PlayJazzGuitar.com Forum

[superdave]

I am getting back to playing after a 20 year absents. I still have my Mickey Baker Vol.1 & 2 books along with Howard Morgan's Concepts book and wondered after all these years it there's something better to study for a new/old beginner to learn full chord melody arrangements and improvising over them ? I'm very excited to have the time to get back into playing and appreciate any help from the forum.
Dave

[sunflower]

Welcome Superdave.......

I don't know about books much
(others will tell you their faves I'm sure)
I just surf Youtube these days cos you can see the fingers

start working on tunes straight away .....
that way you'll get results and it won't just be an exersize
which can get boring quick

I do know that one really good thing to get down is to learn the 4 inversions
for each of these 7th chords (4 note chords chords)
on the top 4 strings

Maj 7th
Dom 7th
Min 7th
Min 7th b5 (half diminished)
Dim


then do the middle four strings

Its a bit of work but it gives you the freedom to
put the melody note on top of the chord

have fun

[Viper]

Although I am not a chord melody player (not clever enough). I wonder if a martin taylor DVD with the music transcribed into a booklet in both the deaded tab and stave might help.

Martin Taylor: Jazz Guitarist and Martin
Taylor: Fingerstyle Jazz Guitar

about $40 or £25 each and cheaper 2nd hand on the net.

good luck.

[stratocasturbator]

I'd second the suggestion to get the barry galbraith books. they're not the be-all end-all but for chord melody they're great, very playable (with some practice of course) and run the gamut from fairly basic to complex. I sometimes like to take a tune, learn the galbraith arrangement, and then go to the real book or whatever the basic chart is, and work through the changes vs. comping/soloing. and the tunes in the galbraith books are definitely from the basic repertoire--all worth knowing. btw, once I come out the other end of learning a tune this way, I often have a few ideas for constructing a chord melody of my own.

as far as restarting the whole toolkit, well there are obviously dozens of methods and approaches. but the galbraith volumes are a good start vs chord melody... imho.

[superdave]

I had never heard of Barry Galbraith till now. That's why this forum is so great. Already read up on him and have Vol.1 & 3 coming.
Thanks, Dave

[Viper]

Dave
Use the search facility on this forum to learm about Barry Galbraith he has come up a number of times.

You can download free 42 chord melody arrangements in a pdf from the net. And his widow forwent the copyright as a tribute to him so its free.

Personally I wouldn't recommend this because they are advanced pieces which require you to be a very advanced quitarist. I don't know about his other stuff.

There are lots of tedious chord melody players about because they do not take onboard the immense amount of technique that is required to achieve clarity of expression in this the most demanding aspect of jazz guitar playing.

[Jazzie]

Get the Joe Pass video. It is easier to learn when you can see and hear what he is talking about. There are probably samples of his video on Youtube.
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[Krah13]