A variety of new and traditional percussive techniques are now prerequisite for virtually every performing and recording style of acoustic guitar. Michael Hedges, Preston Reed, Andy McKee and Vicky Genfan slap and tap their way through solo guitar performances with brilliant precision and energy. John Mayer thumps out a mean bass line with his thumb. Kelly Joe Phelps uses a pinky move on his pick guard. Tommy Emmanuel’s percussive techniques are nothing short of amazing. Dave Matthews, Tim Reynolds, James Taylor, Janis Ian, JJ Cale, Greg Brown, Rodney Crowell and dozens of other top caliber players Slap, Frail and Thump to spice up their performances and compositions.

Slap, Frail and Thump covers three essential percussive techniques for singer-songwriters, accompanists and solo guitar performers; palm slaps (for percussion and melody), frailing (traditionally a banjo picking technique) and thumping (combo slap and frail). Slap, Frail and Thump is demonstrated primarily on a six-string acoustic guitar for steel-string players; however all of the techniques can be readily applied to electric, 12-string and nylon-string guitar as well.

Matthieu Brandt, Dutch recording artist and top European guitar educator, presents Slap, Frail and Thump, the first course to drill so deep into the un-chartered waters of percussive guitar techniques. Brandt, who also authored TrueFire’s highly popular Jump Blues course, thoroughly researched the artists and their techniques to distill the information presented in Slap, Frail and Thump.

Students play their way through Slap, Frail and Thump starting with relatively simple grooves and progressing to quite intricate and challenging accompaniments. Students learn 12 original arrangements to get a grip on the techniques in context and work through 180 exercises covering every nuance of palm slaps, frails and full hand frails (thumps).

Students will learn how to use the techniques in band settings, solo guitar performances or as a singer-songwriter across all styles spanning rock, blues, country, shuffles and funk. Even players with little or no fingerstyle skills can quickly incorporate these techniques in their playing.

Whatever your style, or level of play, Slap, Frail and Thump will add new energy, range and excitement in your playing.

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Slap, Frail and Thump is optimized for intermediate to advanced players and is presented across 3 interactive video CD-ROMs (Win and Mac compatible), and features 40 full-length video lessons, text overviews, standard notation and interactive Power Tab so you can "see" and "hear" the tab and notation played out at any tempo, without a change in pitch.

TrueFire's video lesson player features zoom, frame advance, looping and many other handy controls.