar’s body:

Some guitars feature a tail piece that is drilled into the face of the guitar’s body. If you’re absolutely set on installing a Bigsby on this instrument, keep in mind that you will either need to try using a model like the B70 or B3, or be willing to cover up those unsightly holes left after the installation.
Another thing to keep in mind when making your purchase is that standard guitar bridges are not always designed to function with tremolo units. The strings will tend to catch onto the saddles and just push and pull the bridge as you use the tremolo arm, affecting intonation and just making things sound rigid. It would be a good idea to invest in some kind of “roller bridge” (like the one in the following picture) to allow proper use of your Bigsby:

Alternatively you can use a set of files to lightly file out the grooves in the saddles to “round” them a bit. It won’t work as well as rollers, but it’s better than nothing!
Let’s get the process started. Once the strings are off, you can begin by swapping out the bridge if you have one. Ideally you will have one that fits the old bridge posts. Next you can remove the guitar’s tailpiece to get ready for the new Bigsby. For this example I’m installing a B50 Bigsby to an Airline Tuxedo with center block.

Alignment

Typically your new Bigsby will come with an “alignment string” that you can use to ensure your Bigsby is set properly. For full instructions on how to use it, check out their official install instructions at www.Bigsby.com. The following are the steps I take and some tips you can use in addition to using this string, or without it.

It’s important to first place the Bigsby in a spot that looks right to you. Set it on the body, and look at it from different angles. Does the arm sit in an accessible spot? Is it too close to the controls for your liking? The distance you place the Bigsby from the bridge makes a difference. The closer to the bridge, the steeper the angle from the saddles to the Bigsby. Too close, and you risk having too much pressure on the bridge resulting in it being pulled backward and affecting intonation, as well as poor tremolo functionality. Too far and you simply won’t have as much tremolo control. This can also risk not having enough string pressure on the bridge (when set low), and potentially cause strings to pop out of their saddles when plucked. Here’s a look at what a close B50 placement does to the string angle VS a further B70:

Keep in mind that some bridges (like the one I’m using for this example) are placed on an angle for intonation purposes, and it’s easy for this angle to deceive your eyes. You want the Bigsby to be aligned with the guitar, not the bridge. For this reason, I remove the angled bridge from the posts when first placing the unit.

With the bridge removed, placing a straight-edged block that is sized correctly up against your bridge pickup cover can solve both the straightness issue and distance issue as seen here:

You can cut a block out of wood to use for this purpose, or find something of a good size like I did here.

Of course, distance and straightness aren’t the only factors that come into play when lining up the Bigsby. You want to make sure the strings travel straight from the bridge to the Bigsby string pins. With the bridge back on the guitar, hold a guitar string across the Low E string saddle down to its appropriate pin. Confirm that the string remains straight for this distance. Repeat this process for the High E string, and make any side-to-side adjustments of the Bigsby necessary.

It’s a good idea to repeat this process a few times – adjusting the Bigsby straightness and distance, then the straightness of the string from saddle to pin before getting ready to drill. Once you’re completely satisfied, it’s on to the next step!

That’s it for part one. Next time, I’ll go over the preparations for drilling, the actual drilling, and finally, perhaps the most difficult part: the stringing of the guitar once the Bigsby has been installed!

Happy Playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – issue 10 from MyRareGuitars.com

When an electrical device fails, and its functions are a mystery to you, it’s normal to feel a little helpless. The first thought is to take it in for repair, which is your best (and most cost effective) bet if you’re someone who just wants to play. However, for those “do-it-yourselfers” or any interested in learning to work on guitars, this is a beginner’s guide to the minor electrical repair of a guitar.

The first step is to identify what the problem is. Is there no output at all? Does the guitar cut in / out when the cable is jiggled? Do you have output from only one pickup? Do you hear a dirty crackling noise when you rotate the volume/tone knob? Is there a constant loud hum that comes from the amp when you plug the guitar in? These are all common problems that can occur, and are usually very simple soldering fixes. In order to get started, here’s a list of what you will need:

1)     Soldering Iron (not too powerful, 30 watts will do. You don’t want to fry your components!)

2)     Solder

3)     Wet Sponge (wet paper towel will do)

4)     Screw driver set

5)     Needle nose pliers

6)     Wire cutters/strippers

7)     Electrical contact cleaner

Before opening the guitar up, check that the knobs and the input jack are tight. A loose bolt can signal the reason for the problem – if the bolt is loose and a knob is turned, the whole pot will spin. This can eventually lead to wires being disconnected. In order to properly tighten a bolt, hold the top still with a flat head screwdriver, and then tighten with your pliers like so:

Now it’s time to open up the guitar! Different models will have different access spots. Most often, a guitar’s electronics will either be mounted to the pick guard on the front of the body, or will be accessible through a panel on the back like this one:

Sometimes, neither of these are available which leads to a tricky process of feeding the components through the pickup cavities, the input jack cavity, or even through one of the thin “F-holes” on a semi-acoustic. Most people call them F-holes because of their shape, but when you are trying to feed a large volume pot tied to a string through it without damaging the pot or the guitar, the name will have a new meaning. More on that later.

Here, I’ve opened up an Eastwood Sidejack which has the electronics mounted to the pick guard:

The first thing you’ll see is that there really isn’t much to it. At least, not for a 2 pickup guitar with basic volume and tone controls. At this point, it’s time to remember what the issue was. If it was just a dirty crackling sound, you may only need to spray some contact cleaner into the problematic component. Find the small hole in the pot, and spray some in. Rotate the pot back and forth until the noise goes away. If this doesn’t seem to help the problem after a few attempts, the pot may need to be replaced. Was there no output at all? Check the connection of the wires at the input jack, and make sure the metal piece that the cable make contact with is properly bent to do so. Check that the “hot” wire (usually red) is connected to the volume pot properly. If you see a wire that’s completely disconnected, well that’s a dead giveaway. How do you know where to connect it if you aren’t experienced? Look for a lump of solder somewhere that doesn’t have a wire attached to it, and just place the wire up to it. Check to see if that fixes the problem. Alternatively, many guitar manufacturers offer wiring diagrams that you can follow and match exactly.

What if all the wires seem to be connected, but the problem is still there? Hopefully, this is just what’s known as a “cold solder joint”, meaning something is not fully connected with solder. With your hand, gently jiggle each wire around at its connection. When you find one that makes the guitar cut in and out as you move it around, you’ve found the cold solder joint!

(not in a guitar, but shows a good solder joint vs a cold one on the right)

A guitar that is making a constant, loud hum noise could be a grounding issue. Check that the grounding wires are all properly connected. These are normally the wires that have a large portion of their wrapping stripped, and are soldered to the tops of the pots. Follow along the grounding wires to see where they attach to – you will notice each component connects with each other somewhere, and then one wire goes through the body of the guitar to attach to either a bridge post or a tailpiece screw.

When you’ve found the wire that needs to be re-soldered, you can get your soldering iron ready. When it’s hot, you’ll need to “tin the tip”, which just means to melt some solder on to the tip of the rod, and then wipe it on the wet sponge. The fresh solder on the tip allows for better solder and heat flow. If the wire is still somewhat attached, you can use the iron to melt the solder holding it and detach it completely. Often a wire may need to be prepared to be re-attached, such as this one:

Here I cut off the “bad” end, re-stripped the wire, and then coated it in solder to make re-attachment easier:

The tabs on the pots have small holes in them, and the best connection you can make is when the wire sits in this hole. To do this, make sure the hole is filled with solder. Then, heat up this solder with your iron and thread the wire end through. Make sure the solder fully connects the wire and the pot tab, and there are no holes between them. This is exactly what a cold solder joint looks like, and you don’t want that! If it looks good, let it cool, and you’re done!

When I fixed my first electrical problem on a guitar, all fears I had of making things worse went away. It really isn’t too daunting of a task; as a matter of fact, it’s kind of fun doing the troubleshooting and figuring out the problem. Hopefully you’ll feel the same when you fix yours!

Happy Playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – issue 9 from MyRareGuitars.com

Personally, I’m not a smoker. With that said, a situation like this is not at all unfamiliar to me nor should it be to any who are reading this. Remember the first time you had to buy a set of guitar strings?

Nowadays I always gravitate to the same package, but I can remember staring blankly at a giant wall full of different colours, brands, prices and sizes of strings wondering “what the heck?”
So, what string is best? Is there a superior brand? Are the fancy “coated” strings for 10 dollars more worth it?  What gauge should we be using? What’s a “hybrid” pack? Can we replace just one string if we only broke one?
These are all fair questions to ask. In this article I’ll answer each one, as well as address some tips for getting the best tone out of the strings you use.
First things first:

The Brand.

In my experience, the reason people buy a particular brand of string boils down to: recommendation. If you take 2 Stratocasters each strung with a different medium gauge 10 – 46 set, (base set, uncoated… more on that later) you likely wouldn’t be able to say “these are D’Addario, and the other one has Ernie Ball!” (Unless you cheat and look at the colorful ball ends of the D’Addario.)
It’s really not comparing apples to oranges. More like red apples to a different shade of red. The string sizes are the same, the material used is the same, and they are manufactured in the same way. In some cases, they may even be made in the same factory! Rather than being too concerned about brand, you should worry more about your string sizes, or the…

String Gauge

The thickness of your strings is measured in “‘thou”, or thousandths of an inch. To use the example I used above, a medium gauge 10 – 46 set of strings means that the thinnest string measures 0.010″ in diameter, while the thickest comes in at 0.046″. This set of strings as well as the “light” gauge 9 – 42 are the two most common sizes that brand new guitars are strung and set up with. It is for this reason that these are two sizes that many players stick with – the player is familiar with this size of string and not much work needs to be put into the guitar when it is restrung. A lighter size string such as these are easier to manipulate, so fast playing and techniques such as bending require less effort. However, many would argue that a thinner string tends to sound…well… thinner when plucked compared to a larger one. Moving from a 10 – 46 set of strings to an 11 – 48 will certainly result in a noticeable difference in feel, and you may also find that your overall tone changes. That said, there are many fantastic guitar players who are living proof that you can get a HUGE sound from a small string – Billy Gibbons, Eddie Van Halen, and Jimmy Page, to name a few.

There are packs available that combine thicker E, A, and D strings (to provide meatier sounding rhythm guitar) with thinner G, B and E strings to allow for easier play. If you plan on playing your guitar in a lower tuning, a thicker gauge string will make it so your strings remain tight enough to accommodate the lower pitch. It may take a few re-strings before you find the size that suits you, but that’s part of the fun!
PS – If you are converting to a different string gauge, always get your guitar a setup. The string tension will be different, and you will need to make changes to accommodate that.

The Materials

While acoustic guitars are typically strung with phosphor bronze, an electric guitar requires a metal that works better with the magnetic pickups. The majority of electric guitar strings are made of stainless steel, or are a steel core that is wound with nickel. While the steel strings tend to last longer, many players gravitate towards the nickel plated string for its softer touch and easier playability.
Some brands take the process even further, offering strings that are coated in a polymer type material. Elixir strings are a notable example. This addition can prolong the life of the string, and make it a lot smoother to the touch. These ones tend to cost more than their uncoated counterpart, but the argument is that you won’t need to replace them as soon. I personally prefer the uncoated steel or nickel, but again, this is something you’ll have to test out and see what you like!

General Tips

Strings sound different when worn-in as opposed to just being put on. It really is a preference thing, though. I prefer a string that is almost new, while many prefer one that has a week of play in it. Either way, this is why I always prefer to restring the whole guitar when you snap a string. One brand new string with 5 old ones will stick out like a sore thumb both in looks, and the way it sounds. The amount of time to go before changing your strings depends on the player, and how much you play. Some professional musicians get a fresh restring every gig! I tend to go about a month before doing a restring on a guitar I play often.
If a string sounds dead or muffled, check to see if it’s dirty. Dirt can collect in the grooves between windings and cause the string to not vibrate properly. Even a tiny piece of fluff on the string will affect its output and resonance.

Check for dents in your strings before putting them on. If not stored properly, a string can develop a bend in it. Sometimes it will disappear when under tension, sometimes it stays which will alter the vibration of the string. If the notch in the string is located above a fret, it can cause fret buzz.

All in all, don’t be intimidated by the sheer number of strings available. Find one that works for you, or have a different style for another guitar you own. Try things out, and see how they change your tone and playability!

Happy playing!

Tips on Tones – Issue 9 from MyRareGuitars.com

Wear and tear is one thing. Dirt and grime buildup is a completely separate thing! Sweat, oil, and dead skin builds up on the fret board when you play and has a tendency of getting trapped under the frets. Think of it like plaque buildup on your teeth. Metal can become tarnished, or just build up grime on the bridge especially. A lacquered body collects all the oil and sweat from your arms, hands and fingers leaving scuffs and fingerprints. If a criminal touched a black guitar at the scene of a crime, police wouldn’t even need to dust the thing for prints to find the culprit.

Looking at a clean guitar is obviously much more appealing than the opposite. It makes you want to pick it up and play, and it doesn’t feel gross when you do so. In this article, I’ll list and explain some of the products I use when it comes time to maintaining the clean look of your instrument.

I found a dirty old bass neck in the shop, so I’ll go over the process with photos using that.

1)     The Fret board.

This one was never played, so luckily there’s none of the characteristic “green powder” in and around the frets, but I’ll still do what I normally so in this situation.

For polishing the tops of the frets, I find the “fret erasers” from Stewmac work best. You don’t need to use all of them, but it’s good to go over each fret with at least a couple different grits. Here’s the difference between a dirty fret and one I went over with just the red fret eraser:

Small shavings of the fret eraser and dirt will be collected around the frets, so before cleaning, I spray the board with some compressed air. Next, it’s time to clean the fret board.

The product I use here is called “Simple Green”, which is just a general cleaner. Be advised, you don’t want this to soak into the wood! It’s very much a karate-kid technique: scrub on, scrub off.

Make a few sprays along the neck, and scrub it in using a scrub brush or toothbrush paying extra attention to where the fret meets the wood. Once you’ve scrubbed everywhere, wipe it off with a shop towel.

While this process cleans the board nicely, it can dry it out. Next you’ll have to give back some moisture. There’s different oils you can use like lemon oil or linseed oil. I haven’t tried the latter but have heard it does the trick. Applying it is the same idea as the Simple Green here, except instead of scrubbing I use a shop towel to rub the oil in, and then out. After all is said and done, your neck should look like this:

2) The Headstock

The headstock had some weird water marks caked onto it, so for this I used a small amount of “Goo Gone”. This stuff works great, especially for removing sticker residue. Don’t use too much, and remember to wipe it off. This should be a “last resort” product for stuff that just won’t come off, and even with it you’ll still need to use a little elbow grease. It also tends to leave the guitar feeling greasy, and the product itself is very runny. Here’s what the headstock looked like after:

3) Hardware

Next I did the tuning pegs. For all things metal, lighter fluid or any fluid that contains the flammable “naphtha” chemical mixture works very well. Naphtha is getting harder to find, (at least where I’m located) and some brands are removing it from their formulas. Double check that the fluid contains it before you buy.

For light grime, you can just rub the fluid onto the metal with a shop towel. Don’t light a smoke while doing this, unless you want to be in a Jimi Hendrix tribute band.

If the stuff isn’t coming off, you can remove the metal components, and leave them to soak in a bowl full of the solution. A good alternative is a metal polisher like “X-treem metal polish”, but the powder is very dry and messy so if you go that route be sure to wear gloves.

4) The Body

As most people likely did, the first time I polished guitars I used the standard “guitar polish” you find in guitar stores. I’ve never found that to do a fantastic job, leaving swirl marks and taking forever to wipe in and out. One day I bought a product to try and cover up small surface scratches, and found that it served as a brilliant guitar polish! The product is called “Scratch Doctor”, and is intended for car finishes.

Just put some on a shop towel, wipe it onto the guitar body until it’s evened out (it’s easy to see where it’s been applied) then wipe it off. The pictures here don’t really do it justice, but you can kind of tell:

Make sure you don’t re-use these shop towels. The product can harden a bit on the towel, and you don’t want to leave scratch marks later on.

5) Electronics

If you’ve ever spun a knob and heard a static, crackly noise, chances are you’ve got a dirty pot. A quick spray from electronic cleaner will typically fix it right up. I use “Deox-It” – this is a very expensive cleaner, but it’s also a very good one. A tiny spray is all you need, so the canister goes a long way.

With the pot exposed, you’ll see a small hole in the bottom somewhere. Spray the cleaner in, then rotate the pot back and forth until the noise is gone. Voila! The same process can be used for a dirty toggle switch.

That’s the basics! Try some of these out if you wish. I do not work for any of these product manufacturers, I just find that they work best for me!

Do your research, talk to some techs and see what other opinions are. Most importantly, make sure a product is safe to use before you use it.

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 8 from MyRareGuitars.com

Well, that’s what I’m telling you! But don’t worry; the process is rather painless, and as long as you use the right tools and follow this guide, you’ll have your frets properly crowned and polished in no time.

First off, what does it mean to “crown a fret” and why is it necessary? If you look at your recently levelled frets, you will notice they appear very flat on top with tons of horizontal scratch marks.

This is not a good thing because: A) it is not very visually appealing, B) the strings will scratch up and down the fret when you bend, causing a “nails on chalkboard” effect, and C) the strings will contact too large a portion of the fret, causing your intonation to be off.

When a fret is installed, its intent is for the string to contact the center of the fret and not such a large surface area. What crowning does, then, is shave off the edges of the fret to make it round on top, or at least leave a very fine flat surface down the middle. The idea is not to take a bunch more fret off the top, but instead to just round it out. You don’t want to make all the time spent levelling a waste! Here’s some things you’ll need:

(From left: Diamond crowning files, sharpie, fret erasers, masking tape)

The crowning files shown here are a tad expensive, but I find they work the best for me. There are plenty of other options out there that don’t cost you an arm and a leg. I tend to use the 150 grit as it gets the job done faster. Note: these files are double sided, each side shaped for a different width fret.

As I stated in my last article, it’s a good idea to use masking tape to tape the fret board between frets as a backup in case you slip. To save tape and time, just use two pieces and move them from fret to fret as you work your way up. I didn’t use tape for the following photos.

To begin, mark off the entire length of each fret with your sharpie like so:

(sorry about the black mark on the fretboard, there’s a chip on my camera lens.)

The marker will serve as a template for when you start to file. When you file each fret, watch as the thick marker line gets thinner and thinner. When you’re left with a very fine line down the center that’s barely visible, you know that the fret has a nice crown:

Continue this process all the way up the neck, and you’re done crowning! When you’re finished, you’ll have something that looks like this:

Before you string up the guitar, it’s a good idea to use those fret erasers to polish up the frets, followed by some compressed air to get rid of the fret filings and residue left over from the polish.

The “fret erasers” from Stewmac are good because they’re colour coded depending on the grit they are. The best is to use a combination of a couple different grits for each fret; I like the green #600 and the yellow #1000. Steel wool is a good alternative for this step.

After you’ve polished the frets, you can clean the fret board and give it a nice dose of lemon or linseed oil, and your fret board should now look something like this:

All that’s left to do now is string it up, and have fun!

Happy playing!

Airline BOBKAT: http://www.eastwoodguitars.com/airline-bobkat-red/

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 7 from MyRareGuitars.com

Companies like Fender, Gibson or PRS tend to offer few body stylings, but more color palettes or electronic setups. The cool thing is that even though two models may look the exact same, chances are they have a completely different sound. While many factors come into play that affect the sound of the guitar, perhaps the biggest factor lies at the beginning of the electrical signal path… The pickups!

Even more interesting is that the majority of pickups work using the same phenomenon… Electromagnetism!
A pickup is essentially a magnet wrapped in a copper wire, which creates a magnetic field around itself. When a metal string vibrates within this field, it creates a disturbance which in turn creates electrical energy in the coils. This energy flows through your cable to your amp, where it is converted back into an acoustic sound by the speaker.

So if most pickups operate under this same principle, why do they sound different? The answer is a number of different things: the material used at the core of the magnet, the size of wire and number of times it wraps around the magnet, the number of coils, the pickup’s position on the guitar and proximity to strings, and the pickup’s power source (is it passive or active?)
When looking for a guitar or different sounding pickup to compliment your playing style, it’s good to have an idea what ballpark you might be in. Without further adieu, here’s a few things to look out for during your search!

The Material:

There are two main materials that a pickup’s  core can be made of: ceramic and alnico. Ceramic pickups tend to give a harsher, brighter tone, while alnico are usually more warm and smooth. That said, alnico pickups can be broken down even further into types II, III and V. Alnico III is the weakest of the three, followed by II, and then V being the strongest. What’s the best way to find the right pickup for your playing? As I’ve said in other articles, experiment!

The coils:

The two main types of pickup coils are single coil, and double coil (otherwise known as a humbucker).
The single coil pickup was the original design, featuring one magnet with one coiled wire wrapped around it. The design worked, but it allowed for exterior frequencies to be picked up and amplified other than the guitar.
The humbucker was invented to cancel out these noises, by adding a second magnet with its polarities facing opposite the other magnet. This creates an out of phase effect, and drastically lowers the amount of noise that can get through. What it also does is increase output, and has an overall warmer, bassier tone than the single coil.

Where they go:

When you strum an acoustic guitar close to the bridge, it sounds a lot more thin and trebly than when you play over the sound hole. Electric guitars work the same way: a pickup placed close to the bridge will amplify those thinner tones. To compensate, pickup manufacturers tend to wind their bridge pickups “hotter” than their neck pickups. This adds warmth and output, so unless you want an extremely loud neck pickup and extremely quiet / shrill bridge pickup, try not to mix them up!
Pickup height is important too. Ideally you’ll have the pickups set in a way that there isn’t much of an audible volume difference when switching from pickup to pickup. Often you will notice the bridge pickup will have to be slightly higher than the neck to achieve this. Again, experiment and test different heights of your pickups to see how it affects your tone!

Passive or active:

Passive pickups function in the way I’ve described thus far. Active pickups have one major difference: a preamp powered by a 9V battery. Why? They have a lesser number of coils in the pickup, which requires the extra power boost. The lesser coils make for smaller susceptibility to feedback, but a much smaller dynamic range than that of the passive pickup. Many hard rock and metal musicians have gone the way of the active pickup, as they rarely need to have an output any less than “extreme”.

At the end of the day, you shouldn’t buy a guitar or replacement pickup because (insert name of famous guitar player) uses it! You don’t know what other equipment said player is using, the way their album was mixed, or how their sound technician works. The bottom line is: you are not (insert name of famous guitar player)! They already did their “tone quest” and found what works for them. So, try as many pickup combinations as you can. Try playing the guitar at various volumes, not always on ten! See how different pickups change your tone or even your mood while playing. You may even discover that the way a different pickup sounds will make you play differently and try new things, which is definitely a good thing!

Happy playing!

Tips on Tones – Issue 7 from MyRareGuitars.com

The absolute first step before you do any kind of fret leveling is to ensure that the neck is as straight as possible. I explained a good technique for doing so in my “Worksop Issue 5”, so you may refer there before reading on if you like.

There are some contraptions available to help keep a neck straight, or apply force to simulate string tension while you work (such as the Erlewine Jig), but said contraptions are relatively pricey and to explain how to use them would fill up an article on its own! For now, we’ll go without.

With a straight neck and the strings off, you can begin to map out the bad frets. Using a fret rocker or straight edge, test each fret in the same way I explained in Issue 5. This time, however, you need a way to remember where the problem areas are. With a sharpie, mark along each fret where the rocker… rocked. If you’re nervous about slipping with the marker, you can tape off the entire neck as seen in this picture:

When it comes time to filing, you can use these markings to indicate where you need to pay more attention. Keep in mind the person in this picture is likely making markings for crowning the frets – only mark the fret in the area it’s actually high in.

Once the markings are done, you can get ready to start filing! Again, as a precaution and to save from cleaning up metal “dust” afterwards, you can tape off the neck. It’s also a good idea to lower the neck pickup if you feel you may slip and hit it, and taping off the whole top section of the body will prevent fret filings from flying into the pickup cavities or onto the guitar.

There are a couple different tools you can use to file the frets, my favourite being:

These fret level bars from Stewmac. I use the 16” and the 8” as the 24” tends to be too long for the instruments I’m working on. The idea is to wrap sandpaper around the beam, and slide it back and forth on the frets to make them level with each other. The weight of the beam should be enough force on the frets, so you shouldn’t have to push down very much. I like to use a 220 grit paper, but there are many who start with a lower grit and change to a higher grit as they progress. This helps make any file marks in the frets get smaller and smaller, eventually resulting in a smoother fret. Personally I prefer to do this step afterwards while I’m crowning each fret, so I find sticking to a 220 grit works just fine.

Like I mentioned before, the markings you made are reference points while you file. Make sure you hit those points in particular with the file and essentially get rid of those markings. You can also look and see the filings coming off each fret – there will be more buildup beside the high frets of course.

While you want to make sure your frets are level, don’t overdo it! A fret only so high, and the more you file, the closer you get to needs a re-fret job.  The fewer strokes it takes you to get the frets level, the better.  With that in mind, it’s a good idea every few strokes to go over with the fret rocker and check those problem areas.

When you’re confident with the height of the frets, you’re done! It’s time to move on to crowning and polishing. That’ll be next time on Vincent’s Workshop. For now…

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 6 from MyRareGuitars.com

by Vince Schaljo

Here in the great white north, winters can be… well… pretty great and pretty white! Unfortunately they can also be pretty annoying for your everyday commute, just trying to get from point A to point B.
One thing that can really help keep you safe and make your drive easier is, of course, a decent set of snow tires. If you just spent a small fortune on a brand new car, the last thing you want is to slip on some ice and have the thing destroyed!

Snow tires are a small price to pay for a better drive and reduced risk of damage. What does this have to do with guitars? Nothing! But here comes my analogy anyway. If you’ve spent a small fortune on a nice guitar and a nice amp, wouldn’t it make just as much sense as snow tires to want to represent their sound to their full potential? To reduce risk of damage to components? To help the signal flow from point A to point B well?
The term “it’s just a cable” is one I hear far too often, and while it’s true that most cables can get the job done, (to a degree) not all cords are created equal. Taking good care of your cables is important, and using a quality cord where it is required can actually improve your tone. Not to mention using the wrong cords can potentially cause serious damage to some expensive equipment.

One example of an error (and I’ve been guilty of doing this myself in a pinch) would be: not using a proper speaker cable when connecting an amp head to its cabinet. Just because the connector end fits into the input doesn’t mean the cable is meant for that purpose. Speaker cables should be used with your amp to head connection at all times, while instrument cables should be used from the guitar to the amp at all times. Why? The biggest reason is the shielding (or lack thereof) in the cables. Your guitar puts out far less power than the amp does, and as such your cable will need a good amount of shielding to keep unwanted external noise out. An amp that pushes so much power out needs a cable that will allow for more electrical flow, and does not require as much (if any) shielding to keep out the unwanted noise. When you plug an instrument cable from the amp into your cabinet, it struggles to feed signal through. It’s used to the easier flow through a speaker cable. You run a huge risk of damage to your equipment by putting this kind of strain on the amp. Not to mention, the small speaker cable required to make this connection will generally not cost you as much (depending on quality) as a longer instrument cable anyway!

The flipside of this error is: using a speaker cable to plug your guitar into the amp. As I mentioned, a speaker cable typically has far less (if any) shielding. With the low output from your instrument, outside noises have a much easier time getting into the cable which can result in lots of feedback, squealing, and static. It’s a good idea to spend the extra money on a better quality instrument cable for this reason.  You get what you pay for!

Make sure you buy only what you need. If you’re only ever going to be playing venues where you will never be more than 5 feet away from your amp, don’t use a cable longer than 10 feet! Just like when you throw a baseball or shoot a water gun, signal loses strength as it travels. The longer the cable, the more distance that needs to be covered which can actually have an effect on your tone and output.

Lastly, do a good job of maintaining your cables. When you’re packing up, don’t crumple them up and throw them in your car! Not only can this ruin your cables, but it also just makes it that much more difficult to untangle everything when it’s time to set up again. Learn how to properly wrap your cables, and try to keep them from being tied to each other like spaghetti. A small piece of tape or velcro around each separate cable coil is a good way to do this.

Save your money! Take care of your cables, and take care of your equipment by using the right cables!

Happy playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 6 from MyRareGuitars.com

It’s important to understand how your amp reacts to its settings to get the tone you want – especially if you’re one to use multiple guitars.

The first thing to understand are your basic controls. Bass, Mid, Treble, and Presence would be a good place to start. The first three are generally understood. This is a fixed 3-band EQ, meaning that each control handles a pre-set section of frequencies. As I said earlier, not all amps operate the same so it is important to get an idea for how each dial affects the signal. While bass and treble knobs almost always boost in level, sometimes an amp’s “mid” knob will actually be cutting the level.

The other thing to get a handle of is how much each knob changes the tone, and where in its rotation it does this. Sometimes you can’t even hear a change in tone from 0-5, while other times you end up on a different planet.

A good way to test your EQ dials would be “over exaggerating”. First off, make sure your amp’s volume is set where you want it because cranking it or decreasing it will have an effect on the EQ.

Next, set the EQs somewhere you would never actually set them to – either all zero or all full. From here, you can sweep each one either way to see the effect it has on your overall tone. You will likely notice a point in each knob’s rotation where you can really hear a drastic difference. Some people use this “break” point as the setting for each knob, but it really comes down to your own ears and what you’re looking for.

“Presence” is one of many other parameters that you can find on an amp. Other common names could be “shape”, “contour”, or “enhance”. Again, these effect pre-set frequencies but can be thought of more as a master tone knob. “Presence” will typically boost your high mids – highs, while “Enhance” might boost the lows and the highs. It’s important that you look up your specific amp, because again, the controls will vary from amp to amp.
Another thing to keep in mind is the tone you set yourself when you’re playing alone at home probably isn’t the same tone you want to keep when you’re playing with a band. It’s important that the instruments aren’t fighting to be heard, especially if you have another guitarist in the group. You will likely find that in order to have your guitar cut through and really sound good in the mix might not sound as good on its own.

The last thing to look out for that I’ll talk about is your gain setting. It’s very easy to become comfortable with a very saturated and warm level of gain.

While a higher gain setting can sound super sweet (or menacing as the case may be), too much distortion throws your frequency range all over the place and can potentially mess things up… and not in a good way! The other thing that tends to happen with a lot of gain is your mistakes aren’t as audible. While some may say “but… that’s a good thing!”, getting used to playing without all that distortion can really improve your articulation, and, in turn, improve your tone!

Happy Playing!

Tips on Tone – Issue 5 from MyRareGuitars.com

There are two main sounds a guitar can make that really make me cringe. The first being one that’s terribly out of tune, and the second… the notorious fret buzz. An out of tune guitar is a quick and easy fix, but fret buzzing can be caused by so many different things that sometimes it’s hard to get rid of without compromising the playability of the guitar (or spending some serious dough on fretwork!)
In this article I’ll try to tackle as many causes as I can think of, and explain how I go about identifying the culprit of an annoying buzz.
First and foremost is the setup. Check to make sure the neck relief is good and the string height is proper. If it’s not, a simple twist of the truss rod or heightening of the bridge could solve your problem. (You can check out my other articles for advice on these steps.)
Although further increasing the relief in the neck or raising the bridge could potentially get rid of fret buzz, the problem is likely elsewhere if the guitar is already set up well and by doing this you’re just covering up the problem.
Think of fret buzz as a symptom. If you had a bad headache that lasted for a week, would you simply keep taking Advil and hope it goes away? Or would you get checked out, identify the root of the problem and target that specifically?

In most cases, the “buzzing” is due to the string hovering too closely over a fret and rattling against it; hence the term “fret buzz.” Occasionally your neck might twist, a fret might pop up, or your action may just be too low causing this to happen. In extreme cases, certain notes will be beyond just a buzz and end up “fretting out”, or play as a higher note than the one you’re trying to play. For argument’s sake, let’s say the setup on the guitar is good, and by eye you can’t see any funny business in the fretwork when you sight the neck. The next step is to identify where the buzzing occurs.  If a string is buzzing when played open, and the setup is good, your nut may be filed too low. Check to make sure there is sufficient clearance between the string and the first fret.
Does the guitar have a zero-fret? If so, make sure the string is sitting flush up against it. The idea of a zero fret is to have the strings rest entirely on top of it. This is where the scale length begins on these guitars instead of the nut. You may actually need to file the nut more so the string rests well on the zero fret to get rid of that buzz.

Next to check would be the saddle. Sometimes what sounds like fret buzz could be the string rattling somewhere other than a fret. Try moving the string from its groove on the saddle, and place it elsewhere on the saddle. If the buzz stops here, you may need to file the groove a bit, or perhaps the saddle is sitting loose in the bridge.
Another common culprit for buzz happens in the machine heads. Sometimes a piece comes loose inside the mechanism, creating a distinct, long sustaining buzz sound. Your best bet in this situation is to replace the machine head itself – you can likely find single ones for sale at your local music shop.

If that’s not it, the string itself could be the culprit. Many times I’ve simply switched out a string, or rotated the ball end a bit and erased an unpleasant rattle. Strings that are too loose will move around more when strummed, so switching to a heavier gauge may make a difference as well.
Loose screws anywhere on the guitar have a habit of causing a buzz as well, so just make sure everything’s nice and tight.

So that just about does it for open notes, but what if you’re getting fret buzz when fretting a note? Fret wear, high frets, low frets, uneven frets, neck warps, neck humps and bad set-ups are all potential culprits if this is the case. The first thing is to figure out where the buzz occurs. Is it limited to just a couple frets, or all over? The best case scenario is that you’ve just got a high fret or two, and a gentle tap with a fret hammer may fix your problem.

When I say gentle I mean very gentle! Hitting too hard could do more harm than good – the only thing worse than one fret that’s too high is one fret that’s too low.
Before you start smacking things though, make sure that the fret ends of the fret in question are resting firmly into the wood, and not hovering above.  If you can’t tell, just push on the fret and see if it moves like a loose tooth. If it is indeed loose, hitting this with a hammer won’t do a thing except make a satisfying “smack” sound. In this case, you’ll want to glue the fret back down to where it needs to go. Pour a small amount of super glue around the fret end that’s sticking up, then wipe any excess glue off of the fretboard and neck. Be sure to push firmly on the fret, (or clamp it if you’ve got one) and again wipe off any glue that seeps out the sides. A good glue won’t take too long to set.
Sometimes you’ll need to do a lot more to fix buzz problems on a guitar, so next time I’ll talk about some methods for fret leveling and more steps to erasing that pesky buzz.

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 4 from MyRareGuitars.com

Often times, a guitar’s poor action is fixed with an easy twist of a truss rod like I explained in my “neck relief” article. However, adjusting the truss rod should not be the primary source for fixing your string height! The guitar is built bearing in mind that the neck will be set properly. Putting too much relief in the neck in order to raise string height can lead to problems elsewhere, so it’s important to set the neck well and then adjust your string height at the bridge. To find a height that works for you, there’s no harm in experimentation! Try setting the bridge to where it’s uncomfortably low, and gradually raise it until you’re happy with the playability. Personally, I prefer to use a measurement tool to quickly dial in a height that I know I’m comfortable with. The “string action gauge” from Stewmac has everything you would need. The bottom of this tool has markings that go up in increments of ten thousandths of an inch beginning with .010. Placing this edge down behind the low E string, the distance from the fret to the bottom of the string should be around .075-.078, so, between the .07 and .08.

On the other side, again place the edge down behind the high E string. The distance I go for on this side is around .063-.065, or, you should just see the .06 marking peaking out underneath the string. The numbers I’m using here are for guitars around a 25″ scale length, assuming standard tuning, and neck relief set similarly to how I described in my neck relief article. From here, you can make minor adjustments to suit your needs! If at this point you are still experiencing fret buzz in certain areas, your neck or frets may need some extra work in order for the guitar to set up well. Sometimes the strings may be too hard to push down in the first fret, or may even play too sharp! It is not uncommon for the nut slots to be cut too shallow. With the right tools, this is an easy remedy. You’ll need a set of files, sized correctly for each string. You don’t want the slot to grab and choke the string, so you actually want to use a slightly larger gauge file than string gauge. As a general rule, try to go .003″ larger. So, for a .010 high E string, a .013″ file would be fine. Some stores offer double edged files that are marked 1-6 instead of a gauge – be sure you know which gauge they are before cutting!

In some cases the number may not necessarily pertain to the string slot you are trying to cut.
The other 2 tools I use are a straight-edge, and a set of feeler gauges to measure the height of your first fret. The idea is, of course, to not cut your slots too deep!

Remember to make sure your neck is set before making your nut adjustments. If you cut it with an over bowed neck, you run the risk of having open-note fret buzz once you straighten it out again.

Laying the straight edge down across the first two frets, try sliding different combinations of gauges underneath until you find a combo that just contacts the straightedge.

Let’s say .040 is the one that worked. Now, you want to add ~.005 to that number to make .045, find the two feeler gauges that total this new number (or close to it), and use them as a “shield” when cutting your nut.

In this case, I took size .022 and .024, stuck them together, and lay them flat on the fingerboard against the nut. Then, I cut each slot with the correct file until making contact with the feeler gauges. It’s a quick and easy way to get your proper nut height set without having to worry about going too low!

After you’ve got your neck set, your string height at both the bridge and nut set, and your intonation dialed in, you should be ready to play!

Happy playing!

Written by: Vince Schaljo

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 3 from MyRareGuitars.com

Last time I talked about the benefits of compression, which led me to want to talk about some of the other heavy hitters in the world of signal processing. The first thing you need to ask yourself is: “what am I looking for?” Are you looking for a boost or more gain? The opposite? Are you looking for something to thicken up your tone, or maybe just some fancy sounding effects? In this article I’ll give some examples for each of these, and an idea as to where they can be used.

Let’s say you’re looking to enhance the clarity of your tone, and perhaps even clean things up beyond what the EQ enables you to do. This is where a compressor pedal would come in handy (like I talked about in my last article) or even a filtration/EQ pedal. There are some pedals that allow you to dial in and adjust specific frequencies, which could be useful if you’re playing a venue that doesn’t have a professional sound system / technician. You could also purposely crank or take out certain frequencies to create interesting effects, or to make it easier to get feedback from your amp if that’s your thing! Other pedals have a pre-set frequency range that they alter, such as the popular Ibanez Tube Screamer. This guy pushes your midrange, and is a very effective way to make your lead guitar work…well… scream.

Perhaps rather than cleaning up, you’re looking to make things dirty or just give yourself a nice boost. With a tube amp, generally speaking you want your tubes to run hot to get your best tone. That said, the more gain you put in, the dirtier the signal will be when it comes out.

A good boost pedal (I’m partial to the MXR micro amp) will increase the signal level of your guitar before it reaches the amp, thus pushing the amp harder. Think of it as instantly raising the height of your pickups with the flick of a switch… Or stomp of a foot. You can use one of these in band situations during a solo section where you need to be heard, or just to enhance your tone if you like it dirty! Many boost pedals come with an output volume knob, so you could theoretically use it in the opposite way to quiet yourself down, or clean up your tone a bit.

Modulation and time-based effects processors are next: these are the ones that fall under the “fancy effects” category.
Modulation effects are things like chorus, flangers, phasers and tremolo. You can use any of these to add flavour to particular riffs, or in some cases drive the feel of the guitar in the entire song! Here’s an example of a heavy phaser effect used by Eddie Van Halen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-IUB62zDlA

And some chorus used by Kurt Cobain:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YyDg9tT0Vw
Time-based effects are things like delay and reverb. A lot of amps come with their own reverb installed, but you can always experiment with different pedals to try a variety of different sounding ones. Generally, reverb is used to thicken up your tone. Be careful not to use too much! While it may sound nice and creamy right next to your amp, in large rooms especially you can start to sound very muddy if you over do it.

A “slap-back” delay is another way of getting a thick sounding guitar tone. “Slap-back” is a term used to describe a delay of just one repeat that comes very quickly after the initial hit. Again, you can use a delay pedal not just as a tone enhancer, but also as an effects pedal by playing around with the settings!

Once you have a few pedals, it’s important to decide which order you’re going to chain them in. While the generally accepted rule of thumb is to start with your dynamics, then do EQs and filters, then modulation, followed by boosts, and finally time based processors… you’re always free to experiment! Maybe you want your delay to go through a boost, or maybe you want to boost everything before you put on that tremolo. After all, these effects you’re using weren’t created without experimentation! There’s a world of soundscapes to explore.

Happy playing!

Written by: Vince Schaljo

Tips on Tones – Issue 3 from MyRareGuitars.com

Maybe if you could actually make out the song they’re listening to it might be enjoyable… But instead all you get is the “thud thud thud” from the bass! Why is that, anyway?
It’s all about vibrations, and transference of energy. The speaker receives a signal to start vibrating, which starts a ripple effect causing nearby air particles to also vibrate. If a solid object is in the way, this energy will react in a way dependent upon:
1) the material and size of the object, and
2) the frequency and amplitude of the sound.

The lower the frequency, the larger the sound wave produced. Bigger sound waves have an easier time resonating with larger objects, while higher pitched small waves will bounce off. If your neighbor rolled down their car window, the smaller waves would have an easy escape and you’d actually be able to hear the song.

Different instruments initiate these vibrations in different ways. For example, on a recorder, in order to play the lowest note possible you need to close all the holes before blowing into it. This creates the largest air cavity it’s capable of, therefore creating the largest sound wave and the lowest note.
Have you ever looked inside a piano? You’ll notice that the longest, thickest strings are the ones responsible for making the lowest notes.

A guitar operates in a similar way – the difference being that instead of hitting a thicker, longer string to produce lower notes, you physically change the length of your strings to do so.

The three main things that tell a string what note it’s going to play are its length, tension, and size. On a guitar, your strings are all the same length between the nut and the saddle. In fact, each string is under a similar amount of tension as well (somewhere between 15 and 20 pounds of tension per string). The reason each open string produces a different note therefore, given the same length and similar tension, has to do with the size of the string. A thicker string under the same amount of tension as a much thinner one will create a much lower note. For example, if you wanted to tune the Low E string to sound like the high B, you would end up tightening it to the point that it would just snap. On the other hand, If you tried to tune the High B so it sounded like the Low E, the string wouldn’t have enough tension to properly vibrate. The sizes of the strings on your guitar were carefully calculated by their manufacturer to achieve a proper balance.

Of course – your guitar has more than six notes! When you start playing and fretting notes, you are essentially decreasing the length of each string. Lets say you play an E in the seventh fret of the A string. The distance between fret seven and the nut no longer has anything to do with the note that string is producing – it is now dependent on the shorter distance between fret seven and the bridge. The string hasn’t changed it’s size, you’ve just shortened its length, thus raising its pitch.

So what if your guitar is out of tune? If a string is flat or sharp in the open position, you can increase or decrease its tension by simply turning the machine head to bring it to pitch. However, what if it already is in tune, but when you fret a note it’s sharp or flat? This is when you’ll need to intonate the guitar by slightly adjusting the strings’ length.

Before you intonate your guitar, you’ll want to make sure your neck relief (talked about in my previous article) and your string height (will talk about in my next article) are already set the way you want. If your action is too high, you have to push the string further towards the neck in order to sound a note. By doing this you’re essentially bending the string, potentially making the note too sharp and giving you a poor reading.

Once your action is set, you can test the intonation. The distance of the strings from the nut to the 12^th fret should be equal to that of the 12^th fret to the bridge. If the bridge is placed in the wrong spot on the guitar, automatically you know you’ve got a problem! If it’s in the right spot, then you should just need a few minor tweaks to get the guitar intonated. For this example I’ll be using an Airline 2P with tune-o-matic bridge.

First, play the open A string. Make sure it’s perfectly in tune. Then, play the same A string one octave higher in the twelfth fret. If the tuner reads that the note in the 12^th fret is flat, you will need to shorten the string between the 12^th fret and the bridge by moving the saddle closer to it. If it’s sharp, lengthen the string by moving the saddle away. Repeat this process until each string reads the same note when played open as when played in the 12^th fret. That’s it! Well… hopefully. Other factors can come into play like worn frets, twisted necks, or even applying too much pressure to the string. These are all things that you will, of course, want to fix to have your guitar play in tune all the way up and down the neck.

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 2 from MyRareGuitars.com

The range between the quietest sound something can make and the loudest is what’s known as the “dynamic range”, and it’s very important to make use of it in the correct way not just in movies, but also in your guitar playing.

Generally speaking, to get the best sound out of a tube amp you have to run it hot. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean you have to constantly dig in and play loud. Try experimenting with different thicknesses of picks, or even without a pick at all. That said, there’s nothing quite like a crushing strum of the strings through a stupidly loud amp.  Look at the iconic “windmill” gimmick – sure it looks cool, but the idea was first done for a heavy strike.

Using your fingers with a low gain setting at high volumes can give you a very warm sounding tone, while still enabling you to really bite in when necessary. The way you pluck the strings will have the greatest influence on the output you get though the amp, while the settings on the amp will process and alter the sounds you are feeding it.

These knobs are essentially volume knobs that are assigned to a specific range of frequencies. The bass handles the lows, while the treble handles the highs. Therefore, if you’ve got everything turned on full, you’ve basically just turned up your overall volume rather than EQ anything. The best thing you can do is play with your settings, and understand that every guitar is different. You will likely adjust settings every time you plug a new guitar in.

All this being said, in a band situation it’s about sitting well in the mix. You don’t want to be fighting anyone for level, and you want to sound articulate and clear. Jumping from super quiet to super loud, or hitting notes slightly weaker than others can turn out sounding sloppy. If the style of music you are playing doesn’t require you to explore your entire dynamic range, it would be a good idea to shorten it! It’s for this reason that one of the most common things you’ll see on a guitarists pedal board is a compressor.

A compressor takes the dynamic range, and “squishes” it. Very basically, it is quieting down the super loud parts so everything is on a more level playing field. This way, slight variations in picking attack or finger pressure are not as obvious as they would be without a compressor.

Many compressors only have a few controls, and often times things are labeled differently, but I’ll outline the main parameters here.

Threshold: The threshold control determines the level at which the compressor fixes the incoming signal. Whatever level you set the threshold to, everything above that value will be compressed, while whatever’s below it will remain untouched. So, the lower your threshold, the more you are actually compressing. Many guitar pedal compressors don’t have this control, meaning the threshold value is pre-set. The only way to adjust how much is being compressed with these type of pedals is to, well, make things louder! Increase your input, and more will be affected.

Ratio: This is the amount that the compressor will choke the signal by. A ratio of 8:1 means that when your input signal is 8 decibels over your threshold, the output becomes only 1 decibel over your threshold.

Attack: This is the setting that determines how quickly the compressor decreases the level when the threshold is reached.

Release:  This is the setting that determines how quickly the signal comes back to the level your ratio is set to once your input falls below the threshold.

Be careful setting your release! Let’s say you have a guitar part that’s really loud and very soon after dips down quiet.  With a release that’s too slow, the signal is still being compressed when you go to play that quiet part which may make it a lot quieter than you would like! On the other hand, setting a release value too quickly can give you an unwanted “pumping” sound as you hear the level being adjusted in and out.

Compressors can be difficult to learn, but once you’ve got it down you’ll greatly appreciate the difference they make in your dynamic range!

Happy playing!

written by Vince Schaljo

Tips on Tones – Issue 2 from MyRareGuitars.com

No matter the price of the guitar, the fact is that they all operate the same way and all need to be maintained the same way. Recently, I began an article series called “Vincent’s Tips on Tones” (check it out if you haven’t!). In the first issue, I mentioned that a proper guitar setup can have a large impact on your playing, and ultimately your overall tone. In this series, I’ll go further into detail about setting up your instrument and fixing issues that prevent you from playing to your full potential.

For starters, a little about myself:
My name is Vince and I’ve been working as a guitar technician at Eastwood Guitars for the past three years. It is my job to inspect, set up, repair, and prepare the instruments for shipment to their final destination. For the first few entries, I’ll go over the essentials of a basic guitar setup assuming there are no major problems with the instrument.

The first thing you want to do is look over the entire guitar for any blemishes, and make sure the electronics are functioning properly. There’s nothing worse than doing a full set-up only to notice a problem that’s going to require more work. If you’re working on a heavily used guitar, it’s still good practice to familiarize yourself with any damage on the guitar before you work on it. That way, you won’t notice it afterwards and think “uh-oh, did I do that?”

If the guitar looks clean and is working, you can begin the setup. The first thing you need to understand is that whatever adjustment you make will have an impact somewhere else on the instrument. For example, flattening out the neck will both lower your strings and alter your tuning and intonation. For this reason, it’s important to inspect each piece in order, and make the adjustment where necessary. Often times you will need to go back and readjust changes you’ve made so everything will balance! Today I’ll focus on:

 Neck Relief.
Generally speaking, you want your guitar neck to be as straight as possible. A neck that is too far “back bowed” can cause significant fret buzz problems and dead notes, while one that is too far “over bowed” can cause your action to be impossibly high and throw off intonation.
With a keen eye, you can visually check for this by holding the guitar by its body, and looking down the side of the neck from the nut to where the neck meets the body. Be sure not to push on the neck when doing this as you could influence the bow in the neck. What you’re looking for is a bow in the neck. A neck that dips down like a valley is referred to as being over bowed. One that dips upward like a hill is known as being back bowed.

If I’m working on my own guitar or I know what the owner likes, sighting the guitar in this way is enough to know what kind of adjustment I need to make to be happy with it. If it’s for an unknown customer, I prefer to use a measurement method that will turn out the same way each time.

Using a capo, clamp down the strings in the first fret. Then, push down on the low “E” string at the 17th fret. Now, look at the 8th fret. There should be just a sliver of space between the bottom of the low “E” and the top of the fret. If you have one, slide a .010 feeler gauge underneath the string. If it just sneaks under, you’re golden.

If there’s a large gap between the feeler gauge and the string, it means your neck is over bowed and you’ll need to tighten your truss rod. If the gauge pushes against the string too much or doesn’t fit underneath, your neck is back bowed and you’ll need to loosen the truss rod.

Once you’ve determined the state of the neck, you can try an adjustment if necessary. First you’ll need to find the truss rod access, which is typically located where the headstock meets the neck just above the nut. You will need the right sized Allen key or truss rod wrench to make the adjustment (your guitar should have come with this when you bought it). If the key does not fit perfectly snug, do NOT turn it! The last thing you want to do is strip your truss rod!

Once you’ve found a wrench that fits in tight, start by making a small turn counter-clockwise to loosen the rod. You never want to tighten first incase the rod is maxed out. Once you’ve learned that the rod will spin, you can start to make small adjustments whichever direction required to straighten the neck. Counter-clockwise will loosen the rod, while clockwise till tighten. Remember to sight the neck after each turn to see what’s happening with the neck.

When you think you’re happy with how straight the neck looks, you can check the relief again with the capo method, followed by a play test! Many times a simple neck adjustment is all a guitar will need to play smoothly. However, if during your play test there are still problems with the guitar, the issue lies somewhere else – but we’ll get to that in a later “Guitar Workshop”! Next time, I’ll talk about the two things I follow up every neck adjustment with; String height, and intonation!

Happy playing!

Vincent’s Guitar Workshop – Issue 1 from MyRareGuitars.com

Sure, new stuff is fun and definitely a viable way to improve your sound pallet, but there is a plethora of ways using the equipment you already have that could help you get that tone you’re always looking for! Over the next few months I’ll outline some tips and tricks I’ve learned through my own experiences, as well as some things I’ve picked up from professionals around the world.

To kick things off, we’ll start with the basics. Playing an instrument and making music in its purest form is an extension of yourself. You’re the one playing the guitar, so ultimately you are the one responsible for the majority of how it sounds. Your mood, your focus, and your blood-alcohol level are just a few things that can have an effect on your overall playing before we even get into the equipment you’re using! If you feel like crap, you’re going to play like crap. One of the main things that can contribute to all of these factors is how the guitar feels in your hands. Think of it this way: you’re a lumberjack and your boss hands you a dull saw, asking you to cut down the thickest tree in the forest. Is that going to put you in a good mood? No. Will you be able to remain focused? Probably not. Are you going to want to grab a cold-one half way through the tree? …Maybe.

Like saws for lumberjacks, guitars are tools for guitarists and should be treated as such. This brings me to my first tip:

Get your guitar professionally set-up!

Your guitar is not going to remain the same since the day you bought it. It is absolutely necessary to maintain it with string changes and set-ups to keep it playing the way you want it to. Comfort and ease of play will make you want to play your guitar, and really enjoy it! Things like old strings, fretbuzz, dead notes, sharp frets, high strings and poor intonation are all things that physically make you need to play your guitar differently in order for it to sound acceptable.

Those changes you are making (like using a lighter touch to avoid fretbuzz, applying more pressure for high strings, or completely avoiding dead notes) are obvious factors that affect your tone in a negative way. The height of your pick-ups, as well as dirt or poor connections in the electronics are typically inspected with full service set-ups as well. Issues with either of these will affect your output, and therefore your tone will suffer.

With a guitar that feels good in your hands, sounds smooth through the amp, and looks clean and polished, it will be as if you got a brand new instrument without the price tag.

Happy playing!

Written by: Vince Schaljo

Tips on Tones – Issue 1 from MyRareGuitars.com

Dr. Dave Walker (guitarist)

“How can there be a Dm chord in the key of C?” This is one of the most common questions I get asked as a theory teacher. In some cases the person has not considered that there must be different chords in any given key or else we would have to stay on one chord for a long, boring time. More often though the student knows that “the chords of the key of C” are C, F, and G (or G7). This last idea is partly true – those are the MAJOR chords in the key of C. However, every major key contains 3 major chords, 3 minor chords, and one diminished chord. And not only does every major key have that same number of chords of the same type – they are all in the same order.

Let’s start with the C major scale. This is simply all of the notes (i.e. the letter names from A to G) put in order, starting and ending on C. So the C major scale is: C D E F G A B C. I have placed these on the staff in example 1, with tab underneath for those who don’t read music.

Chords in C (Ex. 1)

To create chords in any key, we take each individual note in the key and build a chord on top of it. We call the note that we are building on top of the “root” of the chord, and its note name is the name of the chord. We then take the 3rd note above the root, and the 5th note above the root, and these form the notes in our chords. So if we take C as a root, the 3rd note up from it is E, and the 5th note up is G. Our C chord then contains C, E, and G. Likewise, if we start on D, we get F as the 3rd note up, and A as the 5th. So Dm contains D, F, and A. Example 2 shows all 7 chords in the key of C.

Chords in C (Ex. 2)

How do we know that C is a major chord but Dm is a minor chord? There are three ways. First, you might be able to just hear the difference between the sound of a major and minor chord. Second, you can learn the theory of intervals which will tell you the internal construction of these chords. But the third is the simplest: you can memorize the order that chords appear in a key. The sequence is the same for every major key.

Let’s number the notes in the scale from 1 to 7 (since 8 brings us back to C again). The chords we build on notes 1, 4, and 5 are always major chords. The chords on 2, 3, and 6 are always minor, while the one on note 7 is always a diminished chord. So the sequence for any major key is this: 1 – Major, 2 – minor, 3 – minor, 4 – Major, 5 – Major, 6 – minor, and 7 – diminished. (MmmMMmd for short.)

Notice that all of these chords have just 3 different notes. On the guitar, we can distribute these over the strings at different locations to give us different “voicings” of the chord, but it will always have the same name. For example, whether you play a C chord in the “cowboy” shape closest to the nut or as a bar chord at the 8th fret, you are still just using the notes C, E, and G.

So to get back to the original question, there is a Dm chord in the key of C because that is the chord that we can build on the note D. The same logic applies to the Em and Am chords, as well as that B diminished chord.

Written by: Dr. Dave Walker

Finding the Chords in a Key from MyRareGuitars.com

Jimi Hendrix in Studio

If you are thinking of learning guitar or getting into the guitar scene, one of the important decisions that you will need to make is whether you want to go acoustic with your guitar or electric. Both types of guitar are fantastic and offer a wide range of playing styles to experiment with. Today we are going to highlight the main differences between the two to help you make your decision.

1. The type of music you want to play
The type of music you want to play will be the greatest indicator of which kind of guitar you would like to go for. An electric guitar is best suited for rock, metal and blues music, although it can be used more creatively if you have the knowhow. However if you are seeking a guitar to sing songs with and play alone, classical guitar or ballads then acoustic is the best bet for you. You can also play acoustic versions of rock songs with an acoustic guitar which can be great fun, trying to figure out how to play a rock song on your acoustic will also help with your learning process.

2. Where you are going to play
If you are going to play your guitar with others and will have access to amps and other equipment, then you may be happy with an electric guitar. If you goal is to play in a band with a drummer, bassist and so forth then you will definitely want to go electric. If you need a guitar that will be more mobile and give you more options (such as playing by a campfire or playing in a park) then acoustic is the best bet. Acoustic guitars are great for taking to a barbeque or round to a friend’s house, if your friend also has an acoustic there is nothing more fun than strumming some tunes while sat outside on a beautiful summer’s day.

3. Your budget
An acoustic guitar can be picked up for as little as £50 whereas an electric guitar is significantly more expensive. As well as the cost of the guitar itself, electric guitars tend to be more high maintenance, requiring specialist equipment and storage to get the best out of it and keep it running for a long time, so if budget is a primary consideration for you then an acoustic guitar is probably the better option for you. But if you are serious about learning the guitar you may want to invest a little more to get a semi decent guitar, the sound quality and tone will be far superior to any low cost options.

4. Your commitment
If you are absolutely committed to the art of playing guitar then an electric guitar will give you more options, more longevity and more variety for the kind of music that you can play, whereas an acoustic guitar is quite limited by comparison. If you really want to be a guitar pro and you are fully committed then you will derive very intense pleasure from mastering the nuances and subtleties that you can achieve with electric guitar.

5. Your need for variety
Although acoustic fans will hate that we are saying this, the truth is that acoustic guitars have limits that electric guitars simply do not have. Whether you like to twang your notes, extend them or vibrate them, the electric guitar is a lifetime of new discoveries, special skills and moves that you can show off at various opportunities! (sorry acoustic guitarists, but its true!) There are also a whole host of different techniques and styles that you can adopt on the acoustic guitar, using a slider or even a loop pedal can give you hours of fun.

6. The kudos factor
Electric guitars are just plain cool and so if you are taking up an instrument to impress, win fans or show off then electric is definitely the way to go. Electric guitars look good, sound great and can make a relatively novice player seem like a superstar with a just a few choice skills. Acoustic guitars can also be very cool, however you will need some more advanced skills with an acoustic to really start attracting fans.
Choosing which guitar to start on is a big decision, there are multiple factors you need to weigh up in order to make the right choice. Everything from your preferred style of music to how much noise you can make will have weight. The best way to know is to go into your local guitar shop and ask to try a couple of guitars out, get a real feel for the difference between acoustic and electric. Whatever you decide on it is important to pursue your learning, the first few weeks are often the hardest but, like with most things, the more you put in to it the more you get out.

Ben writes about music and currently works for a guitar shop specializing in acoustic guitar strings .

Beginner Guitar Tips: Acoustic vs Electric from MyRareGuitars.com

It is pretty much an unavoidable thing that happens in every guitarist’s lifetime. We get in ruts. The difference between great players, and players that tell you that they have pretty much given up, is that great players’ know how to steer out of the ruts.

I want to share with you, my 7 top tips on getting your guitar playing out of the ruts and back on the highway of rock ‘n’ roll! What’s best about learning how to get out of a rut, is that you learn the techniques once and become aware of when you might be in a rut, and avoid it at all costs from that day onwards.

So, here we go, lets get stuck into the guitar and have some fun starting from today! Try a technique at a time over the next week and I promise you will want to share these tips with everyone.

1. Listen to a different style of music
Head straight to Spotify or where ever you like to get your music from, and start listening to some music you have never heard before. Honestly, you will be surprised how much your listening affects your playing. If you are an acoustic-pop guitarist, try listening to some hip-hop and hear what the guitar is doing. If there is no guitar part, could you make a part to compliment the track? Perhaps you are a shred guitarist and have become slightly lost in a sea of notes? Try listening to some simplistic music, the type of music often found in film and performed on the piano. Appreciate the note choice and try your hand at working out the note use over the chosen chord.
This is my top tip because it has helped me become a diverse guitarist and it develops your ear.

2. Take a guitar lesson
Ok, I know I am a guitar tutor in Brighton, but I honestly do believe in the value that taking guitar lessons holds. If you explain your current level, tastes and where you want to take your playing, any good guitar tutor should inspire, and put you into action. Quite often, just seeing a good guitarist up close and explaining what he is doing, will be enough to clear your guitar-haze. Give your guitar teacher pieces of music you want to aim towards, and ask about realistic time frames for how long it will take for you to be able play the song.

3. Jam with someone
If you have any time to spare at all, then please find a local musician to jam with you, even just one night a week. Sharing musical ideas and writing parts to compliment each other’s lines will improve your musicality, and give you an idea of how flexible you are. You will also get a good look at how even your rhythm and lead skills are, as you trade off accompaniment.

4. Record yourself
Now, I know this is not quite as easy to do as some of my other tips, but if you have access to recording yourself, then go for it. It is scary at first hearing yourself, but you will get used to it and learn how be critical about your playing, in order to produce a recording you can’t wait to share. You learn how to interweave guitar parts, making use of a variety of tones to create the ambience you are looking for.

5. Experiment with an alternative tuning
This is a really fun way to get out of a rut and an excellent way to make some beautiful sounds you never knew you could make. Investigate into open G and open D tuning for starters, and learn what notes to tune the strings to. What is amazing about this technique is that you can’t rely on your trick book anymore, and unless you learn someone else’s music in this tuning, you rely fully on your musical creativity rather than shape and memorized patterns. Some players get so engrossed in alternative tunings that they never turn back and become completely shaped by the tuning.

6. Attempt to play music performed on another instrument
As guitarists, we quite often have an array of tricks and approaches that we pull out at any time, often slightly adapting them to fit the musical situation at the time. If you consider that the notes we play are largely in part due to the shapes we were told to learn, then you start to realise why many guitarists sound the same. A lot of great guitarists I have met over the years have had this one attribute in common; they all listen to music from piano, saxophone, violin and trumpet, and pretty much any melodic instrument as well as rhythmic instruments to build a great rhythmic command. Being able to take music from another instrument and perform it on guitar may be my number 6 top tip, but it is an art well worth mastering.

7. Immerse yourself in music
Picture music as your fuel. You need fuel to run, and when music equals creativity, then why not immerse yourself in a sea of songs? Find the time to listen to music, both consciously and sub consciously. By that, I mean sometimes have the music as a background sound and then at other times listen to the music and imagine how to play the parts. Pay attention to the tone, dynamics, note choice, space and development of a part throughout the song.
So, that was my 7 top tips that will hopefully guide you out of the woods and onto the road next time you are lost, whilst on your pursuit of guitar mastery.

Tom Clark is the founder of Your Guitar Tutor, and is a guitarist who is passionate about sharing expert advice on anything guitar.

7 Ways To Get Your Guitar Playing Out of a Rut from MyRareGuitars.com

But, it’s still good to know what components of your electric guitar connection need replacing so you can prevent yourself from spending money on something that wasn’t actually necessary. Here is a basic order for troubleshooting the connection between your electric guitar and amplifier.

1. Cable

• Before you even attempt to get your precious guitar or your expensive amplifier fixed, you need to find out if your cable is just messing with you. The fastest way to check it is simply… replace it.
• Switch it with another that you know is guaranteed to work and you’ll know immediately from your guitar troubleshooting if you need a new cable.

2. Guitar

• Jiggle and turn the tone and volume knobs. There could possibly be something wrong with the volume or tone knobs of your guitar and you can find out by giving those knobs a little jiggle. If there appears to be static in the sound or no change in tone or volume when the knobs are manipulated, now you know it’s a guitar problem and it’s primarily in those knobs.
• Lightly jiggle the cable input. A lot of guitar troubleshooting finds bad guitar input jacks, because they tend to go bad with lots of playing while you’re sweaty. If you have your guitar plugged into the amplifier, move the cable around in the guitar’s input slightly and notice if you hear any static or dismissal of sound.
• Press the strings to the pick-ups. The pick-ups underneath the strings where you strum are where all the tone gets absorbed into the hardware and if those aren’t working, your guitar is now a poorly made acoustic. To check, simply turn on your guitar while plugged into an amplifier and lightly press a string to one of the silver dots on your pick-ups. If you hear a sound come through your amplifier, then your pick-ups are all ship shape.

3. Amplifier

• Check the power: This one is a no-brainer, but sometimes it can be overlooked when you get overwhelmed by your guitar problems. For this guitar troubleshooting, if your amplifier won’t turn on, you’ll need to try the power cable. Simply switch it out with another and see if your amp turns on. You’ll immediately know if something is wrong.
• Move the cable around lightly inside the input: Just like you tested the input on your electric guitar, the input on your amplifier should be tested the same way. Jiggle it around and if you hear any static or the sound begin to cut out, you’ll know it’s an input problem.
• Press and turn all of the knobs, even the ones not used often. I once had a faulty knob that chose to create a loud, blaring noise every time that it was pushed in slightly. Test your amplifier knobs by pressing on them and turning them in their appropriate directions.

It really stinks when you have to get repairs on your electric guitar or your equipment, but doing the necessary guitar troubleshooting can save you some money on unnecessary repairs. Go through these steps the next time there’s a problem with your guitar’s connection and discover where the source is.

Kyle Hoffman is an experienced guitarist that loves to play just as a hobby, and to perform live on stage. To learn Kyle’s valuable tips for beginning the guitar the RIGHT way, visit How To Play Guitar as part of his popular guitar blog, How To Tune Guitar.

Guitar Troubleshooting: Finding the Source of a Bad Electric Guitar Connection from MyRareGuitars.com

Guitar Hero: Jimmy Page

But there are things you can do to help the process along and progress faster to the speed licks you’d like to be playing.

1. First the basics: Make sure your guitar is set up properly. If the action is too high, or the neck is warped, or the strings are too heavy or too light for your hands, it’s going to be hard to gain speed. It also won’t be as much fun to play.
2. Try different picks. Some people like thinner or thicker picks, and you might not be using the right one for you. Many shredders prefer smaller jazz-style picks to the traditional teardrop style. Go spend a couple bucks and pick a large selection of thicknesses and shapes to see what works best for you.
3. Use a metronome. I can’t emphasize enough how important this is. Start with a slow tempo on your metronome. Really slow. Like 52bpm. Pick out a scale or musical phrase you’d like to work on. When you can accomplish that phrase at that speed 5 times in a row without making a mistake, bump your metronome up just one notch. That’s generally 2-4 bpm faster. Go through the same process there, bumping it up a little bit each time. Within 15-20 minutes you’ll have that phrase blazing fast!
4. Work on your right hand. We tend to forget about our right hand a lot since the left is where all the action is. But your right hand is the engine driving the action. If it can’t move fast, it won’t matter how fast your left hand can go. Back to your metronome again, take just one note (preferably a fretted one) and practice playing 8th notes and 16th notes. Again bump the tempo up slowly until you’re reaching speeds you want to hear.
5. Practice left hand finger patterns. Scales and arpeggios are good also, but these 5 finger patterns will give you most every combination you need. Here they are:
   • 1-2-3-4
   • 1-3-2-4
   • 1-2-4-3
   • 1-4-2-3
   • 1-4-3-2.

   Do these on each string, in both directions, and on different areas of the neck. You can reverse them all.

6. Keep a written log of your progress. Using this “slow and grow” method, you may not notice that you’re getting faster in regular playing situations. I certainly didn’t. One day it snuck on me while I was listening to a recording from my gig the night before. I heard a blazing fast guitar lick and asked my girlfriend who the heck that was! She reminded me that I was the only guitarist in the band so it must have been me.

So, yes, it does take putting in the hours to get your speed going, but these tips will help you get there faster. As Eddie Van Halen said in a recent interview, “Just keep playing and playing and you’ll eventually find out who you are.”

Get at it!

Post by: Phil Johnson

How Your Guitar Heroes Learned to Play So Fast from MyRareGuitars.com

Define Your Music Goals

The first question you need to ask yourself is, what do you want to learn? What is it that you want to be able to play on an instrument? We are all different and there are many reasons why we play music. It might be because we want to learn how to play our favorite songs on guitar, learn to play jazz piano, play bass guitar in a band, master the drums to become a drum teacher and so on. They are all valid goals to want to improve on your instrument and they each require different focuses for study. If you sit down and think, what do I want to achieve on my instrument, then you can define your goals and what you want the outcomes to be from your music practice. This will help set up what you you need to work on and also will give you a measure so you can monitor your progress along the way.

What To Practice

Once you have defined your music goals, you can break down the goal to lower level details of what you need to do to achieve your goals and get the most out of music practice. Scales are great for many reasons, however, if your goal is to learn how to play your favorite songs on acoustic guitar, then learning how to play scales isn’t a very good way to go about achieving the goal that got you interested in learning acoustic guitar in the first place. It’s simple things like this, playing mundane exercises, that put people off sitting down and learning to play an instrument.

A better way to learn to play your favorite songs would be to get the music for the songs that you wish to learn, look at the chords in the songs and then spend your time learning how to play the chords and chord shapes in the song. Once you spend some time learning how to play the chords used in the songs you want to learn, you’ll be able to put the chords to use and start playing the songs.

When you break your goal down to a lower level like this, and focus on making sure that what you are practicing will give you the right for the outcome that you want to achieve, its easy to see that any music goal is attainable and can be reached in a reasonable amount of time.

Consistency Is The Key To Good Music Practice

One of the great motivation killers is that we get enthused over something, spend a large amount of time on it and because of the other things happening in our lives and we find that we can’t keep spending all that time on something every day. It’s a big misconception that you need to play for hours on end every day to become a really good musician. For most of us, it’s not practical to be able to spend hours and hours playing music on a daily basis.

When you first start out learning to play something, you usually think that you will need to spend forever on being able to play it. The fact of the matter is, its consistency that will get you to reach your goal, not massive amounts of practice in a short space of time. It is much better to work consistently for short periods of time, than it is to spend all your weekend working and then put not time towards study during the week. A large aspect of playing an instrument comes down to muscle memory. In that way music is a bit like sport. Your muscles learn what to do and they develop over time.

You will not become a good runner by running 6 hours every Saturday and Sunday and then not doing any running Monday to Friday. You would do more damage than good and would be much better off if you went on a 30 minute run on six days of the week and had one day off as a rest day. That’s comparing doing 12 hours of running against doing 3 hours of running per week, and its doing the 3 hour of running per week that will make you the better runner.

Its the same with music. Consistency is they key. Can you commit to spending 30 minutes a day, 6 days a week to learning to play your instrument? Even on a busy day, we can usual find 30 minutes to spare. If we make that 30 minutes a priority, it will happen on all 6 days that you decide you are going to commit to practice. If you spend 30 minutes a day, focusing on the music that you set out to learn to achieve from the goal that you defined, you will find that you will reach your goal in a short space of time. Not over months, more likely over the course of a few short weeks.

Try It Yourself, Become A Better Musician

Put the above, simply concepts into place to develop a music practice routine and stick with it for just 2 weeks. After 2 weeks you will find that you will progress significantly and realize that you will be able to reach any musical goals that you set for yourself.

As you achieve each goal you set, the motivation to continue will be in ample supply. After all, we are only talking about a 30 minute investment of your time. Anyone can afford to do spend that, especially when it will turn you into a better musician.

Post by: Nick Cresswell
Nick Cresswell is a musician, music teacher, author and webmaster of FreeJamTracks.com. Free Jam Tracks provides guitarists, bassists and drummers with free, high quality jam and backing tracks as well as articles and instruction on music and music theory. Visit Nick’s site to download free jam tracks and backing tracks.

Music Practice & Motivation from MyRareGuitars.com

String bending is a great way to make your playing stand out apart from everyone else. With a slight bend of a string you can take your soloing into a whole new dimension.

String bending refers to actually stretching the string upwards towards the ceiling, or downwards towards the floor, causing an increase in pitch as the string is being stretched. If you are not familiar with string bending, you should definitely start taking action today and practice it. Use your ring finger to firmly hold down a note on the fret board. While holding the note down, bend the string upwards or downwards, while making sure firm string pressure remains on the fret of the guitar.

A good rule of thumb is, when bending the LOW three strings ( E,A,D) you should bend down towards the floor. On the HIGH three strings (G,B,E) you should bend upwards towards the ceiling. One very IMPORTANT rule when string bending is to be able to nail the pitch you’re going for without drifting. This makes your playing sound much more professional and pleasing to the ear.

Example: You are playing a solo within the pentatonic scale, you are getting ready to bend a note with your ring finger and intend on bending it a whole step (two frets up). When you bend that note you accidentally over bend making the note slightly sharp. Or, under bending the note making it slightly flat. This is a common over looked problem in players who bend a lot of notes. The majority of the people who are doing this don’t even realize it’s a problem for years. It’s the difference between Professional and Amateur.

A great way to improve your playing with string bending is to work on adding more emotion into your playing by utilizing the bends as a tool. Look at some of the blues greats like S.R.V. or Clapton. They don’t necessarily play with burning speed, but the notes they do play, and the bends they apply, display powerful emotion and feeling within their guitar playing.

When soloing in any style of music, your bends can really take the solo to new levels, unleashing all the power and feeling of what you are trying to say musically. Bending the notes in different ways can change the feel of your solo as well. By bending slowly and gradually reaching that note is a whole different sound then just a quick bend up.

Another great sounding technique to try is “GHOST BENDING”. This is done by starting the note in the bent position and releasing it back to the original note. Pre-bend the note up a whole step and then release it moving it back down to the original pitch. This has a very unique sound, similar to a whammy bar dive.

Take the necessary time to examine how you bend your notes. Be sure to either bend your strings a whole step up or down, or a half step up or down. You’ll need to practice on nailing the pitch with complete accuracy. This will help clean up your playing tremendously.

Out of control note bending can destroy a great guitar solo.

If you properly practice your bends daily, you’ll soon get to a point of complete control, and you won’t even be thinking about it anymore. This is when you’re actually using bending as a tool, Or Weapon!

For More Information, Click Below…

Post by: Bob Molton
Guitar Instructional Product Development

Guitar String Bending Secrets from MyRareGuitars.com

Even if a guitarist starts out sloppy and looks at their own playing half-hearted, eventually they will start taking it more seriously, because they tend to get a taste of what’s possible in their own playing. Eventually a guitarist will become somewhat of a perfectionist, and for many the word perfection is sublime, but once you attach that “ist” to it, it some how taints the beautiful word perfection, by suggesting that there is a lot of work involved.

Well, I would be lying if I said that there wasn’t any work involved, but feel comfortable in saying that, because if you do play guitar, then you already know that there is no really easy method to establishing an exclusive prestigiousness in your playing.

However, there are two ways of looking at this. I don’t believe in right and wrong, I only believe in good and better. In my opinion there is no wrong way to do anything, only a better way and I strongly believe that those who have chosen to remove words such as “can’t” and “wrong” from their vocabulary, travel further. Also, a hard lesson for most of us, and I certainly am no different, is this false form of competition. The competition that I am speaking of, comes in the form of competing with time itself. Usually this is cleverly masked as competing with someone who is better than yourself. This is an unhealthy form of competition. You shouldn’t compete with those who are more advanced than yourself in anything that you do in life. Instead, you should correct your thinking and use them as a milestone to reach. This is a mandatory outlook, and I am sorry if you do not agree, but after studying many things in my life, it still stands tried and true.

There is one person that you should compete with, and only that person. That person is you. By doing this, you inspire and push yourself to accomplish what you know that you are capable of doing. Yes, this is a pep talk, but I often remind myself in my life of these very same things, though over time it gets easier and easier to the point where you almost don’t have to remind yourself of these desirable attributes in thinking.

I’ll leave you with this very true thought. Success in anything is 90% proclaimed by the correct and positive mindset. Re-read that and eliminate the word “correct”.

1. Practice everyday for an hour.
For many of you, finding the time to tackle personal interests is daunting, considering that many of you work very hard in the job world, and many of you have a family to attend to, not to mention the things that would seem necessary to conquer in order to exist. Its all about being able to manage your time. An hour isn’t much and can be fulfilled effectively. The best time that I have found to practice is with the TV on and the sound on mute. If you have a favorite program that you cannot get away from, keep your guitar handy and practice during the commercials. That is not the most effective way to practice but it still does the trick. Practicing throughout the day or evening is the best way. Practice for 20 minutes, take care of something that requires your attention, go back and practice for 10 minutes, take care of something else, then practice for 25 minutes.

That is not a formula. Don’t take me literally when I say practice for 20, then 10 and then 25. The key is to break it up and you really shouldn’t keep track, unless you are having trouble disciplining yourself.

2. If possible work with a metronome.
You can buy one for peanuts, but there are a lot of free ones out there. My personal favorite is a program called Guitar Speed Trainer. I like it the best because its an actual training method that doesn’t require a lot of time, and you can program your own passages into it. The best part about it is that it has the typical tick-tock sound of a metronome, but it is one step better for the simple reason that you can match up the notes you play with the notes that are being played in the program.

The key to using a metronome is to find your limit and then set the metronome to an extremely conservative number. If you can play something very easily at 80bpm (beats per minute) then set it to 60bpm, no matter how incredibly boring it is. Practice a riff at this speed, several times over, until it is flawless, then set the metronome for anywhere between 61 and 65bpm. Take breaks in between, repeating this process until you have reached a speed where your hands lose control, then stop. Call it a day. The next time you go to practice, practice starting at 60, and then practice starting at a slightly higher setting like 65bpm. Use that formula for taking breaks and slowly building your speed. It will take a little bit of time to reach your goal, but being consistent is what will get you there, a lot quicker than you might think. You’ll be glad you did it.

3. Don’t always practice the same thing.
Make the attempt to step back and look at the exercises that you are playing, and make the effort to figure out how you can make them a little more difficult, interesting and melodic in order to challenge yourself. Then practice them with the metronome using that same principle. Figure out different timings and look at ways to make your picking hand pick out 2 notes on this string, 3 notes on that string and 4 notes on another string, within the same pattern or exercise.

4. Practice with one chord.
Pick any chord and see how you can condition yourself to come up with different strumming approaches and rhythms. Really think about it. “I’ll try playing this chord with 3 strums in even timing. Now I’m going to take that chord, play 2 strums and hesitate before the 3rd and final strum”, or “I’ll play this chord five times, with 4 down strokes, but the 5th one will be an upstroke”.

5. Practice with multiple chords.
Go out there on the world wide web and find a chord chart. Pick five randomly and play each one over and over again, repeating its name as you are playing it. Then, ignoring chord progression formulas, rearrange the order of those 5 chords. This will help you memorize and will train your ear for ultimate modulation. After you have mastered those 5 chords, add another 5 chords. Now you have 10 guitar chords to work with when you experiment with chord progression. Continue this process.

6. Get a simple tape deck for recording purposes.
I would say use some recording software that you might have, but a tape is a little bit faster, for when you want to record quickly and have immediate playback. Record yourself playing a chord that interests you. Record yourself strumming it over and over again, with any rhythm that you like, but make sure to record it for a good length. Play it back and then solo over it, which brings us to….

7. Soloing.
People think to hard about guitar and they think way to hard about soloing on the guitar. They have no idea because they choose to be stubborn and not correct their thinking. It is not hard. Forget scales – forget modes. Do you honestly think that when I am improvising, I am thinking about what mode I am playing out of? If someone asks me later what mode I was playing out of, I can most certainly backtrack and define, but let’s look at the word theory. Theory, as in theoretical, as in theoretically this is a way to explain something so that two people can be on the same page, but it is a tool like the guitar itself, and it is far from being set in stone. Unfortunately, people base their musical lives around this. The world of musical theory is beautiful and fascinating, but until a guitarist is willing to experiment, it will not make a lot of sense, no matter how knowledgeable that guitarist may be. Which brings us to….

8. Improvising.
Yngwie Malmsteen declared that “The genesis of all musical creation comes from improvisational playing”. I know that I have quoted him before, but I can’t even put it as well as he did. Don’t be afraid of it. Too many people ask about how you get started improvising and then developing your own solos. The answer? develop your own style. Listen to a lot of different types of music and not just guitar related music, and yes, Malmsteen even said the same thing. Build a massive collection of varying musical genres and then jam with those Cd’s or mp3s as often as possible. You may not be very good at first, but that’s a part of any challenge. Start with a note and if it matches what you are listening to, then find another note that matches to go along with that note. Try to keep in rhythm with the music that you are listening to while you are playing those 2 notes, and then take a chance and grab another note. That 3rd note may not work so well, but you always have options like bending or sliding that note up to one that does work. In doing this, you are training your reflexes. I still hit a lot of funky notes when I improvise, but have taught myself to correct them, almost before its noticed. You can do this too. Some people don’t even know when I’ve made a mistake and some people do. I don’t care because I’m having fun. That’s the whole point of music and people are quick to forget this. Which brings us to the fact that the best musicians, artists, scientists, human beings…

9. Do not judge.
I have learned so much from musicians who were not nearly at my level of skill, just as much as I have learned from those who were way beyond it. The thing to ask yourself, is whether or not you are doing this for yourself or for other people. If your answer is that you are playing what you want to play, the way that you want to play it for yourself, then you have already won. The reason is because even those who have massive dreams to become musical icons, start with what they want to hear in music. One of my other great passions is film-making and the greatest filmmakers; Fellini, Scorsese and Kubrick were highly self indulgent. Most people are too afraid to be this way. They feel that it is selfish and they are sadly mistaken. When you have an idea or a style in anything that you do, you will attract to you, those who appreciate it, and considering that the world currently suffices some 6 billion people, I think that if you desire to, you can certainly find those like-minded individuals.

My point for saying all of that was because it is important to realize that the most unlikely sources can be great teachers. Mankind desires recognition. Give your fellow man recognition. This is key and the reason is, because those who cannot recognize others around them are not capable of recognizing their own self worth, and therefor, their own potential. You could say that this is really heavy stuff, and you are right in saying so, but the truth of the matter is that everyone has at least a personal dream of what they want to see come out of themselves, and even the everyday Joe, who just wants to learn a few chords, has a secret longing to see where they can take an instrument such as the guitar. It does not matter how far you want to take it, but everyone presents themselves with a challenge that is worthy of their own capabilities. Sadly, few go through with this, when it is just around the corner. This now brings us to the conclusion, which is…

10. Limit yourself.
This is a trick that Steve Vai uses that I read about when I was a kid, and it almost works too well. What you do is pick two notes, generally next to each other but they can really be anything. Take those two notes and play only those notes for as long as you can. You can do absolutely anything that you want with them. Bends, sliding up, sliding down, hammer-ons, pull-offs, tremolo picking, etc. Make a good attempt every now and then to play those 2 notes for at least a half hour. I’m not going to paint a pretty picture. At first it is interesting and you come up with lots of ideas for those 2 notes, but after about 5 minutes, you start to lose your mind. However, if you stick with it, you will very soon realize that there is a whole plethora of concepts and ideas out there.

The important thing about this exercise is that when you finally give yourself a break, your hands go crazy. Its like they’ve been cooped up in a prison cell for 6 years and are now being set free. The ideas will flow to you so quickly that your mind can barely keep up. I will also say, that this method of training works best if you are pretty relaxed when it comes to improvising on the guitar.

Final thoughts. You will notice a common factor that seems to act as an under-layer throughout these 10 methods of guitar training. That layer is the metaphysical, aka mental power. This was cold turkey, I admit that as well, but I did not write in such a heavy manner to scare you, I wrote this the way that I did, not even to inspire you. You can only inspire yourself. I wrote this to hopefully settle that negative thought process and attitude that most guitarists have. Why are guitar players so arrogant? well, you don’t have to be. No matter how good you become, there will always be someone better and that’s a very good thing. It will push you to get better, at the same time keeping you humble.

The over-all message is to just have fun with it. This is not work, this is play. Those 10 approaches to playing really do work, but if you apply them, you have to think of it as fun and get excited about the progress that you are making. With that, I will simply say, here’s to you and the wonderful journey ahead.

Post by: Tennyson Williams
Tennyson Williams has been studying guitar for eight years, sixteen hours a day, and has studied every style of music imaginable. He has played in bands, that encompassed a wide range of music. It wasn’t until after eight years of piano lessons, that he made the decision to become a self-taught musician, but the journey has been well worth it for the guitarist. His sole passion is to share with others, his endless knowledge of music, in order to make their musical dreams a reality. He currently maintains a site called GuitArticles, where a wide variety of lessons and articles on the intellectual properties of music can be found.

10 Ways to Maximize Your Guitar Playing from MyRareGuitars.com

The minor pentatonic scale is created using the root (or 1), flatted 3rd, 4th, 5th, and flatted 7th of a major scale. Notice that there is no 2nd or 6th scale tone used. There’s an interesting reason for that but it requires a substantial amount of music theory to explain it and this isn’t really the place for that.

To create the minor blues scale we take the minor pentatonic scale and add a flatted 5th (or sharp 4) to it. In the key of A, this creates a scale with the notes A, C, D, Eb, E, and G in it. Some people don’t differentiate between the minor and the major blues scales. If someone calls a scale a blues scale, assume they mean the minor version.

A major pentatonic scale is created with the 1st (root,) 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 6th tone of a major scale. In C that would be C, D, E, G, and A. To make it a major blues scale you add a flatted 3rd which gives you C, D, Eb, E, G, and A in the key of C.

Notice that the rule governing relative major and minor keys/scales is also in effect here. If you look at the keys of A minor and C major, which are relative, meaning they contain the same notes, you’ll see the same group of notes.

The A minor blues scale is A, C, D, Eb, E, and G. The C major blues scale is C, D, Eb, E, G, and A. Same notes, different starting point. This sort of thing happens all the time in music. This is of particular interest if you’re playing blues lead guitar because you can see that your blues guitar scales really do double duty. Once you learn one pattern, it’s really useful for 2 keys, one major and one minor.

So how to we apply this scale to a standard 12 bar blues chord progression? What’s cool is that the simplest approach is really simple. Whatever the first chord of the chord progression is, let’s say it’s A7, use that minor blues scale to solo over the song. There’s no need to change scales at any time.

Keep in mind that this is only one possible approach, and in many cases it’s not the best approach. There are several ways to play over a 12 bar progression, or any other kind of chord progression. Many of these approaches use some combination of major and minor blues scales.

It is easy to find the 5 “boxes” or patterns of the blues scale on the internet. A simple search should turn up hundreds of choices. Once you learn the blues scales and have them under your fingers. You’ll want to start jamming with them and learning how to make the sounds you want to hear.

For more blues guitar lessons and help with your blues guitar scales, check out Playing Through The Blues, my blues lead guitar course.

Post by: Griff Hamlin
www.PlayingThroughTheBlues.com

Blues Guitar Scales: How Blues Scales Work in Lead Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

Keep in mind that many guitarists are satisfied with their ability to play just a few songs here and there. There are many guitarists who enjoy performing in clubs for larger audiences. Others strive to become accomplished nationally and internationally. The practice habits for all are different, because the goals are different.

For the purpose of this article, I believe it’s safe to say that those who enjoy playing a few songs here and there, will, most likely, bypass the rigorous schedule of scale and chord practice.

For the intermediates, advanced, or professional players, scale and chord practice is absolutely essential. In fact, daily practice sessions are in line with these levels of musicianship. Why? The development of strength, endurance, recognition of melodic and harmonic structure, and, of course, more facility on the guitar.

The leap from good to great on the guitar is actually a short distance. Shorter than one might think. It’s really all about the level of desire and commitment one has, that will determine the actual distance. However, willingness without action equals fantasy. Good intent means nothing if one is not prepared to act.

None of us believe that, as guitarists, our fingers somehow magically end up on the correct note, the correct string, at the right time, merely by accident. In fact, a great melodic solo and chord work is generally reflective of many years of pure practice. It’s almost a guarantee that behind every great guitarist, there are thousands and thousands of hours of scale and chord practice. It’s important to remind ourselves of all the benefits as a result of this hard work.

For starters, practicing scales develops finger strength, wrist control, picking techniques, pivot techniques, thumb placement, fret logic, and a multitude of other essential elements needed in order to execute in a professional manner. By practicing scales as scales (not musical statements per se), we learn very good habits and general rules of performance. We also learn that rules are made to be broken. When we, as experienced guitarists, break a rule, we at least know that we are, in fact, breaking a rule. Further, we all know that it’s permissible to break certain rules due to the impositions of certain styles of music, among other things.

For the experienced guitarist, I truly believe it’s important to remember how we arrived at our proficiency level. This is important because, in reality, we should never stop learning and progressing.

As a progressive guitarist, I enjoy those over-the-top solos that generally send chills up the spine of the listener. However, I also enjoy the hours of personal practice that allows me to execute those solos. Performance is one thing and skill development is another. It’s beneficial to enjoy both.

Imagine setting aside approximately eight straight hours of practice time and devoting a good share of that time to practicing one or two scales only. The thought of this routine might surprise some of the more experienced players. Once again, why practice scales when we can solo into infinity? The answer is forth coming.

I can almost guarantee that after a few hours of practicing a scale, the strict succession of the scale tones will disappear and will be replaced with new musical statements. Further, fresh new techniques will also emerge. For example, one might discover a new way to pick a string, cross a string, mute a string, embellish the scale tones, as well as many, many other discoveries. How’s that for progression?

A hardcore practice session can easily turn into a fantastic creative session. This is great news for the original guitarist and songwriter. Need a new guitar lick or song? Practice, practice, practice.

Everything discussed thus far, pertaining to guitar scales, also applies to practicing guitar chords. In music, time waits for no man. Chord construction and execution takes practice. Especially, when dealing with extended chords and altered chords (let’s not forget inversions). Not all of us will have the opportunity to encounter a major 11 Augmented 13th chord. However, what happens if we do? Answer; play it at the speed of right.

Whatever your level of musicianship, be sure to practice for the sake of practice. Great things will result from your hard work.

Post by: Michael E. Fletcher
©2008 Michael E. Fletcher. All Rights Reserved Worldwide.
www.UltraGuitarMethod.com

Practicing Guitar Scales & Guitar Chords: The Inherent Value from MyRareGuitars.com

Patterns and Modes
Modes don’t require learning additional patterns. Modes stem from the same patterns as the major scale. Understanding how to play and apply major scale patterns is the key to grasping the modal concept.

Patterns of the Major Scale
The notes of the major scale cover the entire guitar neck. Instead of tackling the whole thing all at once, the fretboard is always learned in steps by focusing on one position, or pattern, at a time. This is usually accomplished through 5 patterns. Once the individual pieces are memorized they can be connected to complete the whole scale template. Each pattern may make a unique shape, but they all are simply broken pieces of the whole form. So, the individual patterns don’t become new scales on their own. They are all simply different arrangements of the same scale tones.

Playing Over Chords With Modes
The major scale can be played along with any one of its notes or chords. For example, the G major scale includes the chords G major, A minor, B minor, C major, D major, E minor, F# minor b5. The whole scale can be played over any one of these chords. When the G major scale is played over a G major chord a typical, happy, major sound results. To hear this correctly, guitar players need to have a friend strum the G chord or perhaps record or loop a rhythm track to play over. Any part of the G major scale, in any position or pattern, can be played. It doesn’t even matter what note is used to start. Guitarists can jump into the scale anywhere they like and use the notes in any order. The root G may be emphasized in order to tie the scale to the chord better, but the modal concept still works without doing so.

When the G major scale is played over the second chord, A minor, the sound of the scale changes. Again, guitar players need to have a friend strum the chord or perhaps record or loop a rhythm track to play over. Now the same scale tones sound minor, dark and jazzy. Any part of the G major scale, in any position or pattern, can be played. It doesn’t even matter what note is used to start. Guitarists can jump into the scale anywhere they like and use the notes in any order. The root A may be emphasized in order to tie the scale to the chord better, but the modal concept still works without doing so.

Seven Scale Modes
In the above example, the sound changed when playing over G and A minor because mixing notes and chords no different from mixing colors. Yellow and blue make green. Red and blue make purple. And so it is that the G major scale played over a G chord makes “Ionian Mode” (or the Ionian scale) while the G major scale played over an A minor chord makes “Dorian Mode” (or the Dorian scale). Each major scale degree, or chord, has a unique tonality and sound. Patterns, positions and starting points don’t effect the modal sound. Rather, the note or chord the scale is being played over establishes the mode.

Hearing and Playing Music Modes
Mixing colors has to be seen in order to be understood. Likewise, music modes have to be played and heard. In fact, many music theory concepts have to be applied and experienced this way. Theoretical explanations alone can’t demonstrate how modes work. Guitar players need to apply the concept to the fretboard.

Seven Greek Mode Names
Each major scale note, or chord, has its own unique sound characteristics and corresponding Greek mode name. The seven Greek names have origins in the church and include Ionian Mode, Dorian Mode, Phrygian Mode, Lydian Mode, Mixolydian Mode, Aeolian Mode and Locrian Mode. All musicians use the same Greek mode names because this music theory concept is relative to all instruments.

How to Learn Scale Modes
With music theory, each concept builds on the next. Guitarists should never get ahead of themselves by studying topics that they’re not ready for. The modal concept is related directly to major scale patterns and guitar chord progressions. To learn modes, guitar players must first master the major scale and its patterns. Next, guitarists should learn how the major scale is used to build chords. Finally, all good players should learn about chord progressions and playing by numbers. Then, guitar modes will be easy to understand and apply.

Play Until Your Fingers Bleed!

Post by: Mr. Desi Serna
Author of Fretboard Theory
www.Guitar-Music-Theory.com
Scales, Chords, Progressions, Modes

Guitar Modes: The Modal Scales of Popular Music from MyRareGuitars.com

Now, within lead guitar there are two main types of learning – the physical techniques (such as hammer ons, bends, vibratos etc.) and the theory. The first step with the theory side of lead guitar should be to get a basic understanding of scales.

Think of scales as pots of “flavours” – each scale has its own unique flavour because of the different notes it uses. Different notes act as different tensions over a particular chord, and eventually guitarists learn which tensions compliment particular chords. Of course, it’s a matter of personal taste what goes with what. That’s where your creativity takes over.

Technically, a scale is merely a sequence of notes – that’s it! However, it is the intervals between each note in the sequence that defines its structure and flavour. For example, we have the natural major scale (also the 1st mode called Ionian). The numerical notes of the major scale are:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Simple, eh? That’s because the major scale is the basis from which we build all other scales. Even minor scales are referenced against the natural major scale. For example, the natural minor scale (also the 6th mode called Aeolian) is:

1 2 b3 4 5 b6 b7 – the “b” means “flat”, so what it’s really saying is “the 3rd, 6th and 7th tones of the natural major scale have been flattened”. This is what creates what has been named the natural minor scale (or Aeolian).

All scales work in a similar way, being noted against that original major scale position.

Therefore, in light of all this, it would make sense to learn the natural major scale first! Once you’ve done that, you have your foundation scale upon which to build all other scales/flavours.

Now, when learning a scale, the notes will be spaced out over the 6 strings. These are known as intervals. Looking at the major scale once again…

1 W 2 W 3 H 4 W 5 W 6 W 7 H… then the sequence starts again at 1.

The W stands for “whole step” – this is the equivalent of a two fret space on your guitar. So, if you were on the 3rd fret on the low E string (the note G), moving up a whole step would put you at the 5th fret (the note A).

The H stands for “half step” – this is the equivalent of a single fret space on your guitar. So, if you were back on the 3rd fret on the low E string, moving up a half step would put you at the 4th fret (the note Ab).

Obviously though, to be practical, we want to play the scale across 6 strings, not just 1. This is where you need to know about string relationships and how a note at one fret on the low E string is the same as another fret on another string. That’s what allows you to condense the scale into a “box” about 4 or 5 frets wide, across the 6 strings of your guitar.

Essentially though, it’s these whole steps and half steps that determine the structure of notes/tones in a scale and therefore determine the overall flavour of the scale!

At this stage, it’s not that important to know the actual notes you’re playing (e.g. the notes of the “B major scale” would be: B C# Eb E F# Ab Bb), but rather just understand the sequence of intervals in the scale. This will allow you to visualise the scale more generically, in any given key.

The A major scale, B major scale, C major scale, C# major scale etc. all have their own notes, but the intervals they all use are the same… the major scale’s sequence of intervals!

There are many resources on the web to help take you to the next stage of learning scales. Once you know how intervals work within scales, you can also learn how chords and arpeggios are essentially created from the same bag.

However you progress, don’t become complacent and learn things parrot fashion – don’t just learn scales… understand them!

Post by: Mike Beatham
Mike Beatham runs a free, easy to follow guitar lessons site with backing tracks and audio exercises for you to develop your own unique playing style. Visit FretJam.com/ to learn guitar at your own pace.

Guitar: Understanding Scales from MyRareGuitars.com

Begin by forming good study habits. Part of your study will be physical performance and part will be mentally engaged in the study of theory, listening to recordings, tapes and the radio, watching television, Internet and watching live performances. You will be talking to other guitarists, students and professionals, studying in classes and with private teachers and of course via online guitar courses, guitar training software etc. You will also be improvising. All of these activities will give you valuable information and experience, increase your skill, broaden your scope and develop your insights. Keep an open mind and learn something from everyone you meet …even if it is not what to do!

The following suggestions should help you in your study and practice:

• Never practice or study when you are tired or worried. Relax a bit before you begin. If possible study in a quiet place where you can be undisturbed. Have a music stand adjusted to your eye level when you practice, and make sure that you always have good light. Form the habit of studying in a regular place and at a regular time.
• Several short study practice periods on successive days are usually better than one lengthy period of study. A little study every day is better than spasmodic, inconsistent study. Use various ways of making yourself think about what you are studying. If you are looking at a printed page of notes, try to imagine them on a guitar finger board and vice versa.
• Form the habit of mentally reviewing every page of music you study before going on to the next one. See how much of it you can recall and try to remember it. When you have learned something make use of it as soon as you can. The sooner and more often, the better. If you have learned fingerings for a few new chords so that you can play them even slowly, make up an exercise or song that involves these chords and has you shifting from one chord to another often. It is not enough to learn about something. Unless you utilize this information it does not become a part of you.
• When you have completed a reasonable amount of material, take time to summarize what you have covered. You may want to write your summary. Keep a good music dictionary handy, and use it frequently. When you have discovered the meaning of a new word or term, use it yourself.

Self Study

To correct poor study conditions, consider thoughtfully each of the questions below and write specific answers to each one. Then decide what you can do to correct each of the things wrong with your study conditions. Make notes of these and correct them:

1. What can you see on your desk, music stand, or through your window that distracts you?
2. What music, talking or other noises are disturbing your practice and study?
3. What is wrong with your position or posture when you practice or study?
4. Are you sure your lighting is adequate? What is wrong with it?
5. Is your work space large enough and arranged well?
6. What materials do you lack for effect study?
7. What time of day is most difficult to practice or study? Why?
8. What worries or special interests divert you from studying?

Effective methods of practicing or studying, of themselves, will not suffice. Careful planning also is essential. Lay out your work systematically before you begin. Each individual’s time, facilities and desires are personal matters. Just be sure to adopt some plan and stick to it as conscientiously as possible.

Post by: Mike Hayes
Mike Hayes is a guitar teacher, author, performing musician and session guitarist with over 30 years of professional experience. Find out more about how to learn guitar fast with his popular free ecourse, available at: => GuitarCoaching.com

Accelerate Your Guitar Playing from MyRareGuitars.com

First some quickie suggestions right off the bat for you guys and gals.

Phase 1

1. When using a wah wah and a distortion always have the wah wah before the fuzz box (how’s that for old school?) in your chain. You want to effect your guitar signal before you distort it. When using a clean boost that should be last in your chain right after your distortion units.
2. Use as few pedals as you can. The more effects you use the more your sound suffers. If you are using more than 5 or 6 pedals try using an A/B switch and set up two loops to keep the chain as short as possible.
3. If you like a tight sound, ceramic speakers are a good way to go. In general AlNiCo speakers tend to be a bit more saggy. But there are some Alnico speakers that are clean too, these tend to be the higher quality ones. And as they break in the ceramics tend to be tighter and cleaner.
4. Lower output pickups tend to be thinner eq wise, and subsequently a hotter pickup tends to be darker sounding. If you want to use a lower output pickup for the reason that they reproduce your playing dynamics better, you must use a higher output amp. Again, if your guitar is a high output axe you can use a smaller amp, and still achieve a nice fat sound.
5. Shorter scale guitars make light gauge strings feel extra light, and consequently longer scale guitars make light gauge strings feel a bit heavier. This is why back in the day when light gauge strings were not readily available, guitar players preferred Gibson guitars over Fender.

1962 Fender Telecaster Electric Guitar (Vintage)

Phase 2
Next on the cavalcade of hits, I will give you some examples of typical setups for certain types of music. Remember you can mix and match these suggestions for your signature sound.

Clean Country Sound:
This is a sound made popular by country pickers since the 1960’s. It’s a clean sound, very little if no distortion at all.

• Guitars: Fender Stratocaster, the bridge pickup for a bright twang with a bit less output and fatness then the Tele bridge p/u. You can also get a great albeit a more modern country sound using the between the pickups sounds (2nd and 4th) on the Strat. For all you Eastwood fans check out the Wandre and the Joey Leone Signature Models for a great bunch of aforementioned country sounds.
• Gretsch models w/ DeArmond Dynasonic pickups give you a great country sound with alot of dynamic range for subtle to ear splitting tones. For those of you who want to dabble in some cool country tones try the Eastwood Classic 6 for a very reasonable starter country axe.
• A Gibson thin line arch top like a Byrdland is also a great clean country axe, don’t believe me? Ask Roy Clark and Hank Garland (Mr. Sugarfoot Rag). One of my idols Scotty Moore (of Elvis fame) played an L5 and an ES-295 during his years with the King.
• Amps: The cleaner the amp the better, period. A Twin Reverb comes to mind immediately as well the solid state high wattage steel guitar offerings from Peavey like the Nashville and Session 400. Amps with at least a 12-inch speaker will help you get that twang. If you are the only guitar player in the band consider using an amp with a 15-inch speaker. You can also use a smaller amp at a lower volume with a mike on it.

Gritty Country Sound:
Same guitars choice as above, just crank your amp up. 10 inch speakers are okay for this application. The Marshall TSL Series, Fender Deluxe. Vibrolux, and Super Reverb will make you smile.

Heavy Rock Sound:
Again I remind you I am an old school guy so I say….

• Guitars: Gibson SG w/ humbuckers is my choice for ultimate heavy rock guitar. It cuts and yet is still as fat as your fifth grade Home Ec. teacher. Tony Iommi, Angus Young, and Glen Buxton (the most underrated heavy rock guitar player) are shining examples of what an SG in the hands of a capable axe murderer can do. Gibson Les Paul Customs like Steve Jones and Mick Ronson used to play also kill.
• Those pointy guitars from the 80’s, Jackson, Charvel, Ibanex JEM and ESP’s are all a bit more edgy and hotter then a stock SG or Les Paul.
• I also love the sound of P90 equipped solid body axes for a great crunch sound, maybe a more punky sound is a better explanation. Les Paul Jr.’s ala Johnny Thunders and Leslie West are prime examples of this guitars sound when cranked. I am sure these guys influenced Billy Joe Armstrong in his choice de axe. Again, Eastwood offers some great single coil guitars of this ilk, the P90 Special, Stormbird and JR Elite just to name a few.
  1962 Fender Telecaster Guitar – Sunburst
• Amps: Marshall, Marshall and more Marshall. The JTM 800 is numero uno in my book, as well as the JCM 900 for a more modern shred vibe. I was also impressed with the Carvin stack offerings back in the day. THD, Randall, and Peavey also have really good sounding shred generators in many configurations.

Marshall Guitar Amps

Rock and Alternative Sound:
This is a potpourri of suggestions, please take one and pass the rest back.

• Guitars: Well take your pick, I am just gonna rattle em off….first the off the wall ones. These are the “next big things.” Maybe? Remember Cobain’s JagStang? Gretsch solid bodies from the 70’s and 80’s ugly as your neighbors AMC Gremlin. Silvertone’s and Danelectro’s from the 60’s. Link Wray, Jimmy Page, duh! Kramer’s from the 80’s, Eddie something or other played one of these. Carvin solidbodies from the 80’s. Still a great deal on Ebay. Ovation guitars form the late 60’s and 70’s (the Deacon, the Breadwinner, and Tornado.) The pickups were nasty sounding, but oh so cool. Legit ones. Fender Telecaster, Rickenbacker solid and semi-solid guitars, Gretsch arch tops, Mosrite solidbodies, and Gibson solidbodies guitars w/ P90’s.
• Amps: The Vox AC-30 is a seriously important amp in the history of rock and roll, for a very good reason, it’s an original. History tells us that early Marshall’s are in essence copies of a Fender Tweed Bassman. So the Vox is the only original amp design of the “Big Three”. Best news about that is that it sounds great! The Vox AC-15 is also a slammin’ amp. Portable, strong and ballsy just like my first wife.
• Fender Deluxe Reverb, crank it up and feel the magic. The singularly most versatile amplifier in the history of guitardom. This little dynamo is IMHO the best sounding amp ever made (Blackface models produced from 1964 to 1967).
• The Silvertone/Danelectro Twin Twelve. What a great/cheap amplifier should be. Two twelve inch speakers (usually Jensen’s) a killer tremolo and reverb. Most models I have seen run four 6L6’s in the output section. Although I own an early Danelectro Twin Twelve which runs a duet of 6L6’s that is a great amp. Also any of the Valco made amps will do the trick (Supro, National, Airline, Montgomery Ward).
• There are so many great boutique amps out there that are really well built and versatile. They are expensive, usually very expensive. Also they are tough to try out as many of these amps are not in music stores. Making it hard to test drive them . And if they do have one, that’s the problem they only have one, so you can’t a/b them with your favorite guitar plugged into them. Some of the ones I have either owned or played are Victoria (a tweed Fender vibe), Matchless (some Vox like models). I also really liked the early Bedrock amps that were basically JTM 45 clones.

Getting Your Own Sound with Guitars & Amps from MyRareGuitars.com

Pete Townshend (The Who)

#1. Being seen.

There are several ways to go when getting your name out there. Many musicians think it’s a good idea to move to a big city and play gigs for no money just to be “seen”. In my estimation, through years of experience, this is a total waste of time and effort. Take it from me, if you think your talent is worth not being paid for, it’s a guarantee no one will either. Being a good guitar player in a live setting is a good idea to showcase your skills, but if a guitar player plays well in the forest and nobody hears him (her)… well you get the idea.

My solution to this scenario is to fine tune your skills, find a high profile band and get the gig playing in that band. How do you do this? Take a page out of Keith Moon’s book. Walk right up to the bandleader during a break and introduce yourself. Shake hands, compliment the band and quickly present your card. At that point, you say “if you ever need a guitar player please give me a call I think I can do a good job for you.” Do your research and meet as many bandleaders as you can until you get the gig you want. I can tell you that bandleaders are always on the lookout for players, always! And if they don’t need one at that moment they soon might or might know someone else who does. There is no such thing as a wasted contact.

When I say high profile, I mean a cover band with a full schedule of well paying gigs. But if it is an original band you seek, this will be harder, but not impossible. Remember, you must prepare yourself for other then musical parameters to get the gig. Stuff like image fit and age specifics. Be real and reasonable. These days image is 90% of what original bands look for when filling positions. You may even have to switch over to a more “video friendly” axe. Also, a good tip for auditioning for an original band is to have songwriting ideas on your guitar. This is where a guitar education comes into play. If the songwriter has a three chord formula going, your alternative voicing on your guitar will quickly enamor you to the band and its producer.

#2. The Demo.

Oh yes, the old demo, the most underrated tool for gig attainment. I cannot tell you how many musicians I have auditioned in the past 5 years who do not have a decent/relative demo. You would think in the age of affordable digital home studios some one out there would be focused enough to have a relevant demo for a gig they are applying for. I recently ran an ad for a friend who owns a piano bar looking for an entertainer. The ad specifically said “piano player/singer.” I cannot tell you how many responses I got from solo piano players and from singers who did not play piano, and from people who sent demos without singing on them. Be focused enough to send a demo that is appropriate. Why in God’s name would I hire a guitar player for an R&B gig if his demo is a country demo. That to me means he’s trying to stretch or did not feel the R&’B enough to include it on the demo. No dice!

#3. Be professional.

I have alluded to this in other columns, but it bears repeating and in a bit more depth.

My motto is ABP, Always Be Playing. Study, study, study, take as many lessons as you can afford in as many types of music as you can. I believe that a classical guitar lesson will probably not transform you to becoming the next “maestro” but some classical ideas, or fingerings may make their way into your style. This will help you get a signature sound and feel. That is a very marketable commodity in the cookie cutter world of guitar players. Same can be said for country or jazz guitar disciplines, as they all add to the gumbo of what is to be “you.” Aside from your gear this is what you bring to every gig you do, and is a lot more valuable.

I played with a guy years ago named Lou Korosi from Glen Cove, NY who could play some mean jazz on his Telecaster as well as play rock, reggae and fusion. And Lou could move seamlessly from one to another. His rig was a Tele w/a bumbucker in front, a Twin Reverb and a MXR Phase 90. That’s it.

Once you get your gig, show up on time, with dependable, appropriate gear. Be prepared and relaxed. Remember you are a guitar player! A most noble of trades.

Now get to work!

Eastwood Guitars & Friends

I’m a Guitar Player, Now What? from MyRareGuitars.com

This month I will be discussing a much overlooked aspect of guitar playing and appreciation, the professional setup. As I always say – this is not MY Guitar until it is setup to my specifications. I think perhaps 90% of today’s guitar players do NOT have a personal guitar repair technician that they work with. People have a favorite video / music store with a favorite clerk that helps them with selections, a tailor, a banker, a doctor, a dentist, a lawyer… yet they don’t have a favorite guitar tech. Why? Here are three scenarios that will exemplify this point.

Scenario #1: My Seagull sounds better then my Martin!

How many times have I heard this story, “I bought this cheap guitar at a local music store for $200 bucks, and it really needed a good setup and strings, and afterwards it sounded amazing!” The truth is that this is no urban legend – the professional setup is the real deal – and can make a decent guitar play and sound very good and sometimes even great. This is true for electrics and acoustics equally, although the most obvious is the acoustic as they are usually more prone to neck and body adjustments due to heat and humidity (or lack thereof). But, the electric guitar also needs a good setup as well.

Scenario #2: Music store guitars.

In my 30+ years of perusing music stores I have rarely entered a music store where the guitars were maintained w/ fresh strings and a good setup. As a matter of fact they are rarely even in tune to concert pitch (A440). I know – the profit margin, the man hours, blah, blah, blah – the truth is Mr. Music Store owner you will sell more guitars if they are maintained. Truth be told unless you are talking about a high end guitar shop where they have to sell guitars to pay the rent, guitars are usually hung up on the wall and expected to sell themselves.

So if you are really interested in buying a guitar in a music store, ask them to restring it and set it up for you. I mean don’t be an idiot and jerk the guy around for no reason, but you should know what it sounds like before you buy it. For a guitar under $1,000? Probably not. But for something more expensive, you bet.

For all you vintage guys out there how many times have you picked up that prehistoric Strat and were disappointed with how it played, knowing full well that it probably has been sitting for a long time without the benefit of some needed tweaking. Most dealers will say, “dude I left it as I found it” like that is a favor to you, how convenient! It’s really a disservice to those who’ll plunk down 20 G’s for a piece of guitar history, because these fellas know as well as we know, that just because it was made 50 years ago don’t mean it’s a good guitar, and the only way to know is? You guessed it, if it’s setup professionally.

Scenario #3: Online Purchases.

Online mega stores, Ebay auctions, direct sales, mom and pop sellers, third party sellers, yes my friends this is where a majority of guitar and guitar related commerce is done, online.

I must confess that I was one of those “I ain’t buying what I can’t play” guys. The idea of paying for a guitar that I had not seen gave me chills, and even more frightening to this paranoid guitar buyer was the fact that I was buying one of many guitars in that model that they had in stock. Who was going to pick the one I was getting? Beavis or Butthead? Or what does “very good condition” mean? Now we deal with words like “vibe” “correct” and “players” guitar – and are supposed to know what that means. I know what new means, it means new! I know what a demo is, it’s a demo! Alas, now I have learned how to buy guitars that I cannot play, one way is to buy from someone who is reputable and has a track record. Another is to buy what you know, a 1970 ES 335 (if it has no issues) is a 1970 ES 335, you will pay for it, and 99 times out of 100 get what you expect (from a reputable dealer or seller).

BUT… Now please my friends, pay attention here because this is the gospel as I know it. Never take a guitar out of a box after it has been shipped to you, and expect it to play right. To me that’s an unreasonable expectation. You buy a guitar on the merit of its sound, playability and pedigree (where and who it comes from). Like I said earlier, you can’t expect the store owner to take a lower cost guitar, re-string it and setup to your specifications, just for you to try it out. All players have different ideas about string gauges and low action etc, etc. That is why you need to find your own local technician, who will begin to understand your personal preferences and expectations. These guys can make a $500 guitar play like a $5000 guitar, and the more they know about you the better a job they can do for you. So, as soon as you get your guitar, inspect it for shipping damage and for flaws. As far as flaws are concerned, be reasonable, as far as I am concerned my expectations on a guitars fit and finish are directly related to its price.

Here is what I believe are the necessary parts of a good setup:

• A neck adjustment (if needed)
• Intonation
• Action adjustment
• Fret work (leveling if needed)
• Pickup balancing
• Nut filing (a way underrated aspect of tuning issues)
• New strings
• Cleaning scratchy pots (used guitars)

These tasks should be done by a qualified guitar repairman. You should have a local guy who knows your likes and dislikes. I personally like a flat neck adjustment with almost no bow and a higher action then most would like. You have your own expectations for a setup, communicate these to your local repairman and than enjoy your guitar.

Guitar Tech Setting Up a Guitar

I will say again – any guitar I own is not truly mine until it is setup to my specifications.

So in closing my friends I respectfully say don’t decide whether a guitar is a good guitar or not until it is setup professionally.

So many guitars, so little time.

That Is Not My Guitar Until It Is Setup To My Specifications from MyRareGuitars.com

Frank Zappa

One of the greatest musicians of the 20th century was also a damn good guitar player, he stands alone as a composer, instrumentalist and satirist beyond compare. His name was Frank Zappa. Frank is still IMHO the most underrated musician in the rock and roll era.

Frank was a master at the use of wahwah (check out his early wah solo on Orange County Lumber Truck from the album Weasels Ripped My Flesh), one of his techniques was using the wah as an EQ boost. His feel for the wah was so good he could feel the notch in the pedals throw that would give him (for most part) that growling round sound that Frank was known for during the 70’s. Try it yourself plug in your SG (or any humbucking solidbody guitar) and get your favorite distortion sound. Now go to the neck pickup crank it up but do not roll off the treble as you would if you were trying to cop the Clapton ‘Woman tone’, leave it up full and roll off the highs using the wah. This will give the wah a full spectrum signal for it to work with.

Another Zappa secret was his uncanny ability to combine exotic scales with the pentatonic blues scale. If you watch any videos of Frank playing you will notice he is not in the “normal guitar boxes”. Viva la Frank!!!

Speaking of Frank Zappa, it is well documented that growing up two of his favorite guitarists were Guitar Slim and Johnny Guitar Watson. Frank in a Guitar Player magazine interview said that his favorite guitar solo of all time was Guitar Slims Story of my life. This solo has a tone and approach that is very Zappaesque.

Guitar Slim

One of the secrets of Guitar Slims sound was the fact that he preferred to plug his guitar into a PA amp as opposed to a guitar amp. This was probably a Bogen or Premier. What Slim liked about these amps I am sure was the loudness (I have seen p.a. amps from the early 40’s using 2 6L6’s way before Fender used these tubes for his amps) their high end, and most important their reaction to the signal of his guitar (Slim was reported to be using a Strat and a 52 Les Paul) which gave out more signal than the microphones of that era. End result? Distortion mmmm yummy yummy!!!

Jimmy Page with his Fender Telecaster

How come I don’t sound like Jimmy Page when I play the intro to Heartbreaker when I use my Les Paul? Is it because I don’t own a 59 Burst? What can I do to make my Les Paul sound like Jimmy’s? Well first of all you would have to transform it into a Telecaster. That’s right a Telecaster. Now let me explain how this happened.

A young Jimmy Page was the protégé of British studio legend Big Jim Sullivan. Jim was a member of an elite group of cats who like their American counterparts the “Wrecking Crew” played on most of the hit records of the 60’s recorded in England. The fact is that 95% of the records we grew up listening to in the 60’s were made by the same two dozen or so musicians. The truth is no producer (the music industries version of a movies director) would put his reputation on the line using some prettyboys who were signed because of the haircuts or their trousers. (Rutles 101). This fact by itself is what separates the Beatles, the Stones from everyone else, they were the first truly self contained band.

Now back to Sully, Page and the Tele. Sullivan could be seen weekly in the UK and US as a featured player on the Tom Jones Show. Sullivan was known for his swarthy good looks and his White Telecaster. Being a studio player Jim knew the merits of the Tele, how it cut through the mix and was a safe bet at sessions as far as its versatility. (A side note; there was a guitarist across the pond making ground breaking records with his Telecaster, his name was Joe Messina one of the house guitarists of Motown’s Funk brothers).

When Jimmy took his formidable talent and studio experience to the studio to produce the first Led Zeppelin record Jimmy had an early 60’s rosewood board white Tele in tow just like Big Jims.

Jimmy had already toured with the Yardbirds using the Tele as well as the first go round with Zeppelin in the UK (check out Zep on the DVD Supershow). But Page felt that the Tele was not fat enough sounding for a power trio setup, Jimmy soon switched to the Les Paul for good.

Jimi Hendrix in Studio

Jimi’s tone using the Fuzz boxes of the 60’s. We all know how thin sounding the fuzz boxes of the 60’s were. Whether it’s a Big Muff, an Octavia,or a Tonebender, they were all pretty thin sounding. Jimi Hendrix used all of these at one time or another, yet his tone was mostly pretty fat and round sounding (unless he was looking for a special effect) This leads us to Jimi’s secret tone maneuver.

It’s a really simple one. We all know now that Jimi used Marshall’s most of his career and we also know that Jimi made use of the channel jumper cable (as seen in many of Jimi’s live video’s) Jimi’s trick was to boost the bass sounding channel to even out the thin sound of the fuzz box. This gave Jimi the desired fat tone he was accustomed to when he came up using Fenders and Ampegs. The other benefit was that when Jimi would simply turn down his volume for his rhythm sound it was still quite big sounding. Rarely in the videos I have seen (many) did Jimi ever step on a fuzztone for a lead, when you have seen him go to a pedal for a lead it was to a wah for the tone boost.

Surf guys outboard reverb unit trick. Boy did the surf records of the early to mid 60’s blow my mind. Imagine guitar records with no singing, simple melodies that almost everyone could cop, and tons of self important guitar slinger attitude. I ran into a surf guitar legend years ago and I asked him how he ran his reverb, because I could see that he had something funky going on there as I saw that his guitar was plugged directly into the amp.

He smiled and told me that he and some of the other cats of that era were using a primitive effects loop so to speak. Here’s how they did it.

He ran the guitar into input one of his Showman and then ran a cable from input two to the input of his Fender reverb unit and ran the output of the reverb to the input of channel two (or normal channel). This way he could not only tailor the sound of the unit with the onboard controls he could also utilize the second channels volume and tone controls.

One benefit he did not realize too, was that the guitar running direct into the first channel did not have its dry input signal colored by the reverb unit! This setup is also called the poor mans effects loop.

Adrian Belew - The Twang Bar King

What the hell is all that duct tape doing on the stage? Did you ever notice that when you have a single coil guitar plugged in that the amount of noise changes as you turn or move around? Yeah me too! Did you also ever notice that there were certain spots on the stage that you could get really good feedback if you turned a certain way? Yeah me too!

Over the years I have heard stories about how Hendrix would spend over an hour at his sound check finding those hot spots on the stage. Legend has it that Twang Bar King Adrian Belew took it to a new level by incorporating this feedback and sustain into his tunes as part of the melody and arrangement. This made it necessary to make these markings on the stage part of his setup. No room for spontaneity for Mr. Belew, he needed what he needed when he needed it.

So here’s the trick after the band sound checks bring out the tape and find your hot spots, even if you don’t utilize feedback you will still benefit from knowing where on the stage your guitar will be most responsive.

Joey Leone with his amps

That’s it for now my friends so, “keep those cards and letters coming in.”

Secrets of the Great Guitar Players from MyRareGuitars.com

Below, I lay out the answers, based on the classic traditional surf sound of the Sixties. Whether you want to nail the sound with vintage gear, or whether you are on a budget, you’ll find useful guidelines here.

Surf Guitar Gear Basics

Instrumental surf music has its own distinct sound – influenced by both the natural sounds of waves crashing on the beach, the typically rudimentary skills of its early performers, and technological breakthroughs in amplified guitar technology during the hey-day of surf music, the early 1960s. In short, the key characteristics of the surf guitar sound are a clean tube-amp tone and heavy reverb. Not coincidentally, those sounds are closely associated with Fender musical instruments. Back in the day, all Fender instruments were made in Southern California, just a mountain range away from the Pacific Ocean. Naturally, Fender had a huge impact on the early surf musicians blasting out their instro tunes in the music halls of SoCal.

Surf Guitars

Most early surf bands made use of a full array of Fender gear, beginning with the famous single-coil guitars that still define “the Fender sound.” Dick Dale, the father of surf guitar, played his staccato machine-gun sound with the help of “the Beast” a highly personalized Fender Stratocaster.

Today, the Strat remains a favorite choice for surf guitar slingers. The most popular Fender surf machines, however, are the Jazzmaster and its twangy, shorter-scaled cousin, the Jaguar. While nothing tops a vintage Jazz or Jag dated anywhere from 1958 (the first year of the Jazzmaster) to about 1966 (the venerated “pre-CBS” era, when Fender was still owned and operated by Leo Fender), you’ll have to shell out mucho dinero for the authentic item.

Fender Jazzmaster.. proper surfin’ vibes!

Fortunately, Fender has created excellent reissues of its classic instruments. Most players would agree, Made in America (often designated as “MIA”) vintage reissues of the Jazz and Jag come very close to the sound and mojo of the originals, and can be had new or used for less than a king’s ransom. For those on a budget, the Made in Japan/Crafted In Japan models (often denoted as “CIJ” and “MIJ”) come very close to the feel and tone of the American-made models, at about half the price.

A minority of players seek out other vintage guitars popular among early surf bands. Mosrite guitars, made by California’s Semie Mosely, were made famous by The Ventures – not strictly a surf band, but still a vital group in the pantheon of surf music legends. Other popular surf guitars include single-coil models manufactured by Japanese manufacturer Teisco Del Rey, American-maker Danelectro, and the Italian firm Eko. Plus dozens of Japanese guitars churned out during the 1960s and 1970s.

Any of the recent Eastwood Mosrite Reissue models are a great choice if you want to go down the Ventures route:

Eastwood Sidejack, a great option for surf music

That said, anyone new to the surf sound can get by with most any solid-body electric guitar featuring single-coil pickups. For the economy-minded, a Fender Squier Strat is a good choice. Yamaha also makes some surfy guitars loosely fashioned after the wild SGV models of the late 1960s. Other brands to consider are the Danelectro-style guitars made by Reverend, the retro-60s guitars made by Eastwood, reissue Danelectros, DiPintos, and the many Strat-clones made by just about everyone.

Back in the early 1960s, strings were quite heavy when compared to the light, thin, slinky strings favored on most guitars today. If you want a dedicated surf guitar, as opposed to one set up for playing a wide array of rock music, you’ll want to stock up on the heavier guages – high “E” strings of 11, 12, even 13. The true surf sound was typically played on ribbon-wound or “flat” wound strings; these help reduce string-slide sounds and have a mellower tone than the more common round-would strings. However, this is an item of personal preference; many surf guitar players swear by flat-wounds, while most continue to play the cheaper and more widely available round-wounds.

The Ventures, one of the greatest surf bands ever, played Mosrites

One last note: one other characteristic of the surf sound is whammy bar dips. Not the dive-bombing acrobatics of Eddie Van Halen, but a nice quarter or half-tone warble. Any worthy surf guitar should have a bridge set up to create this sound; used judiciously, they will stay in tune. Hard-bridge guitars, such as most Telecasters, lack this feature, making them less desirable among surf guitar players.

Surf Bass Guitars

Surf music played a big role in the acceptance of the electric bass and the movement away from the standup basses used by Jazz, blues, and rockabilly musicians of the 1950s. The surf players ushered in the era of the electric bass, launching the modern rock bass sound. Of course, the surf bands used Fender basses, both the Precision bass and the Jazz bass. Another popular brand was the Danelectro Longhorn bass, with its distinctive double-cutaway body.

Just as if their guitars, Mosrite basses were also used by surf bands, such as The Ventures. The Eastwood Sidejack Bass 32 is a pretty good choice, if you want something similar:

The Sidejack Bass 32… great choice for surf music

Surf Guitar Amps

Think clean, sparkly treble and a round, clear bass tone. That’s the essence of surf amp sound. The most famous and venerable surf amps are the classic Fender Showman and Dual Showman. These were early amp “heads” intended to be played through Fender amp cabinets, typically with big 15″ JBL D-130F speakers. These setups have mountains of clean headroom, sufficient to spread the sweet surf guitar sound across an entire auditorium of stomp-crazed beach kids looking for some fun on a Saturday night. You can still find a bargain on Showman heads by shopping eBay, but snapping up the matching cabs with JBL speakers will cost you a month’s salary or more.

Fender Bandmaster

Other popular early Fender amps are the Twin Reverb, Deluxe Reverb, Bandmaster, Vibrolux, and Super Reverb. Any of these true vintage Fenders will likely put you deeply in debt. Fortunately, Fender has revived many of its timeless designs, which are available as the reissue series. The ’65 Twin Reverb, the ’65 Twin Reverb Special 15, Custom Vibrolux, and the Deluxe Reverb Reissue are all excellent choices for surf music. If you want to lay out serious dead-presidents, the VibroKing Custom comes with a built-in ’63 Fender Reverb (see “Reverb” section, below), while the new SuperSonic combines the tones of the classic Vibrolux, ’66 Bassman, and modern high-gain amps.

That said, there are many other affordable – and not so affordable – amplifiers from which to choose. For novices who want to play at home, the Fender Blues Junior gets great tube tone. Other good choices are the Fender Blues Deluxe, a 40-watt with great versatility, and its beefier brother, the Fender Blues Deville (also sold as the ‘Hot Rod’ series amps). A bargain-basement amp that has excellent surf tone is the Fender Frontline 25R, a surprisingly warm-sounding solid state amp. Of course, you can play through a classic Marshall stack or Vox AC30 (the amp used by the fab British instrumental band, The Shadows). Anything is possible – just bear in mind, you’ll be straying from the classic surf sound.

Another choice (and this is mainly for guitar players with lucrative careers as doctors, attorneys, business execs, and mafia captains) are boutique amps. Many makers, most notably Kendrick and Victoria, have re-created hand-wired amplifiers based on the classic Fender circuits. You’ll get classic Fender tone without having to worry about the reliability issues that come with owning a 50-year-old piece of electronic gear. Unfortunately, the boutique makers seem to focus largely on the tweed-era Fenders of the 1950s, rather than the black-face amps of the 1960s, when surf guitar ruled. So, some of the boutique amps seem better suited to mildly distorted blues than to crystal-clear surf.

Surf Guitar Reverb

Ahhh, reverb. One of the earliest effects created for guitar, and the essential ingredient of surf sound. Originally intended to create an ambient atmosphere, like a large music hall, reverb came to the fore in surf music with the creation of the Fender Reverb based on the G15 circuit. Turned up midway, they do capture the sounds of amplified music bouncing off the walls at a high school hop. But turn the dwell, tone and mix knobs up past the mid-mark, and you start to get the wonderful resonance of a guitar played at the bottom of a well, or in a long tunnel, or perhaps through the barrel of a breaking wave. Coveted by surf musicians, these original tube reverb units are the standard by which all reverb is compared – and by which most fail.

Basically a stand-alone box, tube reverb works by taking the original guitar signal, pushing it through a series of springs mounted in a box, then recapturing and amplifying the sound again before sending it along to the amplifier. Soon after the creation of the tube reverb effect, Fender began adding reverb to nearly all of its popular amp models; however, most will agree that the reverb effect built into the amp itself is a pale and sickly cousin when compared to a true Fender reverb.

Today, you can buy reissue models of the classic Fender ’63 Reverb, but bear in mind, these are not actual copies of the originals. While the circuits are similar on paper, the newer units have circuit board construction, rather than the hand-wired circuitry of the originals. You can, however, find hand-wired reverbs by boutique makers such as Victoria, Soldano, and Kendrick, all based more-or-less on the original G15 circuit. You can also buy a kit and build your own (Weber Vintage Speaker Technology of Kokomo, Ind., is a good source for such kits).

If you can’t spend the $250 for a used reissue much less the $600 or more you will pay for a vintage Fender reverb or a boutique clone of the original, you can go with a variety of pedals, starting as low as $35 for a Danelectro mini-pedal to about $150 for a Little Lanilei reverb pedal that actually uses a spring reverb tank. Other popular models include the Electro-Harmonix Holy Grail and Holier Grail, the Verbzilla, and the Digitech Digiverb, which all get excellent reverb sounds for just over $100.

Finally, you may find that the reverb in your amp works plenty good. You may not get the sputtering “boosh” sounds of a true Fender Reverb, but you may find that it’s enough reverb for your throbbing versions of ‘Pipeline’ and ‘Miserlou.’ Then again, you might be like surf guitar aficionado Jeff ‘Big Tiki Dude,’ who believes that there is no such thing as too much ‘verb.

Good surfin’!

Post by: Gavin Ehringer

Let’s Go Surfin’: How to Get the Classic Surf Guitar Sound from MyRareGuitars.com

Tuning a Gibson Acoustic Guitar

Everybody deserves to have a guitar that plays well, stays in tune, and is in tune with itself. This is not just the privilege of globetrotting superstars, but everyone who owns a decent instrument.

Before I go any further, let me give you the proviso that I am not a guitar tech, set-up guy, or luthier. I’ve been playing for almost 4 decades and I’ve picked up a lot of valuable information along the way. What I do know is when to go to an experienced guitar technician / luthier to get problems solved. The whole purpose of this column is to inform those of you who were curious about some of these things but were afraid to ask or just plain didn’t know. You experienced guys and gals – Eddie Van Halen and Django Reinhardt: who’s better? Discuss.

New Eastwood Wandre Deluxe Electric Guitar

New Guitars

In preparation for our upcoming cross-Canada tour this summer as a member of The Bachman Cummings Band, I decided to take my 2005 G&L ASAT Deluxe to my friend Brian Mascarin, a very in-demand luthier and guitar technician in Toronto, to have him dress the frets for me. Now you would think that the frets on a $2,500 guitar like a G&L would be set-up to perfection. Not so.

Consider the journey that guitar took to get to me: it was made in California in a very temperate climate, traveled across the continent in a truck, possibly in freezing weather, and arrived in Toronto where it hung in a music store for the better part of two years by its neck! And with the same set of strings!

I detected an annoying buzz under the D string that I couldn’t get rid of so I took it to Brian. He said it is not uncommon for some guitarists to come directly from the music store with a brand new Gibson, Fender, or Paul Reed Smith to his shop where he sets up the instrument to its new owners specs and tweaks any minor flaws that the factory may have overlooked. Keep in mind that with the worldwide explosion in popularity of the guitar, these manufacturers have to pump out literally hundreds (thousands?) of guitars every month. It is not realistic to assume that these instruments are 100% ready to go in every way for every player’s needs.

The need for a set-up by a qualified expert is even more crucial in the case of instruments made offshore: drastically different manufacturing climates, month-long trans-oceanic journeys with varying degrees of temperature and humidity, and high volume factory output are factors that have to be considered. No one can dispute the very high levels of quality and workmanship that goes into guitars made in Asia but keep in mind the changes and the journey your instrument has undergone before it got to you. No wonder it needs a bit of tweaking and TLC!

Guitar Strings on the Wall

Strings

Quite often I hear of guitar owners complain that their newly purchased axe just doesn’t play the same as it did when it was purchased (Hey! It was in tune when I bought it!).

Did you change the strings? Of course you did. You took off the now tarnished and oxidized strings that the factory installed and put on a fresh set of your favourite brand with your favourite gauge – you know the super slinky .008’s with the .056 E string! Or the good guys at the store or e-store threw in a set of strings for you. Now the neck has a bow in it and the strings are an inch off the neck.

Why? Because you changed the geometry of the instrument. Here’s a real nugget for you – a guitar’s playability is affected by the gauge of string you use! A set of strings exerts hundreds of pounds of tension on a guitar’s neck. When you change the gauge or thickness of those strings, the tension on the neck changes. Your guitar was set up with a certain gauge of string at the factory. Unless you replace the strings with exactly the same brand (string characteristics in the same gauge vary from brand to brand owing to different manufacturing techniques and different metals used), your guitar will play differently. The only way to accurately determine the gauge of a string is with a micrometer and not many music stores have one of those under the counter.

What to do? Pick a brand and a gauge of string, get your guitar set-up for that string and stick with that string. When you experiment with different brands or gauges (and you should!), get the guitar setup again for that particular string.

Guitar Neck Truss Rod Diagram

Truss Rods

The truss rod is what is adjusted to add or reduce – relief – or bow in the neck. As I said in the opening, I am not a repair guy and I’m not going to tell you how to adjust your truss rod. I personally don’t think you should because the potential for permanent damage is huge. This is when you should go to an experienced technician.

Tune-o-Matic Guitar Bridge

Intonation

Ever wonder why some chords play in tune and others don’t? That’s intonation – the guitar’s ability to be “in tune” with itself. Without going into a long boring treatise on the tempered tuning system developed in the 16th century or whenever it was, suffice to say that your electric guitar, thanks to Mr.McCarty and the engineers at Gibson in the 50’s, has a bridge with little moveable saddles on it called a “tune-o-matic” bridge.

These little saddles adjust the string “length” relative to the 12th fret, which theoretically is the midpoint of the note. There are many resources on the net to get more details on the theory, but the idea here is to let you know that if you have a decent electronic tuner, a small screwdriver and a bit of patience, you can intonate your guitar so that it plays more in tune with itself.

Here’s how you do it:

1. Plug your guitar into your tuner.
2. Tune the strings to pitch.
3. Pluck the harmonic of the 6th string (pluck the string with your finger directly over the 12th fret without fretting the note).
4. Fret the note at the 12th fret and compare it to the plucked harmonic.
5. If the fretted note is sharp, move the saddle back (or to your right looking down on the guitar). If it is flat, do the opposite. Make small adjustments until the pitch of the harmonic and the fretted note is the same. Do this for all 6 strings.
6. If you’re confused, go see your friendly neighbourhood guitar technician or luthier. A set-up with new strings, truss rod adjustment and intonation costs around $20 – $50 but it is well worth it.

Resources

Please visit David’s Website and don’t miss the Bachman Cummings tour this summer!

Here are the names of three very qualified technicians / luthiers in the Greater Toronto Area:

• Musicality, Brian Mascarin (416) 787-1531 Toronto
• The Peghead, Mike Spicer (905) 972-9400 Hamilton
• The Guitar Shop, John Bride (905) 274-5555 Mississauga

Guitar Tuning & Set-Up Tips of the Stars! from MyRareGuitars.com

Rickenbacker 360/12 Old Style 12-String Electric Guitar

For me, it all started with the two Godfathers of the electric 12 string: George Harrison of the Beatles and Roger McGuinn of The Byrds. Obviously, the first ingredient is a great 12 string. The Granddaddy of them all is the Rickenbacker 12 string.

Ricks have been handmade in the same factory in Santa Ana, California for many years and if you can find a dealer that sells and stocks Rickenbacker, you will pay thousands of dollars and you may end up waiting many months for the model of your dreams. I waited 8 months for my 360/12 Old Style when I bought it in 1990.

If you play in a weekend band or jam with your friends, you may find that the electric 12 string, once you have done all of the mandatory Beatles, Byrds, Animals, Who, Tom Petty, R.E.M., and Smiths tunes, has a rather limited use for the rest of your repertoire. Or, maybe not. If you’re like me, you’d happily play the electric 12 all night!

12-String Guitarist: David Love & His Rickenbacker 12-string

Crank up the input gain, compress the bejeezuz out of your 12 string and jangle away!

Tone Secret Number One: Compression!

George Harrison’s great 12 string tone came from a combination of three things: his matchless technique, the venerable Vox AC 30, and the Altec limiter that was in the Abbey Road studios. The Vox, with its all-tube EL 84 platform and its GZ34 rectifier gives any guitar that creamy, brown, compression sustain and chime but it really sparkles when you play an electric12 through it.

The Altec limiter is an old tube-type studio compressor/limiter that squishes the sound at the mixing console and simply enhanced the sound of those old AC 30’s.

Roger McGuinn of The Byrds has said that his tone came from recording his Rickenbacker directly into the console and running it through not one, but two Pultec Limiters at the same time! Listen to the opening figure of “Mr.Tambourine Man” and you’ll hear those compressors squeezing away!

Now I know many of you don’t have George’s or Roger’s technique (neither do I), or access to old AC 30’s (that can cost upwards of $5,000 for collectible examples) or old pieces of studio gear like Altec or Pultec limiters, but you can achieve the same effect with a good quality stomp box compressor. My personal favourite is the Diamond Compressor made here in Canada but any good compressor will do: Keely, Ross, Analog Man, Barber, MXR DynaComp, and the old standby BOSS CS-2 or 3.

Tone Secret Number Two: Flatwounds!

I discovered this Tone Secret the day I got my Rickenbacker 12. I had played other makes of electric 12’s before but they had never produced “that sound” that my Rick had. What was different about it? The single coil pickups that come standard on a Rick? The way Rickenbacker arranged the strings with the root string on top and the octave string underneath?

Both of these things had an influence on the way it sounded but the most important difference to me was the strings. They were not round wound like 99% of the strings that are on the market these days: they were flat wound!

Back when George and Roger were young men (1964), and before the late Ernie Ball started making round wound light gauge guitar strings in California, almost everybody played flat wound strings – that’s what was widely popular and available at the time. Round wounds were available but it wasn’t until The Shadows made them popular that there was a demand for them in Europe. The best flat wound strings in the world came from Germany (and still do) and were sold under the brand names of Pyramid and Thomastik.

Rickenbacker in California was buying Pyramids from Germany at the time (presumably because of the relationship they enjoyed with West German music retailers who were selling Rickenbacker guitars) so that was the string that was being installed on Rickenbackers from the California factory in early ’63 and ’64. So, the sound you hear on Beatles, Byrds, and The Who recordings – those are flat wound strings! The great Pete Townsend refers to them as “tape wound”. He won’t play his 12 string with anything else but!
Pyramid strings are still available to this day (you can find them on the Internet) and Rickenbacker still sells their Number 95404 Compressed Medium Round Wound.

(ground wound) set for about $20.00 a set. I buy them by the box of 12 from a store in New York. I prefer the Rick strings: just a tad brighter than Pyramids.

Round wound strings on an electric 12 string sound like doo-doo. Too crashy and too clangy. Flat wounds or ground round wounds are the way to go if you want “that sound”. If you can’t find Rickenbacker strings where you live, your local music store probably sells or can order D’Addario Chrome singles in a flat wound with which you can assemble your own 12 string set.

The string gauge shipped on every new Rickenbacker is as follows from low to high:

• .042/.026
• .034/.020W
• .026/.013plain
• .020wound/.010
• .013/.013
• .010/.010.

12-String Guitarist: David Love & His Rickenbacker 12-string

Tone Secret Number Three: Use a light gauge pick!

Try it! It works! A medium is too stiff and , in my opinion, “sends” too much signal to the pickup. I have found that with a light gauge pick, you can strum harder but still have a sound that doesn’t break up from string distortion (over strumming).

That kind of vibe (string distortion) works great for, say, a PRS through a Dual Rectifier but not for the sweet chimey strings on your 12 string. I keep a medium and a thin pick in my back pocket whenever I’m on stage depending on whether it’s a 12 string song or a 6 string song.

The great Colin Cripps of Hamilton, Ontario, revealed this Tone Secret to me many years ago. Colin is the guitar player/composer/producer of bands like Crash Vegas, Junkhouse, The Jim Cuddy Band, and Kathleen Edwards.

Tone Secret Number Four: Get your 12-string set up!

Find yourself a good guitar technician and get him or her to set up your 12 string.

The #1 complaint I hear from new 12 string players is that they put the guitar down because it’s too difficult to play.

The 12 string, by its design, is a different and difficult instrument to play because basically you are stuffing 12 strings into the same real estate as 6 strings. Players with small hands (like me) don’t find a problem especially with Rickenbackers, which have notoriously narrow necks.

A good guitar tech will straighten the neck as well as it can possibly can be – this is really important. He/she may also suggest that the frets be “dressed”, polished and leveled. This will benefit your 12 string and make it very playable. Ask him/her to set the action as low as possible – this is really important!

Another innovation that Rickenbacker has developed is the 12 saddle tuneomatic bridge, which ensures near-perfect intonation. If your 12 string doesn’t have one, don’t despair. Any good guitar tech worth his or her salt will get your 12 string intonated as close as it can possibly be even if you have a 6 saddle bridge – very important if you want those big jangly chords to be as sweetly in tune as they should be.

A well-set electric 12 string should play like a brand new PRS or (insert your favourite guitar brand here). If it doesn’t, find yourself a new guitar tech!

The best affordable 12-String Guitars

As a professional musician – yes, I’ve got the Vintage AC-30 and the Ricky 12 – hard to see it any other way. However, there is a price to pay for perfection, and therefor II recommend to my guitar-playing friends who jam for fun, to buy an electric 12 that’s a little more affordable than a Rick. There aren’t many electric 12 strings on the market these days but a few models by Eastwood fit the bill very nicely, such as the Eastwood Nashville 12 (discontinued) or the Classic 12.

The Eastwood Classic 12, setting a new standard in price vs. affordability

Mike Robinson from Eastwood consulted with me prior to the development of the Nashville 12. We discussed a variety of options and settled on this style as is was possible to achieve the tone (mini-humbukers) and setup (flat neck, low action) that would make it a “professional” grade instrument at an affordable price. Last month I visited Eastwood Guitars and took the prototype for a test drive. Two big thumbs up…… jangle away!

Currently, though, the hugely popular Eastwood Classic 12 is the model setting the standard for affordable, high-quality 12-strings, and is the best bet if you want to discover the joys of playing a 12-string guitar:

Still want more? Visit the Eastwood Guitars website for a look at their full range of 12-string guitars:

Suggested Listening:

• Mr.Tambourine Man by The Byrds
• I Should Have Known Better by The Beatles
• A Hard Day’s Night by The Beatles
• The Waiting by Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers
• Kicks by Paul Revere and The Raiders
• You Were On My Mind by We Five
• Turn!Turn!Turn! by The Byrds
• Can’t Explain by The Who
• The Kids Are Alright by The Who
• It’s My Life by The Animals

Tone Secrets of the Electric 12-String Guitar from MyRareGuitars.com

What makes a song a hit and what is it that you remember? Melody .

What is the only aspect of music that you can copyright? Melody.

Melody is boss. Which is why I always shudder a bit when I hear ‘scales’, ‘modes’ and ‘improvisation’ mentioned in the same sentence. (I just shuddered).

Sure, you can rattle off scales and string riffs together and throw in the odd mode or two, but unless you’re thinking melody, you have not made music; you are not improvising. You may have confirmed that you know which building blocks fit, but you’ve created nothing new. Improvisation to me implies invention, and you don’t invent scales any more than an artist invents Cobalt Blue or Vermilion Red. Scales and modes are like the squirts of paint on a palette. You have to choose carefully which to use, which to blend. Start mixing too many colors and you wind up with mud.

Think melody, is my advice. Don’t let your hand dictate what you play. More often than not, two or three well-chosen notes are far more musical (melodic) than a run through a scale, or worse, an inappropriate modal… thing. Let your heart lead you. Of course you should know your scales, just as an artist should know his or her colors, but to truly invent something new, like a spontaneous melodic line, you can’t be thinking scales or modes.

The rules of improvisation are set by the key of the piece of music generally, and specifically, by what I call the ‘chord of the moment’. Both provide the framework upon which you can drape your melodies. When chords from outside the key intrude, consider them as key changes.

On the face of it, music seems like a highly complex set of relationships: intervals, chords, scales, modes, keys, harmony, rhythm, tempo, ‘feel’. But really, all these elements are there because of melody. In fact, the entire multi billion dollar music industry exists because we love melody.

If you’re still looking for a way of ‘seeing’ the music on the fretboard, a way of distilling any musical moment down to it’s barest essentials, visit my site and read about my book PlaneTalk-The Truly Totally Different Guitar Instruction Book. It is a comic strip conversation in which I describe in great detail (in plain old English) the trick I use to keep track of everything, a simple visualisation trick that years ago opened up the whole fretboard to me.

And remember, Melody is boss.

Melody is Boss from MyRareGuitars.com

The key with the least number of barre chords is C, with F being the only non-open chord, so I guess it’s the easiest for a beginner; E, A, D and G are the next in rank of easiness as they also consist mostly of open chords; B and F are getting trickier to keep track of and play with ease, and the sharp/flat keys — forget it! Even after 42 years of playing, I don’t bother even trying. The way I see it, the guitar was designed to ring loud and clear, and it’s next to impossible to get that ringing without open strings doing the work. Barre chords, by their very nature, will always ring less.

That’s where capos come in. Whoever invented the guitar must have already thought of the capo, which compensates for the unfriendly keys. A simple idea, it effectively moves the nut up the neck by clamping down all all strings at once. The result is to raise the overall pitch while keeping the relative tuning of all the strings intact. This allows the player to choose another key to play in, a more friendly key. I should really say ‘pretend key’ because the key doesn’t change at all. Only the fingering changes, as if it were a new (friendly) key.

I have put a chart together here which shows as a graph the 12 keys and their seven notes/chords. It will allow you, if you’re wondering about the subject, to see how it all works. The 12 keys read horizontally, and their scale/related-chords reads below them, vertically. You will see at a glance which are the least complicated keys… they’re the ones without all the fly specks around them. The fact is of course, they’re all identical – it’s only the guitar’s design and tuning that makes them seem different – but try telling your brain and hand that.

There has always seemed to be a bit of a stigma about capos, like you’re cheating if you use them. If being able to ‘see’ a song quickly in terms of I, ii, iii, IV, V, vi and vii and giving the guitar a chance to ring out with nice open strings a vibratin’ and have all the years of playing in nice friendly keys another chance at it — if that’s called cheating, then let it be so. I’ve always felt that the music reaching the ears was the main thing, and I’ve always found that MUCH more comfortable in the friendly keys.

Capos only move the pitch up, never down (unless you’re moving down form a higher already capoed position) and when reading the chart, you can only pick keys lower than the original. They’re on the left of the original key.

Remember that all that changes is the letter. The major or minor or 7th or sus4 — the chord flavors — remain the same. The left hand column indicates the Roman numeral value of the note/chord and by its use of caps and lowercase, indicates the major/minor quality. Remember though, these can change. The composer can pick chords other than those to write a tune.

Capos can misbehave and be a bit of a pain in the neck sometimes. It’s usually best to keep the capo as close to the nut as possible, just for the sake of the tuning. The higher up the neck you go, the more likely it is to pull the tuning out a bit. If you clamp the capo too close to the fret wire, you’ll probably sharp everything a bit; too far back and you might lose good string contact with the fret wire and it will sound choked. Experiment, and find the happy medium. Make sure you put it on straight – parallel to the fret wire, or you’ll pull some strings out of tune and not others, and that’s as sour a sound as you can get.

There are many designs of capos and all have pros and cons. None are foolproof. I’ve tried them all and I think to this day I prefer the little Dunlop variety that have a little nylon belt and rack and pinion type clamping device. They’re adjustable, and can be very reliable. They all tend to pull the strings sideways slightly as you apply the final clamping action, whatever it is, so you’ve got to be ready and compensate by holding it firmly. It’s when you’re playing with others that you have to be careful about these slight discrepancies as you can quickly be out of tune with the band if you’re not careful.

Guitar Capos & Transposing from MyRareGuitars.com

I recently received a letter with the question — How do I mix scales? (Thanks Andreas)

This, with a few additions, is the answer I sent him:

How do you mix scales?

By forgetting about scales completely.

I have hated the idea of scales all my playing life. I never use them (consciously), and never think them. I think melody. I don’t know, or care to know, the names of the various scales and modes. I know the major scale and see all others as being distortions of it. I am also aware that there is the chromatic scale (all twelve notes) to use at all times. You can link any interval with semitones if you so choose, any scale note to any other scale note, from any scale you care to name. It becomes a question of timing, to get to the note you want in the time left to do so, if you follow. All twelve notes are there for the asking.

But seriously, do yourself a favor, stop thinking about scales and concentrate on melody and viewing notes simply as Ones, or flat Threes, or sharp Fives or whatever. You can name all twelve notes like that.

i.e., in ascending order (major scale notes are in bold):

• One (or Tonic, or Root note)
• Flat Nine
• Two / Nine
• Minor Three
• Major Three
• Four / Eleven (often referred to as Sus Four)
• Flat Five
• Five
• Sharp Five (the augmented note)
• Six / Thirteen
• Dominant Seven (or plain old “seventh”, or minor seventh)
• Seven (usually referred to as “major seventh”)
• and One again.

All scales and modes that ever were fit into the chromatic scale.

I have often likened improvised lines to little trips away from home, with “home” being the 1-3-5 of the “chord of the moment”. These are usually, and I stress ‘usually’, your starting notes and finishing notes. The other notes used to link home notes can be any of the twelve notes of the chromatic scale. Naturally, the 2, 4, 6, and 7 (which are the other scale notes) will be favorites, but any of the others (non-scale notes) can be seen as linking notes – notes not to linger on, but notes to fill the gaps. Basically, any fret will do. However, timing becomes paramount. “Phrasing” might be a better word. You must mold your line so that you wind up passing through the home notes at the right time, and most importantly, resolving them on time. By that, I mean get home on time. How do you do that?

Another way of looking at it: you create a simple melodic line, one that fits the changes, and then you fill in a few gaps (in space and time) with notes from the chromatic scale. Before long, you know what every one of those twelve notes sounds like in context. You’ll know where each one leads, and which tensions are set up and resolved with which notes.

A good example is the blues. Again, I never think “blues scale”, but I know that (in a major key) the 3 hovers between the minor and major versions. It never settles, so I avoid it as a resolve note. I know that the seven is the dominant 7th, the flat 7. So I make sure it winds up in my lines, not the major seven. The flat 7 really is a blue note, and can be used as another home note. All intervals can be linked with semitones. Strictly major music never uses the flat three and only uses the flat 7 for the V chord.

Major key music which isn’t the blues never uses the flat 3 and uses the major seven, except for the V chord, which uses the flat seventh. (Why? Because it’s one of the scale notes.)

Minor music is minor music. I was asked that question in another letter.

What is a minor key?

I’ll answer that next time.

The Chromatic Scale from MyRareGuitars.com

I spent many, many guitar playing years to figure it out, but it paid off. I turned it into a profession, and now I earn a good portion of my living doing just that. I do it on album tracks, jingles, soundtracks, and it’s often my role in a band line up. I specialize in slide guitar, but it’s all the same thing.

Here are some tips:

1. Know the key you’re in completely, totally, absolutely. In the end, they all become the same thing, but the rules of music and the layout of the fret board conspire to make it seem otherwise. Know the mother scale, and the *chord scale* that goes with each key. I’ve written many articles about keys, but here goes again in a nutshell: The major scale consists of seven notes. These seven notes give rise to seven chords of three notes each, using a simple formula. This family of seven notes and chords is called The Key. (There are twelve keys, one for each note of the chromatic scale which acts as a starting note.)
2. Know the *chord of the moment* inside and out. It’s setting the rules for those moments that the chord is being played. When I say *know it*, I mean:A) know where it is on the fretboard in all positions at once. It took me years to realize that chords are smeared out the whole length of the fretboard, they’re not little diagrams with dots where your fingers should go. A simple chord consists of three notes — the old (1) (3) (5) — and they can be played any old way you can figure out, and since the fretboard is essentially a maze of repeat notes, it follows that the whole fretboard becomes a chord… if you’ve tuned your brain that way, that is.B) Know it’s context. Know which chord in the key’s chord-scale it is. Let’s say we’re in the key of G, and one of the chords in your solo is a D, then know that you’re on the *Five Chord*, for that is what D is to G, the fifth chord in the sequence. Why should you be aware? Because a D chord in the key of G does not come from the D scale, it comes from the G scale. It comes from starting the G scale from D and ending at the next D. This yields a scale almost the same as the major, but the 7th note is one fret lower. This new scale is called a mode, but the easiest way to remember is simply to know that the *Five Chord* is a flat seven chord. If you can see where the seven fits into the fretscape, you can use it. If it’s NOT one of the seven chords of the scale (anything is allowed), then really know it.
3. Always think melody, never think scales. Scales are for getting your fingers familiar with the fretboard, the feel of the strings, the stretch of the intervals, but they should never be used AS solos. To be in any way effective, a solo has to tell some kind of sonic story, to do that you must first set the scene, develop the plot, introduce tension and suspense, and finally resolve the whole thing with a satisfying ending. Every song is different and there are no set rules.
4. Don’t ruin it with technique. There nothing worse than being jolted from the magic by a poorly executed piece of show-offery. Speed has NOTHING to do with solos. Naturally, if the tune itself is uptempo, then your solo can be too (but not necessarily), but your technique must be flawless if you’re going to play fast. Again, music has the ability to suspend time if properly rendered. That’s one of its best features and that’s why we love to listen to it. Playing beyond your ability just ruins the music and brings the listener crashing back into reality.
5. Solos are not a bunch of riffs strung together. You may fool your audience with that, but you’ll never fool yourself. Always seek to make your next solo totally different from the last, and always seek to follow the tune you hear in your head.
6. If you like metaphors, here’s one: solos are a collection of musical phrases. Musical phrases can be seen as excursions away from and back to *home*. Home is the (1) (3) (5) of the chord of the moment. There is only one chord of the moment at any one given moment.

When it all boils down, there are only 12 notes. Inventing melodies spontaneously from the three and a half octaves or so at a guitarist’s disposal is more a matter of elimination: which notes CAN’T I play? It takes a while, but eventually you will know the hierarchy of the moment. In other words, which notes are boss, which are subsidiary, which are connecting notes. Your melodic ventures will then have a framework to explore.

The TRICK to keeping track of it, of course, is described in my book PlaneTalk. You can find out all about it here: www.thatllteachyou.com. Over 5000 guitarists all over the World have now been let in on the secret to *seeing* the music on the fretboard.

All the best.

The Art of Soloing from MyRareGuitars.com

Music is Mathematics

There are two basic numbering systems in music. One has to do with the scale, the other with the key.

Let’s look at the numbers relating to the scale first.

There are seven notes in the scale. Simple enough. The order of intervals, or spaces, between these 7 notes is what makes it unique. The formula, as we should all know by now is Tone, Tone, semitone, Tone, Tone, Tone, semitone.

Pythagoras ratios for guitar

Understanding the notes

So our first little bit of math is to understand that from the TWELVE notes of the chromatic scale — all the notes — the scale uses SEVEN, spaced out as described. If there were six notes in the scale, you could imagine them evenly spaced a tone away from each other. But there are seven, so there have to be a couple of semitones thrown in.

(These seven notes by the way, weren’t simply chosen by someone long ago to be the ones we’d all use. They also come from mathematics, from fractions. For example, a vibrating string tuned to A440, when halved will produce another A note, but vibrating at 880 cycles / second, an octave up. That same string doubled in length will vibrate at 220 cycle / second, yet another A an octave down. That same string cut in 3 will produce E notes, and if you cut it into quarters and make 3/4 of it ring, you’ll be listening to a D note. Try it out on your guitar, you’ll hear for yourself. By the way, the halfway mark of guitar strings is the twelfth fret, the one third mark is the seventh fret, the one quarter mark is at the fifth fret.)

Back to the seven scale notes. Chords are made by combining alternate notes from the scale. The simplest chord of all is the triad. It uses three alternate scale notes. The old one-three-five.

You can add other scale notes to those to make an extended chord. The next alternate note is the seven. So a One-Three-Five-Seven combination is called a major seventh.

Mathematics Quote from Oswald Veblen (1924)

You can add a ‘Two’ note to the chord, but it has be added on the treble side of the grouping, so you’re actually using the ‘Two’ from the next octave up. Since the root (One) note of that octave can be seen as the eighth note of the scale, a ‘Two’ note is the next one up, the ‘Nine’.

You can use the ‘Four’ note if you want, but since it’s only one semitone away from the ‘Three’, it actually replaces the ‘Three’. This chord is called ‘Sus Four’. It begs to be brought back to the Three.

If you add not the Seven note that is in the scale but the next note down, the ‘minor Seven’ it’s sometimes called, you wind up with a Seventh chord, as distinct from the major seventh. They’re also referred to as ‘dominant’.

‘Elevens’ are ‘Fours’, ‘Thirteens’ are ‘Sixes’. (Simply subtract seven from those big numbers to find out which note is being called for). And so on and so. It’s pretty straight forward really: the numbers refer to the the seven notes by their order. Just remember that the One-Three-Five are taken for granted as being present.

The next set of numbers refers to the chords within the key. Each of the seven scale notes qualifies as a starting note to build a chord using the alternate note rule. These chords are often written as Roman numerals.

I — II — III — IV — V — VI — VII

Sometimes, you’ll see them written like this:

I — ii — iii — IV — V — vi — vii

This is a good way of doing it because it shows the major / minor quality of the chords. As I’ve been trying to impress upon you, it’s really important to instantly know what all those chords are for any key. Remember The Music Building I wrote about recently.

Let’s say you see a chord written as V7. What does that mean? It means it’s the Five chord from whatever key you’re in, and it’s the Dominant Seventh version. So if you’re in C, you’re looking at a G7. Or a vi7? That would be Am7.

Record producers often write tunes out simply using the numbers. If they’re unsure of the singer’s range, they will choose a suitable the key in the studio. Only then will the numbers become actual chords, mentally converted by the players. Nashville is famous for this kind of notation.

Of course, time signatures and tempo are also related to mathematics. In fact the method we use to crank up a song is for someone to yell out ONE – TWO, A ONE – TWO – THREE – FOUR. The whole of music is one seething mass of numbers when it comes down to it. Lucky for us it sounds and feels so good to make listen back to, otherwise who would bother trying to figure it out?

I hope this article hasn’t put anyone off. The fact is, all these numbers simply become music when you do put a bit of effort into practising it. The layers of music become distinct and workable. Then the fun begins…

Kirk Lorange is one of Australia’s best know slide guitarists. He is also the author of PlaneTalk guitar method. Check out his sites: www.KirkLorange.com and www.ThatllTeachYou.com

Music is Mathematics from MyRareGuitars.com

Mark Knopfler (Dire Straits)

There are many fine guitarists out there, but if you think about it, the ones that stand out are the ones with their own sound. Mark Knopfler, Eric Clapton, JJ Cale, James Taylor, Robbie Robertson, Ry Cooder, Keith Richards… What do they all have in common apart from being great players? They’ve all got their own distinctive sound. You can recognize them instantly.

On the other hand, I know many many great guitarists down here in Australia who have got wonderful technique, great chops and musical knowledge, but who are indistinguishable from each other. Nothing in their playing makes them stand out. This can also be a plus. Often, these are the players who become quite busy in the session scene. Producers sometimes prefer for the guitar part to be anonymous with no personality showing through. It’s less distracting to the star.

David Lindley has worked with Jackson Browne & Warren Zevon

In the long run, I think having your own sound and being recognizable is the way to go if you aspire to being a professional. How to go about getting your own sound? Play, play, play and play some more, never learn someone else’s licks exactly and explore the fret board as much as you can. When you practice, concentrate on making the sounds you like and trust your ears. There are only twelve notes to play with, but an infinite number of combinations. All those great guitarists I mentioned before had confidence that the direction they were choosing was the right one for them. It obviously paid off for them. They’re all household names. Naturally, your fingers and your gear will contribute to your sound, but I think it’s more note choice and phrasing that distinguishes each player from the other, a way of thinking about music that comes out in the playing. Until next time, and as my ol’ pal David Lindley (another great player with his own sound) says,”Keep on Twangin’“.

Getting Your Own Sound from MyRareGuitars.com

Let me start off by saying that No Guitar Will Play Perfectly In Tune. EVER. The tempered system of tuning upon which guitar fret placement relies on is imperfect, but it’s the best we can do. The system was designed by J.S. Bach in 1717 and first demonstrated on his work, The Well Tempered Clavier. Before Bach’s tempered tuning, fixed pitch instruments (keyboards, instruments with frets, etc.) were designed to play in one key at a time. If you needed to play in a different key, you’d use a different instrument or completely retune the one you had. Bach’s system redesigned the relationship between all of the notes so that the octaves in all keys would be an octave apart. In order for this to work, all of the notes in between the octaves had to be slightly out of tune. For folks with good ears, nothing played on a guitar or piano really sounds in tune.

That said, lets talk about intonation as it applies to your guitar. Basically, intonation is the process of setting all of the octaves on your guitar an octave apart, and eliminating some of the problems that may hinder this procedure.

Most guitars have a string length between the nut and bridge of between 24″ and 26″. If you were playing the guitar, as a slide instrument and not depressing the strings to the frets, setting the intonation would be a simple matter of placing the bridge of the instrument at the prescribed scale length. Since most guitarists press the stings down to fret them, simply setting the bridge to the scale length won’t work. When you press a string down, you bend it sharp. The bridge of the guitar needs to be moved in such a way as to lengthen the string beyond the calculated scale length to compensate for this. The amount of compensation is a function of string gauge, string core diameter, height of the string above the fingerboard, and the player’s technique. Basically speaking, the larger the core diameter, the harder you press, and higher the string height, the greater compensation.

Setting the intonation can be pretty easy or complex depending on how picky you are and the limitations of the design of your instrument. It is easiest to set intonation on electric guitars with; fully adjustable bridges, neck and pickups. It is most complex to do so on an acoustic without these features. Quick functional intonation settings can be accomplished by properly setting one set of octaves on each string, while those with good ears may want to set several sets of octave on each string and average the setting for optimal results.

Before intonation can be properly set, all of your ducks need to be in order. In other words, no matter what you do with string length, your guitar wont play in tune unless the neck is properly adjusted, the nut height is set so that the strings are the same height over the first fret as they are over the second fret when the strings are depressed on the first fret, and the pickups are far enough away from the strings so that their magnetic field doesn’t interfere with the vibration of the strings. If the frets on your guitar are worn or unlevel, this will also cause intonation discrepancies. All these items will be topics of future articles.

To properly set the intonation, you will need a good electronic tuner or a well trained ear and a tube amplifier. Most good guitar repair shops use strobe tuners by Peterson or Conn. These provide the best results, thought any quality electronic tuner should work.

Assuming the guitar is properly set up, you are now ready to set the intonation.

1. Tune the guitar to concert pitch with the electronic tuner.
2. Play the low E and check it against the tuner to see that it is still correct.
3. Play the octave E at the 12th fret on the low E string. If the tuner shows that it is sharp to concert pitch, you need to lengthen the string. On an electric with an adjustable bridge, this is probably a matter of moving the E string bridge saddle away from the neck. On an acoustic, it will require filing the saddle in the proper direction. If the string is flat at the octave, it needs to be shortened and the process is reversed.

That’s about all for keeping your guitar in tune. I welcome any questions or comments.

Post by: Scott Freilich

Hi folks. I’m Scott Freilich. I built my first instrument in 1968, and have been repairing guitars professionally since 1973. I’ve run the guitar repair division at Top Shelf since 1979. I received training at Gibson’s old Kalamazoo plant, and have been a factory authorized luthier for Gibson, Fender, and Martin for over 20 years. My clients have included the Goo Goo Dolls, The Black Crows, Ani Di Franco, 10,000 Maniacs, Taj Mahal, Billy Sheehan, Percy Jones, and Melissa Ethridge. It would be my pleasure to provide you with any information regarding guitar repair, and maybe add you to my client list.

Why Won’t My Guitar Play in Tune?! from MyRareGuitars.com

Which bits and pieces? The best way to approach it is to ask yourself “what is the essence of the chord?”

If it’s a simple major chord, include the major 3rd to establish its major quality. The major 3rd and the 5th, or the major 3rd and the root will do that for you. Go looking for all the places you can find these two-string chunks.

If it’s a minor chord, same thing. The minor 3rd is the note that says “minor”. Add to it the 5th or the root. If you’ve located the majors, you’ve also located the minors. Simply flat the major 3rd for a minor 3rd. The root and the 5th played together will fit against either minor or major.

If it’s a 7th chord, include it in your double stop (another way of saying two notes played together). The major 3rd and the flatted 7th together will state the quality of any 7th chord. The flatted 7th and the 5th to a lesser extent, but it still works.

Sus 4 chords obviously require the 4th, which replaces the 3rd. The root and the 5th are your only choices to add to it.

After a while you will find you can string melodies together using these bits and pieces, weaving through the chord changes. Remember that “the chord of the moment”, as I call it, dictates the rules. Never forget what key you’re in and what the chord of the moment is.

Next, go looking for double stops that use notes two strings apart. Again, look at any old chord and select notes from it which are two strings apart, a “sixth” away from each other. By that I mean they are separated from each other by an interval of six scale notes. Build melody lines out them in the same way, by keeping track of each chord of the moment.

Practice by playing along with your favorite records, or better yet, with someone else. If necessary, write the chord changes down so you’re always aware of the chord of the moment, which is the most important thing.

Keep practicing — it can be worth it. I read The Eagles did a New Year’s Eve gig to bring in the Millennium, for $10,000,000!!

Think Small With Chord Changes from MyRareGuitars.com

I felt the same thing years ago about guitars. I had been playing for Four or five years. I can’t remember the brand of instrument I was playing. It was a nylon string Spanish guitar, the rosette around the sound hole was a decal, it was a piece of crap. My playing had hit a plateau, and my plan to master the instrument was looking shaky. I just couldn’t do the things I wanted to do, and I thought it was something to do with me.

Then I went to a music shop and played a good guitar. It’s still with me, leaning over there against the wall. A nylon string Goya, made in Sweden, a real guitar. Within minutes of buying it my playing ability had doubled, no, tripled. I had been wasting my time on the other thing, limiting myself to it’s mediocre workmanship.

If you’re one of those players — frustrated in your playing by an inferior instrument — do something about it. Either get it fixed up (if that’s possible — some cheap guitars are so poorly made that they can’t be adjusted) or save your money and buy something decent. You won’t regret it.

And how to find the perfect instrument? I’m asked that question all the time. “What kind of guitar should I buy Kirk? What’s a good brand?” My answer is always this: There is no such thing as a good brand. Sure, Gibson, Fender, Ibanez, Gretch etc. are all ‘good’ brands. They meet a certain standard. But there are some great guitars out there of unknown brand, and even out of a hundred seemingly identical ‘good brand’ guitars, there will only be 10 or so which will really be outstanding and only a couple greats. The rest will be good guitars, but I’m talking about upgrading to an instrument YOU LOVE to play.

You’ll know it when it happens. My favorite guitar is still my little Gibson nylon string I bought maybe fifteen years ago. I was in a shop and was intrigued because I didn’t even know Gibson made nylon strings. I picked it up to try it out and was still there plunking away a couple of hours later when the shop was closing. They couldn’t pry it out of my hands so I bought it. I had to have it. It was made for me.

I digress. I titled this article ’10 Golden Rules I just made up’. Here they are:

1. Get tuned up and stay that way. There’s no excuse these days for being out of tune. You can pick up an electronic tuner for just a few bucks these days. If your guitar doesn’t stay in tune, or is out when you play up the neck, chances are you need new strings. If it’s out of tune with new strings, have the intonation adjusted.
2. Listen.
3. Pay as much attention to what you don’t play as to what you do. In other words, let the music breathe, let it be an exercise in contrast. The holes you leave make what you do play sound better. Even if you don’t hear it at the time, your audience will. The great players we know and love wouldn’t be household names if they over-played. They’d be sitting at home wondering why the big break hadn’t arrived for them.
4. Listen.
5. Avoid alcohol when playing. It makes you sound bad and look stupid. A few years ago, my band, The Train, was playing in Sydney at a venue where a certain ex-Rolling Stone, had been playing the night before The manager asked if it was alright if he got up with us and had a play. We were thrilled of course. “Yes, by all means”. Unfortunately, he was pissed as a fart, couldn’t play a thing, kept stepping on MY effects pedal, was abusive and I had to ask him to desist. Alcohol. (Mick, if you get to read this, it was at The Bridge in about 1995. I know you won’t remember. I hope you’re feeling better)
6. Know what you’re playing. Never play anything without knowing its context, how it fits into the tune. By that I mean: know what key you’re in; know what chord is being played (the chord of the moment) and its role within that key; know which notes you’re playing in the context of that chord (is it a I, II, III, flat V, VII) etc. This becomes automatic after a while. It’s hard work at first, but stick at it until it does become automatic. Playing away without knowing what it is you’re doing will get you nowhere fast.
7. Listen.
8. Play within your own limitations. We’re all made differently. Some of us have long quick fingers, some of us are getting old and stiff. There is nothing worse than listening to someone trying to play beyond their capability. Much better to make beautiful music with one or two notes than to go for twenty and muff them all. Lucky for all of us. playing guitar was never a contest.
9. Let the song rule. Guitarists often think they are indispensable. So do drummers and bass players and keyboardists… I won’t even mention singers. The fact is, the piece of music is boss. Let it be so.
10. Listen.

There. I’m sure many of you have different ideas about the discipline of being a guitarist. These are mine.

Have a look at the new-look PlaneTalk site. All of a sudden, I can do anything I want design-wise. I have so many options, the difficulty has become settling on one. In all the hours I spent changing my pages, this iMac didn’t freeze once. I love it. Don’t forget, if you still haven’t ordered PlaneTalk, the ‘trick’ to keeping track of all music is written in and illustrated in it’s pages. The Guitar Slide Rule that comes with it is so revealing that even I, its inventor, marvel at it. All for the cost of a couple of lessons! And now, you can order it through a secure online shop. How much easier could it be?

Those who have ordered it (thanks) won’t even be reading this. They’ll be playing the guitar. You can read some of their comments on it at the Testimonials page at my site.

Until next time.

– Kirk Lorange (written in 1998)

10 Tips to Becoming a Better Guitar Player from MyRareGuitars.com