Chord Master: How to Choose and Play the Right Guitar Chords

Product Description

Chord Master
is a chord dictionary with a difference. Rather than just show chord shapes – which are all there in the Chord Matrix – a large portion of the book explains how to use chords, with information about the theory behind them, and attempts to answer the questions guitarists often have about chord shapes. Also, it presents usable groups of chords for beginners in relation to a variety of song styles.This new, revised edition emphasises the practical and is even more useful to beginners, with expanded exercises and more audio. The multimedia component has roughly doubled the number of tracks and is 30 minutes longer. Some audio examples have a backing track arranged to stress melodic and rhythmic elements so that when the reader puts the chords alongside, the effect is marked, sometimes allowing for re-harmonizing the same music with a different chord progression, or a chord progression played in more than one area of the guitar. The notation of the chord progressions is partly redesigned, making it easier to read. This will also make this part of the book more attractive to the casual browser.More chord types have been added to
Chord Master
‘s Matrix (dictionary) section, with new material about balanced chords (which remove ineffective or unnecessary doublings of notes) and about effective chord voicing. The section about chords from famous songs is expanded with more examples of unusual chords, including ones that players are often curious about – one of the most famous examples is the first chord of “A Hard Day’s Night.”Includes online resource.

Review

Now in a newly updated and expanded edition, “Chord Master: How to Choose and Play the Right Guitar Chords” by Rikky Rooksby (a guitar teacher, songwriter, composer, and writer on popular music) is a chord dictionary that rather than just show chord shapes (which are all there in the Chord Matrix) also explains how to use chords, with information about the theory behind them, and attempts to answer the questions guitarists often have about chord shapes. Thoroughly ‘student friendly’ in organization and presentation, and including Online Media, “Chord Master” is an ideal instruction manual that is unreservedly recommended for novice guitar players and would be an ideal for music department curriculums as an introductory guitar studies textbook. –Midwest Book Review

About the Author

Rikky Rooksby is a guitar teacher, songwriter/composer, and writer on popular music. He is the author of How to Write Songs on Guitar (2000, revised edition 2009), Inside Classic Rock Tracks (2001), Riffs (2002, revised edition 2010), The Songwriting Sourcebook (2003, revised edition 2011), Chord Master (2004, revised edition 2016), Melody (2004), Songwriting Secrets: Bruce Springsteen (2005), How to Write Songs on Keyboards (2005), Lyrics (2006), Arranging Songs (2007), How to Write Songs in Altered Guitar Tunings (2010), and Songs and Solos (2014). He has also written fourteen Fastforward guitar tutors and arranged over three dozen chord songbooks, including The Complete Beatles. He has written entries on rock musicians for the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and published interviews, reviews, and transcriptions in many UK music magazines. He is a member of the Society of Authors, Sibelius One, and the Vaughan Williams Society