McLaughlin - here's how he does it...

[gennation]

Originally Posted by GovernorSilver

Then I am confused as why your statement "This was originally released with no tab what so ever and ONLY the notation on the screen" was addressed to me when I posted nothing to contradict this statement of yours.



Like I said, click that link.

Sometimes what comes out in text is not what was intended...

Sorry, maybe I should have quoted this, "You're better off getting the pattern in standard notation".

When I bought the DVD all that was available was the notation you could watch on the screen, there was nothing to print off and read. Then I found the tab had been released with the notation, but the tab was wrong and some of the notation was questionable too. But mainly, the notation is hard to follow and block train with when it's on the TV/monitor.

I didn't realize they had a 'just-notation' version available. I'll check it out.

[vivacuica]

I have the DVD, just got it on Friday. So far it's pretty damn good, and inspirational for sure -- I spent almost 3 hours practicing just the modal stuff the first day, and I already knew the modes. It was just his approach that was interesting.

As far as the downloadable PDFs, they appear to me to be the same ones that are on the screen when he is playing. I'm taking a guess here but I think he played directly into a notation program like Finale and the program did the transcription -- not a person. That's why there's some questionable stuff. Still, they're valuable to have.

Personally I get more out of listening to him talk about ways to practice these things as opposed to watching him blowing and then trying to learn his stuff. It's entertaining for sure, but I'm not so sure about the value there.

The bottom line is though, you get 3 DVDs and lots of great stuff to practice for $100. How much do you think a lesson with John would cost, even if he taught? These DVDs are worth it.

[GovernorSilver]

Originally Posted by vivacuica

As far as the downloadable PDFs, they appear to me to be the same ones that are on the screen when he is playing. I'm taking a guess here but I think he played directly into a notation program like Finale and the program did the transcription -- not a person. That's why there's some questionable stuff. Still, they're valuable to have.

He used the MIDI output of his Godin MIDI guitar rig for transcription.

I recently started learning his melodic minor scale exercises from Chapter 8. So far, I haven't noticed any discrepancy between the guitar audio and the on-screen notation. At first I wished someone had put up the notation for the exercises on the web too, but I quickly got used to pausing the video, sight-singing the exercise, then playing it repeatedly until I memorized the exercise in my head. I tried to resist the temptation to attempt learning the whole exercise right away and instead focused on memorizing a couple of bars at a time, only adding more after memorization of the previous bars was complete. Admittedly, this is a PITA compared to practicing exercises off of a book or website but it'll be interesting to see what results come out of it. I recently collaborated with some friends on a simple piece that included a "cadenza" for me to play in the key of D (major or minor), gradually transitioning to G, which we then played live. I messed up badly in the beginning of the piece, but did ok during my cadenza. The thought later occurred to me that more focused practice on modal playing might be useful for that situation (we might play the piece again), so I turned to McLaughlin's wisdom...

I also tried watching his fingering with the DVD player set to 1/8 speed, but decided to not adhere too strictly to his fingering, as it seemed more important to get the sequence of pitches right than the exact fingering. It also reinforces (for me) the memory of the exercise by trying it on other parts of the neck and changing up the fingering.