Berklee Workshop DVD - Jazz Guitar Techniques: Modal Voicings
I got this DVD while out and about because I thought it dealt with modes (ie: Dorian, Ionian, etc, in a diatonic way) but when I got home I found it was a more advanced concept lesson in jazz comping and non-traditional chord voicings. The teacher is Rick Peckham and he is an assistant chairman of the guitar department at the Berklee School of Music...and it shows!
This guy is GOOD. He explains the material well and shows nice examples of various techniques like - "tension and release" "altered Dominants" "Chromatic and diatonic embellishment" and more. One of his tenets is that one should never practice guitar without some kind of drum machine or musical accompaniment so you're always playing in time and hearing some sort of harmony. A simple thought, but how many of us guitar players noodle away on the couch while watching TV? A little musical discipline is a good thing and to this end he uses a little sampler to play chord sequences into and then accompany when he's working things out. I liked this idea so much I ran out a bought a sampler to use for the same thing....now I just got to read the damn manual and get it going;)
Like many Hal Leonard products, the DVD is well laid out and concludes with a neat performance piece from Peckham that will give you a good "view" of his approach to modal voicings. I'm not really a "jazzbo", but found this DVD well worth watching again and again. You can always learn from great players, no matter what the genre.
Just do a search on the box on this page for the title and have at it!
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