The Guitar Bible !

[Afronaut]

This is a long read but i hope it helps some folks.
(might have some typos also but hey, im a guitar player, what ya expect?)

I just wanted to make a post about Guitar Books. Real ones and eBooks.

I've been playing guitar for over 20 years, I have not taken too many lessons and
im what one could consider self-learned, more or less.
I do have some Piano Lessons from my youth etc, but I've have not payed for a
Guitar Lesson(s), ever.
I've got good advices and lotsa talks with the more Theory-People so Im
truly not a Really Self Learned, we all pick up from other folks in some way.
I didnt lock myself to the room 20-odd years ago and came out to make this post.



Ok, since I like to study about the Music and Guitars in my own tempo and privacy
etc.
I think i got some good pointers to give here, but bear in mind these methods has
been working for me and may not be your way of doing things.

The hardcovers:

The best book about the Guitar has to be The Guitar Handbook by Ralph Denyer.
I have not seen this on the "market" as a pdf.
I cannot praise enough of it content. It is extremely good book to have
for Beginners or the Experienced players as it hold so much info.
If you're a Player or just getting started, you better get this book.
It covers so wide range of subjects. From the history of guitar players,
history of Guitars in general, the building, the maintanance (which a lot of ppl desregards)
the effects, recording, technical info of amps, guitars, effects etc...
and last, but definately not least, the Theory.
It has a good ways of explaing the Theory of how/why notes are written etc.
plus the modal talks, scales, most used chord progressions (12-bar blues anyone?)etc. practising tips.

In my opinion this is book is the Bible and the Mother, plus 1.


I dont have too many other books about the guitar, it seems that I just dont need one
sinse i got the Net (market) and I got this book in 2 languages allready.


I also got Fender Amps: The First Fifty Years because
I got myself The Blonde and didnt have the Net at the time to get more info about Fender Amps.
Its a nice book to drool over if you're into Vintage Amps.


I got me a Gretsch 6120SSL in 1995, and i had to get a book about the guitar also,
just to dig deeper about it. I found The Guitars of the Fred Gretsch Company, by Jay Scott.
Im not sure how Good it is but it sure has been nice to read. Tons of info.

But since I got the Internjet, I've been collecting books about Music Theory,
songbooks about albums and all other kinda things, like little lessons for
scales, fingering (fingerbang, ahaha), warmups and the likes.

Most of the stuff i got from eMule, just make a search with a word Guitar and
put the extension to pdf (acrobat files) and your all set.
I'd go for bigger files for better quality, if songbook like the
Dream Theater - Awake wights about 2 MB, you wont be seeing much of the notes
no matter how much you zoom in.

SoulSeek is one place to look at too, lotsa Guitar Players there.
Try to look for Instruction Videos and you'll might find a user with
shitload of guitar material. If you search with a word Guitar you'd get mp3's
with guitar on the filesname, there a lot of those. (even teh Guitar-Slingers files)

Try to narrow the search with some pretty typical name for a Instruction Video.
Guitar Players who use SouSeek etc. tend to have some cool teaching videos.

And when you find a fellow player, just make friends, be nice etc.
and keep downloading.


I dont know about Kazaa network but i suspect it is not dry of eBooks.
I just havent used it for it, yet. I guess it works if you go after PDF files somehow.

For what books to DL? Thats a matter of what you're into.
There is a lot of books out there.

If you're into jazzy stuff, check out the Real Books.

If you're into metal type of thing, there is lotsa songbooks
about some albums. Just search with the artist name and with the extension PDF.

If you're looking for a book that has teh shortcuts to learn how to play, really quick or fast,
remember the muscles has memory too, and it can take time to
get your fingers do what you want.

Also the Theory is a Must to learn if you're even a bit more serious
than a Sunday Player. It is not a difficult language to learn,
makes your life so much easier in the jam sessions and it will open your
ears for things you'd never thought of before, in a Good Way.

[sebastian_insua]

Have you tried Guitar Pro and one of those huge guitar pro tablature packs that you can downlaod off eMule, they have like 30,000 tabs in them.

[leeferdude]

Powertabs! http://www.powertabs.net

By the way, Guitar-Slinger, what equipment you using?