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@tbeltrans: I have not seen the Goodrick chord books; I do have 'The Advanacing Guitarist'.
After Berklee in '75, I became engrossed in George Van Eps' approach.
Mine is just another way of attempting to organize this entire subject into some sensible format.
@barricwiley: Thanks for your kind words!
@artcore: A thorough knowledge of chord spelling and function is needed, but guitar is a visual instrument.
Recognizing and transposing shapes is important as well.
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11-11-2014 10:14 AM
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You probably won't see the "Goodchord" voice leading books anymore. They apparently went out of print some time ago and seem to command ridiculously high prices when they occasionally show up on Ebay. Volume III is particularly hard to get for some reason. I was lucky that a friend of mine who went to Berklee made me aware of them. He carried them at the music store he was involved with. I like the books because they invite you to dive in and experiment and see what you can come up with. The difficult part is applying the data to practical application, which is why my comment about this chord melody book. In this book, it seems to me it is the underlying concepts that are most useful.
Tony
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I don't understand how, in the 21st century, anything could ever be out-of-print. There seems to be so much intrinsic value in publishing something as an e-book that when it has been out of print. Zero overhead, all profit, no minimum publishing volume necessary. Selling used books isn't making the publisher or the author any money. Why isn't everyone doing this?
Originally Posted by tbeltrans
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Apparently, there is work being done toward that end, but in a somewhat different format than the original books. There is a thread here in these forums on using the Goodchord voicing books. Here is a link to that thread:
Anybody use the Goodchord Voice Leading Books?
Toward the end of the thread, there is news about ongoing work to make this information available again. To get your particular questions answered specifically, you would have to communicate with Mick Goodrick. I don't know him and have never met him, so I don't have any answers. The books seemed unique enough and from a very small publisher, so it just seemed to make sense to grab them there and then. In Mick's defense, that was a number of years ago, so maybe the electronic publishing arena was still developing.
Tony
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Thanks! Looks like a good one. Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
Tony
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Good 4 U! Try this one...great place to start. Originally Posted by tbeltrans
http://www.amazon.com/Jazz-Piano-Boo.../dp/0961470151
Also, the jazz piano website...as good as it gets on the web:
Online Jazz Piano Lessons | JazzPianoOnline.com
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YW...most here know author Mark Levine from his 'The Jazz Theory book'...Mark wrote the Jazz Piano book years before the theory book. Originally Posted by tbeltrans
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I have a book to work from as my skills improve on the piano: Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
Piano Improvisation: A Powerful Practical System by Frank Caruso and Karl Mollison
Piano Improvisation: A Powerful Practical System music lesson book
Tony
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Has anybody found the George Van Eps' books to be really helpful?.....I was thing of getting the first book in the series.
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I started working with The George Van Eps Guitar Method in the early 1970s. It's a small book of about 40 pages. There's a lot of information in that book. Our own Rob McKillop has done a fine job of videoing all of the exercises in the book that can be seen on his website.
When the first volume of Harmonic Mechanisms for Guitar (328 pages) was published in 1980, I bought it and as volumes two (381 pages) and three (188 pages) were published I picked them up. The books are densely packed with information and there really isn't a lot of hand holding. The student is expected to the physical work of learning an perfecting the mechanisms as well as spend some serious time thinking about how and where to use them.
The good news is that Van Eps said that someone can pick something that interests him or her and work on that without going through the whole series. Steve Herberman has said that he worked his way through the three volumes in about five years and if you've heard him play, it definitely shows. To do what he did would require a great deal of dedication, focus and devotion which he obviously had.
Harmonic Mechanisms for Guitar is George Van Eps magnum opus: a lifetime's examination of fingerboard harmony packed into three volumes. If you are willing to apply yourself to just a small portion of the books you will gain a better understanding of the guitar and become a better player in the process.Last edited by monk; 11-13-2014 at 12:58 AM.
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You will note that Van Eps' books deal mainly with interval studies. (10th down to 6th, 3rd up to 6th, 6th up to 10th, etc, etc. These are the bulk of the work, and are meant as facilitation exercises. There is very little 'meat' there. These are the 'mechanisms', the ability to expedite movement. Chord structures are never dealt with in a traditional sense.
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I will respectfully disagree with you. Harmonic Mechanisms is all meat. The examination of the triads of the major, harmonic minor and melodic minor in all inversions as both scales and arpeggios are exhaustively dealt with. Upper, middle and lower voice movement in all the triad inversions are similarly examined. Articulated tenths and sixths, chromatic concepts, diminished studies, four note voicings, blockout patterns and much more are explored in the three volumes. The interval studies are an important part of the book because they illustrate the melodic possibilities that are hidden inside the triads but there is much more than just that. Originally Posted by herkimer
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Ordered today paperback amazon uk
Originally Posted by herkimer
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@trevorS: Thanks and hope it is helpful
@monk: I don't disagree with a single word you said. Van Eps' Mechanisms is a masterful work. I guess I should've explained what I meant by 'meat., that being that for those looking for chord-melody analysis - a sort of 'how-to' guide, it requires a lot of reading between the lines for that. The material is all there, but it's up to the player to incorporate it all into his playing. There's not a section, for example, that a player can turn to when asking 'what are some good substitutions for a Minor7b5?'
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Ordered hardback via Amazon today - Thanks Harold!
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Yes, to be fair, Harmonic Mechanisms are not "How To Play Chord Melody" books nor are they intended for a beginner. Originally Posted by herkimer
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Okay, the book arrived yesterday. When did the USPS begin delivering Sunday's! Talk about a surprise.
Love the layout of the book. Just one problem.
As I questioned earlier after previewing the book via Amazon, throughout the book is the common use of first finger barre chords. Example 3x345x with a finger 1 barre covering the 6th and 4th string notes G and C. Or another example x1x133. I'm assuming each of these mutes the middle string with the 1st, the barre finger.
So, apparently contrary to some commenters, this barre is a common thing among you players, and yet not one person can specifically address how a new player is to get it under his finger(s)?
I'd like to learn how to mute the 5th string while playing the 6th and 4th string...freeing up another finger would be fabulous. Thanks in advance!
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Not necessarily.
You can play the sixth string with the thumb (less likely) and mute the fifth with a bit of thumb or ring finger, or play fingers only or hybrid style with the right (more likely)...then you just barre the whole thing and pluck the notes you want.
At least that's how I'd play those examples.
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This reminds me of when I first learned G7#5 in this voicing: 3X344X. I had a hell of a time trying to strum it. The guy who showed me was Boss Nova-type player who fingerpicked his notes. It did not matter to him since he could pianistically pick whichever strings he wanted to while leaving out others.
I personally concluded that it was impossible unless your fingers have the unique, perfect shape that would allow it.
Someone please prove me wrong.
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Yes, except the finger suggestions in the book are specifically laid out for each chord option, and in the above first example of the G13 chord I gave the books noted fingering is 1x123. I've seen tons of youtube videos of players barring dominant 7 chords at the 6th string and strumming chords, not finger style...the barre is a breeze with finger style...it's strumming I'm after. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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Ahhh. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
So even though the chord diagram shows a "barre," it does not mean the chord has to be played with a single finger barre chord.
Silly me. I should have realized this.
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No, I strum that grip all the time...but not with a first finger barre. Originally Posted by AlsoRan
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Well, then finger it 1x234x Originally Posted by 2bornot2bop
If you want to strum, you have to get creative...fretting hand muting, thumb over neck, pick a bass note then strum the rest...
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I don't fret with the thumb, and it barely reaches the 6th string. Besides, that defeats the purpose of using the barre, freeing up an additional finger. C'mon folks, somebody on the forum must be commonly using this. L'me see if I can find a few videos to more accurately displays what I'm referring to....now that I think of it, seems I recall Jim Soloway commonly using a 1st finger barre often when he stopped by the house. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
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book examples - seems very specific to me
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