I am sure that a lot of you (rock fans) admire voices such Bruce Dickinson (Of Iron Maiden, of course), Michael Kiske (ex Helloween, “the silver throat” as some used to call him - by the way, I am a big fan of you, man!!) and others with similar abilities. I know I do. I love this kind of voices. What I didn’t know is that you can actually study this kind of vocal technique and that the way they sing is not just pure talent or God given voice but also studied technique. Here in Romania, I am not aware of someone teaching this kind of things. Of course we have all kind of music schools and a lot of great vocal trainers, but, damn, I don’t think we have something similar to this.

Here’s a movie of a guy singing a Queensryche’s song. He is a student of this private rock class. Of course, lead singers like Dickinson or Kiske are not born every day, but admit it, he’s there!

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This will be a short one. I remember when I started to get interested in guitars that something started to burn me inside, I just needed to learn to play! I had a high school class mate that used to bring the guitar to school back then and each time I used to see him playing, I felt such a strong urge to learn it myself.

He usually brought the acoustic guitar, a big one with a full and warm sound. Once he brought a Fender like electric guitar that it looked sooo  damn good! Red, if I well remember…

So I wonder: what actually makes us want so much to play the guitar? Why do YOU started to play the guitar?

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I have always admired Jazz guitar players, but I am not into Jazz. And I surely don’t like all kind of Jazz music, I love melodic one, not that modern-I-can’t-understand-it Jazz. I love the creativity that these guys show and the chromatic scale improvisations. I think this is what fascinates me the most: chromatic scales, because there is not much theory there. Instead there is much creativity, inspiration and feeling, the very heart of Jazz music.

For me, Jazz it is like an alien world, a world still not open to me but full of hidden poetry. Don’t yet consider me uneducated, please don’t! I have listened some (some is the keyword here) but indeed, not a lot. However, it is fascinating to me the way (inspired) Jazz musicians come up with the most beautiful chromatic phrases that always make sense…As George Benson said, “everything works in Jazz”. Right, but only if you know how to make it work!

Note: I embedded the following movie only for the first 10 seconds, I think, of Charlie Parker, not for the lesson itself. I find those liks just lovely. What do you think?

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Dr. J brought to my attention this guy, Michael Kelsey, that of course, I didn’t know about! I found him to be a great acoustic guitar player, as his website (michaelkelsey.com) says:

MICHAEL KELSEY cannot be limited to a simple description. When you listen to his music and see him perform live you’re witnessing more than a just another singer-songwriter. You’re watching a rhythmic, inspired guitarist and performance artist who brews soul, funk and even a little bit of the blues into a guitar festival of organic sound. Multi-instrumentalist Kelsey has been known to blend many musical genres with fervor and grace. When he hits the stage to perform, he plays every inch of his guitar and makes it sing, soar, pop and ping–by strumming it, pounding it and pulling every part of it or anything else an arm’s length or foot kick away. He has created a style that he described best as “progressive-aggressive acoustic guitar,” and he has only begun to make a first impression.

He sings, plays the rhythm, solo, bass guitar and drums at the same time on the same acoustic guitar. But beyond words, there is music so I suggest you the same video Dr. J suggested to me, Slow movin’ train.

Enjoy!

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Starting today, January 14th, Chris Broderick is the new guitar player of Megadeth. Started as a rumor a few days ago on the internet, it is now announced that Chris Broderick officially replaced Glen Drover, no more room for rumors. Glen Drover had problems balancing his family life with touring and band business so he left room for a new guitar player and the new guitar player is Broderick, formerly known as the guitar player of Jag Panzer and Nevermore. Now he is officially the new axe player of Megadeth.

Great news for him!

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Last night I have seen on CarbonFiberGear.com, through Guitarz, a great looking guitar that I didn’t know about. The guitar is called The Handle and comes from XOXAudioTools.com. The guitar is made of carbon fiber, with a hallow body that enhances the sound resonance. I find this to be a great looking guitar, and somehow reminds me of Yamaha Silent Guitar.

I was also curious to see how it plays, how this guitar sounds since more than how it looks, a guitar needs to sound well, so I have searched on YouTube (of course!) for a video test. Here’s what I found:

Also, XOX Audio Tools seems that has a whole line of carbon fiber guitars, electric and acoustic and not only. Theyhave a mandolin too! A carbon fiber mandolin! Now, isn’t that cool or what?!

Later edit: Thanks to Dave from CarbonFiberGear.com,  who reminded me that only The Handle guitar comes from XOX, not the rest of the guitars presented there. What I can say? This guitar had all my love so it totally got my attention and I missed this! Mea culpa!

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I saw this on YouTube, man what creepy sounds you can make with an electric guitar and a slide…

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Today, because I watched a video on YouTube, I asked myself how many ways of playing the guitar we know. Ways like in how to keep the guitar, how to use it, not as in electric vs acoustic or musical styles. However, in some cases, particular techniques can be defined as an other way of playing the guitar, case when I will put a separate entry for them. Let’s see:

1) The normal way

I didn’t know how to call it in an other way than the normal way, because this is exactly what it is, in my opinion, the normal way of playing the guitar: you hold the guitar hung by your neck/shoulder and you pick/strum strings with one hand while pushing them with the other hand to get particular notes. Doh! Like this.

1b) Guitar tapping

Well, here there are many things to say. Guitar tapping is one of the favorite techniques of the 80’s, starting with Van Halen and remembering Michael Angelo Batio’s 2 hand playing/tapping. But I want to put here an other style of music, not hard/heavy rock , but Jazz. See Stanley Jordan’s version of Stair to heaven here:

2) Lap playing styleOK, this one is one of those moments when I am not sure how to categorize it since the position is different and at the same time the way of playing, usually with a metal or glass slide thus forcing me to refer to this as an other (4rd) style also. Used a lot for Hawaiian music(with specific guitars) but also for blues.
As Wikipedia says:

“The lap steel guitar is typically placed on the player’s lap, or on a stool in front of the player, who is seated.

The strings are not pressed to a fret when sounding a note, rather, the player holds a metal slide called a steel in the left hand, which is moved along the strings to change the instrument’s pitch while the right hand plucks or picks the strings.

This method of playing greatly restricts the number of chords available, so lap steel music often features a restricted set of harmonies (such as in blues). Alternatively, the lap steel guitar player can play the melody or another single part.“

Like this:

2b) Playing with a slide

I called this 4rd way of playing (since I consider it to be a different mode, not just a technique) 2b because it is somehow similar to the second because of the slide being used. We are speaking now mostly about blues music, the guitar being hold in “the normal way” while the the notes are obtained by sliding a piece of round glass or metal on guitar strings. Like this:

3) Andy McKee unique finger-style

OK, if you can or know better than me, find a better name for this cause I can’t. Composed of a series of techniques such as normal string picking,tapping, hitting and beating the poor guitar box, his style is truly unique. Here’s Andy McKee:

I would also put here Dominic Frasca with his way of playing, in the same category, in a way. More taping than Andy McKee. Also related to 1b)
Or Erik Mongrain with his lap style of playing the guitar combined with the 2 above. Of course, there is always THE FUNNY AND EXTREME WAY!!! where 2 guys share the same guitar

I ask also my fellow guitar bloggers to help me add more styles here, if they know more. Guys?!! (Jon, GuitarMX, JP, Dr. J,Cary , Ignacio and all of you blogging the guitar!)If you liked this, subscribe to RSS and please remember to Digg and Stumble this! Spread the word! Thank you!

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Today somebody entered my site searching for 12 strings fretless guitars. Man, is there such thing as 12 strings fretless guitar? What would you do with such an instrument? What would be the use? The exact use of those 12 string would be for strumming while I would find difficult to use chords while fretless…

Anyway, maybe use it like a mandolin? The mandolins I think that have the strings doubled to sound full and can be used at “soloing” at the same time. Because I couldn’t find a picture with a 12 string fretless guitar, here’s a mandolin!

By the way, if you know somebody knowing somebody who has a friend owning a 12 string fretless axe, let us know!

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I didn’t know Benjamin Lechuga since the only Chile music I listen from time to time is that acoustic folk that some Latin America musicians play in the middle of the city square. Actually I think they are from Peru, not from Chile. Anyway, I didn’t know him or his music and I found about him or his band, Delta(playing progressive rock music), this morning by reading GuitarPlayerZen. Benjamin Lechuga is not the regular hero everybody posts about since he has not such a great visibility for the moment but he has the support of Ibanez after winning the Ibanez Project when 17, has his part of recognition, playing with Andy Timmons and a lot of talent, in my opinion.

Find more about him on his website here. Enjoy and comment, Digg and Stumble! Thank you !

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