Skins v.s. Pats, Carlos Rogers out for the Season

Click here for a recap of the woeful tromping of the Redskins by the Patriots. This is a funny one!
So, you know, the game starts. We win the toss. Nice. We get out there, it’s tough going. But we hit a couple plays, convert some third downs…honestly, it didn’t feel so bad. Just two NFL [...]

The End of an Era….

….an era of boredom!
What I mean is the end of baseball season.
Let me be the first to congratulate the Boston Redsox on their victory over the Rockies in the World Series. I am grateful to them for thier hard work and talent that allowed them to sweep the Rockies. Why? Because that [...]

DADGAD Tuning

One of my first musical influences was a friend by the name of Dan Lotti. Dan was a friend who grew up in the same area as me, though I didn’t really know him until college. At that point Dan had been playing guitar most of his life, and it showed. Dan was one of [...]

Mark Dzuiba

When I attended the National Guitar Workshop in Connecticutt (for five straight weeks) back in 1998, Mark Dziuba was one of the instructors. The workshop was broken up into week long schedules where you chose your classes. After attending the first of his classes I made sure to take everything that he taught!
Mark is a [...]

Beau Leopard Designs: Custom Bass Guitar

Beau Leopard is a NY area luthier and bass player. He attended Berklee College of Music, and the Roberto-Venn School of Luthiery. So, you know that he isn’t just a hack guitar builder with slick website and good photography skills. Good thing too because these are some of the most beautiful instruments that I’ve [...]

Essay on Improvisation I

Instrumental improvisation is one of the most difficult skills for an aspiring musician to master. It represents one of the pinnacle achievments for most musicians. While in certain styles of music you can get away with never needing to improvise, for Jazz musicians it is a necessity. One of the reasons why improvisation is so [...]

Jimmy Bruno

I used to participate in an online jazz guitar discussion group and the subject of Jimmy Bruno came up. There is a quote on Jimmy’s website from Johnny Smith that says, “”JIMMY BRUNO HAS NO PEERS. His taste, concept and technique is unsurpassed as a jazz guitar player…” A few of the participants thought that [...]

The Purpose of Scales

For a modern guitar player scales serve a few definite purposes. I think that it is important to establish the purpose of scales before we consider how to practice them. I have listed those purposes in no particular order.
Establishing the sound of a certain key/scale
Understanding theory
Knowing the notes on the fretboard
Technique
A framework for improvisation
These are [...]