Customer Reviews

Steve Kaufman's Four-Hour Celtic Workout: Four CDs Plus Book

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Bought this book, listened to the tunes. They aren't played in this book the way they are played in sessions. True, different sessions have different variations, but they are closer to the norm. If you are struggling to learn the mandolin you could spend a lot of time learning how to play the tunes per Kaufman, and then have to re-learn them. The same could be said for the Mandolin Players Fake Book. Chief O'Neill's Music of Ireland is considered to be the standard, but you will have to read notation which is not all that hard for mandolin, and it truly makes things easier. Mel Bay publishes O'Neill's book, but the original index is difficult and the book is flimsy and expensive. For a better solution, check out [...]. Better yet, buy a small recorder like the TASCAM DR-07 that I purchased at Amazon, and take it to session. You can play back the tunes at a slower speed so you can learn to play the tune exactly like they do at your local session.

One positive thing about the book and CD is that they play the tune slow and provide tab and notation. Then when you have it down, you can play along with the faster recording of the tune. Just don't expect it to be what they are playing at session.

Thanks for stating that this was ONLY the 4 CDs from this package, as it was exactly what I had been looking for. I'd recently found the book at a used-book sale without the CDS and had slim hopes of finding just the CDs somewhere online. Thankfully you had just those items! And the shipping was fast too...I received the package just 2 days after it was sent by you. I'm very satisfied and will gladly purchase more!