Guitar Noise

Welcome to the latest issue of Guitar Noise News.

In This Issue

• News and Announcements
• New Lessons and Articles
• Worth a Look
• Thoughts and Feedback

News And Announcements

Greetings!

Welcome to Guitar Noise News!

I’d like to start this week by iterating a couple of items:

First, I’d like to once again thank all those who participated in our year-end fundraiser by donating to Guitar Noise (I know a lot of you have donated after the New Year and I want to make sure you know I mean you as well!).

And I don’t want to thank only those who donated money. We fully realize (another classic Hodge understatement here) that not everyone is able to contribute money. But, being a community, we rely on each other. People also donate of their time (think of all our moderators on the forum pages) and talents.

“Talent” isn’t limited to our writers, though! If you look at any of our lessons, you’ll notice a little icon near the top that says “Tell A Friend.” If you click on this, you can send the URL of that particular article directly to someone you know (even yourself if you’d like!). Believe it or not, Paul didn’t create this and I don’t even have to tell you that it certainly wasn’t me, right?

This new feature comes courtesy of Guitar Noise reader Adam McMaster who programmed the whole thing from scratch after a having a few email discussions with Paul on the project. Some of you might recognize his name from last year, when he created a page where Guitar Noise folks could post their original MP3s free of charge. Adam is a student, so we know that his time is valuable and he could easily be spending it otherwise. I’d like to take the time to offer him not only my thanks, but thanks as well from all the Guitar Noise readers.

The second thing I’d like to mention is that you shouldn’t forget that this year marks the start of our “Gutiar Noise Seminars” series. There are still a few spaces left in the February and March sessions. We’re holding classes at my (new) home in Egremont, Massachusetts, which is just outside of Great Barrington, which is just over an hour out of Albany, NY or Hartford, CT, under two hours from Boston and just over two hours from New York City.

Here’s the schedule for the 2004 Guitar Noise Seminars. Please note that we’ve changed the topics for the April seminar. This “Day of Blues” is open to both acoustic and electric players, so feel free to bring either (or both!) guitars:

Saturday, February 21, 2004
Topics: Strumming Basic Theory

Saturday, March 20, 2004
Topics: Beginning Fingerstyle Intro to Chord Voicing

Saturday, April 17, 2004
Topics: Beginning Blues Guitar Beginning Blues Guitar (part 2)

In order to ensure that everyone gets plenty of personal attention, each of these classes will be limited to 10 people, so if you’d like to attend let me know! And in case you’re interested in more specifics (such as learning exactly what will be covered in, say, “Intro to Chord Voicing”), just drop me a note.

You can see I’ve tried to group the lessons in a way that would make it worth your while to attend the whole day and I should once again mention our “special offer:” Attendance for any of these first three full-day seminars (that’s six hours of class plus food, (nonalcoholic) drinks and jamming afterwards) will cost $100.

If you’d like to attend any (or all!) of these, drop me an email at dhodge@guitarnoise.com and be sure to put “Seminars” in the subject line. I will get back to you with details and will be more than happy to answer any of your questions.

We’re also still working on the “Guitar Noise Seminar On The Road” ideas. Currently Toronto and the Washington DC / Maryland area are under high consideration as are Cincinnati, Nashville and Houston. If you think you’d like to hold one in your little corner of the world, think about (a) what topic or topics you’d like to have covered and (b) how many people you think you might be able to get together for one. You don’t really need a big crowd because more than a dozen people usually cuts down on the individual attention one can give to the participants. Six to ten is optimal.

Then think about where one could be held – a small group can easily fit into a home or a small school or church hall. You’ve got to have room for everyone to comfortably sit with their guitars.

If you think you have the logistics covered, write me and I’ll be more than happy to work out more of the details with you in order to make this happen.

Oh! I should also mention that Chicago will probably see a few of these!

Returning to home, we’ve got a lot of things to cover. So let’s get right down to it, shall we? Here are the new things that have gone online at Guitar Noise since we last chatted:

New Lessons And Articles

An Introduction Into The World Of Rreplacement Pickups (Part 2)
by Bill Cozzo

In his second chapter of this two-part piece, Bill details the stages of choosing and then installing the right replacement pickups for his guitar. As usual, he gives us a wealth of detail and information, making something as intricate as the whole procedure a snap to understand and appreciate.

An Interview With Martin Barre
by A-J Charron

Can’t place the name? Would “Jethro Tull” ring a bell? Read A-J’s fascinating interview with this guitarist whose work spans four decades. Martin offers some fine advice concerning the nature of playing for a living and the attitudes that make it a lot easier on one’s well-being. A definite must-read!

Arranging Things
An Introduction to Song Arrangement – Part 1
by David Hodge

Not everyone picks up the guitar to be a strummer! But song arrangements and chord melodies do not have to be the forte of just classical and jazz players. You, too, can learn to create song arrangements to play at your own level. How easy do we start out? Can you hum Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star? Then you can definitely learn how to do this!

Worth A Look

Late last year, Guitar Noise Forum Moderator Graham Merry wrote a wonderful piece about his first adventure in writing a chord melody arrangement. If you’re interested in my new piece on song arrangements, you’ll definitely want to read this one as well! Find it here: The Birth of a Chord Melody

Thoughts & Feedback

I’ve probably mentioned at various times that we get a lot of email. I get a lot of what we get of it. And, no, this isn’t another of those “don’t worry if you haven’t heard from me yet” paragraphs (although perhaps it should be! I’m still pretty far behind and you should feel free to write me again if you’ve not gotten a response from meand…)…

Sometimes when I’m writing responses I (quite unintentionally) stumble across a phrase that I like and feel conveys a lot of the heart of Guitar Noise. Lately, I’ve been thanking people for their emails and adding that I hope that our site continues to be a source of “education and inspiration” to them. I think that these two words, education and inspiration, have to go hand in hand.

When I first started writing for Guitar Noise, over four years ago now, I think that my ratio of “educational” articles to “inspirational” ones was a bit more balanced. Nowadays I’m writing much more on the educational side and, while I’m not sure that’s an entirely good thing, I do know that others are picking up the slack on the inspirational end of things. Our forum page is certainly a tribute to that and I’m quite proud of the encouragement that people receive there.

But, just to prove that even I’m constantly learning things (!), I’m also realizing that the educational articles can also be inspirational in their own way. Knowing how to play a song you really like makes you want to learn even more songs, right? Being able to play a lead line that you thought was beyond your abilities makes you want to expand those abilities even more.

Last week we had a piano delivered to the house. The folks who did this were also nice enough to help me move an organ I’d brought from Chicago into the house from the garage (okay, it was more like I helped them by keeping out of the way!). One of the men noticed my guitars and asked to try out the Seagull acoustic. He plays, I found out from talking with him, in one of the local bands here in the county. He, of course, was at first taken aback by the fact that the guitar was left handed, but still managed to play around with it enough to get a feel for the instrument. While he was playing he said, “This is like learning from scratch again!” and I had to laugh.

But it’s so true that it’s very easy, almost as easy as breathing, to forget what it was like to be a total beginner. Because of this, it’s also incredibly easy to loose patience with answering the same questions over and over.

We’re all part of a community. As I mentioned at the start of this newsletter, I know that everyone is not able to donate in the form of money. We don’t expect that. But never think that you have nothing to contribute. Sometimes simply telling someone “I’ve been there and this is how I got through it” is a huge thing. And no one remains a beginner forever. One of the things I find incredibly cool on the forum pages is how some new folks, people who’ve been playing for less than six months, are happy to tell the really new players of their experiences.

All of us, regardless of our age, sex, ability, or whichever label you want to stick on yourself, have talents to contribute. This is not my call for you to start giving to Guitar Noise. It is a call for you to remember to give back to the world.

I hope you all have a grand week. Stay safe.

And, as always,

Peace

David