Jazz Chops for Guitar [Paperback]

Buck Brown (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 2001

Great musical ideas need great chops to back them up. Build your finger strength, flexibility and independence with these exercise books from one of America's leading guitar schools. Jazz Chops covers the finger independence needed for smooth, rapid changes between complex jazz chords in the context of important progressions, such as ii-V-I. Develop your chops practicing exercises in the style of music you enjoy!

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Buck Brown knows that guitar playing is the "real job" his mom always told him to get. In the past 35 years, he has been fortunate to play with such great artists as Nils Lofgren, Tony Trischka, Stacy Phillips, Dave Hamburger, Robert Lee Castleman, Mark Egan and all of the incredible teachers at the National Guitar Workshop (where he taught from 1984 to 1991). Buck has written ten National Guitar Workshop publications (under the name Robert Brown) including Chord Connections, his master work on guitar harmony. As a composer, he has written music for innumerable episodes of America's Most Wanted, has won an Emmy Award in Cleveland, a Bronze Medal at the New York Film Festival and has been nominated twice for Helen Hayes Awards in Musical Theatre. When he is not on the road, Buck plays and teaches in Washington, D.C., is married to the fabulous chanteuse Rebecca Davis, lives with three dogs, bats right, throws right and plays loud.

Product Details

• Paperback: 80 pages
• Publisher: Workshop Arts Inc; Pap/Com edition (August 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1929395353
• ISBN-13: 978-1929395354
• Product Dimensions: 11.6 x 8.8 x 0.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,355,517 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Highly Recommended, September 22, 2004

By 

J. Janssen (San Diego, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Jazz Chops for Guitar (Paperback)

I purchased this book with the accompanying CD a couple of years ago, flipped through it, and put it aside for more "interesting" material to work on. Having gone through numerous method books on jazz guitar I felt I was beyond the skills this volume purported to teach. Boy, was I wrong!

After reaching a certain plateau on the learning curve I just wasn't progressing the way I thought I should. On a whim I pulled this slim volume out of my pile and proceeded to leaf through it with a more open mind. After working through specific chapters (in my case fingerboard speed and economy of travel) My playing improved significantly. I was now able to reach fret positions with time to spare. Maybe that's an exageration but the excercises definately helped in arriving "ahead of the music" rather than constantly racing to keep up to tempo. Additionally, the alternate picking excercises should be required reading for anyone. My third and fourth finger strength has improved and the six fret stretches are now comfortable with my fretting hand held solidly in position. And, it didn't take that long to make significant improvment.

My only criticism of this volume is, compared to other teaching materials and given it's size it seems a little overpriced, but that's nitpicking. I would highly recommend this book/cd combo for anyone who wants to improve their technique. There's no theory, no solos and no comping patterns; just sequencing, scales and fingering excercises.

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth picking up, February 3, 2011

By 

Louis Fitzgerald (Melbourne, Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Jazz Chops for Guitar (Paperback)

I too had this book in my pile of method books for years until I thought I would try some of the exercises. It starts of in a pretty straight forward way, but by the middle it has some amazing exercises that really help conceptualise the FULL fretboard. Highly recommend this for anyone willing to put in 15-30 min a day to make major improvements in strength, flexibility and fretboard mastery.

5 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Some good comping ideas, but ..., April 21, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Jazz Chops for Guitar (Paperback)

much of this book is devoted to basic finger exercises, none of which are jazz-specific. My philosophy is that exercises should be musical, or at least close .... About 2/3 of this book is mindless permutations. I was disappointed.