Customer Reviews

Progressive Lead Guitar: With Cd ( for beginner to advanced students)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Progressive Lead Guitar by Turner & White is an excellent way to get started on playing rock and blues lead guitar. Those familiar with basic open chords, root 6 and root 5 bar chords as well as basic music theory should have little difficulty understanding the material presented (if not, check out Progressive Rhythm Guitar by the same authors). The lessons are carefully planned, with all of the exercises on CD so you can hone your playing.

There are three main sections to the book - the first deals with 12-bar blues riffs, the major scale and alternate picking. This section provides you with plenty of tricky fingerings, so you get chance to build up your dexterity. I frequently use this section as a basis for my own warm-up exercises before practicing.

Section two deals with improvisation, introducing the "Blues" scale (otherwise known as the minor-pentatonic, five-tone, scale), the "Country" or major-pentatonic scale, slurring techniques (hammer-on's, pull-off's, slides, bends, vibrato), major & minor key progressions, as well as several fingering patterns for the major/blues/country scales. This section allows you to get to grips with the basics of all rock & blues improvisation, and the tricks-of-the-trade.

The last section expands upon second, with a focus on using additional notes, passing notes and harmony notes with the scales already presented. There is also a short but sweet introduction to modes. What makes this book true value for money is the excellent appendices that cover music theory as it relates to the scales covered in previous sections, tips for soloing, chord formula charts, modulation, ear training, harmonics, as well as 21 full-backing tracks in a variety of rock & blues styles for you to practice improvisation.

For the price, quality and depth of the material presented, no beginning lead guitarist should be without Progressive Lead Guitar.

The book is excellent in the fact it goes into great detail in music theory, scales, patterns, and so forth, but the problem comes with the included CD. The CD lessons do not correspond with the lessons in the book. Mostly the error comes from mistitling the first 6 lessons on the cd which puts the whole thing off. The only way I saw to correct it, is to download the cd into a program like iTunes and spend an hour renaming all the lesson titles, then either playing back on your iPod or burning it onto a new CD.

I've bought a number of entry level guitar instruction books, and this is tops. Learning to play someone else's music is a waste of time - create your own music, your own style. This book is one of the few that really steers you in that direction.

Fantasic book for anyone interested in playing lead guitar, be it a garage band or professional on-stage band. Clear and concise instructions. The CD is worth the cost just for listening pleasure, but, learn to play them and you get the best of both worlds.

Good stuff here. I am an advanced player who teaches young people. I walked through this book in a few hours and feel that it presents a pragmatic and musically interesting view of beginning lead guitar.
Real good stuff coming out of Aus these days.

All the basics are here with annotated and well explained examples.
I appreciated that the authors used motif development from the beginning of the first page through the entire method. This is a most important concept as it teaches the student to continue the development of the musical idea--fractal/phrase/theme-- throughout the song. Herein lies one of the keys to the source of that endless well of creativity that a lead guitarist requires.

All in all well worth the wait.

I used to think that you could learn the basics of guitar playing from free internet web sites. But say that anymore because the material in this book is arranged not just to teach the beginning guitar student the basics of playing lead but to facilitate the development of the necessary skills.

It includes all the integral items that one would expect: it teaches alternate picking, various scales, hammer ons, pull offs, bends, slides, double stops, octaves, etc... But it also includes some practice riffs that are included on the CD. Almost all the practice riffs involve a heavy use of the pinky finger. The book doesn't just teach you, it trains you. The practice riffs help build strength and flexibility.

At the end of the CD there are 21 background tracks of all different styles of music which the student can jam to and practice what they've learned.

The only drawback is that the book is very simple. The example exercises are very easy. There is nothing challenging. The book only briefly touches on some skills like thirds and sixths. That doesn't take away from the quality of the book. It's only to say that intermediate and advanced level guitar students might not get a lot out of this book. And after working through this book, there is A LOT of learning and practice that needs to be undertaken prior to becoming a performance-level player.

This book keeps it simple and direct. learn what is presented and you can move forward with your goal to play lead guitar. The CD is fine and the riffs written out are good, but it is the way the lead patterns are presented that make it easy to do your own thing right away. I'll be looking for this author in the future.

This book is very helpful for my son taking guitar lessons. The CD that comes with the book also lets me know if he is doing what he is supposed to do.