The Box Set is great if you want to hear the Beatles (amazing early reviews) and the RockBand release is hip if you want to pretend to be the Beatles. That’s cool. But if you want to really get down to playing guitar and writing songs like the Beatles then you want to purchase The Beatles: Complete Scores.

Learn from the Masters
This book is essentially the bible of pop song writing. Not only does it transcribe every song the Beatles wrote and played, it includes every part of every song (hence the name Complete Scores) from the Beatles catalog. Every guitar part is shown (guitar parts get tab and chord boxes) as well as drum, bass guitar, and lead and harmony vocals. Even piano, strings, french horn parts (!) and such get their place when used. All parts are meticulously transcribed and beautifully presented, a real treat if you are a guitar songbook and transcription hound like myself.

There are so many songs and so many layers to most songs that I can find new things every time I work out of this book. The melodies are unforgettable and the chords progressions timeless. Seeing and learning them will only sharpen your musical ear when you go back to being a Beatles listener.

I would warn beginning guitarists: This book is presented in a ‘conductor score’ format (all parts shown simultaneously) and the print is small. Because of the volume of music shown, finding the right guitar part to play first can be a challenge on some songs. Another Beatles songbook might be better choice for beginners to start with.

Also, if you can’t read traditional staff notation you won’t be able to get to much of the non-guitar information given. Learning the vocal parts, the string lines of ‘Eleanor Rigby’ or the piano intro of ‘Hey Jude’ is some of the best stuff here, IMO. A great reason to get back to working on your note reading!

This hard-back book is huge (1136 pages!) and comes in a nice hard sleeve to protect it. I think it would make a great gift even for a non-musician as a ‘coffee table’ book. The presentation really is that beautiful and artful.

If I had to bring one book to a desert island, music or print, I would choose this book. I recommend it that much.

Long-time GuitarTeacher.com reader Mike(MJK) asked (via Twitter) “What is a good lesson to strengthen the fretting hand?” Following is one of my favorites for increasing left hand stamina and strength. It is called the “6 Minute Trill Drill”. I believe I learned this at an open counseling session with guitar great Gary Hoey during my time at Guitar Institute of Technology (G.I.T.) It is the guitar player’s equivalent of some extreme, P90X workout routine so I sometimes call it the “6 Minutes of Pain”! Try it and find out why! Here’s how it goes, with tab and explanation:

Setup: Place your fret hand in the 5th position (1st finger at the 5th fret). Relax. BREATHE. Then begin.

Minute 1: Pick the 1st string at the 5th fret once. Now repeatedly hammer-on and pull-off (trill) between the 5th and 6th frets using fingers 1 &2. Try to maintain even volume throughout.

Minute 2: Now switch to trilling between fingers 1 & 3 at 5th and 7th frets.

Minute 3: Trill between fingers 1 & 4 – frets 5 & 8.

You think you are done. But think again!

Minute 4: Trill between fingers 2 & 3 – frets 6 & 7.

Minute 5: Trill between fingers 2 & 4 – frets 6 & 8.

Minute 6: Trill between fingers 3 & 4 – frets 7 & 8.

And, you’re spent!

Pace yourself until you can fill each of the six minutes with each finger combination. This may take some experimentation to find how fast you can trill before you fatigue. When I first worked on this exercise, I know my last hammer-on/pull-off combination of 3rd and 4th fingers were barely audible! If you a physically in pain, STOP! Shake your left hand (fret hand) out, relax, breathe, then try and continue.

Feel free to share this exercise with a guitar playing friend you hold a slight grudge against. Be sure to tease them with “Girly Man” taunts if they complain!

BTW, I will have news shortly of an upcoming eLesson series covering similar (but mostly less painful!) exercises to this designed to increase technique, coordination and strength for guitarists of all levels and styles. Hope this helps, Mike!

In the tradition of the “Secret” Pentatonics lesson let’s continue looking for pentatonics in undiscovered places. Maybe our familiar, five-note friend has been ‘hiding’ under our noses, just waiting to be revealed in other familiar scale patterns? In fact, this is the case! I present (drum roll, please!): Hidden Pentatonics. We will start with an overview and diagrams and then search out those pesky,  profitable pentatonics one step at a time.

DIAGRAM #1:  This is a G major fingering.
The numbers label the scale degrees for theoretical discussions. (See 4 Scales You Should Know for reference)

DIAGRAM #2:  One minor pentatonic scale can be found starting on the second note of any major scale.
This is still a G major scale but the shaded notes highlight the “hidden A minor pentatonic” inside of it.

DIAGRAM #3:  Another minor pentatonic scale can be found starting on the third note of any major scale.
This is the same G major scale with the shaded notes highlighting the “hidden B minor pentatonic”.

DIAGRAM #4:  Another minor pentatonic scale can be found starting on the sixth note of any major scale.
This is the same G major scale with the shaded notes highlight the ‘hidden E minor pentatonic’ inside of it.

DIAGRAM #5:  Use this one standard pattern to easily play all three pentatonics listed above.
Positioning the dark dot at the fifth fret ‘A’ note creates an Am pentatonic fingering. Positions dark dot at fret 7 for Bm pentatonic and at fret 12 for Em pentatonic.

TRY IT: Improvise over the following ‘alternating Am to D’ jam track.

Use the G major scale to improvise over the jam track… Next, try using an Am pentatonic to guide your improvising approach… How about Em pentatonic… Bm pentatonic works also.

I would be curious to hear in the comments about your results with the different approaches.

For the unfamiliar, a capo is used to shorten the strings by clamping across the neck of the guitar. This raises the pitch of the strings without having to retune. There are different styles of capos available but they all do basically the same job. A capo makes it much easier to play in those “non-friendly” guitar keys that use lots of barre chords, very useful when playing acoustic guitar. Many singer-songwriters use capos to easily change the key they are playing in to fit their voice. Mixing guitars with and without capos can really fatten up a group or recording, too.

The following chart shows how to change keys(transpose) using the five common guitar keys of C. G, D, A, and E. Follow each column down to the fret the capo is on the find your resulting key you are actually playing in.

It may be helpful to review the Guitar Harmony Chart and Major Scale Chords charts presented earlier to get the most mileage of today’s material.

Note: A PDF of the chart presented in this lesson can be viewed here.

In the following video guitar lesson I show the opening riff and verse guitar parts for “Crazy Train” both full and half speed.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTzsNuTQCg0

If you like this lesson and want to dig in on this song or Ozzy/Randy in general, consider taking private lessons with me. You might also like to check out the following resources:

• Ozzy Osbourne sheet music
• Crazy Train transcriptions

Crazy Train Intro & Verse Riffs

And, as always, please subscribe to my RSS feed!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kcaR8hKSQxw

If you like this lesson and want to dig in on this song or Led Zeppelin in general, consider taking private lessons with me. You might also like to check out the following resources:

• Led Zeppelin sheet music
• Babe, I’m Gonna Leave You transcriptions

And, as always, please subscribe to my RSS feed!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4IuL-EZrIE

The tabs are in the video (full and 1/2 speed, how cool!) but here they are for your off-video practice.

Wanted Dead or Alive Intro

Wanted Dead or Alive Intro - Part 2

You might also like to check out the following resources:

• Bon Jovi sheet music
• Wanted: Dead or Alive transcriptions

Or take private lessons with me.