Guitar Exercises For Dummies Book And CD - 218 Pages Paperback
Most all guitar players have some sort of a practice routine.
I've heard of a few players say they never practice but most players do. And practice methods can vary and be as different as styles of playing, which is quite a big difference. I've also heard instructors say practice everyday, even if only for 15 minutes.
The thinking goes that this way, you have the guitar in your hands everyday, and you are going to make a constant and steady progress toward being a better player. Other players may go to more extreme measures with their practice session: giving it 2 or 3 hours in a single day. Then skipping a day or two before doing their next practice. And in reality, most of us fall in between these extremes. We know constant practice is a part of developing as a musician and as a guitar player, and depending how busy we are with other things we practice as we can. Anyway, if you're looking for something to ignite your practice sessions, and make them come alive, have a look at Guitar Exercises for Dummies. This book will add structure and direction to your guitar practicing, and it will simply make you a better guitar player.
Intermediate Level Book
The author assumes the reader has already played guitar a little. This is a book full of guitar exercises, to make you play better, to add more dexterity to your fingers. While you can work through the book start to finish if you want to, the author suggests that this book might be best used as a reference. In other words, you can jump to the part of the book that has the exercises you want at a particular moment.
There are three main teaching sections in the book, giving you vital teaching information and exercises related to scales, arpeggios, and finally chords.
The section on scales teaches common scales patterns. Where the notes are on the fingerboard. Where the root note is located for each scale pattern. Exercises are provided where the scale notes are mixed up to provide a variety and a good All the scale patterns they give you will work up and down the guitar neck in all the various keys. workout for the mind and the fingers. Then, after teaching the scale patterns, and showing the exercises to help to get used to playing the scales, now the scale pattern is to some well-known pieces up music. So what happens is you immediately recognize the tune you're playing, and you learn low the scale notes are used in the tune, and how the song is constructed of scales in certain points. Scales that are covered in this section include major, minor, harmonic minor, natural minor, and melodic minor.
By the way, most of the teaching chapters of the book are grouped in pairs. The first chapter of the pair (which is always an odd number) is where a new idea like a scale pattern is introduced. Then the second chapter in the pair is where you do your exercising and practicing of what you've learned. This is helpful convention, and because it is used consistently it makes it easier to use the book as a reference. You jump in and find the topic you want to practice and you know exactly what to expect.
The next section is about arpeggios. They explain a little about the nature of arpeggios, including the fact that they are a little like scales and a little like a cross between scales and chords. Next they provide several arpeggio patterns you can learn. Again, after teaching you several major arpeggio positions, you get to play a couple of songs that really let you enjoy the sound of the arpeggios, not just playing exercise. By the way, all the CD track numbers are shown in the book directly above the exercises and songs so it's very easy to find the music on the disk that goes along with what you are learning to play. This section also has minor and seventh chord arpeggio instruction.
After scales and arpeggios, they give you chord exercises. Here they explain about chord inversions. And They talk about inside and outside chords, and give you a lot of patterns to learn and practice with. They have some beautiful example songs, just like in the other units, which illustrate how beautiful and spiced up a song can sound with the inversion techniques they teach you.
In addition to the main practice sections of scales, chords, and arpeggios, the book also has some information having a good practice session. Tips on warming up and getting the most out of your practice time with the guitar. As well as a list of ways to improve your musicianship.
