Learn Guitar

And songs for ceremony and sweat lodge, with the drum and rattle

 
Hi, I’m offering lessons in guitar, with a particular focus on accompanying sacred medicine songs of the world and also singing with traditional style drum/rattle accompaniment. Feel free to book yourself in for a lesson below and I’ll see you see you in the Zoom-o-sphere!

I’ve been teaching guitar for over fifteen years, and over the last few years I’ve found that my work has aligned very powerfully with my passion for singing medicine songs and accompanying them on guitar.

Since I’ve begun to specialise in this niche, I have had the very great pleasure of connecting with some true kindred spirits through my work as a teacher. It’s a great honour to have the opportunity to support brothers and sisters to deepen their practice in this way and to work towards ever more beautiful renditions of many of the inspirational songs that have been created to honour the teacher plants and the four sacred directions etc. It’s such a joy to share these with my students and they often introduce me to wonderful songs that I might not have otherwise heard too and in turn I’m able to help them learn them on the guitar.

My particular area of focus is supporting students to get beyond the “glass ceiling” that is a familiar experience for so many students of the guitar, and certainly was to me, earlier in my playing journey.

Many students come to me having learned the basic chords, along with perhaps a finger picking pattern or two and a couple of strumming patterns, but are stuck as to how to get to the next level with their playing and achieve the sort of mastery displayed by the musicians who inspire them.

How to get to that next level is not often immediately apparent and it took me many years of study to understand how to round out my playing skills.

I am now absolutely delighted to have the opportunity to guide others on this journey towards greater levels of guitar mastery and it is a real blessing to witness students developing their musical abilities and understanding in this way. In this way, it is my hope that we can bring more beauty to our songs and prayers.

 

For those who feel confident to take make that leap to the next level with their guitar playing on their own, but just need the relevant information to help them get there, I’ve put together this “Free Range Guitar Manual”. So called because it’s my firm belief that the freedom to roam the entire fretboard is arrived at through a thorough understanding of the system that underpins all music and the way it pans out on the fret board. Freedom through structure is my mantra.

Here you’ll find an invaluable resource for both those taking lessons as well those going it alone. I’ve done my best to set out the basics of musical system, as it applies to the guitar, in the kind of comprehensive way that I’ve not really come across elsewhere. That’s really why I put this together, because I came to understand that lack of understanding of this system and the way it all fits together was the one thing that held me back and the same for my students.

The good news is that the manual, which contains twenty one pages of crucial need to know information and exercises for anyone looking to take their playing to the next level, is available for free to all email subscribers.