Newsletter Vol. 2 # 14 – December 08, 2002
Welcome to the latest issue of Guitar Noise News.
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In This Issue
- News and Announcements
- New Lessons and Articles
- Email of the Week
- Sunday Songwriters Sessions
- Reviews
- Hot Forum Topic
- Thoughts and Feedback
News And Announcements
Greetings! And welcome to Guitar Noise News!
I’m making progress! In my spare time this week, I’ve learned to (mostly) work a digital recorder. Now if I can just get the hang of turning these into MP3s, I think we’ll be in business as far as radically upgrading our lessons. As you might imagine, I’m pretty excited about all this, Pretty frustrated, too, because I keep thinking, “if only I had more time to work on this!”
Time, or perhaps more time, seems to be so hard to find. Thursday I was scrambling around wondering how I was ever going to get things done and I got an email from one of our readers telling me that he had spent the day with his kids playing in the snow. I’m glad he took the time to remind me about having my priorities in the right place. It’s easy to forget what’s really important about life.
Speaking of which, don’t forget to share your thoughts and stories concerning “The Joy of Guitar” or “The Joy of Music.” We’re getting things almost on a daily basis and I am seriously wondering if this is something we might want to continue through the year, maybe one compilation a month. What do you think? For now, don’t wait to send yours! Email Dan Lasley, Darrin Koltow or myself and we’ll take it from there.
And now back to our regularly scheduled program…
New Lessons And Articles
More joy and A-J Charron does triple duty – concert reviews, interviews and CD reviews. And Share Ross tells us about getting your music into the movies. Here’s what’s gone online since we last chatted:
The Joy Of Music – 2002 (part two)
Here are three more wonderful contributions from our readers and writers. We encourage you to share your thoughts and stories concerning “The Joy of Guitar” or “The Joy of Music” with all of us. It doesn’t even have to be much more than a paragraph, we just want to hear from you. Email Dan Lasley, Darrin Koltow or myself and we’ll take it from there.
Indie Music In Indie Films
by Share Ross
Share Ross, guitarist and lead singer for Bubble, gives us a brief guide to an increasingly popular of getting your music out to the public. Get it into a movie! This advice comes from someone who’s gone through the steps and if you haven’t considered this particular option before, I think it will open your eyes to an exciting possibility for you.
Two A-J Charron Interviews!
I don’t know how he does it, but A-J managed to interview TWO great bands while they were in Montreal recently. AND he reviews the concerts as well. It certainly sounds like everyone was having a great time!
Email Of The Week
I love it when I can use an “Email of the Week” to highlight an upcoming project!
Quick question: Do you know any acoustic songs that are played in open E tuning off the top of your head. I have been working on Little Martha by the Allman’s (love Duane) and I hate having to change tunings every time I want to play something different. I would prefer to leave it in open E for a while, than change back and forth all the time, b/c I heard it was bad on the guitar to change tunings too much??? Just thought maybe you would know…
Thanks for writing. Off the top of my head, I know that a lot of the songs from Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks were done in open E as he was crazy about the tuning at the time. Shelter From The Storm, Simple Twist of Fate and Buckets of Rain are definitely played that way. Some of the other songs, like Tangled Up In Blue were originally done in open E but got changed somewhere down the line in the recording process.
Another thing to remember is that open E is simply a step up from open D, so any songs that you might know in open D can in essence be done in open E if your voice is up to it (assuming you sing). I perform versions of Fleetwood Mac’s Over My Head and the Police’s Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic and Going to California by Led Zeppelin(although the recording is in open G) in this tuning. Personally, I prefer to tune to open D and then put a capo on the second fret.
You can find lessons on Shelter From The Storm and Every Little Thing in our article, Here There Be Monsters (Open Tuning part 2).
By the bye, in January, I hope to do a beginner’s lesson on Tangled Up In Blue and an intermediate on Simple Twist of Fate. The latter will definitely be in open E (or D) tuning.
If you have a question for us please remember that many questions have been asked in different ways, and the answer may already appear somewhere on Guitar Noise. If you have a question please check the help pages.
Sunday Songwriters Group
SSG Week 9
With the holidays upon us, and time at a premium, we can lighten the load a little and still work on essential songwriting tools.
Take a song’s title. It’s arguably the most important part of the song. It gives the listener an idea of what to expect. It gives your adoring fans a way to ask for your latest at the local CD store. The title is often overlooked even though it can make or break a song. No lie, Midnight Train to Georgia was originally Midnight Plane to Houston. Which title evokes warmer feelings?
This week’s assignment is to come up with three or four killer song titles.
No songs necessary, for the moment, and that’s a hint of the wickedness to come!
If you are having songwriting withdrawal, do a re-write of one of your earlier songs. Let’s see if all this writing is paying off.
Reviews
A-J’s certainly keeping himself busy. In addition to the interviews he arranged with both Planet X and Symphony X, he’s found the time to review their latest releases!
Hot Forum Topic
Beginners’ Q&A Forum
Book Reviews In The Forum!!!!
One of our readers asked a question about instructional books and look what happened! This is another example of a great idea that benefits everyone. If there’s enough interest in this, we’ll probably start a separate forum page for reader reviews! What do you think?
Come join the discussion in the Guitar Noise forums.
Thoughts and Feedback
Sometimes it seems that I could fill each newsletter with nothing but “thank you” – for writing, for sharing, for caring enough about Guitar Noise and music and each other to write. Between the holiday and work and trying to learn how to get MP3s on to the site (and PLEASE feel free to offer advice!), I’ve fallen a bit behind on the email, but, hopefully, I should be caught up again before the next week is out.
Starting in January, I plan to do a little more coordinating of the song lessons. By that, I mean either running a theme (doing songs by the same artist) or getting more involved in arrangements (having both the Beginners and Intermediate pieces be on the same song). When I did the first Easy Song for Beginners, Horse With No Name, I wrote it in two parts. The first part dealt with simply learning the chords and strumming and structure of the song. The second dealt with coming up with things to do to make it more interesting.
As I mentioned earlier, we’ll be on a Dylan kick in January – Tangled Up In Blue will be the Beginner’s lesson and Simple Twist of Fate will be the Intermediate piece. In February I thought I’d go a little overboard and show you two versions of Dire Straits’ Sultans Of Swing. The Beginner’s version will simply be an arrangement to learn the chords and strumming. In the Intermediate version, we’ll break down the original recording and look at how the leads and fills are done. I’m hoping that this will demonstrate to some of you why chord shapes are just as important as scales.
And if that wasn’t enough, I’m also hoping to get started on a new project – pieces for the beginning electric guitarist. I’m thinking about starting out with Coldplay’s In My Place.
All of this is, of course, subject to time (you knew I’d get back to that, didn’t you?). I’m truly hoping that I will be able to get on a schedule of sorts that will permit me more time to spend writing for you.
I’m also pleased to say that there are others among you who are planning on taking the writing plunge. I think you’ll be happy with the lessons coming in the pipeline.
Next week, let’s discuss resolutions a little more…
I hope that each of you has a great week. I look forward to hearing from you.
As always,
Peace
David
