Rock & Roll 101

January 28th, 2025

Luke must have forgotten tonight, or maybe is away?

January 14th, 2025

Luke and I continued with Back in Black, and worked on the solo for a bit, but Luke didn't seem that keen on it. We talked about something else we could do on the guitar, and looked at Pink Floyd, Money for a bit. He showed a bit of interested in learning some piano, but we didn't really do that tonight.

December 17th, 2024

Luke started a new song today, Back in Black by AC/DC. We went through the tab for the first part of the song up untl the solo, and did the first four bars or so of the solo. After that part it gets a bit crazy, and we ran out of time anyway.

Merry Christmas! Thanks for a great year!

December 3rd, 2024

Luke was thinking he'd learn the We Will Rock You solo for something happening at school, so we spent the first fifteen minutes working on it. It's kind of tricky, so he decided to give up after a while.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=if9q6BpMd-o

We went back to Freebird, and this video has inline Guitar Chords:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGG7N_JggPg

November 19th, 2024

We went through Bobcaygeon, Sweet Home Alabama, and added Free Bird.

November 5th, 2024

Luke played through Wonderwall, and then we added Bobcaygeon by The Tragically Hip (on guitar-- we already had learned the bass for it).

After that we reviewed Black Dog. Good job Luke!

October 29th, 2024

Luke didn't come tonight. Perhaps his sports went past time, or he was too tired.

October 22nd, 2024

We went through House of the Rising Sun again, and then added a new song, by Oasis, Wonderwall:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4FQgb8h9as

We learned some new chords, like the A7sus4, Cadd9 etc.

October 15th, 2024

Luke forgot his guitar (he had to bring his trumpet to school this morning), so used mine. He decided to change gears and focus on a song with chords. He chose House of the Rising Son.

Here's a video of it with the chords included.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UMPXFC3qrrU

We learned how to play the arpeggios (the climbing ladder/style of the chords)... he had trouble with the F and C chords.

October 8th, 2024

We went through Black Dog at 75% speed - Luke hadn't worked on the solo this week after all, so we just went through up to the solo, and then he decided to look for another song to work on.

He settled on AC/DC, Thunderstruck, and we found this YouTube tab video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx1SC-Jd_9w

October 1st, 2024

We worked our way through the third part today and nailed it pretty decently. Luke's next big project is going to be really hard- it's a solo part and kind of "random" - so we decided to break it into small pieces to work on each week.

September 24th, 2024

We continued with Black Dog, and worked through a part that Luke was struggling with. We tried to come up with alternate ways to play it to make it easier.
Luke is really acing this! Great job!

September 17th, 2024

Luke did really well in lessons today! He's got the beginning parts up to 100% speed, and hardly any mistakes.

This week he's going to focus on the chorus part, and we'll save the solo for starting next week.

September 10th, 2024

We went through a bit of Free Fallin and Sweet Home Alabama.
We settled on doing Led Zeppelin, Black Dog (guitar parts):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PikvWrtfMxU

September 3rd, 2024

I missed seeing Luke today.

June 25th, 2024

In Luke's lesson we started off with refreshing the 12 bar blues, and playing rhythm for that. Then Luke took over soloing on the blues with the E minor pentatonic scale. We did that for most of the lesson

In the last 5 or 10 minutes we started Free Fallin' by Tom Petty.

Have a great summer!

June 18th, 2024

June 11th, 2024

We started out going over The Tragically Hip, Wheat Kings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il8sGYNdKbw

Which he's learning at school right now in guitar class.

We then went through some of the open minor chords that he doesn't know yet, and that led us into some bar chords, which led us into learning the 12 bar blues in E.

June 4th, 2024

I missed seeing Luke today.

May 28th, 2024

May 21st, 2024

We worked on Thunderstruck again today for the whole lesson. At the end, Luke suggested he try Back in Black or Sweet Child O' Mine next week.

May 14th, 2024

We worked on Thuderstruck today by AC DC:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xx1SC-Jd_9w

He seemed a bit more enthusiastic today, especially once we decided on a song.

May 7th, 2024

Luke wasn't sure what he wanted to learn again today, and didn't want to do Let Her Go again, by Passenger...
So we started with looking for other songs, and he decided to do Sweet Home Alabama. After that I suggested a couple:

Coldplay, Yellow:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEJOoWFXt_s

Plain White T's, Hey There Delilah:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BjQe7EabRk

Hoobastank, The Reason:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR6P2OVGkOo

April 30th, 2024

Luke didn't seem very enthusiastic today, but said nothing was wrong. I guess just feeling laid back? We went through Sweet Home Alabama a few times, and talked about using a pick. He said he wanted to try an easier song, so we looked for something else. We tried Pink Floyd, Another Brick in the Wall, and Perfect by Ed Sheeran, and then Let Her Go by Passenger.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHzsNxFQ9WM

April 23rd, 2024

We worked on getting the song up to speed. We started at 65% and moved to 75%, 80% and then 85%.

The transition from the open chords to the neck part was challenging so we worked on that too.

April 16th, 2024

Luke is away today.

April 9th, 2024

We continued working through Sweet Home Alabama, and I helped Luke focus on the areas he was having trouble getting to the chords on. We were able to get from D to C, to G at 65% speed in the song.

April 2nd, 2024

We continued working on Sweet Home Alabama, going over the guitar part from last week, and trying to add the more lead-oriented part later in the song.

Luke said he didn't make time to practise last week, so hopefully we'll be able to move along a bit better this week.

March 26th, 2024

Luke forgot a book again, but we used a tab video to learn the intro to Sweet Home Alabama:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbuYYzGgZZ8

March 19th, 2024

We continued with electric guitar. Luke still doesn't have a booklet to write songs in, so we looked up songs that have chords in them so he can practise at home with them.

He found it hard to switch to some chords, so we spent some time on switching quickly.

The songs we did were Brown Eyed Girl,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNoiPP_B1-4

Ed Sheeran, Perfect,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGCyXoLnpko

and Lynyrd Skynyrd, Sweet Home Alabama
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQC7W0JBGNc

March 12th, 2024

In Luke's lesson we continued with some chords, adding sevenths (minor and major sevenths). We also did the neck bar chords for the scales using the number system 1 through 6.

Remember this: major, minor, minor, major, major, minor.

March 5th, 2024

Today we continued with the 7ths where we left off last week. Then we learned the open E minor pentatonic scale, and practised playing them with chords. We then took turns trying this with one of us playing chords and the other soloing, taking four bars each.

February 27th, 2024

Today we reviewed all the major and minor chords both open and bar chords. We then talked about 5 chords (power chords), and 7ths. We learned the D7 and the C7 before running out of time.

February 20th, 2024

Today we continued with guitar. We started out with solo scales but then Luke said he wanted to learn chords, so we switched gears.

Today we learned G, D, C, F, adding them to E minor, E, A major, and A minor.

February 13th, 2024

Luke is sick today.

February 6th, 2024

We continued working through Smells Like Teen Spirit. Luke has got the solo and the chords down fairly solid. Just a bit of refinement needed from home practise.

January 30th, 2024

We reviewed the scale and the chords for the scale, and then started learning Smells Like Teen Spirit on the electric guitar.

Electric solo:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUUCN4mBV7c

Song:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYxkezUr8MQ

January 23rd, 2024

Luke brought in a guitar today, and we talked about the major scale, and the major/minor order on that scale.
We learned the E and E minor shape and the A and A minor shape, and played through some chord progressions as bar chords.

January 16th, 2024

Luke didn't work on his song this week, so we spent some time in the lesson trying to work out the details of what he would do on electric guitar over the bass line.

January 9th, 2024

Today we worked out where the verses, chorus, and bridge and solo would go in Luke's new song, and recorded it with some basic fake drums. I emailed it to Jeff.

January 2nd, 2024

Luke wanted to finish up his song today, so we fired up the recording, but as we went through it and tried various things, he decided that he's not happy with it and needs to either add more lyrics or wait until his voice gets lower.

He showed me a couple of other bass lines he's working on, and we decided to do a new song using one of them, which makes use of the chords D, G, and C.

Maybe we'll continue with that next week.

December 19th, 2023

We went over Money first, and Luke's got it pretty close to nailed.

Added new song Red Hot Chili Peppers, Can't Stop:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fA2XKuQAhnE

December 12th, 2023

We worked through to the end of Money by Pink Floyd today. When it switches to 4/4 time, we slowed the video down to 75% and worked out some of the details, then went through the whole song at full speed.

December 5th, 2023

We continued working on Pink Floyd, Money, especially focusing on the two bars that change in between the main sections.

November 28th, 2023

We looked around, trying to find a song that Luke wanted to learn next. We settled on Money by Pink Floyd.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19FgY3o09Ng

This a good video to use, with the tab nice and clear!

November 21st, 2023

We recorded vocals today, doing one or two sections at a time to focus on tuning. He would love to be able to do it without the vocal tuner, but that will just take practise. He should practise with the song, and practise holding notes with the pitch app.

November 14th, 2023

Luke did vocal lessons today, in preparation for singing. I showed him a vocal pitch app which shows what notes you are singing. I suggested he put this on his own ipad / phone and use his piano to sing notes he plays.

My next student cancelled today, so in that time I pitch corrected his old melody to help him learn it. I'll send that later tonight.

November 7th, 2023

Luke wanted to rerecord his solo on his song today, and so we did that. I think he was happy with the final track, and said we would do vocals next week and wrap the song up!

October 24th, 2023

We added Bobcaygeon by the Tragically Hip-
Tab:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jR_NwYjX819tu3ONi6yupH6VqjudQnTo/view
Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGuC69Dz8_o

We also worked on the solo a little bit at the end of the lesson.

October 10th, 2023

We worked through Luke's solo together. He wanted me to make some suggestions which he could copy. After doing that for a while, with him playing along with the recording, he came up with some of his own ideas which were quite good. By the end of the lesson, I think he had a decent solo worked out. If he can get that smooth by next week, we can give a go at recording it then.

He also expressed some interest in voice lessons for singing his song.

October 3rd, 2023

Luke wanted to rework his solo in the song he wrote and recorded, so I showed him the pentatonic scale again, and with the blues note... we worked through the song with me playing the guitar part and him the solo, until he came up with some ideas he likes.

I asked him to work not just on the solo, but on the whole scale, so he gets proficient with it for future songs and solos.

He asked me to send him his song stripped of vocals and solo for him to work with, which is forthcoming.

September 19th, 2023

Luke is at a soccer tourney today.

September 12th, 2023

Luke brought his bass today, but we spent the lesson recording vocals for his song. He wanted to redo parts of it, but we ran out of time before we finished it.

We'll wrap things up next week maybe.

September 5th, 2023

Luke can't make lessons today.

June 27th, 2023

June 20th, 2023

I didn't see Luke today. Hope everything's okay!

June 13th, 2023

We started work on Cordelia by the Hip, but didn't find a video with tab.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb0nFf2PNak

I wrote out some tab, but it was pretty abbreviated... we found this site:
https://www.songsterr.com/a/wsa/tragically-hip-cordelia-bass-tab-s504578

May 16th, 2023

Luke did a great job on his lyrics, and we talked through a few ways to sing them so that they aren't doing exactly what the electric guitar is doing.

He was confident in singing it, and so we thought it might be useful to learn to sing it by singing along with me. I sent an MP3 of the song with me singing it, so if you can send that to him he'll be able to learn it so we can record.

I have some empty spots on the calendar, so let me know if you want any of them.

https://rockandroll101.ca/#!/calendar/

May 9th, 2023

Luke said he had struggled with how to put words to his song, so I helped him through it in the lesson, with topic picking, rhyming, and fitting it in the music.

We came up with a verse and half a chorus, and he's going to try to take it from there this week.

April 25th, 2023

Hey Jeff, try to remember to remind Luke to make some lyrics for his song (he asked me to remind you).

We added Money tonight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=19FgY3o09Ng

Fun one!

April 18th, 2023

Still no lyrics for Luke's song, so we added a new song this week, James Brown, i Got You (I feel Good)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYrYbLDSmcY

A fun one, with a great bass line. Luke did great on it, nearly there already!

Luke suggested we do vocal lessons the first week or two when he's recording his song's lyrics.

April 11th, 2023

We kept working today on Susie Q... it's nearly there. Luke is going to try to finish writing his lyrics too, so we can record the vocals for his own song.

Keep it up!

April 4th, 2023

We started working on Susie Q:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPWigSp1zQo&ab_channel=TomBornemann

We slowed it down to 65%. The song repeats enough that it's a good song for Luke to keep playing and practicing with.

March 28th, 2023

Luke has a basketball game today and won't be coming.

March 21st, 2023

Luke hasn't finished his lyrics yet, and had a sore throat, so we learned a new song, Enter Sandman:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPP3iWd53ic

March 7th, 2023

Today in Luke's lesson we started out with him practising the drums, but then decided he wanted to work on the lyrics, so I talked him through that a bit, on coming up with a story first, and then trying to make it into verse form second.

He took a sheet home, and he's going to work on it over the next two weeks.

Remember, no lessons next week, I'm on vacation! :)

February 28th, 2023

Luke wanted to play drums on his song (or have a different drum track), so I showed him how to play a quarter note beat and we started out slowly, with me playing the piano for his song, and then gradually speeding it up. I showed him how to open the hi hat a bit on the chorus, and move to the ride cymbal for the bridge.

We then played along with his song a few times.

He's doing well! Perhaps we can record drums next week.

February 21st, 2023

Luke practised his guitar solo along with the track a few times, and came up with some ideas. I showed him some approaches to help make the solo sound interesting.

Then we recorded a take,... he wants me to send it to you Jeff, so he can practice with it at home. . . that'll be in the next email.

Thanks!

February 14th, 2023

We recorded electric guitar today, and then I taught Luke how to play a solo over his song, by showing him a pentatonic scale that works in D minor.

We practised that for a while before running out of time.

Remind him to write lyrics!

February 7th, 2023

We worked on Luke's song this week, and he made an electric guitar part using some bar chords I showed him (instead of the open chords we learned last week).

We went over it a number of times, and hopefully if he has it down we can record it next week.

January 31st, 2023

Luke decided this week to change the structure of the song, so we laid it out again, and he rerecorded his bass. He played it much better this time!

I wrote out the guitar chords for him so he can try adding acoustic to it next week.

January 24th, 2023

Today we continued working through the song Luke is writing. We recorded an initial bass track, but it needs some cleaning up here and there and he's going to work on playing it without making mistakes.

January 17th, 2023

Luke heard Harrison's song and so wanted to try to record a song too.

We took a couple of his bass licks that he'd been working on, and turned them into verses and choruses and added a bridge.

We'll start recording it next week. It's going to be fun!

UPDATE: here's a drum loop we thought we might start with:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK7U2rMtnAQ&ab_channel=JoeBeier

January 10th, 2023

We went over Paranoid together. Luke is doing well on it, and is going to work on some of the harder parts this week.

Think of some other songs to learn next... maybe another Hip song or AC DC?

January 3rd, 2023

December 27th, 2022

December 20th, 2022

Luke said that the songs were too easy from last week, so we looked for another one, and decided to do Black Sabbath, Paranoid:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0mjHlUzXec&

This has some fast bass licks in it, and is fun.

If he can remember to bring a list of songs to learn, that would be excellent.

December 13th, 2022

We started out finishing up Tiger and Yesterday. Good job.

We then did a few songs
Crazy Train - a little hard
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBR648wnlIs

Sharp Dressed Man
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35ioRsE_vJQ

New Orleans is Sinking
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL3-JmF1WSI

Ahead by a Century (but the tab is upside down)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=naFE_ooNL5Q

December 6th, 2022

We went over Eye of the Tiger, and Luke is really getting it! Great job on the fast parts. Try it at full speed if you can (we did at 90%).

Then we added Yesterday by the Beatles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ix6ffbwnSqc&ab_channel=EuBasss

Make a list of songs!!!! ;-)

November 29th, 2022

We started out trying to find a good song to learn, have Luke write out some new songs he'd like to go over with me.

We settled on Eye of the Tiger, and went through it twice.

Here's the link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHCCKJ7a6I4&ab_channel=MattTen

See if you can get all those fast parts by next week!

November 22nd, 2022

Today we went back to bass to learn the bass line of Come As You Are by Nirvana.
This link let's Luke slow down songs from YouTube and loop parts of them:

https://www.looper.tube/?v=rWHkrYRhOzw&s=0&e=247&spd=0.85


Good job

November 15th, 2022

Today Luke brought his acoustic, and we worked on the chords, changing them at the faster speeds. I showed him how to "race" himself, playing a chord and then counting seconds to switch to the second chord. He's down to about 1 second per chord for his best times. We'll need that to be more like .25 seconds eventually.

Good job!

November 8th, 2022

Luke didn't have his guitar again this week, because I guess his aunt picked up the wrong one? so we went over the Michael Jackson Billie Jean song, and a few others like Another One Bites the Dust and Seven Nation Army.

I asked him to put a list of songs together we could be learning, so that we can get back on target with focus. :)

November 1st, 2022

Luke didn't have his guitar this week, so we returned to bass, and I showed him how to play Billie Jean, which is a really fun bass lick.

Next week bring the guitar along and we'll continue with Yellow.

Billie Jean
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKFS2tDsZRY&ab_channel=TheGreatestSongs

October 25th, 2022

Today we learned the first four chords in Yellow by Coldplay.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vnMmB1qp2Y&

They are A, E, D, and F#m7

They are played with the capo on the second fret.

October 18th, 2022

Luke did some vocal lessons today, and we did excercises - half scales on Lah, Lee, and Loo.

Do this at home yourself, and download the app I showed you on my phone to help you hold notes.

Here's a video to watch about breathing:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-9LPpsBidE&ab_channel=Singgeek

Get a book and put it on your tummy, so that you can practice getting your diaphragm to go up and down when you breathe (instead of lifting your shoulders).

Good job!

October 11th, 2022

Here's the video of the tab for bass for back in Black, which Luke had forgotten:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VAN1lZwQLIs&ab_channel=SamboatMusic

(send it to him)

Good job today!! See you next week.

October 4th, 2022

The Killers, When You Were You
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-ip02FknUo&ab_channel=iskate4funiskate4fun

The issue with learning the next song is trying to find an easy one for Jacob. I suggested this one as not too hard... the chords are:
E / / / | F# / G#m / | B / / / | E / / / |

repeated over and over again.

For bass it's
----------------------------------
----------------------------------
-----------------22222222---------
-0000000022224444-------00000000--

September 27th, 2022

Today we added Smoke On the Water. We went through the bass tab on this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXzQLfiy9FQ&ab_channel=FusilliJerry

It's fun!

September 20th, 2022

We finished up the Joan Jett song, and worked out the rhythm he was having trouble with.

He wanted to write a song, so I showed him a few principles of patterns, themes, and variation.

Have a new song to learn for next week.

September 13th, 2022

Luke said they're skipping the solo part in Iron Man, so we went on to Nirvana, Come As You Are:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfJjcfAPCxo

We finished that quickly, so added CCR, Fortunate Son:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ec0XKhAHR5I

That went quickly too, so we started on I Love Rock and Roll, Joan Jett
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iC8oP4Z_xPw

September 6th, 2022

Luke wants to learn Iron man, Come As You Are, and something by Nirvana.

We started off with Iron Man, but he knows most of it already... so we focused on the bridge to start, and I wrote out the tab for him.

https://www.songsterr.com/a/wsa/black-sabbath-iron-man-bass-tab-s8

The above site has the tab too, and you can actually play along which is cool.

April 26th, 2022

Good job on TNT. We added another AC/DC song-

AC/DC For Those About to Rock, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qsaTFcXVCNU&ab_channel=AC%2FDC-Topic

April 19th, 2022

We continued working on T.N.T, and Luke is doing very well on it. It's quite easy, other than trying to keep track of which section is next.

I asked him to think of some other songs he'd like to learn next.

April 12th, 2022

We went over Ahead by a Century. It's a little hard to follow because the chords change in what feels like random places, so we decided to wrap it up for now.

We added a new one, AC DC, T.N.T:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhsK5WExrnE&ab_channel=AC%2FDC-Topic

We ran out of time on it, so just work on the Hip some more this week.

April 5th, 2022

Luke is doing well - we went over Back In Black, finished up the song, and then added a new one:

The Hip, Ahead by a Century:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QzmaTdyRSDU&ab_channel=%C5%9Fevval

March 29th, 2022

Luke isn't able to come tonight.

March 22nd, 2022

We worked on Back In Black today, getting through most of the song, but not completely finishing.

See if you can get the main parts ready for next week and we'll wrap it up.

Good job!

March 15th, 2022

Luke is away for March break

March 8th, 2022

We continued writing out the parts and learning them for Welcome to the Jungle. This is quite a complex and long song, with many different parts, but Luke is doing very well with it.

March 1st, 2022

We continued working through Welcome to the Jungle, writing out the next parts and practicing them together.

Luke has a good sense of time - he's going to be a fine bass player!

February 22nd, 2022

Luke played through Smoke on the Water for me, which he'd learned on his own using the TAB we covered last week.

We then added a new song, by Guns N' Roses, called Welcome to the Jungle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnvWWJozXzo&ab_channel=WindMusic

We only covered the intro and the first half of the first verse. We will work more on it next time.

February 8th, 2022

Today we reviewed Don't Stop Believing and Dream On, and then talked about some theory.

I taught him how to read basic TAB music, and also how to find the music notes in the bottom 5 frets of the bass on the first three strings (E,A, and D).

I drew out a piano keyboard so he could remember where the black notes are - the flats and sharps. His piano background really helped with this.

I asked him to try to memorize the notes in those first five frets.

UPDATE: Luke forgot his book yesterday - you're welcome to come by and get it anytime.

February 1st, 2022

Luke did wonderfully tonight. We worked through the rest of Don't Stop Believing, (I wrote out the rest of the chords for him).

We're still learning music as numbers, which is kind of like paint by numbers - once he familiarizes himself with the bass, we'll move on to notes.

After Don't Stop Believing, we added Aerosmith, Dream On:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9srmft6STc

January 25th, 2022

This was Luke's first week. We went over the basics first, the names of the parts of the bass, and then we learned our first simple scale, using the number system.

Wherever you start on the bass as 1, on any string, then 2 is two frets up from that, and 3 is two frets up from that.
THEN, 4 is the next string back on the same fret as 1, 5, is two frets up from that, and 6 is two frets up from that.

We played through three songs, including Circles by Post Malone, and Journey's Don't Stop Believing.