Olav Torvund’s Guitar Blog

The Beatles podcasts did not last long on the net. NRKs agreement with two of the three organisations involved only allow NRK to podcast programs containing music for a periode of four weeks after the program was sent. The “Daily Beatles” series was sent in 2007, which mean that it cannot be made available (with the music) as podcasts now. For this reason, the series has been pulled from the net. It was too good to be true.

Go to NRK for further explanations.

In November 2008 there was a real breakthrough in the negotiations between The Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) and the Norwegian Colleting Society for composers. Under this agreement NRK now has the right to make podcasts with music available on the net. The program that is podcasted can not have more than 70% music, meaning that they cannot podcast music as such, only programs including music.

In 2007 NRK was celebrating the 40th anniversary of Sgt. Peppers with a series running for the entire year called “Daily Beatles”. They told the story behind each tune recorded by The Beatles. One song each week-day, with a few minutes talk and the song. 212 programs in all. The series was podcasted, but at this time only the talking, not the music. Now the series has been republished as podcast including the music. My understanding is that it will all be made available in January 2009 (the songs from the first album, Please Please Me, was made available today and the rest will follow. They will be available for four weeks.

This is very interesting for many reasons. The agreement in itself is very important, meaning that many programs about music are or will be available with the music as free download. (NRK is paying for the rights to do this, but we as customers are not charged.)

The Beatles, or those who are managing their recorded portofolio, has been very reluctant to making their music available for download. You will not even find it on iTunes. When the songs are made available for download as part of this series, they will probably be legally available for download for the first time — and they are available for free.

Beeing norwegian, I really enjoy the programs “Daily Beatles”. For those of you who do not understand Norwegian, the price will be that you have to stick with a few minues of unitelligibel talk before each tune (if you do not edit).

The RSS-feed for the series is http://podkast.nrk.no/program/beatles_komplett.rss. But I have to add a word of warning: It may be geocoded. If so, you will not be able to download the series outside of Norway.

A few years ago, I featured selected books and videos as “Book of the month”. I will pick books and/or DVDs I will recommend under the heading “Recommended”. (I will not put pressure on my self to pick a new each month).

In the first installment I have chosen to feature books and videos on the playing of the great bluesman Robert Johnson, under the title “Learning to play Robert Johnson“. There is a clear winner: Rory Block’s two DVDs “Rory Block Teaches the Guitar of Robert Johnson” and “Rory Block Teaches the Guitar of Robert Johnson Vol 2″. But you should also have Robert Johnson’s recordings, for instance “The Complete Recordings”.

Go to “Learning to play Robert Johnson“ for more.

My lessons on music theory are to a very large extent based on what I learned from John Duarte’s series on music theory in Guitar Player Magazine back in the 80’s. Or to put it a bit different: I learned most of what I know from his articles. From his vast knowledge he was able to present it in a form that made it understandable for us who do not have an academic degree in music. And it was all applied to guitar. Many times I have said that I wish he would publish a book on the subject.

Now a book is here, called Melody & Harmony for Guitarists. I have to add that so far I have only seen information on the book in “new publications” lists. I have not yet seen the book. But as I have been hoping for a book on the subject by John Duarte for a very long time, I include this “news” notice. I wil come back to the book when I have seen and read it. But if it is a bit like his Guitar Player articles, it is definetly worth having.

The book is available from Amazon.com and SheetmusicPlus. At the time of writing it is not available from Amazon UK, despite the fact that John Duarte is English. But I hope it will be available soon.

I recently read that some guitarists who where called experts on Open-G tuning, Keith Richards was one mentioned, tuned the second string, which is the third in the chord, a little flat to tune it to the overtones rather than  to the standard G-major chord.

A little theory must be insterte here. When a guitar string is ringing, it produces many tones. We find the first overtone when the string is divied in two, with the string vibrating as two halves rather than in the whole length. This is the note we get if we play an harmonic on the 12th fret (touching the string lightly at 12th fret when it is picked and released imediatly. This will isolate the first overtone.

The next overtone is the string divided in three – which give us a perfect fith above the first overtone (one octave + one fifth above the root). This is the harmonic on the 7th fret.

When the string is divided in four, we get the overtone one octave above the first overtone (two octaves above the root). This is the harmonic on the 5th fret. So far we can stay with the frets.

But the next overtone is one third above. But it is neither a major nor a minor third. It is slightly below the major third. The way we tune the guitar (and the way a piano is tuned) is a compromise called a tempered tuning or equal temperament. The distances between the notes are divided into equal half steps. But this is not in tune with the overtones. In a just or natural temperament you tune to the overtones. And this is what we can to in for instance Open G tuning.

The easiest way to in what can be labeled just Open-G is to find the fourth overtone, the harmonic slightly below the fourth fret on the 3rd string. Tune the 2nd string so that the harmonic on the 5th fret equals this fourth overtone on the third string. I have tried it with slide and it works very well.

As long as we do not move to far from the root, the just or natural temperament works great. But it will not work if we move far away from the root and into other keys. The equal tempered tuning was needed for more complex music with modulations to other keys, etc. You may also run into trouble if you play fretted chords that are not just barre chords, as you change the relations between the strings. (You cannot play a B on third string, fourth fret, as it will crash with the slightly detuned B on the second tring). And if the rest of the band is playing in equal temperament, you may run into trouble. But try it out.

It should work in Open-D, Open-C and any other major chord tuning. But so far I have only tried it in Open-G.

You may have noticed that I have included list of bestselling guitar books and bestselling guitar videos.

It is intereseting to see which books and videos people are buying. I see some of my own favourite on the lists. But there are also some surprises. Some long time out of print books are still selling in the second hand market (through Amazon). Stefan Grossman’s first book, his classic Country Blues Guitar is one of the books that seems to be sought after. If you are learning to play, I will recommend some of Stefan’s more recent books (or videos). But it is a classic.

I am also pleased to see one of my favourites, Dominic Pedler’s “The Songwriting secrets of The Beatles”. If you want to learn music theory applied to pop and rock, and a lot about The Beatles, it is my first choice. It is more accessible than Walter Everett’s books if you do not know very much about theory. The majority of the visitors to my site comes from US. This book seems not to be distributed in US, meaning that you have to order it from Europe, either from Amazon UK or MusicRoom. But despite of this, it is among the most bestselling books.

The list of New books and New videos in my “Bookstore” are generated by selecting a limited number of updated records from the database. They will automatically be removed from the list when three months have elapsed from the the time they were added or updated. As I have done some changes to all the records as part of the redesign, all records are marked as updated January 29, if they have not been added or updated after that date. I will not change the selection, meaning that all books and videos will qualify as “new” until the end of April. Until then, this lists will be misleading. But new additions or updates will always be on top.

I am constantly working on the site. There are still sections that are not transferred from the old site and new material is added. To keep yourself updated, simply subscripe to the RSS-feed from this bolg: http://guitarblog.torvund.net/feed, and you will be informed when there are news worth telling.

From time to time I do a Google search to check my ranking. I usually search for blues guitar. As long as my site is listed on the first page, it is good. Most often it has been somewhere between 3 and 5. But today, for the first time, it was number one!

As far as I know, Google is to some extent regionalized. It may be that people searching from other parts of the world will get a different result. But I still see it as a significant improvement of my ranking.

I have just returned from a concert with the Australian acoustic guitar wizard Tommy Emmanuel here in Oslo.

At a concert one should enjoy the music, not look at the players’ technique. But being a guitar nerd I could not help doing both. If there is one kind of message from the concert to all guitar players out there, it is: Don’t restrict yourself.

We are often given the advice that we should concentrate. Be the best in what you are good at, and forget about the rest. You cannot do it all. But Tommy Emmanuel did it all – almost. He fingerpicked with and without a thumbpick, he flatpicked, he did hybrid picking (flatpick and fingers) and he played with the thumbpick as if it was a flatpick. And he used his guitar as percussion. I have never heard anyone getting that much out of an acoustic guitar.

If you are trying to make a career, it may be an idea to play on your strength and not end up as a jack of all trade. But you can also think of building a repertoire of techniques, and use what is best suited for the situation.

For a person like me, who has never had any ambitions more than playing for my own pleasure, it is good to know that I do not have to restrict myself to just one basic technique. But I will never be able to play like Tommy Emmanuel in any of the techniques I use.