Workshop Schedule

Frank Vignola

Duets with Frank and Vinny

Tim Lerch

Accompaniment strategies for Guitar/Vocal Duets

Pasquale Grasso

Harmony, melody and rhythm

Tim Farrell

Choosing The Right Tool For The Job

In this worksop Tim will walk you through the decision making process of choosing which instrument and accessories he used in recording a song for his soon to be released album Hidden Treasure. The song Cumulus Melodious includes many layered guitar tracks using several different types of guitars and accessories. We will discuss the individual tracks and the completed mix.

Tom Nania

Archtop Guitar Dynamics

As well as his work as an acoustics engineer with D’Addario, Tom is a member of the Violin Society of America’s Oberlin Acoustics Workshop. Prior to joining D’Addario, he also worked as a luthier and acoustics researcher specializing in archtop guitars as a co-proprietor of House of Luthiery. In 2021, the Violin Society of America published Tom’s work, “Archtop Guitar Dynamics”, and he’s currently curator of the archtopproject.org, an online resource for the acoustical analysis of historical archtop guitars.

Perry Smith

Creativity and Discipline for the Jazz Guitarist

In this workshop Smith will share ideas on how to structure a practice routine that fosters creativity and technical improvement. Specific elements include exercises for scales, arpeggios, sight reading, technique building, transcribing, jazz improvisation, recording analysis and how to maintain a healthy mindset while performing.

Paul Ricci

Adapting jazz harmony across cultures

Ted Ludwig

Improvising the Changes

Take your improv playing to new heights as we explore some different approaches to creating interesting and beautiful solos over 3 classic Jazz tunes. We will discuss my approach to analyzing, comping, and soloing over “Lady Bird” , All the Things You Are” and “Jazz Blues”.

Sean McGowan

The Holistic Guitarist

For guitarists of all ages, styles, and levels, this workshop offers a comprehensive approach to staying healthy, practicing creatively, and improving as a musician.

Wayne Goins

Mo’ Better Blues – Increasing your ability to extend melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic dimensions for your blues solos.

Knowing how to play the blues is a fundamental skill that every jazz guitarist should possess. In this clinic, you will learn how to develop your improvisational skills through the art of manipulation of three essential elements of music.

Ulf Wakenius

Paul Asbell

Jazz-in’ The Blues, and Blues-in’ The Jazz

This workshop will first present practical ways to incorporate jazz harmony and melodic concepts into playing the blues on guitar, using 9th and 13th chord voicings, II-V-I substitutions, III-VI-II-V turnarounds, arpeggio patterns, etc. Styles of T-Bone Walker, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Count Basie, and others, many in printed handout form, will be used to make points come alive. Then, we’ll explore how jazz players have used bluesy figures and forms to liven up some of the “schmaltzier” aspects of jazz guitar. Tunes by Charles Mingus, Milt Jackson, Charlie Parker, etc will be used- again, accompanied by printed handouts.

Fareed Haque

The music of Shakti: South Asian music for jazz guitarists.

Over the years I have been increasingly involved with South Asian music, most recently numerous performances with members of the group Shakti. For this workshop I will discuss the challenges and opportunities of South Asian music for the Jazz guitarist. We will study some pieces from the Shakti repertoire as well as more general principles.

Barry Greene

Learning Tunes Beyond Memorization

David Becker

The Magic of Triads

David Becker will address the use of Triads and how to use them in building chord voicing’s (Extensions and Alterations), solo lines and chord melody. He will also show how to build Rhythmic and Melodic motifs using triads.

Mark Kleinhaut

Recording Archtops

Practical tips and tricks to level up your home recordings and capture the beautiful sounds of your archtops. Even inexpensive mikes and recording gear can rival the pro sound with the right microphone placement, building your signal chain and judicious use of the right effects processing.

David Becker

The Magic of Triads

David Becker will address the use of Triads and how to use them in building chord voicing’s (Extensions and Alterations), solo lines and chord melody. He will also show how to build Rhythmic and Melodic motifs using triads.

Jocelyn Gould

Improvising Toolbox – Tools for soloing

Great jazz improvisers use a variety of musical approaches to compose masterful solos on the spot. This workshop will address approaches to improvising like call and response, Blues, Bebop lines and rhythm. The objective of this workshop will be to leave the workshop goer with several soloing approaches to work on so that they have a number of tools in their toolbox when they improvise. We will work on using these tools on Bye Bye Blackbird.

John Storie

Effective methods for transcribing solos

Beth Marlis

The Genius of Jimmy Wyble

An introduction to his unique counterpoint, harmony and left-hand independence. Please bring a guitar, this workshop is best enjoyed with your instrument!! Limited to 20 handouts with downloadable PDF for all attendees.

Davy Mooney

Mooney’s Corner

Davy Mooney will explore concepts from his three Mel Bay books: “Personalizing Jazz Vocabulary,” “Into the Labyrinth: An Anatomy of Position Playing for Jazz Guitar,” and “How to Achieve Great Jazz Phrasing: A Practical Method”–as well as touch on ideas from his long-running video series for Jazz Guitar Today: “Advanced Improvisational Concepts.”

Howard Alden

Songs and Stories with Howard Alden

Demomstartaing Howard’s approach to the seven-string Guitar and some of the many influences on his musical journey.

Shawn Purcell

Bebop Boot Camp

Bebop Boot Camp is a hands-on exploration of the essential language of bebop. Dive into chromaticism, the most commonly utilized bebop scales, 7th-chord arpeggios derived from those scales, voiceleading, enclosures, and classic bebop ideas to develop longer, more connected, and expressive lines. Along the way, we’ll focus on practical guitar scale fingerings and fretboard applications, giving you ideas you can take straight to your instrument and into your improvising. Whether you’re looking to sharpen your bebop vocabulary or break out of familiar patterns, this boot camp is all about getting the language under your fingers and into your playing.

Bruce Forman

Ben Turner, Geoff Reecer, Alan Prather and Jan Knutsen

Inside the Rhythm Section: Guitar in Small & Large Jazz Ensemble

Jonathan Stout

Improvising Swing-Era Chord Solos

Covering the basic building blocks of improvised chord solos, as used by players like George Van Eps, Carl Kress, Dick McDonough, Carmen Mastren and Dave Barbour, as well as examine the “swashbuckling” style of Allan Reuss.