It will get exponentially easier after you’ve worked through a few keys. Of those 72 chord and scale forms, most are repeated, with the only exceptions being where open strings are involved. As hard as this may seem, it will get easier, and it will pay off.
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MrWookiee
Country Gent
Is it better to go across, then down- i.e learn all 3 variants of a chord, then move to the next - or learn all the Ones, then the Twos...?
I should clarify, at the end of the day, there are three Major forms and three minor forms. Most are movable, and a handful employ open string notes. It’s slow at first, but it’s not that many forms.
I would follow the order they are presented in the book, key by key. It will serve you well in the future to think in terms of keys.
Bertotti
Gretschified
Traveling and working non stop I’m home and will get back into this this weekend. I am hoping things slow down a bit but there are several new facility builds for work that are sucking up my times soon.
Keep us posted.
Bertotti
Gretschified
I will. I will start by refreshing everything I already did then start the next one.
Bertotti
Gretschified
I have cleanly slowly hit all of these finally but the 12th fret AMinor is come and go with all fingers. Sometimes it works sometimes it doesn’t.
Bertotti
Gretschified
I find it’s like the chop chords on a Mandolin. I couldn’t come close to laying those at first but now I can. Stretch and also my fingertips seemed to grow a bit longer! Not all callouses but the flesh did thicken.
Bertotti
Gretschified
I’ll tell you what really kills me. I can remember words from books movies shows actors were in Almost every road I have traveled but remember anything music is like trying to remember how to do basic math in Kindergarten.
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Scott Fraser
Country Gent
Is there a reason this is notated as it sounds, rather than transposed, as all guitar notation is?
Indeed, the fingers on my left hand are longer than on my right hand.
That’s the point of the book it is written in actual pitch.
Scott Fraser
Country Gent
I guess to make a point, i.e. elucidating the theory, but it seems needlessly confusing as a practical guide for guitarists, who are taught from day 1 to read transposed for the instrument. But, I haven't seen the book so I don't know what he's aiming at.
Ironically, I was introduced to this book by a fellow named Scott Fraser. Johnny’s point is that transposing up an octave is not a good practice. Having lived on both sides of that divide, I agree with him, wholeheartedly.
Having been schooled in this approach for over 40 years now, I find it quite useful. For one thing, I can read a piano sheet in actual pitch and, in many cases, play the piano voicings, directly on guitar. Studying this approach doesn’t erase my ability to read transposed notation, and I’m completely comfortable either way, but for anything beyond a simple lead sheet, actual pitch works much better for me.
One other advantage is the Smith’s approach is that it automatically makes one more aware of integrating a coherent bass line and voice leading in arrangements.
For the heck of it, move forward to the next key, and you’ll start to see a pattern emerge. I promise you, once you’ve gone through all 12 keys, this will seem as simple as 1 + 1 = 2.
Scott Fraser
Country Gent
I know there's a jazz guitarist named Scott Fraser somewhere in the upper Midwest, Minnesota or Wisconsin maybe?
Scott is a tremendous player, at Jazz, Country, Chet-Style, Blues and Rock. I’ve known Scott for many years. He is the best guitarist I’ve ever known, and considering that I knew Johnny Smith, that’s saying a mouthful.
Scott was initially classically trained, and carried his precise approach to technique forward into other genres. Scott studied with Mike Elliot, one of Johnny Smith’s students, and picked up a lot of Johnny’s techniques from Mike. These were passed along to me, when I took lessons from Scott, and this improved my playing considerably.
Here’s Scott’s YouTube channel.
