Customer Reviews

Easy Pop Melodies Book only 2nd Edition (Hal Leonard Guitar Method (Songbooks))

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you're learning guitar from the (very effective) Hal Leonard method books, you're probably a little embarrassed by the old-timey tunes that you're playing. This book is a supplement with some more contemporary popular songs in the form of lyrics + melody + chords. It would be nice if they would just incorporate some of these kinds of songs in the method book in place of say "down in the valley" and "patsy-ory-ory-aye", but given what we're stuck with this supplement is worthwhile for the beginner.

I am a private music teacher and I have used dozens of "Easy Pop Melodies" as part of my curriculum. I use it in conjunction with Hal Leonard's "Complete Guitar Method". I like the way it uses familiar songs, though many of my younger students don't know them. It introduces songs progressively from easy to more difficult. When used with the "Complete Guitar Method" book, it provides a nice break from exercises and lets them have a more practical experience. They will play both written melodies and new chords as they learn them. A good choice.

I like everything about the book and CD except that some of the pieces are very fast and it would be much more helpful if there was both a slow and a fast version of some of these pieces on the CD. It can be very hard to get pieces with syncopated rhythms at fast tempos of 130 or faster.

This book was recommended by Steve Krentz for guitar beginners, it was a very good one with a beautiful collection of songs.

This is an OK book if you're a beginner at playing melodies, the chords are more complicated than the melodies so unless you're comfortable with e.g. bar chords don't bother getting this book for the sake of practicing chords. In short it's OK for it's price (I paid ~$5), but I've seen books that have ten times as many songs in them for only trice the price.

I really like the concept behind this series, but be careful. If you enjoy singing along, then you better know all of the words, because some of the melodies only have partial lyrics. The cover says "Play the Melodies", so if that's all you're looking for then this book is pretty good.