Practice while Commuting by Bus or Train

Hi Barrett. First, I really enjoy your workbooks. I finished Fretboard Logic a month or so ago and now I'm working through your Guitar Reading Workbook. What's perfect about your books is that I commute into San Francisco daily and I have been working through them on my bus ride. The problem is that I'm half way through The Guitar Reading Workbook with no book to work on next! I haven't found anything close to your books. My question is, do you have a recommendation for other guitar or theory workbooks (question and answer) you may have come across? I plan on picking upChord Tone Soloing book but Amazon didn't describe this as a work book per se.

In any case, thanks so much for the great books.
Saul

Hi Saul,

Thanks!

I had to think about your question a bit because I don't know of other guitar books that use the workbook approach, except for some college textbooks that come with a workbook for ear training exercises. You need audio for those though, so you probably won't want to do them on the bus.

But now you know a bit about chords and diagrams and notes on the staff, you can start to create your own chord diagrams and notation of music you know or are trying to read. Do it without a book.

Take a Real Book chart for a tune like "All the Things You Are" and draw a diagram for each chord. If you've gone through both the Fretboard Workbook and Guitar Reading Workbook this will be possible, if still a bit challenging.

(The "Fretboard Logic" you mentioned is a book by another author and I'm not very familiar with it.)

When I was learning notation this next thing helped a lot. Take a piece of blank staff paper and write out nursery rhymes ("Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" etc.) or any other simple familiar tunes like "Happy Birthday" or songs you sing on religious holidays. At first you'll need to figure them out on guitar and then write them down at home, but after awhile you'll be able to just write down the notes you hear and check them for accuracy later. It's very good for connecting notes you hear in your head to the fretboard and the written notes.

Thanks for working with my books. I'm sure you'll like Chord Tone Soloing, although you're correct, it is not a workbook. You need the guitar in your hands for it. You'll also like another book about soloing I did recently, "Rhythmic Lead Guitar." It relates all those rhythms you're reading about to actual application.

Barrett