Issue 002 The FREE Interactive Guitar Magazine · PDF fileGUITAR COACH MAGAZINE : ISSUE 002 Blues Special Songs, Riffs, ... a classic Blues riffs and licks 40 ... The rock ‘n’

Plus guitar news, features, profiles & cool new Apps.

Blues Road Warrior

EugeneHideaway BridgesPlay JJ Cale,Robert Cray,& Blues BrothersStep by step video lessons

Issue 002

The FREE Interactive Guitar Magazine

Beginners BootcampRiffs & Licks

Skills & TechniquesGuitars & GizmosCoaching Sessions

GUITAR COACH MAGAZINE : ISSUE 002

BluesSpecialSongs, Riffs,

Licks & Solos

MAGAZ INE

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Contents

Note from the Editor 5

What’s Hot & What’s Not! 6

The Blues Debate 11

The Blues: Then & Now 13

Chord of the Month 18

Nils Lofgren Interview; Part 2 25

Guitar Top 10s 29

Quick Survey 39

Songwriting & Detuning 52

FAQs 54

Lesson Videos, Tutorials and Tips

Eugene on the road...page 35Guitarist Eugene “Hideaway” Bridges, a nativeof New Orleans, with seven albums to hiscredit and three recent nominations from theBlues Foundation...

Dillon teaches The Blues...page 20Jimmy Dillon is an accomplished and award-winning musician, singer, songsmith andteacher with an impressive record. ..

The eJamming revolution...page 49New technology that allows musicians to jamand collaborate anytime, anywhere...

Beginners BootcampRelax and get into the correct postion to play.Plus an introduction to Fingerstyle playing

7

Features

Riffs, Licks & SolosFrom The Blues Brothers to Clapton - a seriesa classic Blues riffs and licks

40

Skills & TechniquesThe string muting, bass note picking strum.It’s got something for everyone!

22

Coaching SessionA great fun session, developing your improvskills, with our cool Blues backing track

15

Guitars & GizmosGuitar Makers, plus the latest guitar Apps andtech stuff

28

Issue 002

Guitar Coach Magazine 5Editor’s note

Hi and welcome to our Blues insprired issue...

In this second issue of Guitar Coach magazine, we’ve gone for aBlues flavour with some of our features, articles and Coaching sessions.

New this month, we’ve also got a survey for you. This is your oppor-tunity to get the content you want every month. It only takes 30seconds to complete the survey, so don’t miss this great opportu-nity to help shape Guitar Coach magazine to suit you!

Also keep your questions coming for our FAQs.

And finally keep submitting those ratings and reviews, as they arewhat will help us to grow our subscriber numbers and enable us tocontinue to publish Guitar Coach free of charge.

So, have fun, and do let me know what you think about the maga-zine. Just email me at [email protected]

Jonathan HowkinsEditor, Guitar Coach magazine

ContributorsMany thanks to our contributors:

Eugene Hideaway BridgesJimmy DillonThe eJamming teamNick BenjaminRikky RooksbyHarrison Marsh

And to our writing team:Bob CianciGraham LandBen VineTom Rosier

And our special thanks to:Andy Partridge of BandJammer

Cover shot: Alyn Coates

We hope you enjoy this issue of Guitar Coachmagazine and we look forward to bringing youmuch more great free stuff in the next issue.

But we need your help :)In order for us to continue to produce this magazine free of charge, we need to get theword out to as many people as possible - and to do this we need your help.

All you have to do is either tell your guitar play-ing friends about it, ‘Like’ us on Facebook, ormaybe Tweet about us :)

You help is much appreciated, thank you.

Keeping it Free!

Guitar Coach Magazine 6News

What’s Hot...

Wes Scantlin, lead singer of Puddle of Mudd, could face jail time after a drunken encounteron a flight because the crew allegedly refused to serve the singer alcohol.

Green Day release 3 new tracks from their up coming trilogy of Albums, Uno,Dos and Tre, the first of which is due for release later this month.

An eBay auction to support the Randy Blythe (Lamb Of God) LegalFund for his recent manslaughter charge includes guitars and bassesfrom Slash, Megadeth, Gwar and Five Finger Death Punch.

A 13-year-old girl's dream came true Wednesday at the Minnesota State Fair when she gotto meet Motley Crue’s Nikki Sixx after the glam-rocker saw her anti-bullying video onYouTube.

Prog Magazine holds its first ever award ceremony in London.

What’s Not...Eddie van Halen narrowly avoids death after tri-alling a diet containing too much cayenne pepperand nearly had his “stomach explode”.

A new scientific study has noted that pop music, over the last fivedecades, has gotten more depressing.

A deadly spider which hid in one of Noel Gallagher’s guitar cases prompted an emergency quarantine whileexperts tried to catch the insect at Jersey Live Festival.

An LA store owner and music producer has received hate mail after releasing an album of "new" musicfrom notorious imprisoned serial murderer, CharlesManson.

Guns N' Roses have hosted a new auction that includes their oldclothes dryer for $110.

Metallica frontman James Hetfield says there are toomany rock bands, but the best will survive and keep thegenre alive.

What’s Hot and What’s Not this month!By Tom Rosier

Guitar Coach Magazine 7

Beginners Bootcamp– Guitar basics; Hand positions

– Introduction to Fingerstyle

Guitar Coach Magazine 8Boot Camp

Any seasoned, acoustic guitaristwill tell you about the perils oftendonitis and RSI, but it's notjust the professionals that cansuffer.

The best way to avoid these issues is to get a correct and comfortabletechnique right from the start.

There are a few rules with hand position that apply for both hands;firstly if it doesn't feel comfortabledon't do it!

New idea's may feel unfamiliar but avoid hugestretches or extreme wrist angles, becasue youwill almost always find that there is a more com-fortable way of doing things such as changingthe fingering of that chord.

Secondly, just like any exercise, warm up and warndown, ten minutes of scales or simple familiar ex-ercises at a slow tempo before you start will in-crease your stamina, muscle memory and avoidany strains making playing uncomfortable.

Though some famously heavy handed playersmay disagree, keep everything light. Firstly hittingthe strings harder puts more strain on your handsand wrists and is unnecessary, and secondly onetell tell sign of an experienced player is a good un-derstanding and use of dynamics. It's one of thebeautiful things about guitar, and by playingquite lightly, there's room to increase volume andattack when you want a passage to sound moredynamic.

Try this, hold a chord as you normally would andkeep strumming it. Now without lifting your fin-gers from the strings, gradually decrease the pres-sure your using in your left hand until you start toget a buzzing sound. Now the amount of pressureyou were using on that last strum before the buzzis the minimum amount needed to play thatchord. Is it lighter than you normally hold the gui-tar? Thought so! Keeping this in mind makes

changing between chords smoother. A similar ap-proach can be applied to the right hand.

A good starting point for the left hand is to as-sume a "one finger per fret" hand position, i.e ifyour index finger is playing the first fret, your lit-tle finger should be hovering over the fourth.

With your right hand, experiment to find yourown comfortable hand position but avoid strainon the wrist and try and keep your hand loose. Itcan be tempting to tense up but not only will thisbe uncomfortable, your playing will not sound assmooth as you want it to.

Finally, a few words on how acoustic guitars work.Strum an open chord, and whilst this chord isringing out place your hand flat against the bodyjust behind the bridge. You should notice that thesound has changed slightly, becoming slightlymore muffled. The top of an acoustic guitar vi-brates as you play as the sound waves flowthrough it. If your hand or wrist is contact withthe top of the guitar you are going to deaden theguitar slightly. It's also going to limit your playing.You will notice in the video that my hand is hover-ing over the strings and each finger is resting onthe string it's about to play, or just over the stringthat is ringing out. Lightly touching the stringwith your right hand finger will stop any noteringing and in turn stop notes ringing into eachother, making everything much clearer.

Playing Basics: Hand positionsby Harrison Marsh

Guitar Coach Magazine 9Boot Camp

Welcome to this introduction to finger style acoustic guitar; a playing stylethat has found it's way into every genre of music.

Whether it be as an accompanist or solo player,finger picking is a dynamic technique withoutlimitation.

Above, and in the video, I have laid out some sim-ple exercises reminiscent of how I got into thestyle, over ten years ago.

These exercises are designed to be fluid, givingyou a chance to put your own mark on them.Once you can play them to a standard you arehappy with, take the same right hand patternsand apply them to any chord sequence you like, orstart mixing up the order your finger pluck thestrings in.

It will take some time to find the right hand posi-tion that’s most comfortable for you and to builddexterity, particularly in your ring finger, whichisn't used to doing anything.

Repetition and time spent with the instrument iskey here. Muscle memory will be your biggest

friend with your favourite finger patterns becom-ing automatic; just don't get stuck in the samefew patterns!

The rolling arpeggio exercise uses the conven-tional way of showing which fingers to use as fol-lows PIMA. P= Thumb, I = Index , M = middle, A =ring

Mixing pinching, strumming and rolling tech-niques will give your playing rhythmic variety anddepth.

Experimentation is key to having fun and gettingthe most out of finger style guitar. Try growingyour right hand finger nails out for a little moreclarity and attack.

Finally, to understand more about this technique,like many others, you have to study the great play-ers of the style, whether it be classic blues playersor modern acoustic soloists.

Have fun.

Fingerstyle: Introductionby Harrison Marsh

Guitar Coach Magazine 10Boot Camp

Fingerstyle Exercises

Guitar Coach Magazine 11The Debate

For the BluesThe Blues is a fundamental part of everypiece of music you listen to. All of them. AndI'm going to prove it to you.

First of all, let's start at the obvious. The Beatleswould have got nowhere without emulating theirblues influences and bringing them to the main-stream. Don't deny it, it's the truth. And the Beat-les had a tiny influence on popular music,wouldn't you say? Also they covered Chuck Berrysongs. I can almost rest my case there...

Yes, 12-bar can be repetitive and, dare I say it, bor-ing, but the chord structure is a key part of everystyle of popular music that has arisen since. Youmay not like Chuck Berry, but it's artists like thatwhich shaped the music you listen to every day,from metal through to punk and back out to clas-sic rock and prog.

The rock ‘n’ roll movement changed music forever.You can’t escape it. Just like you can't escape LadyGaGa on mainstream radio, or that terrible "Fri-day" song being played in offices around theworld EVERY FRIDAY. Even if it is "as a joke". Eventhese diabolical excuses for songwriting stemfrom the basics. Three or four chords, basic struc-ture and a hook.

Punk music is simple, raw and influential. Threewords you would also use to describe the blues.Because it is the blues. Three chords based arounda pentatonic scale? Definitely blues.

"Metal's based on complicated chord structuresand classical influences" I hear you cry. Well couldthey recreate that sound without distorted gui-tars pioneered by early blues artists such asChuck Berry on "Maybellene" and multi-trackrecording which was innovated by blues legendLes Paul? I'll help you out - the answer is no.

Oh and, by the way, if you hate blues because it allsounds like Status Quo then I have no time foryou. You shouldn't have even been listening toStatus Quo in the first place. What's wrong withyou? Anyone who uses Status Quo to back uptheir argument is an idiot.

Against the BluesSo, the blues may be the ‘godfather’ of popu-lar music today, and yeah sure, without theblues we would not have rock ‘n’ roll, pop,punk and metal cementing its status as thebackbone of the industry for generations oflisteners, but the fact that it could even beblamed for a tiny influence on Miley Cyrus isreason enough to hate it, surely?!

Now, for any abuse I give the blues there will al-ways be those who argue that the blue’s has in-

The Blues: love it or hate it?

We’ve all got our opinions, so let’s share them! Click either the Facebook or Twitter iconsand have your say :)

Guitar Coach Magazine 12The Debate

fluenced everything, from distorted guitar to har-monic arrangements, but just because somethinginfluenced something else does not give it anyworthy notoriety. Apollo 1 influenced Apollo 11,but I would hardly consider Apollo 1 a success,would you?!

Have you heard THAT new country-blues song?!Of course you have!!! We all have!!! A milliontimes, by a million different artists who all havethe same southern-American vocal tone and 12-bar blues arrangement. This is what I truly hateabout the blues: the repetitiveness… repetitive-ness… repetitiveness. It’s like pulling teeth, butthe teeth are being pulled by a man who’s hair isa little too long, jeans a little too tight and belly ishanging over said jeans a little too much. Now Iknow that all popular music today is repetitive,and all music has to have a sense of repetition sothat it is simply not just noise, but the blues… theblues just takes repetitiveness to a whole newlevel. I have even gone to the effort of using thewords repetitiveness and repetitive to such an ex-cessive extent to give you the same sense ofrepetitive hatred that I hear each time the soundof the blues worms its way into my poor unsus-pecting ears.

Below I have made a list of a few songs to helpput my next point across a little better. Pleasehave a listen to the following:

Chuck Berry – Johnny B GoodeThe Beach Boys – Fun, Fun, FunLouis Jordon – Ain’t That Just Like a WomanChuck Berry – Roll Over Beethoven

Now the fact that one artist is in this list twice isalmost pathetic. My point is: listen to the intro ofeach of these songs. Each are blues artists (apartfrom maybe the Beach Boys’, who are in that diffi-cult 1960’s rock/pop/blues era, but for the sake ofmy argument they are blues), so already a similarsound is expected, but the same intro?! They’venot even tried to make them sound different.Lazy! The blues is lazy! If I were to take Queen’sDon’t Stop Me Now solo and use it in my songwould that be OK?! No, it wouldn’t! I’d never getaway with it, because it’s not my solo, and be-cause it is already well established as a part of avery popular song. But, then again, I would nothave the audacity to attempt such a feat of pure,unadulterated plagiarism. And like I said, the factthat Chuck Berry is in here twice effectively copy-ing himself is shocking. Calling him a musician orsongwriter would be a crime. This surely makeshim a lyricist with an endless backing track atbest. Maybe they have the blues because they’renot very creative?!

Now everyone is entitled to their opinion, and Icould well be a misinformed cretin (which I’mnot), but if the only positive aspect of a genre isthat when you go to a Status Quo concert andmiss your favourite song when buying a beer youcan catch it again (another 4 times) later in theset, you’re certainly not onto a winner in my eyes.

Join the debate and let us know what YOU think!

The Blues: love it or hate it?

So, what do you think?

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Guitar Coach Magazine 13Blues; Now & Then

For this month's Blues edition of GuitarCoach Magazine we decided to take a look atsome of the famous locations and cities thatbirthed the Blues, and what music they're fa-mous for now.

Memphis – Let's start with Tennessee. Memphisgoes hand in hand with the Blues, from the veryfirst Blues sheet music. “The Memphis Blues” waswritten down by W.C. Handy in 1912 and it hasbeen the cradle for all blues music since. Someicons include B.B King and the entire call list ofSun Records. Today it is widely known as the birth-place of Justin Timberlake.

Chicago – Became the birth place of the modernday electric blues from 1948. Now it is the drivingforce behind America's heavy metal scene.

Montreux Jazz Festival started in 1967 for thelikes of Ella Fitzgerald. Gary Moore, Eric Claptonand Deep Purple, who wrote “Smoke On TheWater” there in 1971. Now it plays host to Queensof the Stone Age and even Wyclef Jean in 2009.

New York - New York Blues was a type of bluesmusic heavily influenced by jazz. It made NewYork a centre for folk rock music from the likes ofBob Dylan, new wave punk from the Ramones andthe Velvet Underground.

Seattle – Played host to a huge Big Band scene inthe 1940's, have since spawned Nirvana andDeath Cab for Cutie.

Great Britain – The U.K. first got to know Blues asa result of records being brought in through thedockyards and trade ships. Hitting it's peak in the1960's and 70's with the likes of the RollingStones, Led Zeppelin and Eric Clapton. It's good tosee the genre is alive and well today with actssuch as Seasick Steve and the Jim Jones Revue.

Detroit – With a strong blues scene in the 40'sand 50's led by the bars and clubs of HastingsStreet, it spawned the influence on R'n'B whichled to Motown Records. Today, Detroit's son JackWhite brings blues into the 21st Century with hisbands the White Stripes and the Raconteurs.

Los Angeles -  L.A. had a thriving blues commu-nity in the 30's and 40's. It has since exploded intoa variety of genres, influenced by film, punk, metaland hip hop. Los Angeles has produced a fine arrayof bands ranging from The Doors, Red Hot ChiliPeppers, Guns 'n' Roses and Sublime - to name buta few.

Blues Locations: Then and Now

Join me for a Special Webinar:

“The Magic Of Improvisation”

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Guitar Coach Magazine 14

Guitar Coach Magazine 15

Coaching session– Blues Improvisation

Guitar Coach Magazine 16Coaching

Your 20 Minute Coaching Session

Improvisation: Open minor pentatonic

The notes of theEm Pentatonic

Images from GuitarToolkit (click animage for details onthis App)

This month, Andy is going to introduce you to the art of improvisation. This particular sessionintroduces you to the E minor pentatonic scale in the open position.

This particular session introduces you to the Eminor pentatonic scale in the open position i.e.using the open strings wherever possible, anddemonstrates the notes you can use to enableyou to begin your improvisation journey. A level ofscale knowledge is essential when learning howto improvise.

We have had bucket loads of requests on thistopic, which is why we have decided to produce awhole series of improvisation lessons, startingwith this overview.

There is also a downloadable backing track foryou to jam along with, so you can experimentwith playing notes over the top, at your own pace.

Next month, we will be using the same backingtrack to show you some techniques and lick sug-gestions you can use, that will enable you to startbuilding up your improvisation tool kit.

Hope you enjoy.

Guitar Coach Magazine 17Coaching

Improvisation: Blues Riff

The backing track chords: Emaj, Amaj and BmajImages from Guitar Toolkit (click an image for details on this App)

Improv session

Your Backing Track

“The Magic Of Improvisation”Enjoy this Free teaching Webinar with Andy Partridge of BandJammer.

Free Webinar: Register Here!

Should it have a long name? Should you have touse 4 fingers and a thumb to be able play it?Could we find one that had featured in some farout wacky seventies progressive rock album?

Well – no. Because this issue of Guitar Coach is fo-cusing on the blues our minds turned immedi-ately towards a 9th chord. D9 in fact. Mainlybecause the key of D is one of the easier blueskeys to master and therefore quite common forthose of us who are starting out on our guitarjourney. It also has an interesting shape whenplayed in the open position. We will not be goinginto the theory aspect of 9ths, but we will bemore than happy to answer any questions if youwant to use the FAQ section of the magazine.

9th chords are known as extended chords (as are6ths, 11ths and 13ths) and are commonly usedthroughout the funk, jazz and blues genres. Al-though we are concentrating on D9, the inver-sions of the chord can be applied to all 9th chordsby moving the chord shape up and down the fret-board by understanding where the root note isfretted.

The 9th shape that we will focus our efforts on isshown below: The notes that make up the chordare:

A string – D

D string - F#

G string – C

B string – E

Top E string - A

When played using this shape, the root note is al-ways on the A string – in this case the D (rootnote) is on the 5th fret. You can therefore movethis shape anywhere on the fretboard to formother 9ths.

When the chord is played this way it exudes amellow blues sound and is commonly used at theend of a phrase within a song by sliding downfrom the fret above. For example, the 6th fret(Eb9) to the D9 chord.

To illustrate this, we have used the D9 chord inone of the riffs in this month’s issue. You can seethis illustrated and watch, listen and learn theintro to Sugar Mama by Nine Below.

Similarly, many a song has been known to endusing this sequence. The Doors’ Roadhouse Bluesuses the F9 to E9 slide down to finish off theirmasterpiece and it is a great way to end a songthat has been bursting with energy throughout.The slide down brings an apt calmness and final-ity to proceedings without cutting off everythingwith an immediate stop. Whoever first thought ofthis is a genius.

If you are playing a standard 12 bar in the key of Dusng the major chords D…A…G try substitutingthese majors for 9ths and you will achieve a to-tally different feel that is less edgy and feels morerounded and moody. Especially if you slow thetempo down.

Guitar Coach Magazine 18Guitar Chords

It’s strage isn’t it? A few days ago we were thinking what weird, perhaps complex, unusualchord should feature for this month.

Chord of the Month: D9

23

45

6

X

The D9 Chord

Guitar Coach Magazine 19Guitar Chords

Also try this chord sequence G7-C9-D9. Either inthat order or as part of a slow 12 bar blues, eachfor a count of 4 i.e. G7 G7 G7 G7 C9 C9 G7 G7 D9C9 G7 D9 (Letting the last chord ring and then re-peat) The extra texture the 9th chords give thesequence is very noticeable when compared tothe G7.

The other great sound you can achieve with thisshape can be achieved by plucking the A string,followed by the D, G and B strings and then re-turning back to the A string in reverse order.Andy teaches this as an aside after The Nine

Below Zero riff lesson – so have a listen and youwill see exactly what we mean.

Of course, as mentioned earlier in this article,other genres of music also make use of the 9thchord played in the position of the 1st chord dia-gram. To “get to know” your D9 chord it is impor-tant to use it in context with other chords.Examples you may like to check out are ShiningStart by Earth Wind and Fire (C9, D9 and E9),Wheels by The Foo Fighters (D9, A, F#M, E) andlast but not least, James Joseph Brown’s classic,Living in America (Bm, Am7 and D9).

Chord of the Month: D9

Here are some other ways of playing a D9.

The images are courtesy of Guitar Toolkit. Checkout Issue 1 of Guitar Coach for the full review ofthis great App.

Tap here to check out Guitar Toolkit

Guitar Coach Magazine 20Feature

“Have fun with it” – The SF, California professionalguitarist shares his wisdom or learning, becoming inspired and staying motivated

Background & Theory

San Francisco Bay area guitarist Jimmy Dillon isan accomplished and award-winning musician,singer, songsmith and teacher with an impressiverecord. Jimmy backed up the likes of Bruce Spring-steen, John Lee Hooker, B.B. King, Carlos Santanaand Bonnie Raitt, among many others before em-barking on a solo career and recording 4 CDs todate. A quick listen to just a small sampling of hisrepertoire reveals an eclectic mix of blues, rock,country and Latin styles. Just a glance at hishomepage makes it clear that this guy is one ac-tive musician who continues to play a constantstream of solo and group gigs.

Jimmy is also a passionate guitar teacher with aseries of DVD lessons for acoustic, electric, bluesand slide guitar. He spends his summers teachingkids how to play rock and roll at Blue Star MusicCamps in Michigan and San Francisco and givesonline lessons as well.

Jimmy offers the following advice to aspiring gui-tarists who are struggling to learn:

“Don't struggle too much. Have fun with it. Getwith some better players and listen as much asyou play. Remember the 4 T's – Touch,Tone, Timeand Taste. Play with finesse, passion and melodicsense. Don't worry too much about speed, scales,shred[ing]. Rather, make it count. Be a goodrhythm player. 'Lead guitar' is so overdone.”

We couldn't agree more.

And for budding guitarists who may be seekingmotivation, Jimmy recommends going to see livemusicians for inspiration and mixing up whatstyles of music they expose themselves to. He be-lieves this will help those learning guitar to“cross-pollinate” and “get out of the box.”

Influences and Favourites

Among his favourite guitarists, Jimmy lists iconicnames like Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck,Jimmy Page, Mark Knopfler, Keith Richards (“KeefRiffhard”), John Mayer and Pete Townsend, plus aslough of other guitarists both well known andwell... perhaps a bit esoteric to the casual guitarplayer or guitar music fan: David Lindley, DerekTrucks, Buddy Miller, Harry Manx, Richard Thomp-son and slide guitarists Sonny Landreth, Ry Cooderand Leo Kottke.

He's also equally forthcoming about his preferredinstruments:

“Clapton Strat with acoustic Baggs [pickup] inbridge. It does everything well. Martin OMC –workhorse, always reliable, great tone and playa-bility. National Style O – super funky blues ma-chine. Veillette Gryphon mini 12-string – beautifulfor extra chimey stuff. James Trussart Silver Mag-nolia – great for electric slide. 1920s Chicago par-lor guitar – incredible tone.”

Jimmy Dillon: musician, songwriter, teacherby Graham Land

Guitar Coach Magazine 21Feature

About Jimmy Dillon's Rockin' the Blues Deluxe DVDcourse

With his latest instructional DVD, Jimmy shareshis secrets for playing the blues, from inventivechords, picking patterns, licks and tricks to opentunings, “internal melodies” and slide guitar tech-niques – all professional, yet “easy to use”. TheRockin' the Blues Deluxe course has been de-signed to suit advanced beginner guitarists aswell as intermediate to advanced players whowould like to lean more blues or incorporate itinto playing other music styles.

Jimmy sees blues guitar as the foundation forrock guitar.

“I wanted to illustrate how the blues is the rootsand the rest is the fruits. If you can get soulfuland gritty with the blues, your rock will be betterfor it. Consider Clapton, Keith [Richards], JimmyPage, Hendrix, [Jeff] Beck etc. – they were all bluesinformed.”

Teaching Style

The course consists of three one-hour DVDs, eachcontaining 3-4 chapters. Jimmy uses his ownsongs as a platform to demonstrate blues tech-niques and styles. He believes that DVDs are agreat teaching tool because they can be care-fully crafted in order to make them just right.The student benefits from this care and the factthat he/she can revisit the lessons again andagain.

When teaching, Jimmy likes to keep things re-laxed. “For me the journey is always changing….If Istay loose and free with it things go well. Not toorigid or pedantic.” A guitar teacher of 10 years, hisfavourite part of teaching is when the student ex-periences a breakthrough. “I like when there is an'ah ha' moment and the student gets [it]. Often Ilearn as much as the student!” He adds, “My wishis to pass on what I've learned as a lifetime promusician to aspiring players everywhere.”

You can visit Jimmy Dillon's homepage jimmydil-lon.com for more information and to buy hismusic or DVDs. If you've got Spotify you can checkout some of his solo CDs there as well as his workwith San Francisco Music Club.

Jimmy also recom-mends online guitarcommunity www.gui-tarists.net for its “greatvibe”.

Jimmy Dillon: musician, songwriter, teacher

Tap here for Rockin The Blues

Guitar Coach Magazine 22

Skills & Techniques– Blues strumming: Johnny Cash

Guitar Coach Magazine 23Skills & Techniques

Folsom Prison Blues is an archetypal Johnny Cashrhythm and is there to hear on many of his classicrecordings. It is a simple down, down up patternplayed at a relatively high tempo, although not allthe strings are always played and, to emphasisethe rhythm, you can employ a softening tech-nique with your left hand so the notes do not

sound. This creates a percussive-type sound whichgives the pattern a level of distinctiveness. Notplaying all the notes of a chord is a common tech-nique employed by rhythm guitarists and it isworth trying this out for other patterns. Want tosee more? Have a look at the video.

Skills: String Muting, Picking and Strumming

Folsom Prison BluesLearning to strum is one of the first hurdles beginners will need to overcome. It can prove tobe a frustration of many a guitarist , so it is always beneficial to keep such lessons interestingby learning patterns to specific songs. This particular strumming pattern is relatively easy toplay, employs a couple of interesting techniques and, most of all is lively and fun!

Guitar Coach Magazine 24Skills & Techniques

Skills: String Muting, Picking and Strumming

The ChordsChord digrams are taken from the Guitar Toolkit App. Click on one of the images for more details of this App.

Addition

Here’s the detail on how to playthe ending to the strummingsession :)

E major A major B7

Guitar Coach Magazine 25Feature

Springsteen sideman/solo artist expoundsfurther on his teaching/playing theories andmore

One-on-One vs. Online Teaching:

As we learned in Part I of this article, Nils Lof-gren’s online guitar school has been a solid suc-cess for the diminutive guitarist, best known as asideman with Neil Young, and Bruce Spring-steen’s E Street Band, as well as a solo artist ofconsiderable merit. When asked to comparelearning guitar face-to-face with a teacher versusonline, Lofgren had this to say.

“Sitting down one-on-one with somebody, whichI have done, is nice, and it’s a great way to share,as opposed to not sharing. Sometimes whenyou’re with a teacher, he dictates the flow, andsometimes he’s going too fast for you. The nicething about the online lessons, once it’s down-loaded, and I encourage people to do this is, find a

Nils Lofgren: Part 2 of our interviewBy Bob Cianci

lick you like, then shut me off! Work on that, andthat may be the rest of your day. You don’t need toturn me back on. Just silence the teacher and re-ally get into that one little lick.

“Find things that engage and excite you. I’m a bigfan of American football and basketball, and thereare guitars all over the house. I learned a longtime ago, if the guitars are in a closet or off in mystudio, I won’t pick one up. But I have themaround among the furniture, and will pick themup to play while I’m watching sports on TV.”

Playing With Bruce:

Lofgren admittedly went through a self-described“blue period” in the ‘80’s, and jumped at the op-portunity to join the New Jersey rocker’s E Streetband, just after Born In The USA was released.That album skyrocketed Springsteen to the top ofthe charts internationally, and allowed Lofgren to

play for the biggest audiences of his career. Sincethen, he has played a supporting role in the band,but the sometimes-spontaneous Springsteen oc-casionally throws a curve ball, like the night hegave Lofgren an unexpected extended solo on“Because The Night,” something we discussed inPart I of this article.

“I started working on a solo for that song in myroom at night, and sure enough, for the next fortyshows, I never got to play the solo again! Afterthe tour ended, we did some charity Christmasshows in New Jersey and Bruce asked me what Iwanted to play. I did one of my songs, ‘ShineSilently,” and when Bruce asked me what Iwanted to do for a second song, I said, ‘I want toplay ‘Because The Night’ and play the solo on it!’So, then I got to play this long piece I worked on.For the next tour, years later, I got to play the soloevery night, crafting it, refining it, and experi-menting. Some of it is tough for my hands, butevery guitarist has some kind of physical limita-tions.”

Out of curiosity, I went to Lofgren’s website andwatched a clip of the aforementioned solo, andwas suitably impressed with the sheer physicalityand artistry of Lofgren’s technique, as he em-ployed extreme bends, deft harmonics, fast-fin-gered triplets and straight ahead shredding.Always being a very animated stage presence, Nilscapped off his solo with a forward somersaultand spins. Trust me, it’s impressive.

Fab Gear:

Lofgren has always favored Fender guitars, al-though he’s been known to pick up a vintage ’52Les Paul Goldtop, a Telecaster, and a Rickenbackeron occasion. His main axe is a ’61 pre-CBS Strato-caster-he has another as a spare-with replace-ment pickups and the finish stripped to naturalwood. With Bruce, Nils straps on Fender Jazzmas-ters with heavy gauge 13-56 strings, and also usesa Gretsch Black Penguin or Black Falcon on occa-sion. He uses and endorses Takamine acoustics,and also treasures an old Martin given to him byNeil Young years ago. Lofgren uses Fender amps

Guitar Coach Magazine 26Feature

Nils Lofgren: Part 2 of our interview

Guitar Coach Magazine 27Feature

Nils Lofgren: Part 2 of our interview

The new AlbumThe new album, Old School, covers a variety oftopics including desperation, self-doubt, truelove, departed friends, holding on to yourdreams and the world gone mad... along with atribute to the late, great Ray Charles.

"These songs reflect characters with someradical feelings and beliefs," states Lofgren."They're definitely thought-provoking."

"Old School has many different types of songsand feels... some rough, bluesy tracks to haunt-ing acoustic songs," continues Lofgren. "There'ssome interesting and controversial characters inthese songs and I look forward to everyone's re-action."

The album is available directly from his web site www.nilslofgren.com

Tap Here To Visit www.NilsLofgren.com

on the road exclusively; currently two Twin Re-verbs, although he has also used Vibro Kings andSuper Reverbs.

Present & Future:

Nils Lofgren is a proactive exponent of self mar-keting. His website, www.nilslofgren.com, is atreasure trove of information that lists all his ac-tivities, as well as everything the guitarist offersfor sale, including recordings, online teachingcourses and various merchandise. A new projectLofgren is excited about these days is, Blind DateJam, a concept that sprang up over the yearsbased upon very casual and informal downtimejams among musicians. Lofgren realized that usaverage folk never get to hear some of this often-times memorable and spontaneous music. Theconcept was to plan nothing in advance. Bringyour instrument, and whatever happens “hap-pens,” as they say. The first edition of Blind DateJam is available for sale on Nils’ website, as onemight expect, and features Lofgren jamming withpedal steel guitarist Mike Smith. The music ishighly inspired and quite moving.

From a 2009 interview written by this author andpublished in Premier Guitar, Lofgren summed itall up.

“If you find yourself challenged, frustrated andpushing yourself to learn to play, don’t forgetto enjoy the gift of music. It has to be fun, too. Ifind myself consciously separating myself fromall the hard work simply to enjoy playingmusic, and I do it on a regular basis.”

by Bob Cianci.

Guitar Coach Magazine 28

Guitars & Gizmos– Guitar Top 10’s; Covers

– Guitar Apps; Garage Band

– Nick Benjamin, Luthier

Guitar Coach Magazine 29Guitar Top 10’s

Me First and The Gimme Gimmes – Hellohttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oI0d-kOxb4A

Starting this list we have an explosive punk coverof “Hello” by Lionel Richie. Me First and TheGimme Gimmes are a punk cover superband withmembers from NOFX, Lagwagon and Foo Fighters,and approach the track with the same tongue incheek ferocity that has earned them a huge cultfollowing. The guitar solo that comes out ofnowhere and three part harmonies at the end de-serve special mentions.

The Specials – A Message To You, Rudyhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cntvEDbagAw

The Specials debut album opened with this coverof Dandy Livingstone's rocksteady hit, and thesingle went straight into the UK top ten. Theheavy influence of ska and reggae on the Britishpunk scene was highlighted by the two tonemovement and The Specials led the way with di-rect covers of reggae bands such as Toots and theMaytals and Prince Buster also featuring on thesame album. “A Message To You, Rudy” was themost prolific and is undoubtably more wellknown than the original.

Johnny Cash – Hurthttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmVAWKfJ4Go

Trent Reznor's song “Hurt” is widely believed to beabout self harm and society, but in 2005 the NineInch Nails track was propelled to new heights asit was covered by the legendary Johnny Cash. Thecover was chosen by producer Rick Rubin who

contributed massively to song choices on thewhole of the American IV: The Man ComesAround album. The track, which was one of thefinal releases before Cash died in 2003, receivedhuge critical acclaim and is now seen as one ofhis best recordings. Trent Reznor himself, al-though at first wary of the idea of Johnny Cashcovering the song, described himself as “deeplymoved” when he first heard it.

White Stripes - I Just Don't Know What To DoWith Myselfhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVN_h7zO54k

Jack White is famous for his blues and soul influ-ences, with his other projects such as The Racon-teurs and The Dead Weather bringing dirty deltablues back to the forefront of the music scene.However, The White Stripes are also well knownfor their country, soul and blues influence. Theircover of Dolly Parton's “Jolene”, which is regularlyplayed in their live sets, almost made it onto thislist. However the Burt Bacharach/Dusty Spring-field classic “I Just Don't Know What To Do WithMyself” holds it's own on a great album that in-cludes the classic “Seven Nation Army”.

Children Of Bodom – Oops I Did It Againhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGtXlBbWeB4

Children Of Bodom are a finnish death metalband. Covering Britney Spears. I think these twosentences are more than enough to allow them aplace in this list.

Top 10 covers: that are (debatably) better than the original! by Ben Vine

Guitar Coach Magazine 30Guitar Top 10’s

The Beatles – Twist and Shouthttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgd46QiHz4I

“Twist and Shout” was originally a release for R&Bband the Top Notes, but the production of thesong by Phil Spector was despised by the song'swriter Bert Berns. As way of revenge, Berns pro-duced the second version by the Isley Brothers.Only a year later The Beatles recorded their ver-sion for their UK debut album Please, Please Me.Their version made it into the US single chartstwice, both in 1964 and 1986, off the back of thefilm Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Surprisingly thismakes it the longest running US Top 40 hit forThe Beatles with a total of 23 weeks. JohnLennon's voice deserves a special mention as oneof the finest early rock vocal performances.

Alien Ant Farm – Smooth Criminalhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDl9ZMfj6aE

In 2001 Alien Ant Farm burst onto the scene withtheir cover of the Michael Jackson classic“Smooth Criminal”. They quickly left the sceneagain after failing to make their second albumgain any attention, but they left us with this ex-plosive pop punk cover. The driving guitars, fingertapped solo and intermittent Jacksonesqueshouts, this track is definitely a legacy they can beproud of. Even if there's nothing else. And thereisn't.

Muse – Feeling Goodhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOEZMjuoIEY

“Feeling Good”, originally made famous by NinaSimone, was covered by Muse in 2001. The neo-prog band made the song their own using theirclassical music influences to form the track into amasterpiece. Now probably played more oftenthan any other version on the song in film, TV andon radio, a true testament to how a cover versioncan be done just right.

Nirvana – Where Did You Sleep Last Nighthttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcXYz0gtJeM

In 1993 Nirvana visited MTV's studio to record anunplugged episode with all their well known hits.However they ended the set with an AmericanFolk song called "In The Pines". Rebranded as"Where Did You Sleep Last Night", the track is pos-sibly the single most amazing vocal performanceKurt Cobain ever gave. Recorded just five monthsbefore he died, it is seen by many as his final per-formance, with the screamed final verse sendingshivers down the spines of the most hardenedrockers to this day.

Jimi Hendrix – All Along The Watchtowerhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4AuxJH2Mj30

We considered not including this song as it’s socommon on "greatest covers" lists. However,when the original artist admits its better thantheir own and changes the way they play thesong from that day onwards, it's hard to ignore it.It's also hard to forget exactly what Hendrix didwith the song, as its so well known now. He tookthe original, rehashed it, changed the way it wassung, added ridiculous guitar solos and thenshoved what was left through a psychedelicwormhole. What comes out the other side is a dif-ferent song and a brave interpretation for a fan soenamoured with Dylan, he used to keep one ofhis guitar songbooks in his gig bag at all times.

Top 10 covers: that are (debatably) better than the original!

Now I don’t think that the in-clusion of this app is a surpriseto anyone, and it may even bean app that you have used inthe past.

But I certainly think that it is im-portant enough in the iOS envi-ronment to deserve a mention,and a quick scan over some ofthe features you may not be aware of.

In basic terms, GarageBand is a DAW (or digitalaudio workstation), a program for recording liveaudio and MIDI data into a program for mixing,but the latest update for GarageBand is a multi-tude of products rolled into one, but for the pur-pose of this review I will try and place emphasison the guitar-specific features.

Firstly, as stated above, GarageBand is multi-trackrecording software which will allow you to recordyou guitar playing to create songs, which is notonly beneficial for song writing, but also trackingyour process as you learn guitar. The quality of theaudio input is surprisingly high and the depthinto which you can edit your audio is pleasing tosay the least.

Now not all of us have the opportunity to playwith a band, or indeed the time. GarageBand hasa fantastic feature that is aptly named ‘Magic

GarageBand’. This feature allowsyou to pick from a multitude ofinstruments and place themwithin an XY axis of volume andcomplexity, which edits the vol-ume and complexity (obviously)of the samples selected. This canallow you to create a backingtrack for your audio in a matterof seconds. Great for when an

idea comes to you quickly and you want some-thing to back it up to give you an idea of what thefinished article could sound like, and has highenough quality audio samples to actually be thefinished article if you so wanted.

It then has the Smart Guitar feature, which allowsyou to pick from the following styles of guitar(Acoustic, Classic Clean, Hard Rock or Roots Rockguitar), which are all loosely emulated versions ofeveryone’s favourite guitar tones. This feature isactually very cool. Using the iPad’s touch screenyou can play the notes of your chosen chord verti-cally, ensuring that you’re always in tune. This canalso be recorded into the multi-track recordingsection of the App, meaning you can layer up yourparts and really get your track sounding the wayyou want it.

The Guitar Amp is probably the most interestingaddition the GarageBand app. It’s a truly brilliant

Guitar Coach Magazine 31Guitar Apps

App of the Month: GarageBandby Tom Rosier

Tap here to check out this App

GarageBand is multi-track recordingsoftware which will allow you to recordyou guitar playing to create songs

idea. 20+ guitar amp emulations in the palm ofyour hand. You will require hardware like the Am-plitube iRig or Alesis iO Dock to take advantage ofthis, but when connected the sound possibilitiesare endless. There is no other way you could evencomprehend having an amp collection like this inyour house, and the emulations really are of verygood quality for what they are, and each withdedicated controls to get your sound just right.You even have an output using both of these de-vices, so if you really did want to, you could usethese amps as an input into different recordingsoftware. Not strictly necessary, but very handy ifyou wanted to take your recordings to the nextlevel in terms of audio quality.

Along with these features, the GarageBand Appalso comes with a chromatic guitar tuner, whichis always handy and means that you don’t have toleave the app to go to another tuning app thatyou may have installed. Not a great tuner, but nota bad one either. It does the job!

A nice little touch within the app, is that once amixdown of the track is complete, you can share itamongst your friends on a multitude of socialmedia platforms. So you can show your friendshow much you’re improving and rub your abilitiesin their face a little. Again, not a completely nec-essary feature, but a nice touch nonetheless.

The last feature I am going to look at in Garage-Band (though there are many more I could goover) is the Jam Session feature. Brilliant idea. It isa little bit of a shame that it works over Bluetoothinstead of wi-fi, but a step in the right directionfor sure. The Jam Session feature lets you jamwith someone using the app via Bluetooth, mean-ing that you can be playing and recording sepa-rate instruments and work on arrangements ofsongs together, and the beauty of it is that youcan have up to four people in the session at anyone time.

Overall this app has come on leaps and boundssince its first version, and at present it really isahead of the curve in terms of iPad recording.Combined with the iRig or iO Dock you also have a

piece of recording software that will do you noth-ing but favours, and the flow of the app is splen-did. For $4.99 I can’t really see where you can gowrong on this one!

Guitar Coach Magazine 32Guitar Apps

App of the Month: Guitar Toolkit

Tap Here For Details Of Garage Band

Value for money:

Functionality:

Ease of use:

Looks:

Total:

Garage Band is not only a great tool - it’s also greatfun creating new sound setups with a range of ampsand effects pedals.

Guitar Coach Magazine 33Guitar Maker

Engineer and artist: acoustic guitar maker Nick Benjamin

Luthier Nick Benjamin is, in many ways, a true tradi-tional artisan when it comes to making handmade,custom and individual guitars.

The label “limited edition” falls far short of de-scribing what is produced in Nick's small, one-man workshop in an old brewery in the town ofLewes, southeast England.

Armed with an engineering degree, Nick ap-proaches guitar making like an engineer, as wellas a musician and craftsman: “I think of myself asan engineer […] but the sound is an artisticchoice.” Customers should find this combinationassuring. He further explains that both “accuracyand quality is what I'm looking for in the way I'mbuilding.”

According to Nick's homepage, the historic townof Lewes “is unusual in the world of guitar mak-ing in that a small 'community' of makers existshere; each working separately but supporting oneanother and sharing ideas.” Nick averages aroundone guitar per month (though he makes six atonce – you do the math!) and to date has onlymade about 130 instruments. Each of themunique.

Coming from a family of designers, engineers and

musicians (his mother was a flautist), Nick builthis first guitar, a classical model, in 1990 at theage of 17 in his bedroom at his parents' house.After honing his skills on more classical as well aselectric guitars, he moved on to steel stringedmodels, using what he had learned under thetutelage of two local guitar makers.

For those beginning guitar making, Nick explainsthat the traditional Spanish construction stylecan be an ideal starting point, due to its efficientstyle requiring few tools. The progression to mod-ern methods of guitar construction generally in-volves the adoption of many specialist tools andfixtures: the steel-string guitar, in particular, re-quiring additional neck reinforcing inserts whichnecessitate at least some use of power tools.

Making six guitars at once, Nick finds, is the per-fect method. “when I make six guitars they're alldifferent, but I do each process on all six at once. Iactually find this improves the quality of the in-struments.”

And who exactly is buying Benjamin guitars?

Nick's customers are mostly keen amateur play-ers in search of a different guitar with a uniquesound, as well as professional guitarists who de-

Guitar Coach Magazine 34Guitar Maker

pend on simple, work-ready instruments of veryhigh quality. Though authentic and traditional,the modern acoustic guitar needs to be able to beplayed anywhere from the living room to thearena stage, so Benjamin guitars are designedand built to be extremely compatible with ampli-fication so that they sound great plugged in orfully acoustic. Besides standard steel string mod-els, Nick offers baritones, twelve strings, Terz(smaller, higher tuned), nylon string guitars, Vene-tian cutaway and the signature “Benjamin Scoop”cutaway models, among others.

Why choose a unique, handmade guitar?

Nick is not trying to reach an exclusive or elitemarket, but instead offers a personal experienceto his customers. Acquiring a Benjamin guitar islike going on a journey. There is the element ofthe unknown – not in terms of quality, but of pre-cise characteristics. There is the anticipation,choosing the woods, model and decorationschemes, interacting with the maker – and that'sjust the pleasure of the process. At the end thecustomer gets a beautiful guitar. “It's a doublesort of pleasure, if you like,” Nick explains. In anage of mass production and uniformity, he firmlybelieves that a musical instrument is somethingthat can still be very personal.

And what makes a guitar unique? The main dif-ferences lie in the choice of wood, instrumentsize, shape, features, etc., but all of Nick's guitarssound like a Benjamin.

Some notes about wood use:

Luthiers are now being forced to use non tradi-

tional woods for guitar making, “a symptom ofdeforestation and the overuse of resources,” ac-cording to Nick. But these “newer” woods can beextremely close to traditional timbers in terms ofsound and colour, as well as offer some greatqualities of their own. American black walnut andcocobolo rosewood are some of Nick's favouriteadditions to his arsenal of tropical rosewoods,ebonies and spruces. Sustainability, if you'll par-don the obvious pun, is key to the future ofacoustic guitar making.

Properties of the wood are crucial. An averageacoustic guitar will have a soundboard made of asoft wood like spruce or cedar, which are light andstrong timbers. The main body – the back andsides – should be strong and dense, providingweight and strength, making rosewood, ma-hogany and walnut ideal woods. Differentweights of wood can be used to create differentsounds, ranging from deep and dark to light andairy. The neck of the guitar needs to be strong andis usually mahogany due to its strength, stability,sound and the fact that it's easy to carve,whereas the bridges and fingerboard have to behard and are therefore usually ebony or some-times rosewood.

Keep in mind when buying a custom ordered,unique handmade acoustic steel stringed Ben-jamin guitar you are paying for something spe-cial, personal and worth the wait. Nick's pricesstart at £4,000 (the cost of materials plus amonth's skilled labour and workshop rental).Fancy taking a journey?

http://www.benjaminguitars.co.uk/

Engineer and artist: acoustic guitar maker Nick Benjamin

Photos:

The Benjamin JOM77 withunique scoop design.

Newton Faulkner on stageat Glastonberry playing his Benjamin.

Guitar Coach Magazine 35Feature

Eugene “Hideaway” Bridges:

Blues Road Warrior“Let the blues be blues.Get to understand it.Take time to learn beforeyou try to change whatain’t broken.”

Guitar Coach Magazine 36Feature

“I remember when I was two years old singingmyself to sleep to the sound of things my daddywould play. The riffs he played were always in myhead, so one day, I took my plastic spade and putelastic bands on it. My dad saw that, so he set medown and placed his guitar in my hands andstarted to show me a honky-tonk riff, and thatwas my start. I looked within myself to find othersounds that were in my head.

“Daddy showed me the Jimmy Reed riff and whatyou call the 1-4-5 card in blues. We called it your1st, 2nd and 3rd change and the open E tuned gui-tar, and that was the end of my guitar class! I wastwo, about to turn three when I played back upfor him. Along the way, you see things and dothings that are a real good teacher in life. I alwaysplayed what was inside me that was needing tocome out. I was blessed with this music, and youcan’t learn this from a school or a teacher. Some-one cannot teach to you. It is in you, or it is not.

“Daddy led by talking to me about life. To be agood leader, you must learn how to follow andhear what the song is saying to you, what thesinger is trying to say, and play that together.When I was seven, daddy says to me, ‘Are you

gonna’ practice?’

I said to him, “I know how to play my guitar.” Hesaid, OK, play your guitar, now play something dif-ferent, and on and on like that. Real soon, I runout of things to play!

“He said, ‘See. You don’t know it all. Take that gui-tar and put it away. Don’t touch it until I tell you.’ Ihad the ‘Big Head’ at seven years old! If he didn’tstop me, I would have been walking around todaythinking I am the greatest! Daddy was teachingme that I knew something and it was good, evengreat, but I did not know it all. He was teachingme to always learn, always keep looking, keeppaying attention, as there’s so much to learn, butonly if you open your mind.”

The elder Bridges continued to use his commonsense technique to educate his son in positiveways.

“Daddy would teach me to listen to the sounds.Let the guitar talk to you and to the people. I usedmy guitar to say what life was saying to me, tohear what the singer was saying, and finding away to accompany that. You have to find it your-self and earn it yourself.”

Blues Road WarriorRising blues star credits father for education& inspiration

Guitarist Eugene “Hideaway” Bridges, a na-tive of New Orleans, with seven albums to hiscredit and three recent nominations fromthe Blues Foundation, lives the life of a no-madic musician, traveling throughout theUnited States, Europe and Australia, spread-ing the blues gospel far and wide. The 49-year old son of bluesman Hideaway Slim, isdistantly related to Tina Turner, formerlyknown as Anna Mae Bullock.

“I got my guitar skills form the Bridges, andmy voice from the Bullocks,” says Eugene.

Guitar Coach Magazine 37Feature

The Church Influence:

Like the vast majority of African-American musi-cians, Eugene’s father was influenced by thegospel music and sermons he heard in church.His family belonged to the First Church of God inChrist in New Orleans, and Bridges senior foundinspiration in the guitar playing and singing ofReverend Utah Smith.

“Daddy played like Elder Smith, and I played justlike daddy. Names like B.B. King, Jimmy Reed, T-Bone Walker and Lightnin’ Hopkins was all justnames to me as a boy. Daddy would play therecords and learn from them, and when I hearddaddy play, it was full of these guys, but puttinghimself into it. This is how people say I sound likeB.B. King when I never played a B.B. King song.

“B.B. King was the guy that had a way of teachingwithout even knowing he was teaching. B.B. set away of having many people on one stage workingtogether. I would not only see the forest, but thetree and all the parts; how the drummer is the

time keeper, how the bass holds a dedicatedgroove, how guitar, horns and keys work together,each doing his own job to make that sound fulland real.”

Today’s Blues Scene:

The life of a traveling blues musician has neverbeen easy and it’s no different today, as the blueshas a tendency to exist in hills and valleys of pop-ularity. Many would say it is way down in the val-ley right now, with other types of music takingprecedent.

“A popularity contest is the first thing thatcomes to me, and that is why I have to let themusic speak for itself. I will only play for theones who want the real music and not thegames. I am so sick of the haves and have-notsgame. What you put in is what you get out. If agimmick is what the people want, then there’sa lot to go and see, but if my music is some-thing that speaks to you in any way, I will onlyplay where my music is welcomed.”

Blues Road Warrior

Guitar Coach Magazine 38Feature

Blues Road Warrior

Eugene’s latest album: Rock And A Hard Place

Many blues players have complained that gettingwork is harder and harder and drawing crowdshas gotten tougher over the last several years.

“In the USA? I wouldn’t know. (Bridges spendsmost of his time playing out of the USA-author). Ihear some of the bands talk about people andhaving money troubles is a big reason, but I wassigned on a record label when I went to France in1995, and agents have me working all over theplace.

“Blues and hip-hop is all the same. Between the1950’s and 2012, the beats have changed, but ifyou write down the stories to a blues song andwords to a hip-hop song, you’ll see they are say-ing the same thing. You can’t just drop in andsing the blues or hip-hop and get away with it.You have to live it to understand it, be a part of it,and then, you must have something to say onceyou get in the door.”

The Blues Evolves:

Lots of critics talk about the blues evolving, butEugene has other ideas.

“Blues is what it is. It doesn’t need to evolve. Ifyou don’t like it, don’t buy it or listen to it. Youcan’t take an old Ford truck and turn it into some-thing shiny and flash it out and make it fit whatyou think someone wants to do with it. Let theblues be blues. Get to understand it. Take time tolearn before you try to change what ain’t broken.”

By Bob Cianci. Photos by Alwyn CoatesGet Details Of The Album Here

Guitar Coach Magazine 39Our Survey

You decide what’s in the next issue of GuitarCoach magazine...In the next 30 seconds you have the opportunity to shape Guitar Coach magazine the wayyou want it. Do you want more interviews, product reviews, or just more Coachings Sessions,Riffs and Licks?

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Simply tap the button below to go to our survey page. There’s just 4 simple questions. It’ll takeless than 30 seconds to complete - honest!

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Guitar Coach Magazine 40

Riffs, Licks & Solos– Blues Brothers, Sweet Home Chicago– Robert Cray, Phone Booth– JJ Cale, Call Me The Breeze– 9 Below Zero, Sweet Mama

Guitar Coach Magazine 41Riffs, Licks & Solos

Blues Brothers: Sweet Home Chicago

The intro to the song has also had many ver-sions, but Andy has chosen to teach the onereleased by The Blues Brothers, with the gui-tar being played by the late, great SteveCropper.

The Riff.

Its greatness is not its simplicity, more the waythe double stops, vibrato and pauses effortlesslylink into one another, making it immediatelymemorable. It can be employed as a generic riffto countless other 12 bar blues songs and so willhelp you enormously when jamming with others.Just make sure you play it in the right key!!!!

The sound.

I believe this is one riff that sounds great cleanand bereft of effects. But, like all these things, dowhat you want with it once you’ve mastered allthe small parts and can put your own stamp onit.

Written by Robert Johnson and released in August 1937, this song has been recorded bycountless artists.

Guitar Coach Magazine 42Riffs, Licks & Solos

Blues Brothers: Sweet Home Chicago

Guitar Coach Magazine 43Riffs, Licks & Solos

Robert Cray: Phone Booth

Why Choose This?

Andy really wanted to bring you something differ-ent and, in just a couple of bars, you can make outthe distinct Robert Cray soloing style. This partic-ular solo is played over the A minor pentatonicscale but has a unique feel all of its own, usingpauses and vibrato amongst the “clipped” waysome of the notes are played. It is something newto learn and takes you off the main highway to,hopefully, experience and learn somethingslightly diverse, but bluesy all the same.

Difficulty

Probably the most challenging of this month’s riffvideos. But it will show you what you can do witha basic scale – even though it is only a taster tothe complete solo

The Sound

I’d keep it as clean as possible, perhaps with somegain control. If you have a strat, you’re halfwaythere already. If not, experiment away!!!

Now this isn’t a riff, it is the beginning of Robert Cray’s beautifully played solo from his hitPhone Booth

Guitar Coach Magazine 44Riffs, Licks & Solos

Robert Cray: Phone Booth

Guitar Coach Magazine 45Riffs, Licks & Solos

JJ Cale: Call Me The Breeze

What will this riff give me?

This one small riff is played after the first line ofthe first verse has been sung and variations ofthe same “set of notes” all played with a differentemphasis occur throughout the song. What isimportant is the way he emphasizes gaps, playsnotes when you least expect them and most ofall, when he chooses not to play at all.

How will it help my playing?

It is in the key of F# but, like most blues patterns,it is easily transposed to other keys. As far as thisriff is concerned, learn it with the video and thenplay along with the whole song, adding your ownvariations by using the same notes but playingless or more of them, adding in pauses and, ofcourse, in a different order. This really is a funthing to do and will develop your jamming andability to improvise.

Why J.J.Cale?

As you have probably gathered, Andy is a massive J.J.Cale fan, which has prompted him togive you a brief insight into the type of riff he plays in between lines when he is not singing.Known for his great touch, feel and timing, J.J. Cale manages to project an almost laziness tohis playing whilst still making it have passion, often with jazzy overtones. Many a guitaristcan reproduce the notes, but not in the same way that characterizes his style.

Guitar Coach Magazine 46Riffs, Licks & Solos

JJ Cale: Call Me The Breeze

Meolody Line tab

Lead Lick tab

Guitar Coach Magazine 47Riffs, Licks & Solos

9 Below Zero: Sugar Mama

Sugar Mama is a departure from their normallyhi-energy style, but is an introductory riff that themajority of us would consider pure blues.

The Riff

This is a particularly great riff to learn if you areapt at both singing and playing – especially onyour own. It can easily be transposed to any keyand is full of simple hammer ons, pull off andslides. The end of the riff ends with a slidingchord (Eb9 to D9) again, a classic blues “move”and rolls effortlessly into the verse.

The techniques used in the riff itself are not toodifficult to master; the key here is being able to

learn the structure of the riff and rememberingthe changes. Once you have learned it, use it as awarm up before you start playing – whether thatbe at a gig or in the comfort of your own home –because it won’t stretch your fingers too much,but will definitely get the blood flowing throughyour veins.

Sound

For gigging, give your guitar a tiny bit of gain, dis-tortion and reverb, to try and imitate the sound ofDennis Greaves’ 1976 Burgundy Gibson ES 335cr.Clean, but with a growly overtone!!!

Who recorded it?

Nine Below Zero are an English Blues band who were at their height in popularity in the early1980s but continue gigging to this day, having built up a cult following throughout Europe.

Guitar Coach Magazine 48Riffs, Licks & Solos

9 Below Zero: Sugar Mama

Guitar Coach Magazine 49Feature

eJamming: The Premier Online Community For Musical Collaboration

At the expense of showing my age, this writernever dreamed of jamming with other musiciansthousands of miles away when I started playingmusic in the late 1960’s. There was no Internet, ofcourse, and the only way to make music was tosit in the same room with other players. Well, it’sa new day with new technology that allows any-one with basic computer skills and equipment toplay music in real time with others thousands ofmiles away: very hip and definitely cutting-edge.

eJamming is the brainchild of music business en-trepreneur Gail Kantor, a former backup singer forBette Midler, producer, manager and professionalfundraiser, and Alan Jay Glueckman, a screen-writer, lyricist, producer and director, with creditsin movies, records, television, theatre and the In-ternet. These two, along with technology and en-tertainment professional Bill Redman, launched aprototype of eJamming in 2007, and were firstrecognized within the technology industry in2009. But it wasn’t until 2010 that they con-quered the problem of “lag time,” with the intro-duction of what they refer to as 3.0 software,featuring 16 bit 44.1 kHz live audio streaming.With this cutting edge technology in place, eJam-ming has become, in the words of Alan Glueck-man, “The premier online community for musicalcollaboration, from writing, to recording, to livejam sessions, with musician members/sub-

scribers logging in from around the globe. Itsounds like the other player is in the room withyou.”

Who Uses eJamming?

We asked Alan who eJamming is for and how itcan benefit different users, and he respondedthat ejamming is for, “musicians looking to jamwith old friends and band mates, or to meet newmusicians they can play with. It’s for bands to re-hearse, create, play and record together ratherthan lugging their gear to a rehearsal space, al-though it’s never meant to supplant a live re-hearsal. eJamming is for musicians looking toform new bands by meeting musicians and audi-tioning them live, for teachers and students towork together online, and to provide a place forstudents to practice together in a virtual practicestudio.”

But why not just use Skype to jam together?

“People have told me they’re not happy usingSkype because of the way it feels. It’s very delayed,whereas, eJamming eliminates the latency or lagtime issue. There are other technologies that pur-port to offer online jamming, but none offer thereal time, high quality audio and lowest latencyexperience that eJamming offers, because we’re“peer to peer,” rather than server mediated, which

New technology allows musicians to jam and collaborateanytime, anywhere.

Guitar Coach Magazine 50Feature

means eJamming has half the latency of server-based systems. And we offer the same high qual-ity audio as CDs.”

Getting Started with eJamming

Simply go to www.ejamming.com/learn-moreand sign up. Once your email is verified, thendownload and install the software. After receivinga “Welcome to eJamming” email, you will receiveinformation on how to set up eJamming, as wellas a link to tech support, www.ejammingtech-support.com, which contains detailed informa-tion and how to perform tasks such asunblocking ports, allowing eJamming throughyour firewall, and configuring the audio signalstream through your computer. The eJammingsupport website contains pictures and step-by-step instructions how to do everything necessaryto get started. The cost is only $9.95 per monthafter a 30-day free trial, $24.95 for three months,or only $89.95 per year. It obviously pays to go forthe long haul.

And Musicians Said…

Dustin Bogue of the group Brasher/Bogue is aloyal eJamming participant.

“Playing guitar is in a lot of ways a lot like havingsex…Granted, it’s fun even if you’re flying solo, butit doesn’t compare to doing it with other people!

“A musician at any level will readily tell you, play-ing guitar is a lot more fun when you are accom-panied by another picker. You can share songs,theories, chords, licks, stories, ideas, etc, with eachother. That is how we grow. It isn’t always easy toget together with other players, and a lot of peo-ple don’t have a large circle of friends to call on ifthey have the urge to jam. Quite simply, eJam-ming makes it possible.

“The day I found eJamming, I knew it was goingto change things for us in a big way. Since Andy(Brasher) and I first started writing and perform-ing together, our two biggest obstacles have beentime and distance: not enough time and toomany miles between us. eJamming has literally

bridged the gap on both accounts. Each time weget together to write online, we are just amazedthat we finally have this tool. We write and re-hearse probably three to four times as often aswe did before we found eJamming.”

Andy Brasher chimed in, “As a writing/touringmusician, balancing home life and work life canbe a challenge. Especially if you’re like me, andyou live in one state and most of your musical ac-complices live in another. Dustin and I have beenmaking music together, writing and recordingsince 2007. Until we discovered eJamming, get-ting together consisted of taking turns drivingtwo hundred miles and spending a few daysaway from home. This could be very taxing. Nowthat we’re on eJamming, we can write, play, orrecord at a moment’s notice without having todedicate gas money and a couple hours on theroad in order to create together. We are able towork more often and from the comfort of ourown homes. The control panel is super easy touse, and the setup was simple. With tech sup-port’s help, we were up and running that day. “

And Now, Get Ready For…

It won’t be long before the company offers eJam-ming STUDiiO ®, which will integrate live videoalong with audio, and ejamming TEACH ® for stu-dents and teachers, featuring enlarged video, no-tation, plus other teaching tools. And finally,eJamming JAMCASTLE ®, where musicians any-where in the world can use eJamming STUDiiO ®as a live performance capture device and streamthose performances live to smartphones, Surfacetablets, computers and iPads, for fan access every-where in the world, 24/7. All these developmentsare on the verge of reality, according to AlanGleuckman.

Stay tuned…

By Bob Cianci

eJamming: The Premier Online Community For Musical Collaboration

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From Simple Techniques To Awesome Solos…

The BandJammer experience is more than justlearning songs, it’s about developing a wholerange of guitar abilities. You’ll be learning fromscratch, including chord and strumming basics,through to how songs are structured, the dynam-ics of bands, playing in different keys and tunings,playing solos and improvising your ownsolos…and much more!

Guitar Coach Magazine 51

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Guitar Coach Magazine 52Altered Tuning

Altered StatesRikky Rooksby talks about the opportunities a little re-tuning can offer songwriters.

Altered tunings are now an accepted method forcreating great new guitar music. Up to the 60sthey were largely the province of folk and bluesguitarists, but the spread of musical influencesfrom folk protest songs and electric blues intochart pop and counter-culture rock in that decadetook them into the musical mainstream. By theend of the 60s headliners such as Bob Dylan, TheWho, The Rolling Stones, Joni Mitchell, CSN&Ywere writing and recording songs with them.

When Richie Havens walked out on stage at theWoodstock Festival, on August 15 1969, to face aquarter of a million people, he did so – amazingly- with a guitar in altered tuning. Since those days,altered tunings have been utilized by acoustic andelectric players alike in many popular genres suchas folk, college radio rock, indie, hard rock, grunge,New Age guitar and many more.

It is true that thousands of great songs have beenwritten by guitarists in standard tuning. As a tun-ing, EADGBE is an excellent, musical compromisethat provides readily playable chords for mostkeys and chord types. In some keys – notably C, G,D and A, and their relative minors A minor, E

minor, B minor and F# minor – enough of thebasic chord shapes have open strings to produce apleasingly resonant sound for little physical effort.In addition, it is easier to have a key change in asong written in EADGBE.

However, going beyond the familiarity of stan-dard tuning opens some exciting musical doors.Songwriters can find much inspiration in al-tered tunings. This is chiefly because perhapsthe majority of songwriters who compose onguitar do so by finding emotionally-chargedchord changes. Altered tunings provide theseby the bucket-load.

An altered tuning defamiliarises the fretboard.With the turn of a peg or two it removes – eitherpartially or completely – the standard shapes andpatterns which a songwriter can find throughhabit and which, at times, fail to inspire throughbeing over-familiar. An altered tuning has the po-tential to make commonplace chord sequencesexciting again because they sound different whenvoiced in new shapes. It can also offer a song-writer the chance to broaden the harmony of hisor her songs through bringing in other chord

Think of songs such as Led Zeppelin ‘Kashmir’, The Rolling Stones ‘HonkyTonk Women’, Joni Mitchell ‘Big Yellow Taxi’, Bad Company ‘Can’t GetEnough’, Stephen Stills ‘Love The One You’re With’, The Beatles ‘Dear Pru-dence’, Coldplay ‘Yellow’, Nick Drake ‘River Man’, Bob Dylan ‘Mr TambourineMan’, Neil Young ‘Cinnamon Girl’, and Crosby Stills Nash and Young ‘Suite:Judy Blue Eyes’. What do these songs have in common? All were composedand inspired by a guitar that was not in standard tuning.

Guitar Coach Magazine 53Song writing

types in effective shapes. Even the simplicity of anopen major tuning, where a single finger barrecreates a major chord, makes simple majorchanges sound new.

For a songwriter, fiddling with the tuning is asmuch about the generating of inspirationthrough defamiliarization as it is about the al-tered tuning even being audible in the final song.The objection, ‘But you could have done that instandard tuning’ can be countered with, ‘Yes, Icould have but I didn’t until the idea came to me.And it didn’t appear until I re-tuned the guitar’.

If you have only played in EADGBE retuning theguitar and finding familiar shapes no longer workcan be daunting. An easy method for dipping yourtoe in the waters of altered tuning is the single-string change. Re-tuning a single string can beenough to ‘refresh’ ordinary chords and the soundof the guitar. Try ‘drop D’, where string 6 is de-tuned by a tone from E to D, or ‘top drop D’ wherestring 1 goes down by a tone.

For a songwriter’s in-depth study of altered tun-ings (complete with a selective chord dictionary)see my book How To Write Songs in Altered GuitarTuning

Rikky Rooksby is the author ofBackbeat’s series for songwriterswhich comprises the best-sellingHow to Write Songs on Guitar, In-side Classic Rock Tracks, Riffs, TheSongwriting Sourcebook, ChordMaster, Melody, How to WriteSongs on Keyboards, Lyrics, Arrang-ing Songs and How to Write Songsin Altered Tunings.

Visit his webpage at www.rikkyrooksby.com

Altered States

How To Write Songs In Altered Tunings

Guitar Coach Magazine 54FAQs

FAQsHere’s a short selection of the most popular questions sent in by you this month. Please keepthose questions coming and I’ll try and cover as many as possible in the next issue.

I totally appreciate the frustra-tions you are experiencing and,as far as string bending is con-cerned, there really is no substi-tution for practice. Having saidthat, here are a few tips I havepicked up over the years which Ihope will help.

First of all, make sure you arefretting the note correctly. Inother words, you can hear thepre-bend note clearly and youare playing it with the tip ofyour finger. This will ensure youdo not have to adjust your fin-ger position on the string or, in-deed, apply unnecessaryadditional pressure to keep thenote sounding. This will causean immediate bend fail.

Next try bending the string upjust one step (one semi tone) oreven less very slowly. Whilstdoing this, look at where yourfinger or nail is starting to hit

the hit the string above so youcan make some adjustments.

Such as: If your nail is toughingthe string above (apart fromkeeping them short) you willprobably be fretting the stringwith your left hand too close tothe nail. If your finger is touch-ing the string above causing itto sound when you release thebend your will be bend yourfretting finger needs to benearer the tip. Once you havethe fretting finger in the correctposition you will contact thestring above but it will notsound – well most of the timeanyway. You should then be ableto bend the strings a full stepwithout any unwanted noisesand hindrance.

Apart from that, just keep prac-ticing so you refine your tech-nique until string bendingbecomes second nature.

Question: After taking a 2 yearbreak from playing the guitar (be-cause I became frustrated) I immedi-ately came up against my old enemy,the string bend. When I bend and orbend and release a string I keep hit-ting the string above with my fingeror finger nail. Have you any tips tohelp stop this happening?

Well, quite simply if the stringshave a dull color, sound dead,muted, become discoloured orare hard to tune, then it's timeto change them. You will onlyrealize just how dead they havebecome until you here thebrightness and clarity of a newset when you replace them. As abeginner it is especially hard toknow when you should changestrings as you will not tend tonotice the dulling of the tonei.e. not realize the sound has

changed. You will probably behaving too much fun and con-centrating on learning to thinktoo much about the sound.With experience you will knowwhen that time has come. Thetimeframes often depend onyour own body make up andhow much you sweat or whatchemicals are released fromyour hands and fingers.

Continued over page...

Question: Guys, I love your maga-zine and, as a beginner, have one ques-tion for you, which I am sure will beeasy to answer. How do I know whenit’s time to change my strings?

Guitar Coach Magazine 55Ask Andy

FAQs

Guitarists who sweat more,spend hours upon hours playingor fret the strings aggressivelyor with excessive force will allhave to change strings moreoften.

All I know is that I change mineafter every gig due to excessivemoisture being expelled frommy body causing the soundquality to “die” immediatelyafter I have finished playing.

In order to fully understand theanswer you need to have a basicknowledge of note intervals i.e.what notes exist. These are Ab,A, Bb, B, C, Db, D, Eb, E, F, F# (orGb) and G. If you play one ofthese notes and move to one ofthe notes next to it in the se-quence, you travel half a step.For example, E to Eb or E to F.This also equates to moving onefret; so every time you movefrom one fret to an adjacentfret you travel a half step. If youmove two frets, you travel a fullstep and this is the equivalentof playing a note that is 2 stepsaway in the sequence, for exam-

ple, E to F# or E to D.

A similar method is used whenyou tune down a half or fullstep. Standard tuning is E-A-D-G-B-E. When tuned down a halfstep, it is tuned to Eb-Ab-Db-Gb-Bb-Eb. Each string is tuned ahalf step lower. When tuneddown a full step, it is tuned toD-G-C-F-A-D. Different ways oftuning a guitar is a completelyseparate topic, but I daresayyour thirst for knowledge willrequire this explaining as wellat some time!!!! Good stuff –keep up your interest.

Well, this sort of follows onfrom the last question, in somuch as you need to have someknowledge of the notes and in-tervals.

Let’s start by looking at the Cmajor scale. The first note willalways be a C (this is known asthe root note) and follows thefollowing pattern.

Starting on the C note (say onthe 3rd fret of the A string) yougo up a whole step (2 frets) to Dthen another whole step to E,then a half step to F (only a halfstep between E & F), then a

whole step to G, then a wholestep to A, then a whole step toB, then a half step back to C(only a half step between B & Cas well).

So the notes in the C scale are: CD E F G A B C. The exampleabove is executed on the Astring to make it easy to follow,but you would normally use dif-ferent strings to play a scale.

Continued over page...

Question: Although I haven’t beenplaying the guitar long I have a contin-ued thirst for knowledge. What does itmean when it says to tune down ormove your fretting finger a 1/2 stepor a full step?

Question: Although I do not want tolearn too much theory, many tutors be-lieve it is essential you learn yourscales. I definitely think it would help,especially when I progress enough tolearn solos. To get me going and, inthe simplest terms possible, pleasecould you tell me the basic differencebetween a major and minor scale?

Guitar Coach Magazine 56FAQs

FAQs

One suggestion is shownbelow:

C - 3rd fret A string

D – Open D string

E – 2nd fret D string

F – 3rd fret D string

G – Open G string

A – 2nd fret G string

B – Open B string

C – 1st fret B string.

To get the natural minor scale

(C minor) you would flatten (re-duce the note by one fret) the3rd, 6th, and 7th notes in thescale, giving:

C D Eb F G Ab Bb C

Hopefully this has helped youunderstand the difference be-tween a major and minor scale.You should now have enoughknowledge to learn any majorscale and convert it to a minorscale and be able to start learn-ing and improvising some solos.Look forward to hearing howyou progress.

Contact Andy with your questions and we’ll include as many as we can in the FAQ section of your next issue of Guitar Coach magazine.

Simply tap the contact button below and email your question.

Thank you!

Tap Here To ‘Ask Andy’

Any guitar questions?

Guitar Coach Magazine 57Reviews

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GUITAR COACH MAGAZINE : ISSUE 002 Look out for the next issue of Guitar Coach magazine coming soon!

For Editorial enquiries email:[email protected]

For Advertising enquiries contact: [email protected]

With many thanks to: Eugene Hideaway Bridges, Jimmy Dillon, Nick Benjamin,

The eJamming team, and Rikky Rooksby

Articles written by Bob Cianci, Graham Land, Ben Vine, Tom Rosier, Harrison Marsh and Andy Partridge

Special thanks to;BandJammer www.bandjammer.com for video contributions

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