Trills
A trill is performed by quickly hammering on and pulling off two notes. It’s usually represented by a “tr” and a squiggle line like seen… Read More »Trills
notes
Fretboard Tapping
Tapping is the technique Eddie Van Halen made famous. It involves hammering on the fretboard with your 1st or 2nd finger of your picking hand to produce a note then pulling off to notes fingered by your fret hand. The involvement of the picking hand in this fashion is called a tap. It is usually represented by a “T” in tablature.Read More »Fretboard Tapping
How do I play chords with slashes?
Sometimes when looking at a piece of music you’ll see some odd chord voicing that have slashes in them. For example a C/G chord, or an A/E. What kind of chords are these and how do you play them?Read More »How do I play chords with slashes?
“Yellow” by Coldplay
Difficulty:Easy – Intermediate There’s some interesting things going on in this song as two of the guitars use an alternate tuning. The chords played in this… Read More »“Yellow” by Coldplay
“Undertow” by Tool
You will need to tune to Drop D.Read More »“Undertow” by Tool
A Shape Barre Chord Exercises
In these exercises, you are to figure out the barre chord that needs to be played, and apply them to strumming basic quarter notes.
For the first few pages of exercises I’ve include red lettering that Read More »A Shape Barre Chord Exercises
Open D Major 7th Chord
This chord is very easy to play. Just place your 1st finger across the 2nd frets of the G, B, and high E strings. To… Read More »Open D Major 7th Chord
How To Use A Compressor
What does a compressor do? Compression is probably the most misused effect that is used by guitarists. This misuse is probably a result of the fact that many players do not understand what compression is or what it does. When a new guitar player gets a hold of a new effects unit they expect that it is going to alter the sound of the guitar in a very noticeable way. A compressor is not this kind of effect. Think of it as a ghost in the shadow of the effects chain. If you weren’t looking very hard for it you would not even notice that it was there.Read More »How To Use A Compressor
How To Use A Capo
You can use a capo to easily change the key of a song. A lot of people do this so that they can sing the song in a range that is comfortable. Regardless of where you place a capo, the idea is that you create a ‘floating nut’. Read More »How To Use A Capo