Issue No. 2

Who is

SeanMcGowanand whyis he onthis cover?

Vahagni

Nickerson Guitars

Anton Emery

Pierre Bensusan

Steve Herberman

Zane Forshee

Tim Thompson

William Fitzhugh

Craig Dobbins

Lou Arnold

Features

Workshops

PassagesHoward Morgen

Paul Yandell

Great GuitarsMatsuda M1

SeanMcGowanJazz Virtuoso By Bill Piburn

During my tenure as editor of the now defunctFingerstyle Guitar magazine, I have heardseemingly countless guitarists; and whileoften impressed by the vast talent in theguitar world today, none has impressed memore than Sean McGowan. He is an artist ofgreat skill, harmonic knowledge, and innova-tion, and truly is a musician’s musician. I ampleased to say he is both a friend and an inspi-ration.

“Sean McGowan is the most promising young sologuitarist I have ever heard.”

— Tuck Andress

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Where are you currently teaching?I teach full-time at the University of Colorado Denver,and also direct the Guitar Performance program. Ourguitar department is the largest in the RockyMountain region; we have seven guitar instructorswho specialize in a number of different styles andapproaches. Our students study a lot of fundamentalsand literacy, and while we use jazz repertoire andpedagogy as a basis for our curriculum, juries, etc., ourstudents have access to a wide variety of genresthrough ensembles and applied studio work in addi-tion to professional gigs in the Denver/Boulder area.I teach a series of gu tar modules with topics rangingfrom contemporary fingerstyle acoustic, ‘world music’styles, Bluegrass/Newgrass, Latin, studio/live touringwork, musical theater, and funk/R&B styles. We’re notnecessarily trying to turn any of our students intostrictly jazz players, but rather well rounded and ver-satile musicians. We encourage students to find theirartistic voice and also to think about working in thebusiness of music as a career, which is crucial. Manymusic conservatories focus exclusively on musicalaspects, i.e. technique, history, repertoire, etc. By con-trast, our program also includes concepts of entrepre-neurial thinking and learning based on real-life oppor-tunities in the music industry. Personally, I require allof my students to keep practice/gig journals, wherethey record routines, content, tunes, concepts, careergoals, and business information. It’s also important tocultivate an optimistic attitude with regard to being afull-time musician. It’s certainly not for everyone, but Ibelieve there are still plenty of opportunities foryoung musicians to find their niche and be successful— however they define ‘success.’

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I also teach privately and via Skype. Occasionally I teach atfestivals and summer programs. This summer, I’m absolutelythrilled to be a part of the faculty of the Guitar Week at theSwannanoa Gathering (held this past July at Warren WilsonCollege near Asheville, North Carolina). I really enjoy teach-ing in different settings, and meeting new students. I lovehelping them work towards their personal goals and musicalaspirations.

You play guitars built by Brad Nickerson. Tell me about Bradand his guitars.I met Brad Nickerson back in the early 1990s at a guitarshow in Boston. From the moment I saw and played hisinstruments, I knew they were really special and unique.Over the years, Brad and I have become very good friends,and my respect for his skills as a luthier and artist have onlyincreased. I believe his guitars — both archtop and flat-topacoustic — are the best available today. He is truly a one-man custom shop in Asheville, North Carolina, and buildsevery instrument by hand without the aid of CNC machines,

etc. I primarily play a custom Virtuoso model, which I’ve hadfor about ten years. It’s Brad’s standard 17” archtop model; Iused it on Indigo and the new Sphere CD. I also play a 1992FC3 acoustic model that used to be Brad’s shop loaner whenhe lived in western Massachusetts. That guitar sounds beau-tiful and it is featured on the River Coffee recording. I literally just got a new archtop guitar from Brad, which is

based on his Solstice model, a 15” carved spruce top that isfully hollow, but without f-holes. It sounds absolutely amaz-ing! I wasn’t sure how a guitar without holes would sound,but the response and tone are incredible with a strongacoustic voice. Plugged in, it’s ridiculously huge-soundingand clear, and the absence of holes allows me to turn upwhen playing with a drummer with no feedback issues what-soever. What do you use for amplifying your guitar?I play through Jazz Amps built by Henriksen Amplifiers in

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Denver, Colorado. They have a great tone and are tonallyversatile (using the non-traditional 5-band EQ section), plusthey are really portable. I actually have a Convertible headand mini-cabinet that I fly with. I don’t really use any effects,but I do have a nice stereo reverb by Kilpatrick Audio that Iuse if the room is flat. I also like to use Klotz cables, as Ibelieve that cables do play a role in the signal path.The first two things that stand out to me about your playing isyour vast harmonic knowledge and the unorthodox right handtechniques you use when extending the harmony or melodicline. Will you address this for me?Absolutely! I listen to a lot of non-guitar players — piano, bigband, full ensembles, classical, orchestras, etc. I am moved bythe harmonic direction that they can achieve that are nottypical of the guitar. Therefore, it then becomes a two-stepprocess, that is to first figure out what is going on harmoni-cally in the piece of music, and then the second step is toapproximate it on the guitar.I love guitar music, but I am also deeply influenced by thesolo piano recordings of Bill Evans, Oscar Peterson, andThelonious Monk. Tommy Flanagan and Wynton Kelly arealso big influences on me. It’s not only the way these guyssolo, but the way they comp that has influenced me. Thevocal group Take Six has inspired me as well. Many of theirarrangements originate from Gene Puerling’s work with TheHi-Lo’s and later with The Singers Unlimited. One of the biggest differences is the counterpoint and contra-puntal motion as opposed to most guitar players who tend toplay chord, chord, chord — it’s static rather than lines thatthread through the progression. I started developing extended techniques when I tried toemulate things that were not possible when playing theguitar in a standard way. Two things that come to mind is awide range of really low and really high notes and the otheris chord-clusters. Take Six uses a lot of clusters of major andminor 2nds, same thing with piano players.Please explain the extended right-hand technique.It’s basically right-hand fretting. I use the index finger of myright hand to fret a note in the exact same way you wouldwith the left hand. It is not hammered or tapped the wayStanley Jordan does it. I then use the thumb to pluck the noteor strum if I am playing a chord. The idea is to create aguitar-like texture without the harsh sound that tapping cre-ates. The challenge is to make it sound natural and mostimportantly musical. The technique should serve the music.Do you always use the thumb to pluck the string or do you alsouse the ring finger?Actually, I alternate the thumb with the pinky of the righthand but you could certainly use the ring finger. I use thethumb and the pinky when playing an arpeggio while hold-ing down the index finger of the right hand on the extended

note. You can also hold down two notes with the right handindex and middle fingers. It’s almost the same as playing arti-ficial harmonics, however, you are actually fretting the noteinstead of just touching them. It’s the same motion of pluck-ing the string with the thumb or pinky while your index fin-ger plays the harmonic. In this case, you just fret the note.When fretting two notes with the right hand are they alwayson adjacent strings or do you also skip strings?Both…typically I’ll use a string skip because I think it’s moreinteresting the way the voices stagger. That way if you usetwo fingers, you can get a cluster and a wide range. An exam-ple would be an open voiced D major triad (D-A-F#) built offthe fifth, fourth, and second strings, respectively. You thencould hold G on the third string, 12th fret with the index ofthe right hand and use the middle finger of the right hand tohold E on the first string, 12th fret. You end up with theorder being D-A-G-F#-E. The G and the F# create a nice clus-ter while the high E gives you the 9th which is out the physi-cal range of the chord. The tones from low to high sound, 1-5-4-3-9. I assume you went through an experimental period of findingvoicings with this technique.I did. Much of it was in tandem with finding voicings in gen-eral that I could use in comping situations or in a solo guitarsetting. One approach compliments the other as you searchfor as many ways of harmonizing chords and movingthrough inversions. Some work nicely with just the left handwhile others need extended techniques. Specifically if youplay a 7th chord, major, minor or dominant with close voic-ing, 1-3-5-7. That is a pretty easy voicing in root position, butas you move into the inversions, they become difficult if notimpossible. Johnny Smith was one of the few guitarists whocould play those inversions. Most people, including me, needto use extended techniques.Do you have plans on publishing a book in the future that willaddress some of these techniques?I do actually — glad you brought that up. It will be titledFingerstyle Jazz Guitar Essentials. I am excited about thisproject because it’s been years in the making. It’s both abook and DVD that covers chord voicings, harmonicapproaches, walking bass lines, and playing single lines ontop of bass lines and extended techniques. It will be pub-lished this summer by String Letter and distributed by HalLeonard.You play with a pick at times, however, you play solo guitarwith fingerstyle technique.It’s interesting that from the late ‘20s through the late ‘50sthere was a whole movement of jazz guitarists like EddieLang, Carl Kress, Dick McDonough, and later, Johnny Smith,who were trying to put classical guitar literature on the jazzguitar with a pick. They developed a high degree of tech-nique. I have always been influenced by jazz guitarists har-

monically, however technically I have been more influencedby fingerstyle guitarists such as Alex de Grassi, MichaelHedges, Chet Atkins, Luis Bonfa and of course all of the clas-sical and flamenco players. I try to marry fingerstyle tech-niques with the jazz harmonic approach. You certainly play things that turn my head. When I listen toyou, I don’t know if I should cut the strings off the guitar ormake coffee and practice!(Laughter) I’d go with making coffee and practice, that’swhat I do. In fact that’s what I was doing just before youcalled (laughter)!I have been doing a lot of investigation of tritones as a comp-ing device. Not only used as the 3rd and 7th but I also movethem to find alterations on dominant chords — often puttingthe 9th or 13th on top of the tritone. Is this part of yourapproach?Yes. There are many directions that comping can take.Nowadays most guitar players comp for themselves especial-ly in a trio setting, but Lenny Breau was doing it some thirtyyears ago! He was one of the first and maybe the only onewho has translated piano technique and harmonic awarenessto the guitar. He was obviously influenced heavily by BillEvans and McCoy Tyner in particular. Lenny spent yearsworking on those voicings and he would do it with just oneor two fingers while playing lead lines on top! His techniquedeveloped as a result of wanting to sound like a piano player.He practiced it fervently for twenty years and he did it! Fortunately, since the guitar is tuned in fourths, many of theMcCoy voicings can be grabbed with one finger because theyare just stacked fourths. That leaves three other fingersavailable to play lead lines. Another voicing that is often usedis a basic 13th chord with, b7-3-13. If you build that off the5th, 4th and 3rd strings you can play it with just the 2nd andfingers of the left hand. This leaves the 1 and 4 fingers toplay melody.You barre the 3rd and 13th with the 3rd finger, left hand, cor-rect?Exactly...the 2nd finger plays the b7th. I think this is howLenny would play lines while playing the chord at the sametime.One thing that I have been working on is the ability to physi-cally hold down one note in a chord while playing the othersshort. Musically that is very important because all of a sud-den your guitar playing sounds three-dimensional. It soundsmore like two people playing rather than one trying to playtwo parts. The secret is in the articulation. If you can get themelody to sing, in the same way a singer would, meaning —holding a note and paying attention to the dynamics whileplaying the accompaniment in different ways — then you arein business. I practice holding down any one of the notes in achord while playing the others staccato. You can take any

chord voicing and practice sustaining each of the notes whileplaying the others staccato.Are you’re doing this by muting with the right hand or liftingthe fingers of the left hand?None of it comes from the right hand…this is something Ilearned from Tuck Andress. Tuck is a master at this. It allcomes from the left hand. You don’t want to have to be think-ing about the right hand, you want to be able to just go for itat any moment. The left hand is responsible for all the articu-lation. The fingers do not come off the strings., you just sim-ply release the pressure on the strings enough to stop thesound.Let me give you an example: play a C major 7th in third posi-tion. First play the chord and let everything ring. Now sus-tain the B note on the third string while lifting the other fin-gers. Now the B is sustained as a whole note while the chordis staccato. Musically you will hear a huge difference. Thenpractice that same process with all the other fingers. It’s asubtle technique but of paramount importance.Another thing important to practice, and that is really hard,involves right hand technique. It is trying to make one voicelouder within the chord than the other notes. This is some-thing that Earl Klugh is a master at. Earl’s ability to sing themelody always amazed me. In my opinion Earl has taken theLenny Breau approach and made it contemporary and hisown — it’s pretty amazing.I should say that Tuck and Earl are the first two guitariststhat got me interested in solo guitar. Long ago I got Tuck andPatti’s first recording Tears of Joy and later Tuck’s first solorecording Reckless Precision. I also had Earl’s first solorecording Solo Guitar. They were on cassettes and I listenedto them day and night! Earl always sounds relaxed and intimate in his playing. Somemusicians play well but sound uptight, like they are thinkingabout it too much.Yeah, you know the funny thing, or maybe ironic thing, isthat the biggest challenge is just to make it sound good(laughter). You go through all these steps, but ultimatelyyour goal is to make the music a joy to listen to. The idea isto make something that is really hard look and sound easy.That results in a musical performance. All the greats havethat ability. The side that is beyond technique, whichaddresses the spirit, the soul of the player, and that is wherethe magic starts.Most of the great guitarists can be identified within a fewnotes. DNA really does seem to be involved at this level.Yeah, and that’s what makes the guitar one of the coolestinstruments to play, it’s amazing! After all, we are talkingabout a wooden box with strings on it (laughter) — just theway you touch it, your soul, your vibe, your approach andintentions all go into creating your sound. That is why we

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can easily spend a lifetime learning to play.Therefore, we do!(Laughter) Yeah, there are so many things I am just learning,and I have been playing thirty years! It’s fun, it keeps yougoing.

Do you find that some players think they know it all?(Laughter) These days all you have to do is go to YouTubeand in thirty seconds, you’ll hear that you do not know it all.When we were growing up, we would hear about someoneand go to the record store. In my case, growing up in Maine, Iwould order the record. Sometimes I would just blindlyorder guitar recordings. Every day you hear about virtuosoplayers, but that makes the musical side that much moreimportant. There are many players with unlimited technique,but it comes down to communicating. I think of TommyEmmanuel and of course, he is a great guitar player but hecommunicates from the heart and that always trumps tech-nique.I try to impart to my students who have all these chops that

they can play the tunes but they have to take it to the nextlevel. Some people have it and others have to work on it. Youcan never blame it on a tune. As performers, we need to beable to take any song and make it interesting and musical.Do you think there is a danger in disconnecting from thehumanity of music when players are focused on their tech-nique? I do think there is an inherent danger of that. I amvery aware of that being an educator. It is an art andyou hear people say that you cannot teach art, youcannot teach improvisation. On one level, I agreewith that, but you can teach the tools and techniquethat go into the art. Ultimately it comes down to get-ting in touch with your voice. It is important that thisdoes not get lost in the schools. With my students, wedo all the theory stuff because it’s a palatable thingbut in the end, it comes down to finding your voice.

Recently I have been thinking there is no reason to dojust a technical exercise. Maybe one should alwaysincorporate the technique into musical settings., notonly to make it more enjoyable but also to avoid anydisconnect from the musical side. Exactly. It’s interesting that if you go to a workshopor a clinic, most of the students seem to be lookingfor a magic bullet and there isn’t one. I will say thatwhen it comes to really great artists, the one com-mon thread is that they work on tunes a lot. They areconsistently looking for new ways to play through asong. Jazz standards are very challenging in thatregard because of the chord changes. In the begin-ning, a guitarist is just trying to outline the chordchanges correctly. The next step is to make a person-al statement within the confines of those changes.I want to add that of course you have to work on thetechniques. You have to get them in your hands, butbeyond that we need to apply them to musical situa-tions. For example, if we are working on bass lineswe will address the theory of constructing a bass line.We will look at how Ray Brown might construct it.Then we would address playing the bass notes with justdown strokes and then alternating the thumb with down andup strokes. We will then play the bass line only on the low Eand A strings so we are playing horizontally. The next step isto put it into a musical setting by playing a blues or a stan-dard.

Lets talk about time…one of the most common problems I hearin solo players is a good sense of time and control.These days a lot of people have loop stations that they canplay along with, but I think the best thing is to put themetronome on two and four, this will really help secure yourtime. If you can play at various tempos on two and four itwill make your time really strong. Many solo players over-look the importance of good time. They are caught up in try-

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ing to find something fancy and the time does not feel goodor it does not swing as hard as it could. If you listen to OscarPeterson or Thelonious Monk, thereis no question where beat one is!(Laughter) Solo guitar playersshould have the same rhythmicintensity. Growing up I listened to a lot ofmusic that had a good feel other thanjazz because it felt so good. I listeneda lot to Stevie Wonder and RayCharles. If you want to hear goodtime just listen to Ray Charles forabout thirty seconds! I have listenedto him a lot through the years. I actu-ally went to see him when I was lit-tle. You know, R&B and soul havethose same elements. Guitar playersshould be listening to all kinds ofstuff. It will make them more com-plete.I think one thing that hurts solo play-ers regarding their time is the lack ofexperience playing with other musi-cians.I totally agree! Even now, I playmore with ensembles than solo. Tuck had the same experi-ence in his early days. He played in a ton of funk bandsbefore getting his duo together with Patti. He had his‘time/feel’ under his belt early on.While we are talking about Tuck, let’s talk about your friend-ship with him. He has been very supportive of your talent.I had never heard anyone play guitar like that! Tuck hadeverything happening! Great time, aggressive funk, greatswing feel and incredible chord voicings, all at the sametime! (Laughter). His tone was also incredible. I was eighteenyears old and up to that time, my experience was playingjazz with a pick and just playing single note lines or compingchords for someone else. That was my understanding of jazzguitar. I had never heard anyone bring it all together until Iheard Tuck. It was an orchestral approach to the guitar.I first met Tuck in the summer of 1992 when he was teach-ing a weeklong guitar residency. It was an incredible experi-ence and I guess he liked my playing because he invited meto teach a workshop with him the following summer. Do you stay in touch?We do but he tours mostly in Europe. When it is possible, weget together and catch up.Another player who is not as well known but equally as won-derful is Frank Potenza. Frank teaches at USC. He was a pro-tégé of Joe Pass and they became quite close. Frank is an

incredible fingerstyle jazz guitarist with a beautiful sound.Did you study with Frank?It’s funny, I did take some classeswith Frank, but my teacher at USCwas Joe Diorio. By the time I went toUSC, I was older and had been play-ing for a number of years. I did myDoctorate at USC.Tell me about your study with Joe andsome of the other teachers who haveinfluenced you.I have been very fortunate. I havehad wonderful teachers but on somelevel, at least philosophically, Ibelieve everyone is self-taught. Ibelieve most great musicians viewthemselves as students of the music.I recently had John Scofield as aguest at UC Denver. I told him Ithought he transcends the guitar. Hesaid, “Really? I have to disagree. Ifeel challenged everyday by thisinstrument and I am still learning.”Teachers can provide recourses andsometimes shortcuts, but ultimately it is up to you to put inthe hours and make the discoveries on your own. You haveto put in the work and love it. I am a firm believer in that.In regard to Joe and my study with him at USC — Joe waswonderful but at that point, it was just playing music. Iwould go in and we would just play tunes together. At times,I would ask him about his approach to a tune or somethingabout harmony. Joe is a very advanced thinker on the guitar.It is amazing if you stop and think about it, Joe is only fiveyears younger than Kenny Burrell and the stuff Joe wasdoing back in the ‘60s was very modern. He was a modernjazz guitarist before anyone else was. He just did not get therecognition he deserved. There is a YouTube interview ofWes Montgomery and he was asked what young players hewas checkin’ out, and he said Joe Diorio. Joe is a beautifulhuman being. I would sometimes come in stressed or feelingbad about my playing and he would offer things to make methink differently. Sitting down and playing a standard like“Body and Soul” with him was a learning experience organi-cally. You do not have to say a word…you hear his time/feelor how he plays a chord. You are hearing his substitutionsand lines and seeing him play it right in front of you.In going back to Frank — though I never studied with him —I learned from listening to his recordings. I’ll hear somethingand say, wow, what was that? Frank tells a great story aboutasking Joe Pass where an amazing cadenza or somethingcame from and Joe replied, “Oh, I stole that from GeorgeShearing” (laughter).

Sean’s Nickerson Solstice model, 15” hollowbody, carved spruce archtop, no f-holes.

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Who were some of your early influences? Tony Gaboury was one of my firstteachers. He had a big influence onme; he played all these modern lineswith his fingers. Tony is not knownoutside of Maine but he is a greatplayer. He is involved with the drum-mer Steve Grover in the group TheLenny Breau Project. Steve was for-merly a roommate of Lenny’s andhas many of the arrangements Lennydid. Lenny’s older brother, Denny,and Brad Terry are also in the group.Tony and I remain friends and stayin touch. Gary Whittner was anotherinfluence and a great player. He wasthe first person who turned me on tothe music of Thelonious Monk. You went to Berklee, didn’t you?Yes, I did my undergraduate study atBerklee and went to University ofthe Arts in Philadelphia; I got mydoctorate at USC. I was in and out ofschool because of playing and teach-ing a lot. I didn’t start at Berkleeuntil I was a little older, twenty-six. Iwent on to get my doctorate because I love teaching andwanted to do it at the college level. I taught at music stores

for years and knew I did not want to do that. Nowadays ifyou want a position at a university, you have to have a doc-torate, period. After graduating fromBerklee, I spent a number of yearsteaching adjunct at the University ofMaine and Bowdin College. I realizedI wanted and needed a fulltime joband that’s when I went back toschool.While at Berklee did, you study withMick Goodrick?I was able to take a class with Mick,it was a high-level guitar lab. When Iwas nineteen, I got his book TheAdvancing Guitarist. I spent thewhole summer studying that book. Itwas revolutionary for me because Ihad never thought of harmony andthe guitar neck in those terms.Playing with him was the same kindof experience I had playing with Joe[Diorio]. Mick thinks very contra-puntally and plays fingerstyle. Theway he plays a ballad is amazing! Heis an artist in the same way Joe is.Between all of these people, I havebeen fortunate.www.seanmcgowanguitar.com

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Nickerson Solstice model

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Sean McGowan’s Solo to “I’m Old Fashioned”Play Video

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Fingerstyle Jazz Guitar Solo By Sean McGowan

The preceding piece is an original fingerstyle jazz guitar solobased on the chord changes to Jerome Kern and JohnnyMercer’s beautiful composition “I’m Old Fashioned.” I firstheard this song played by John Coltrane on his pivotal BlueTrain album. Years later, I decided to work out a solo guitararrangement that would have a swing feel and improvisation,yet feature the harmonic complexities often found in balladinterpretations. The transcription is from my solo guitar record-ing Indigo (Maple Sugar Music) released in 2008.

This arrangement utilizes standard fingerstyle walkingbass/melody/chord techniques in the styles of Tuck Andressand Lenny Breau. I typically use all of my fingers on the righthand (the pinky often plays the melody on the high E string)and do not have any nails, as I primarily play an amplified arch-top guitar. Probably the only unorthodox technique in thisarrangement is the use of ‘right-hand fretting,’ indicated by thefret numbers appearing in square boxes in the tab. This tech-nique does just what it says: the fingers of the right hand simul-taneously fret notes and pluck the strings. This technique iswonderfully effective in creating close-voiced clusters and verywide, piano-like voicings that are impossible to play with theleft hand alone. I feel it sounds more ‘guitar-like’ than right-hand tapping, though the technique is similar. Simply use theright hand (or picking hand) index finger to fret a note – just asyou would with the left hand – and then pluck or strum thestrings with the right hand thumb and/or pinky.

I typically use the thumb for a downstroke and the pinky for anupstroke. This technique may be used for sustained, highmelodic notes (ms. 1-6), arpeggios, or harp-like strumming pat-terns (ms. 79-82). I do however, occasionally use tapping in tan-dem with sliding to grab a bass line fragment or to create apianistic flourish (m. 15).

Try to find an angle for the right hand index finger to comfort-ably hold down a note while simultaneously plucking the stringwith the thumb or pinky. Players with short to medium lengthnails should be able to do this without any problem – simplyexperiment with the angle of the right hand. In this particulararrangement, all of the right hand fret notes are on the high Estring while holding down and moving chords in the left hand.To do this, I pluck the high RH fret note with the RH pinky, fol-lowed by the RH thumb strumming the bass notes and chordvoicings. At the end (ms. 79-82), the harp arpeggios are playedwith the RH pinky plucking the high E alternating with the RHthumb plucking the other strings up and down.

There are numerous examples of harmonic substitution andreharmonization techniques in this transcription. It is beyondthe scope of this particular article to discuss this in detail, how-ever, try comparing the chord changes throughout the two solosections with the original changes of the song. Common jazztechniques like tritone substitutions are used, as well as lesscommon metric shifting, parallel structures, and diatonic andmodal substitutions. Note that the original bridge features apedal in A major; in the solo choruses I retain the essentialcolor but substitute with counterpoint in A minor and in thesecond chorus, parallel 11th and #11th tonalities.

All of the concepts featured in this arrangement — walkingbasslines & chords, extended fretting techniques, reharmoniza-tion & arranging — are covered in detail in my forthcomingbook Fingerstyle Jazz Guitar Essentials (Stringletter Publishing);please visit www.stringletter.com/Shop/Fingerstyle-Jazz-Guitar-Essentials-Complete-Course for more information.

I try not to think about theory too much while creating anarrangement of a standard — it’s more like trying to create col-ors and textures as an artist would on a blank canvas. Have funexploring this arrangement and incorporating some of theseideas and techniques into your own music! (Please visitwww.seanmcgowanguitar.com)

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