Customer Reviews

Mel Bay Complete Celtic Fingerstyle Guitar

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The accompanying CD is not as much of a stand-alone pleasure as some other books, but few Celtic acoustic books have so much to offer. The tablature is written a bit different from other books and is hard to read at first, but not a big problem. Even though not all tunes are on the CD, once you learn a few of the songs you quickly get a feel for how to play the others. A basic ability to read music helps alot for getting the timing down.

Each tune has a short description preceding that is very interesting and insightful. In some cases the book offers up to three different versions of a tune. I've found better versions of several of the songs here in other books, but there are also some superior arrangements here, and songs I've not seen elsewhere (yet).

I would highly recommend this book as part of a Celtic acoustic guitarists library. If you're not sure you want to delve into this area of guitar, you might try The Blarney Pilgrim first so you don't get overwhelmed. There's a ton of stuff in this one. Six months into it I've only memorized about four of the pieces.

It's a book you can spend a lot of time on... It contains a lot of songs, each one with a different mood: beautiful melodic pieces, quick jigs to be danced, dramatik marches, and so on...

The CD is very helpful and pleasant to listen to, even if it does not contain all of the songs of the book.
The difficulty of the songs ranges from very easy to very difficult. And you'll also find out some beautiful tunings for the guitar: DADGAD, CGDGAD,...

If you like to play fingerpicking, it's a very good book, like all of the Grossman's publications.

This is a very nicely done book. For one thing, it covers the gamut of Celtic styles - airs, jigs, hornpipes, reels, planxties, and songs. For another, it uses arrangements from multiple players, which give a much wider sense of the potential and flexibility of Celtic fingerstyle guitar. In some cases, there are multiple arrangements of the same tune, in different tunings, by different arrangers. Which brings up that it is also a useful introduction to the power of alternate tunings AND the power of standard tuning to address this music. And finally, there are excellent essays on various relevant subjects throughout the book - some on guitar technique, some on music history, etc. And the skill range is helpful too, from nice beginner tunes to very advanced arrangements.

All in all, a useful addition to the library of any guitarist interested in Celtic music.