houndymarcello
Verified buyer
11/30/25
Superb class
Essentials: Fingerstyle Jazz Etudes
Interactive Video Masterclass on Arranging, Performing, and Composing Solo Jazz Guitar Pieces
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Sean McGowan
Educator
Genres
About this course
In Sean McGowan’s Fingerstyle Jazz Survival Guide, you worked on 20 essential concepts and 5 solo arrangements to help you develop a foundation of jazz fingerstyle technique.
In this Essentials edition of Sean’s Fingerstyle Jazz course series, you’ll expand your repertoire with 10 more solo jazz arrangements and dig deeper into right- and left-hand techniques, harmonic applications, and creative approaches for composing, arranging, and performing solo guitar pieces.
”I’ll teach you 10 full-length fingerstyle jazz arrangements, each of which I will perform and then break down for you emphasizing the essential techniques and approaches you’ll need that include muting, dynamics, syncopation, and counterpoint.”
You’ll start with a 12 bar blues in the key of F. Then you’ll dig into Bird of Paradise, a piece that explores block chord harmony and single-note lines. Next is Autumn in New England, a beautiful ballad that explores lush chord voicings and rubato playing.
With a slow, gospel feel, Georgia Peach will cover blues language and the push and pull of straight and swing rhythms, Blues Three Ways is a standard 12 bar jazz blues covered in three different keys, and then you’ll work on Our Romance, which showcases the various ways to approach a ballad as a solo guitarist.
Sean guides you through walking basslines, chord jabs, and triplet rhythms, as you work through a medium tempo 12-Bar blues in the key of B flat. It’s Old Fashioned mixes it up with stop-time breaks and single-note lead lines.
Featuring an intro cadenza, counterpoint, and various substitution techniques, Rainbow explores a number of harmonic strategies for solo guitar. And finally, you’ll round out your repertoire with an uptempo piece that integrates blistering bebop lines with rapid chords and double stops.
Sean will explain and demonstrate all of the key concepts and approaches along the way. You’ll get standard notation and tabs for all of the performance studies. Plus, you’ll be able to use TrueFire’s learning tools to sync the tab and notation to the video lesson. You can also loop or slow down the videos so that you can work with the lessons at your own pace.
Grab your guitar and let’s play fingerstyle jazz with Sean McGowan!
In this Essentials edition of Sean’s Fingerstyle Jazz course series, you’ll expand your repertoire with 10 more solo jazz arrangements and dig deeper into right- and left-hand techniques, harmonic applications, and creative approaches for composing, arranging, and performing solo guitar pieces.
”I’ll teach you 10 full-length fingerstyle jazz arrangements, each of which I will perform and then break down for you emphasizing the essential techniques and approaches you’ll need that include muting, dynamics, syncopation, and counterpoint.”
You’ll start with a 12 bar blues in the key of F. Then you’ll dig into Bird of Paradise, a piece that explores block chord harmony and single-note lines. Next is Autumn in New England, a beautiful ballad that explores lush chord voicings and rubato playing.
With a slow, gospel feel, Georgia Peach will cover blues language and the push and pull of straight and swing rhythms, Blues Three Ways is a standard 12 bar jazz blues covered in three different keys, and then you’ll work on Our Romance, which showcases the various ways to approach a ballad as a solo guitarist.
Sean guides you through walking basslines, chord jabs, and triplet rhythms, as you work through a medium tempo 12-Bar blues in the key of B flat. It’s Old Fashioned mixes it up with stop-time breaks and single-note lead lines.
Featuring an intro cadenza, counterpoint, and various substitution techniques, Rainbow explores a number of harmonic strategies for solo guitar. And finally, you’ll round out your repertoire with an uptempo piece that integrates blistering bebop lines with rapid chords and double stops.
Sean will explain and demonstrate all of the key concepts and approaches along the way. You’ll get standard notation and tabs for all of the performance studies. Plus, you’ll be able to use TrueFire’s learning tools to sync the tab and notation to the video lesson. You can also loop or slow down the videos so that you can work with the lessons at your own pace.
Grab your guitar and let’s play fingerstyle jazz with Sean McGowan!
What you'll learn
- Perform 10 complete solo jazz guitar arrangements
- Use tritone substitutions to modulate between keys
- Apply chromatic approaches and substitutions in blues context
- Create rhythmic motives that make the progression swing
- Apply advanced fingerstyle techniques to jazz repertoire
- Create rhythmic motives that make the progression swing
- Apply advanced fingerstyle techniques to jazz repertoire
- Add chord jabs while maintaining independent bass line
- Voice chords based on melodic top-note movement
- Build chord density progressively from 2 to 5 notes
Release date: 08/24/2020 • 3h 20m runtime
Sample lessons
Simple Blues
Overview
Simple Blues
Performance
Simple Blues
Breakdown
Georgia Peach
Overview
What's included
32 lessons • 10 charts
Essentials: Fingerstyle Jazz Etudes
Hi, I'm Sean McGowan. Welcome to this Fingerstyle Jazz edition of Essentials.
In my Fingerstyle Jazz Survival Guide, we worked on 20 essential concepts and 5 solo arrangements to help you develop a foundation of fingerstyle technique.
In this Essentials edition of Fingerstyle Jazz, we'll expand your repertoire of solo jazz arrangements and dig deeper into right and left hand techniques, harmonic applications, and creative approaches for composing, arranging, and performing solo guitar pieces.
You'll learn 10 full-length arrangements, each of which I will perform and then break down for you emphasizing the essential techniques and approaches you'll need that include muting, dynamics, syncopation, and counterpoint.
Everything is transcribed and you'll be able to sync the tab and notation to the video using TrueFire's learning tools. You can also loop or slow down the videos so you can work with the lessons at your own pace.
Ready to get started? Grab your guitar, and let's go.
In my Fingerstyle Jazz Survival Guide, we worked on 20 essential concepts and 5 solo arrangements to help you develop a foundation of fingerstyle technique.
In this Essentials edition of Fingerstyle Jazz, we'll expand your repertoire of solo jazz arrangements and dig deeper into right and left hand techniques, harmonic applications, and creative approaches for composing, arranging, and performing solo guitar pieces.
You'll learn 10 full-length arrangements, each of which I will perform and then break down for you emphasizing the essential techniques and approaches you'll need that include muting, dynamics, syncopation, and counterpoint.
Everything is transcribed and you'll be able to sync the tab and notation to the video using TrueFire's learning tools. You can also loop or slow down the videos so you can work with the lessons at your own pace.
Ready to get started? Grab your guitar, and let's go.
Simple Blues
Our first étude is a simple 12-Bar blues in F, with a laid-back medium tempo swing. It features some classic double-stop clichés in tenths as well as a turnaround using sixths. We'll also look at a few ways to spice up a basic blues progression with chromatic approaches and substitutions. This étude will serve as a great warm-up piece to get your hands ready to play some more complex fingerstyle jazz material.
Simple Blues
Our first étude is a simple 12-Bar blues in F, with a laid-back medium tempo swing. It features some classic double-stop clichés in tenths as well as a turnaround using sixths. We'll also look at a few ways to spice up a basic blues progression with chromatic approaches and substitutions. This étude will serve as a great warm-up piece to get your hands ready to play some more complex fingerstyle jazz material.
Simple Blues
Our first étude is a simple 12-Bar blues in F, with a laid-back medium tempo swing. It features some classic double-stop clichés in tenths as well as a turnaround using sixths. We'll also look at a few ways to spice up a basic blues progression with chromatic approaches and substitutions. This étude will serve as a great warm-up piece to get your hands ready to play some more complex fingerstyle jazz material.
Bird of Paradise
Based on the classic Jerome Kern standard, "All the Things You Are", this étude works through harmonizing a melody with 4 and 5-note block chords. This piece also features some examples of constant structure with chord voicings, and using sub ii-Vs in the style of Wes Montgomery and Joe Pass. The last chorus integrates some single note bebop lines, creating a question and answer dialogue with the moving bass and chord figures.
Bird of Paradise
Based on the classic Jerome Kern standard, "All the Things You Are", this étude works through harmonizing a melody with 4 and 5-note block chords. This piece also features some examples of constant structure with chord voicings, and using sub ii-Vs in the style of Wes Montgomery and Joe Pass. The last chorus integrates some single note bebop lines, creating a question and answer dialogue with the moving bass and chord figures.
Bird of Paradise
Based on the classic Jerome Kern standard, "All the Things You Are", this étude works through harmonizing a melody with 4 and 5-note block chords. This piece also features some examples of constant structure with chord voicings, and using sub ii-Vs in the style of Wes Montgomery and Joe Pass. The last chorus integrates some single note bebop lines, creating a question and answer dialogue with the moving bass and chord figures.
+ 25 more lessons
Reviews
7 results
Dave58
Verified buyer
12/24/22
Great!
Here a very pleasant teacher to listen to and who continues to fascinate. Very interesting teaching material, tasteful examples with a clear explanation of where your fingers come and which strings to pluck. This was a try for me, but in the meantime I own more courses from this virtuoso. Haven't regretted a moment.
Raffaello
08/09/22
Excellent Course!
Totally diging the breakdown of each song and loved the teacher. One of the best by far.
spider88
Verified buyer
12/08/21
Awesome!
If you are interested in solo jazz guitar, this course is for you. Don't be confused by the introduction text that states "in my Fingerstyle Jazz Survival Guide, we worked on 20 essential concepts and 5 solo arrangements to help you develop a foundation of fingerstyle technique." This course is the "essentials" course that offers ten full-length solo guitar etudes that are based on jazz standards. There are a few blues pieces and etudes based on tunes like Georgia, My Romance, and Misty. There is a lot here that will help you get your solo arrangements up and running in no time. Sean provides a short introduction of each piece, plays it, and then spends 15 to 20 minutes going over each arrangement. If you learn the melody on which each etude is based on you can utilize these etudes to help flesh out a solo chorus or two before coming back to the melody. Highly recommended for those willing to dig in and have interest in this genre.
zonemark
Verified buyer
11/11/20
tasteful
McGowan's courses in action. Tasteful selection and good arrangements. Pick a piece wherever you'll find useful lines and chords. For the more advanced guitarist's.
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