Mickey Baker's Complete Course in Jazz Guitar

[joe2758]

can you imagine if mickey was writing this book like “they’re going to love this. nothing too spicey until chapter 16 then WHAM i hit them with a cmi7!” kidding of course

[goinbaroke]

Thanks for this, just what we needed!!

[android]

just bought the book, god help me

lol

[telerocka]

hello, (sleepy?) study group!
i got my hands on MB book, read the thread and am excited to join you. i play guitar for quite a long time, but did not rise from power/barre/cowboy and light soli on the pentatonic scale.
but i dig jazz and wanted to learn it on the guitar, so here i am.

i jumped right into it and started with lesson 1, learning the chords.
as stated, i bought music paper and transcripted (is this the right word?) the tabs.

right off the bat i get confused, as i dont have much knowledge about theory either.
the Am7 chord consists of the root, a minor 3rd, perfect fifth and a minor 7th.
the Am6 chord consists of the root, a minor 3rd, perfect fifth and a major 6th
my question is twofold:
a) why does the 7 chord add a minor 7th while the 6 chord adds a major 6th? is this "given"?
b) do i have to know how and why chords are constructed to grind through the book?

if b) is recommended does someone have a link/book recommendation to learn this kind of stuff in an intuitive way? the internet is full of information of questionable quality, so im overwhelmed where to look

EDIT: I will have a look at jazzguitar.be own course on "Jazz Guitar Chord Theory". I would appreciate recommendations for a nice "theory" book or site nonetheless.

thanks in advance

[snailspace]

For those who may be interested, Tommy Harkenrider offers a Mickey Baker course via monthly subscription. I don't know anything about how it is structured, but he seems to be very prompt in responding to questions.

Mickey Baker Monthly Subscription | Tommy Harkenrider Blues & Roots

Contact | Tommy Harkenrider Blues & Roots

[Jazzstdnt]

hello, (sleepy?) study group!
i got my hands on MB book, read the thread and am excited to join you. i play guitar for quite a long time, but did not rise from power/barre/cowboy and light soli on the pentatonic scale.
but i dig jazz and wanted to learn it on the guitar, so here i am.

i jumped right into it and started with lesson 1, learning the chords.
as stated, i bought music paper and transcripted (is this the right word?) the tabs.

right off the bat i get confused, as i dont have much knowledge about theory either.
the Am7 chord consists of the root, a minor 3rd, perfect fifth and a minor 7th.
the Am6 chord consists of the root, a minor 3rd, perfect fifth and a major 6th
my question is twofold:
a) why does the 7 chord add a minor 7th while the 6 chord adds a major 6th? is this "given"?
b) do i have to know how and why chords are constructed to grind through the book?

if b) is recommended does someone have a link/book recommendation to learn this kind of stuff in an intuitive way? the internet is full of information of questionable quality, so im overwhelmed where to look

thanks in advance

Yes a jazz theory book will help you. I recommend Berklee Press materials.

Instrumental study and theory/harmony are separate topics. Learning them together is possible, but inefficient.

[Banksia]

hello, (sleepy?) study group!
i got my hands on MB book, read the thread and am excited to join you. i play guitar for quite a long time, but did not rise from power/barre/cowboy and light soli on the pentatonic scale.
but i dig jazz and wanted to learn it on the guitar, so here i am.

i jumped right into it and started with lesson 1, learning the chords.
as stated, i bought music paper and transcripted (is this the right word?) the tabs.



EDIT: I will have a look at jazzguitar.be own course on "Jazz Guitar Chord Theory". I would appreciate recommendations for a nice "theory" book or site nonetheless.

thanks in advance

That section of the MB book is mainly about chords and progressions in G major, as I recall. In the key of G Maj the 6th of A would be F#.
Think of it as (Am)+6. You are thinking A+(min6)
In Gmaj your A chords will be built with A1 B2 C3 D4 E5 F#6 G7

[telerocka]

Just a little update... i "advanced" to lesson 3. As i get half an hour of practice approximately every two days at most, its not as fast as i would like it to be. but even now i feel myself getting better every session. "practice makes perfect" ad its best. in lesson 3 you can even start singing a melody over the chord progressions as they sound just nice... ill keep keeping on

[jdazey]

OK, I think I'm finally ready to do this. I had an MB Book 1 several years ago, took a look at some of the chords and thought "no way". Now I have a fresh copy, am studying Michael Joyce's web site, downloaded the corrections to MB. I know some of the chord stretches will be a major challenge, but I'll keep trying or find work-arounds. This forum has been a huge help.

Cheers,
Joe

[crusoe]

Mickey Baker's Jazz Guitar is the one book I'd take to the "Island". I yawned myself through a ton of books which have been either (expensive) jokes or too complicated. I finally stripped down to Mickey's book and one about arpeggios/scales.(old) It's a good combo and enough for me.

[jdazey]

That brings up an interesting question. Like a lot of people who never get very far with guitar, I have a lot of books. This time I'd like to keep my focus on MB, but something to complement his book might be helpful. If you had one supplement to Mickey Baker, other than Michael Joyce, what would it be?

Cheers,
Joe

[ah.clem]

If you had one supplement to Mickey Baker, other than Michael Joyce, what would it be?

Perhaps either Frank Vignola's "Modern Method for Guitar" or his "Inversion Excursion"?

[Drumbler]

That brings up an interesting question. Like a lot of people who never get very far with guitar, I have a lot of books. This time I'd like to keep my focus on MB, but something to complement his book might be helpful. If you had one supplement to Mickey Baker, other than Michael Joyce, what would it be?

Cheers,
Joe

Not a book but I'd look into Fareed Haque's ideas on comping.

He has many youtube videos to watch.

The big chords Mickey Baker teaches, while great to know, have limited practicality for comping with others.

[crusoe]

Not a book but I'd look into Fareed Haque's ideas on comping.

He has many youtube videos to watch.

The big chords Mickey Baker teaches, while great to know, have limited practicality for comping with others.

There is pretty good book about so called shell chords and comping:

[broturtel]

This is rather late (almost 2 years after this thread was started) but I'm buying this book right now and beginning it. I've been playing guitar for just about 8 years and I have not really ever wanted to focus until I decided to start learning jazz guitar. Now that I'm learning jazz guitar I'm finding out how scatter-brained I am with this darn thing. So I'm beginning! Thank you!

[jdazey]

Actually, it's been 12 years. I've been going over all the earlier posts trying to get some perspective on MB and finding a lot of good tips/suggestions. I'm still working on lessons 1 and 2, but lesson 3 isn't too far off.

[crusoe]

I take nearly everything in Mickey's book for "starters". i.e. I take one of the chords, write down its
tones, build arpeggios or take one of his runs (part 2 of the book), build the scale around it and practise.
That book is an endless source.

Here's Mickey...cool

[JC Stylles]

I highly recommend this book for those trying to get their head around how to start moving towards jazz. This really helped me as a teenager to start to put things together.

In relation to study, very soon I will be re-releasing "JC Stylles Benson Picking Tutorial" again for those who really want to take advantage of this down time. Additionally, I am setting things up so if anyone would appreciate a way to have some money coming in , I will be in a position to set you up as an affiliate, so you can receive a 25% commission on anyone clicking on your link who wants to learn from my tutorials and purchases accordingly, and will also be adding some new Tutorials in due course. In the meantime, keep on shedding ~

Cheers.

JC Stylles

[alltunes]

Not sure why Randy Vincent's intro jazz guitar book doesn't get more attention.

I never got much out of Mickey's book; maybe I haven't tried enough.

[Rob MacKillop]

I reviewed Randy's book on this forum some time ago. Excellent book.

[Fricadelle]

Hello everybody, I read the whole topic with a lot of interest since I had this book (the mickey baker volume 1 one) and wanted to give it a try as a beginner in jazz guitar. I played a lot of electric guitar (rock, blues mainly) as a youngster and recently I have been having a blast at learning classical guitar. And to entertain myself a little bit I figured why not jazz up things a little bit (as an extra).

So here I am learning all the chords on page 2. To be honest I knew a lot of them, just didn't know the names of them . I am progressing my way through the first couple of lessons. I have found very valuable resources to help me start more confidently, because I read that there were a lot of errors and the book could benefit from a little refresher.

I found these:

- Mickey Baker Jazz Guitar | Rob MacKillop ~ Musician explanations from Rob MacKillop, thank you Rob!

- In this thread I found an errata Mickey Baker's Complete Course in Jazz Guitar . Very handy

- Here : Mickey Baker Course 1 - mp3s and videos There is supplemental material, in particular there is a pdf with some more chords, lol!!

- If I understand correctly, the best way to "use" Mickey Baker's book is to jazz up "vanilla" changes. In this thread someone was talking about the basic progression of Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay by Ottis Redding. I came across this "Vanilla Book" : The Vanilla Book that might prove useful later on.

- And just tonight have I found this topic End of an era - Advanced Guitar Study Group dedicated to the Mickey Baker Method with a website in it : http://www.jazzandhotguitar.com/ And it seems like a complete breakdown of Mickey's book.

Anyway, am I missing something?! This forum is a true gold mine, that's for sure...

[lstelie]

Hello,

This is a great synthesis

I'd add that if Mickey Baker is under some aspect a "old fashion" book, it's a great "chord training" one, and that all that you have listed is not a random amount of various ressources but makes a coherent whole package.
Alone Mickey Baker's book is more or les useless for those (me) who are not seasoned jazz guitarists. Best case scenario you learn some chords and chords sequences, without really knowing why and what you are doing (this is especially true for chords substitutions, Mickey Baker gives no info of this topic), even the charts are not especially easy to read.
But
- Michael Joyce .Tef files allow for a real life use of the book, clear charts, playback MID system, and the website provides the text that is missing in the book, as a complement, Rob MacKillop gives great info about what and why we are doing, and a great visual representation of the way to play these chords in his videos
- This text can be completed with Franck Mele Mickey Baker correction file, that is not only a correction file but gives also some great remarks , for example, on chord substitutions.
- Once at ease with the chords séquence, with the help of Michael Joyce .nef files, they are much much pleasant to play along with Franck Prate mp3 files (his vidéos can be found here)

As a beginning player I'd say that all this makes sense as a whole, and the "Real Mickey Baker Method" is : Mickey Baker material + Michael Joyce material + Rob McKillop material + Franck Prate material

Luc

[Cidec]

Sorry, this seems like a dumb question, but I can't find the answer anywhere.

There are 3 on Amazon, Book 1 (Black and Yellow), Book 2 (Red and Yellow), and Mickey Baker's Jazz Guitar (Blue).

If I get the blue one, does that have both book 1 and 2?

I've been picking through reviews and forum posts and can't seem to find a straightforward answer. I'd like to have everything, but don't really wanna pick up duplicates if I can help it.

[Rob MacKillop]

No, is the answer. My preference is for the black and yellow for Book 1. The layout is better, and most people have used that, so any page numbers referenced will probably be for it.

Few people work through Book 2.

[Bill R]

I just bought book 1 and am confused by the very first lesson . . .

When learning the chords, how do I know what strings should be muted? It appears all the strings should be played in the first 26 chords but I know that's not right for all of them.

Any help would be appreciated!