Mark's Guitar Blog

My blog has moved!

Mark Wein — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 17:27:00 GMT

Our New Website is Up!

Hey guys!

Just letting you know that this particular site will no longer be updated although it will remain up and running. All new lessons will be at www.MWGLforums.com both in my new blog over there Mark's New Guitar Blog and on the new site Front Page where you will not only have articles from me but several other contributors on playing guitar and making music in general!

You will need to register (it's free!) at the new site since it is different from this one (if you do not already have a forum membership) but in addition to being able to post in the forums you get your own blog, we have free file hosting for you and access not only to my lessons but lessons and tutorials from many other experienced folks in our online community on subjects like Studio Recording, Live Performance, playing other instruments like Bass, Drums, Keyboards and Vocals as well as the staff of my physical music school in Orange California, Premier Music www.PremierSchoolofMusic.com and events such as our regular RecordingFests!

Thanks and I'll see you guys over there..

Mark

A short interview/Lesson I did with Oscar Jordan of ShareMyGuitar.com!

Mark Wein — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 22:27:00 GMT

Whats up? I haven't been writing in my blog for about a month or so due to the studio being horribly busy and some website updates and whatnot, but I should be going again in February as things die down. This week was the NAMM Show (National Association of Music Merchants) and while I was there checking things out I did a few interviews, one for VintageRock.com that we'll see in a few weeks and this one with "ShareMyGuitar.com" that was just posted today....it's a quick version of my "Hendrix Rhythm Guitar" lesson from a few months ago....

Here are a few product reviews and other junk from the show that I posted over the weekend: Click here for a list of NAMM reviews and stories!

on GuitarWorld.com if you dig this blog!

Blog Rewind - Hybrid Picking, Walking Basslines and Double Stops

Mark Wein — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:07:00 GMT

This weeks lesson is what I call a "Goodie Bag" lesson. I have a batch of licks or ideas that are loosely connected, but each can stand on their own...do all or part of the lesson!

The theme this week is "Hybrid Picking". Hybrid picking is where you use a combination of pick and fingers to play the strings as opposed to just using the pick or just playing fingerstyle.

The first example is a walking bass line played with the pick while the other fingers play chords. The thing to keep in mind is that the chord either happens WITH the bass note, or in between bass notes...it is not as hard as it seems.

The next few examples are mostly "double stops", where you play two notes at one time on adjacent strings. If you are playing more in a Chuck Berry style, you would use your pick to play the double stops. I usually play more of a country vibe on these ideas, so I use my ring and middle fingers to pluck both strings at the same time, and use the pick to play any single notes.

The fifth line down does not have any double stops, but I use the ring finger (notated "A" below) to snap the first of every six notes in the line.

The next two lines are ideas that you can use for either soloing, or as a rhythm guitar riff. Hybrid pick or pick normally, they will sound great in Blues, Rock or Country styles.

The licks on the last line are more for soloing...

Have fun with these...next week, more goodies!

Click Here for a Printable PDF version of this Lesson

on GuitarWorld.com

The Joys of the Two Continent and Three State Cover Band

Mark Wein — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:14:00 GMT

    Today is the "Reveal" for the Recordingfest on my forum, and I personally collaborated on "Black Dog" by Led Zeppelin with three other guys I've never met in person.

    Here is the mp3: Black Dog

    Instead of the usual "go to a studio, mic the instruments and perform the song and overdub" scheme that was how we used to have to do things computer recording and the internet have allowed me to record music with people on the other side of the globe in the privacy of my own office between students.

    I have an Apple iMac with ProTools 8 LE recording software and an Mbox Mini. Instead of micing an amplifier I used a software amp modeler called GTR 3 Solo. Just enough to record with the big boys

    I won't write too much about the process other than the Drums were recorded first in Norway, emailed to West Virginia to have bass played on them and then emailed to me.

    Where they sat for about a month until I got around to playing rhythm guitar. I am usually the bottleneck in these things.

    Usually the last week or so before things are due I get the rhythm guitars done and then shipped off to the next guy. All of the parts are emailed to the guy in W.V. since he is essentially the engineer and producer. After I sent back my rhythm guitars he sent a mix to the vocalist in San Diego who tracked his vocals while I went back to work on getting the solo happening.

    I struggled with the solo a bit Saturday morning but my first student (who is a massive Led Zep fan) came for his lesson with his 1968 VOS Les Paul with pickups and electronics that he had custom made to emulate the Jimmy Page Les Paul I figured I'd give his guitar a go and the solo ended up coming together on his guitar. Sometimes a little bit of inspiration goes a long way!

    Here I am at 8am Saturday morning trying to "BRING THE RAWK!!!!". Eventually it was "brought" and all of the tracks were mixed and posted for the 1970's Recordingfest on my forum.

Some of the other collaborations I've done with these guys:

Round and Round by Ratt

Still of the Night by Whitesnake

I get to play the music I wish I could have pulled of in High School, without the bad hair

on GuitarWorld.com!

3 Note Per String Minor Scales

Mark Wein — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 23:15:00 GMT

This is the 3rd of the 3 note per string lessons and it is the last of our "getting the patterns under our fingers" lessons.

Here are the first two:

3 Note per string Major Scales

3 Note per string Mixolydian Scales

Click here for a printable version of this lesson.

Vote for me on GuitarWorld.com if you dig the lesson! -

Last minute Jazz gig

Mark Wein — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 21:07:00 GMT

My buddy Martin lost the guitarist for his trio gig Saturday night so I headed out to the birthplace of Jazz (Yorba Linda, CA ) to play two sets with him and a Singer/Violinist. It's a low volume gig so the Tele neck pickup/slightly rolled down tone/solid state amp was the sonic "Uniform of the Day".

The FM65DSP will be seeing it's first gig ever. Actually, I don't think Ive even mentioned it on the forum. A student gave it to me a few years ago and it was in my office until the recent repainting. Not an inspiring amp, but it will get the job done. Not a gig for 40 year old (loud) tube amps in need of service so my Deluxe and Bassman stayed home.

The gig went pretty well. It was all lead sheet reading and the violinist played or sang most of the melodies since it was her gig. I sang one tune but it was mostly a comping gig with the occasional solo. It was nice to see some improvement in my playing since the last gig I did like this was last Christmas on Rodeo Drive.

Actually in the parking garage on Rodeo Drive since it was raining that night

These are the tunes that I remember playing:

Bewitched
But Beautiful
Autumn Leaves
Black Orpheus
God Save the Child
Sugar Sweet (I sang)
Blue Monk
All of Me
Fly me to the Moon

There were several other tunes I can't remember right now. Most of the night was spent doing the Freddy Green/Django style quarter note comping since it seemed to fit with the violin and the song selection best. The 2-3 Bossas that we played were a nice departure from that feel.

Apparently the singer liked me so I'm on the sub list for the gig now. The regular guitarist is my friend Stu Goodis who is a great Jazz guitarist who's studied with Pat Martino among others. I'm no where near the jazzer that he is but I think she liked the bluesy and more old style stuff I brought to the table. Being able to sing didn't hurt, either....

How I'm doing at the moment in my own battles and my discovery of "Sarod" picking.

Mark Wein — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 16:42:00 GMT

    I haven't been blogging on the "Reconstruction" thing the last few weeks...life got hectic and my actual "studies" went by the wayside although I've been playing a bunch. I'm recording a version of "Black Dog" by Led Zeppelin for the forums Recordingfest with a few friends, I got asked to play the "Star Spangled Banner" ala Jimi Hendrix at a local political function and I have gigs coming up with two different bands in the next few weeks.

    One thing that has been progressing is my right hand technique, though. I think it all started when Robert Renman from Dolphinstreet.com came by my studio to visit last December and while playing my guitars sounded totally different than me. One thing was his choice of pick (heavy, where I was playing Fender Mediums) but his hands just worked more efficiently on the instrument than mine did. The whole last year has been me working on that inspiration. The Bluegrass stuff has helped, as well as getting rid of the Pod in my teaching studio. Not having the compressed amp models to play through all day long has really forced me to be more accurate and consistent with my pick attack.

    This week's revelation has come from one of the guys in my forum (mosiddqui), who posted a Peber Brown video on "Sarod" picking. Just working on it last night for an hour or so I was actually able to gain some fluidity and some dynamic headroom that I didn't have before in my pick attack....here are the videos:

The "What did you work on today" thread has been cool because it's giving us some food for thought in our own practicing by watching what some of the other guys are working on...I highly recommend it! http://markweinguitarlessons.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8063

Blog Rewind - Minor Pentatonic Scale Lesson #4 - Sequences

Mark Wein — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 16:07:00 GMT

This is the fourth and last lesson in this Pentatonic scale series. This week we are going to explore some simple "Sequences", which are patterns of notes that repeat through a scale. Soloing purely in sequences or patterns isn't particularly musical to my ears, but they are great for building your facility to get around the fretboard. I will also use these sequences in smaller bits to build longer phrases, but I will mix and match different sequences to keep the line or idea from getting stale or too predictable.

We are still in the same A Minor Pentatonic scale that we have been using in the previous 3 lessons. If you haven't already worked through those lessons yet you might want to backtrack and do those before tackling this one...these lessons will make more sense if you do them in order.

Most of this lesson is spent playing a 4 note decending pattern. Here it is in scale degrees:

Root - Minor 7th - 5th - 4th

Minor 7th - 5th - 4th - minor 3rd

5th - 4th - minor 3rd - Root

4th - minor 3rd - Root - minor 7th

minor 3rd - Root - minor 7th - 5th

And then repeat through the scale pattern. You can start this idea on any note, but we are starting on the root in these exercises to make them easier. Later on in the video we explore 3 note sequences, string skipping and 2 string sequence ideas....

P.S. Sorry about the groggy teacher...I have to do this at 6:30am on a Saturday this week due to a hectic schedule...I promise to be more awake next week!

P.S.S. Speaking of next week (and the next month or so of lessons) I will be doing a batch of "one-off" lessons on different soloing techniques...after that we will exploring the layout of the fretboard and learning some basic theory!

Click here for a printable PDF Version of this lesson!

Click here if you'd like to vote for this entry on GuitarWorld.com!

3 Note Per String Mixolydian Scales

Mark Wein — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:38:00 GMT

This is the second lesson in our series on 3 note per string scale fingerings. I chose the Mixolydian Mode this week since it is so similar to the Major scale (the only difference is that the 7th note is one fret or "half step" lower) and because I had a student who needed the lesson this week.

Click here for a printable version of this lesson

Vote for me on GuitarWorld.com if you dig the lesson! -

Blog Rewind - Minor Pentatonic Scale Lesson #3

Mark Wein — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:41:00 GMT

Here is the third in our series on building phrases in the minor pentatonic scale. This week is not as much about the phrase building as it is about knowing where your scale patterns and notes are all over the neck. Next week will be our fourth (and probably last) lesson on this subject and we will spend a little more time playing music as opposed to running scales, but for now we need this foundation to build on.

At the end of the video there are two short extras of me playing. After I did the lesson I thought I should do a small improvised piece to demonstrate how to play these ideas all over the neck. I liked both of them, so I figured I would leave them in. Please disregard my lame verbal introduction, since I was going to do a couple of takes and keep the best and not use them both!

Click here for downloadable PDF versions of this lesson

3 Note Per String Major Scales

Mark Wein — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 23:12:00 GMT

This lesson is about "3 note per string" major scale patterns. There are no applications in this lesson, but we are learning several ways to play the Major Scale that bridge CAGED System patterns like the ones we learned in Major Scale Lesson #1 and Major Scale Lesson #2.

The idea here is that we want to forget about the 5 box patterns that we've already learned and turn the whole fretboard into one big scale pattern. This is the next step towards that goal.

Please forgive the video quality this week. I tried shooting the video in my (newly painted) office and ran into a few snafus but the video is good enough to get the idea across...

If you dig the lesson vote for me on GuitarWorld.com!

Click here for a printable version of this lesson

The week in Reconstruction, Big Concerts and me.

Mark Wein — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:45:00 GMT

The past few weeks have been kind of hectic and not particularly productive in terms of my own practicing or growth as a musician. As a matter of fact I'm writing this from one of the classrooms in my studio as my office is torn apart for painting this morning.

I started the week off by seeing U2 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena with 96,000 of my closest friends. I haven't been to a large show in years and this was fun but also got me thinking about my own musical situation. I started playing music because I wanted to be in an original band and make my own music. By the time I hit college I was a music major and decided to make a living as a working musician but try to keep my aspirations in rock music going and was able to do that for many years. Now that I own a small business, have a family and all of the things that come with those situations my ability to create and play my own music has diminished in time and opportunity. Most of my musician buddies are also busy making a living and our time for projects like my band "Felt" is hard to come by. Seeing such a great show with some of my favorite music did happen to inspire me to try and write where I can steal the time...maybe at some point in the near future I can do another album.

We started rehearsals up this week again with the Metropolitans with us finalizing our song list for our December 11th show and working through a few songs, We are practicing Friday afternoons instead of late Thursday night and it is making us HUGELY more productive with less actual rehearsal time. We were just too beat and tired to get much done that late at night after a full day of work. One of the fun things we jammed on and added to the list was "Good Times Bad Times" by Led Zeppelin. Even though I don't hear many bands around here playing it (or pulling it off for that matter) I think its going to be a great addition to our show...

Blog Rewind - Minor Pentatonic Scale Phrasing Lesson #2

Mark Wein — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 13:38:00 GMT

This week we are continuing our series on Phrasing using Pentatonic Scales. The basic idea is that we are going to learn the notes of our scale relative to the Root, or starting point of the scale. If we see what scale degrees a lick or idea is made of and we know our scale patterns pretty well, we can move the idea all over the neck. The first thing to do is to find out what a "Scale Degree" is...

The Root is the starting point for a scale or chord. In the key of "C Major" we are starting on a C note and then building the scale one note after another. The next note(D) is the 2nd, the one after that (E) is the 3rd and so on. Each of these numbers are called a "Scale Degree". A Major or Minor scale normally has 7 notes. The Pentatonic scale only have 5 notes, so we will be skipping the 2nd and 6th notes of a Minor scale in order to make this a Minor Pentatonic scale.

Understanding this system allows you to keep track of the distances between notes, and most importantly in this application we can see how far away each note is from the root. This is a very simplistic way of looking at the subject, and I really do suggest you spend some time learning scale construction (we'll do lessons on that later, but a good book for guitarists on the subject is Guitar Fretboard Workbook by Barret Tagliarino. We are going to cheat for now and learn them this way...

Starting on the Root (the open circle in the Scale Diagrams below) we can go in this order:

The Root is the first note of the scale

The Minor 3rd is the 2nd note of the scale

The Perfect 4th is the 3rd note of the scale

The Perfect 5th is the 4th note of the scale

The Minor 7th is the 5th note of the scale

A Pentatonic Scale is a 5 note scale "Penta" meaning "five", and "tonic" meaning "tone".

Example 1 is just Root, Minor 3rd and the 4th played a few different places and Octaves to demonstrate the concept.

The Albert King-style lick in Example 2 can be explained like this: Root, Minor 3rd, Minor 3rd, Root, 5th, Root, Minor 7th, Root, Minor 3rd - bend the 4th to the 5th, Minor 3rd, Root. Not how I would think of it this way during a performance, and definitely not how Albert thought of it, but it gives us the opportunity to analyze the idea and move it to other places on the neck....

Try analyzing Example 3 on your own!

Once you have this worked out, try moving each of these ideas into another key...

Click Here for Full Sized Printable Versions of these lessons.

Legato Lick in E Minor in the style of joe Satriani

Mark Wein — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 22:14:00 GMT

This lesson is just a 2 measure legato lick in E Minor. If you haven't worked on your Hammer on and Pull off techniques it might be a good idea to work through some of the Legato lessons in the techique section: http://markweinguitarlessons.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=category&sectionid=6&id=15&Itemid=39

The important things in this lesson are to work through the idea slowly and make sure that every note is even and punchy. Also, get this lick sounding good with a clean guitar sound before you "crunch it up" with your amp gain channel or a distortion pedal. The higher gain will make it easier to play this lick but it will also hide most of your mistakes...

Click here for a printable version of this lesson

This book has a great exercise and explanation of the technique in this lesson:

Here are some more great "Satch" books and DVD's:

Finger Yoga - my hands are killing me again :(

Mark Wein — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:39:00 GMT

I've written about my hand problems in the past:

Hand Health

With my renewed practice schedule, increased computer workload and stuff around the house my hands are starting to get beat up again. The issues I have tend to mostly be muscular, so stretching, the hot wax bath I talk about in the above article and rest usually do the trick.

Right now there is no real rest in my immediate future, so I am just doing my usual stretching and hot wax bath. Last night I decided to give something else another try, though: Finger Yoga!

The site is FingerYoga.com. I tried this a few months ago when I found the site but once every few days was more than enough for my hands. Stretching for Guitarists can be dangerous if overdone, so if you try these please be cautious and go slow.

I've found that doing these once or twice a week is a good thing, and the other stretches I give in the "Hand Health" article are good for a few times a day. I did have someone write on my Youtube video that he had made his hand problems worse by doing the stretches 3 times a day. PLEASE USE COMMON SENSE!

As far as the wax bath goes, I currently have the big (and discontinued it appears) version of the bath on the left. I've been using it for nearly 5 years and the deep moist heat really has been the best thing for my hands. I guess the one on the right will end up being what I get when its replacement time.

Anyhow, I've been trying to keep up my practice regimen without causing too much damage to my hands...we'll see how I keep it up. No band rehearsal this week so I'm catching a break there.....

Pentatonic Phrasing Lesson 1 - Blog Classic Lessons!

Mark Wein — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 13:57:00 GMT

This is a repost of one of my earliest and most popular video lessons. Since the blog is being "reactivated" I think I am going to have one new lesson, a few "Reconstruction" blog entries and a "Classic" every week...

Hello!

This week we are going to learn a simple device to help you build coherent phrases with the Pentatonic or Blues Scales. If you do not already know these scales, you can download a worksheet on the Minor Pentatonic Scale Here :

Minor Pentatonic Scale Worksheet - Home Position

We are going to use just a small section of the scale in A Minor Pentatonic on the 3rd and 4th strings, and play small 3 and 4 note ideas. Then we will try another section of the scale on the 1st and 2nd strings. The main thing is to listen to how each phrase ends. Does it sound resolved, or does it not sound like it comes to an ending?

The idea of "call and response" or "question and answer" is very useful. If you think of a complete phrase as having a "question" first half, where the phrase does not sound like it has ended and an "answer" second half where it does come to an end, your idea will sound more complete.

If you are having a conversation with someone and they asked you a question such as "Did you take the trash out?", even if you didn't speak the same language a listener would get the idea that you had been asked a question because of your vocal inflection...basically, the pitch of your would go up at the end of the phrase among other small clues. The answer "No, I did not take the trash out!" will sound more resolved, and probably will have the pitch of your voice end lower. Try it and see!

The licks in the lesson do not all have the last note of the "question" idea ending in a higher pitch, but I want you to do is to listen to what each ending pitch sounds like, and determine for yourself what sounds like a complete phrase!

Click here for a printable version of this lesson

Here are some recommendations for you to check out...simple blues guitar with short phrases that really make sense from two of my biggest influences and a really useful book that I use quite a bit in my studio from Robert Calva...

B.B. King Live at the Regal is one of my all time favorite albums, and the solo on "Sweet Little Angel" is a must learn...

Albert Kings "King of the Blues Guitar" is another of my favorites...the song "Crosscut Saw (LP Version) is a great easy blues solo to learn!

A cool book that I use with my students to get them soloing with backing tracks and learning some other rhythm guitar skills is "Texas Blues Guitar" by Robert Calva...he has "blues box" scale patterns, a ton of standard licks, solos for you to learn that are well structured and the examples are in four styles...shuffle, slow 12/8 blues, latin and straight feels!

Partial Chord Shapes #4 - Arpeggiated Rock Guitar Parts

Mark Wein — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 22:55:00 GMT

This week we are using the same information from the last few lessons in this series and changing the location and genre of the chord shapes. I have a sample song with a couple of parts for you to learn with two guitar parts - one simple barre chords and one with our new chord shapes.

This week is my first attempt at shooting a lesson on my new iMac using the onboard camera....I'm still working on the best way to do the audio. If you have any feedback please post it in the forum...any suggestions are welcome!

I've also found myself on also on GuitarWorld.com: http://news.guitarworld.com/profile/markwein/ - check it out!

If you see this:

and you dig the story then click the button to vote for it on GuitarWorld.com!

Click here for a printable version of this lesson.

Click here for the full recording of the song example

Click here for the recording without the second guitar part.

Click here for the full recording of the song example without the phaser effect on Guitar 2

Here are a few songs from my album "Desert Center" where I play guitar parts similar to this lesson:

Empty Town

Over Pennsylvania

Sometimes you just have to suck out loud.

Mark Wein — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 15:27:00 GMT

    I haven't written a "Reconstruction" blog in several days because life just got plain crazy this week. Needless to say my practice time wasn't all that I wanted it it be but I have worked a bit in a new Bluegrass book:

This is "Liberty". The major technical issue for me is alternate picking across arpeggios like the one in the tab below...

The funny thing about working on all of this Bluegrass guitar is that what looks simple on paper can e very humbling when you actually try and play it. The benefits in my playing are already pretty obvious in everything I do so I'm sticking with it.....


The title of this blog comes from something I said to a class full of adults here in the studio this week.

    That's right. I told them they needed to suck. Audibly.

    What I was really trying to convey to them was that they needed to play a show, and that they needed to take some chances even if they didn't feel like they were ready for it. The reality is that most musicians don't make very much progress unless they actually have to perform in public. Its the stress of preparing for a gig and not wanting to look bad and the adrenalin and the experience of performing that makes the best crucible for an individuals musical progress. I'm not a big believer in "Practice makes perfect". Practice + performance = progress is what I think is probably the best way to look at it.

    I've seen plenty of bands that have practiced 3 nights a week for a year disintigrate on stage when they finally made it to their first show and I have seen bands go out quickly and start playing, growing along the way. It's hard on the ego but it seems to work pretty well for the player....

    It's also good advice for myself. I play guitar every day, for a few hours at least but I've gone from gigging multiple nights a week to multiple times a year. My chops are sharper than they used to be but my musicality is in the toilet and some things just seem to come harder than they used to. I have paying gigs next month and in December already booked (including a version of the "Star Spangled Banner" ala Jimi Hendrix for a major political party function featuring a pretty big league member of congress that I'll fill you in on later) so I'm trying to figure out a way that I can "suck out loud" to spin myself back up to speed before I'm getting paid to play guitar again.

I think I need to find a way to "suck out loud" a bit before I'm back to playing for real.......

I'm Claiming my Blog!

Mark Wein — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 01:22:00 GMT

I need to post 5867857373 to claim my blog for Guitar World's news.guitarworld.com/ site....

Partial Chords #3 - Funk and R&B Guitar Parts

Mark Wein — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:29:00 GMT

This is part 3 of the "Partial Chord" lesson series although it is a bit of a departure. We're not actually working on the partial chord shapes but I though it would be nice to learn some guitar parts that would fit into the song from Lesson 2. In that lesson we learned to play a simple back beat rhythm guitar part in the style of Steve Cropper. In this lesson we are going to add a second guitar part that fits into the groove.

The first section of the song is a "bubble" part. Make sure that you can keep the 16th notes alternating in your picking hand like I do in the video. Don't let the alternation stop or you will lose the "pocket" or consistent time feel.

The second section is made up of "sliding 6ths" like the intro to "Soul Man".

Here are some of the other lessons in the series as well as another lesson on 6ths if you need to backtrack a little bit:

Partial Chords Primer Lesson

Partial Chords Lesson #2 - Backbeat Guitar - this one has the first part of this lesson and the other backing tracks to download.

6th and the Mixolydian Mode

Click here for a printable version of this lesson.

Click here for the recording for this lesson.