Bebop Guitar Bk/Cd (Book & CD) Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I pre-ordered this book some months back with an expectation that a book calling itself "Bebop Guitar: Basic Theory and Practice for Jazz Guitar in the Style of Charlie Parker" would, of all things, discuss the practice of guitar playing. I am an intermediate level player with a few chords scales and riffs under his belt--no beginner by any means, but not a pro either.

I am not exaggerating when I say there is not one mention of the guitar as the instrument in question in any of the main chapters. The author does explain early on that the examples have been written in the key of G to make things easier for guitarists, but that's it! No tab, no fingerings in the notation. No position suggestions. Nothing. It's all theoretical explication of the melodic devices used by Parker in his solos. Not a bad thing in itself, but I don't see any reason for it to be a book targeted for guitarists. It could very easilty have been packaged as a book for oboists or kazooists without changing one word of the text.

Weirder still is the 64 track CD. Instead of the examples being played on a guitar, the least you would expect from a book shouting "Guitar" in very large, Art-Deco lettering on its front cover, you get examples recorded from a midi. But it's not even a midi using a guitar voice. It's a saxophone voice (and not a particularly good one at that!) If you just want to hear how the phrases sound, it works okay for that, but I should think that the target audience for this book would really haved liked to be convinced that these phrases can be made to sound good on a guitar. That would seem to be the point of a book entitled "Bebop Guitar."

I think my biggest complaint is the lack of any references to actual solos. It might say "He plays this line over a dominant." But there are no references to the names of the solos or recorded performances from which the lines were taken. At the very least a couple of representative solo transcriptions (with guitar tab or fingerings!) would have been nice too. By contrast, Stan Ayeroff's "Swing To Bop" collection of Charlie Christian transcriptions has all of those things--theoretical analysis of the melodic lines AND performance charts. Even if Parker's saxophone fingerings cannot be reproduced on the guitar, some recommendations on which positions to use under which conditions would have been helpful.

Also, the author has very odd credentials for someone taking on the task of explaining an alto saxopone player's style to guitarists. Most of his writing has either been for renaissance and baroque plucked instruments, or for banjo and flatpicked guitar. He has written one other jazz book, Charlie Christian Chord Shapes, and while his classical and early music background certainly qualify him to speak to the melodic theory involved, that's not necessarily what one expects to be the thrust of a book entitled Bebop Guitar. That doesn't mean his analyis isn't valid. It has just been mispresented and packaged badly by the publisher. This may not have been the author's fault, but someone clearly dropped the ball on this one.

Obtain a library or advance copy first before buying. It might be something worth keeping on the shelf for future reference, but you won't be playing KoKo anytime soon on the strength of this book alone.

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Product Description:
This book/CD pack shows guitarists how to transform basic jazz improv techniques into bebop figures in Bird's famous "with strings" style by making chromatic and rhythmic alterations. Includes many musical examples, most in the user-friendly key of G major, to accommodate players not well versed in jazz flat keys.

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