How to care for and travel with your guitar
Always wanted to play? Get started today-with The About.com Guide to Acoustic Guitar!
Product Description
The guitar industrys most comprehensive publication on acoustic guitar information and pricing has been dramatically improved! The new 10th Anniversary Edition Blue Book of Acoustic Guitars is now nearly 700 pages, and features hundreds of new images. Written by Zachary Fjestad and edited by S.P. Fjestad, the fully revised 10th Anniversary Edition Blue Book of Acoustic Guitars keeps the reader up-to-date on new and vintage pricing, technical information on acoustic and acoustic electric instruments, and serialization on most major trademarks. This Anniversary Edition lists the current and discontinued acoustic companies and luthiers, including the new crop of archtop builders, contains a thoroughly revised Trademark Index with contact information, and features hundreds of B&W photos depicting popular makes and models. Reliable guitar information has never been easier! The new 10th Anniversary Edition also showcases a fully revised, full color Photo Grading System (a Blue Book Publications, Inc. exclusive!). The Photo Grading System is the consumers best tool to correctly ascertain the various grades of both new and vintage acoustic instruments. These high resolution color photos enable even a novice to lock into each guitars unique condition factor easily and accurately, showing a variety of real world condition factors over a wide range of instrument models and configurations. Why guess when you can be sure? Most of the information contained in the new 10th Anniversary Edition Blue Book of Acoustic Guitars is simply not available in any other single publication for any price! No other reference and value guide for acoustic guitars even comes close.
Customer Reviews:
price guide.......2007-06-14
Some prices are above what they actually sell for (priced too high) well some prices are below market on EBAY anyway.
Also they need to expand some area's such as Harmony,Yamaha,Taylor and Blueridge,excellent overall guide to Acoustic Guitars aand there prices.
Blue book has set the standard for all.
They do an excellent job on Gibson and Martin both but too little info on small names.
Maybe i should write a book of Yamaha Acoustic Guitars?
These are very popular on EBAY and are considered the poor man's Martin,which includes me by the way.
Good amount on the history of companies that Manufacture Guitars which i find interesting,facts most people do not know or realize.
Gives buyer's the uphand on what price to pay for what condition,as well as an very good examples shown in pictures.
I would rate this a 5 but there is too much info missing in there guide which forces me to use several.I wish some day they could make this more complete so i only need to buy one.But otherwise i depend on it.
If you do not own this you are either a genius with one of the best memories on this planet or you are operating in the dark ages.
Great gift for that Guitar Buff.......2006-03-18
My Friend has an addiction to guitars so I purchased this book as a birthday gift three days ago and he hasn't put it down. Great book, very informative and apparently addictive too.
Buy this book.......2005-12-28
I use this book along with the Blue Book of Electric Guitars from the same publisher as a reference and starting point to price vintage guitars to purchase for my collection. I have found this book to be an excellent source for model information as well as a price point reference. I am not sure I would wish to venture into this collecting field without a reference such as this. I highly recommend both books to anyone interested in buying or selling a vintage guitar.
Comprehensive book.......2002-05-18
The book is fairly comprehensive and has an adequate description of the guitars and features. Some guitars are not listed, and some of the models are hard to look up when a company makes a wide variety of models. The book seems to get superseded pretty quickly but is much cheaper than some of the other guides out there. Hopefuly the book is accurate, since it lists an imported Ovation guitar as having a solid top when most of those models are known to have plywood tops. If you buy the book on CD, the user interface is awkward.
A MUST FOR COLLECTORS OR TRADERS`.......1999-05-15
I DO ALOT OF BUYING/SELLING/TRADING, AND THIS BOOK HAS KEPT ME FROM MAKING MISTAKES AND HAS HELPED ME SCORE SOME PRETTY GOOD DEALS. I RECOMMEND IT HIGHLY.
Book Description
Whether you simply want to maintain your guitar or hot-rod it into a radical new incarnation, this book is the ideal guide. By the columnist of Guitar Player's popular Repairs and Modifications column, this comprehensive book is a must for any guitarist who needs information on beginning repairs through advance enhancements. 8-1/2 inch. x 11 inch..
Customer Reviews:
Well, of course it isn't a "Chilton's"..........2007-09-21
I'm not going to waste your time by parroting the features so many other reviewers have covered, but I will waste your time by rebutting some of the naysayers. Anyone who spends a few minutes really looking at the sheer number of styles, parts and options the world of electric guitars has to offer will realize no single binding could possibly walk the reader step-by-step through all possible operations with all possible combinations. Guitar features can be nearly as expressive and unregulated as the music of the guitars themselves. With that said, if you want to learn to think about working on guitars, this is the book for you. Using this book as a reference and using your brain as a tool, you will find in the author and yourself an excellent team for bringing an old junker to life or maintaining your pride and joy.
Could have been better.......2007-07-22
This could have been a much better book if the author had designed it more like a Chilton's manual. It lacks a detailed, step-by-step walkthrough. Still, this book has its strengths, and I would recomend it to a new guitarist, or a guitar player that might not be so handy, but wants to a have a sweeping general knowledge of guitar maintenance.
I wouldn't use this book as a guide on how to paint a guitar, but it is useful in showing how guitars are painted, d'you know what I mean?
Don't waste your money.......2007-06-12
I've been playing guitar for quite a while and finally got the notion to learn how to set up and upgrade my guitars. The author skims over a lot of information. I agree with most of the other 3 stars or less reviews in that this is no way a step-by-step guide to doing anything. I surfed the net quite extensively and found instructions for exactly what I want to do.
too much detail in some areas and not enough in others.......2007-05-25
When setting up my guitar, I found myself looking for more information and pictures that this book does not have. However, it is very detailed and provides many great insights, such as, creating some of your own guitar tech tools and the tricks of professionals. Instead of simply having a section about adjusting the action on an acoustic guitar, I had to jump around throughout the book, and was still left with many unanswered questions. However, the sections on setting up an electric were much more detailed, all in one place, and easier to follow.
If you own or play guitar, you must own this book!!.......2007-05-09
This is a MUST OWN book for anyone who plays guitar, even casually. Step-by-step instruction how to do the simplest repairs like changing strings, to more difficult and technical like how to install new pickups and wiring...and everything in between.
Just the chapter on how to set-up your guitar makes the book worth buying!
You will NOT be disappointed!
Book Description
This book will help all guitar players make better friends with their present guitar or decide on features to look for in a new one. They will learn about the differences in guitar woods (and how they sound), simple guitar maintenance, how to choose an instrument for their style of playing, what to expect from a music dealer, and the mystique of collectible guitars. This new edition includes more details on amplifying acoustic guitars, and a guide to guitar companies’ Web sites.
Customer Reviews:
Get it or you'll regret it.......2005-11-11
Wow, I don't think I can beat the spotlight review but allow me to add the scores to this book because it deserves a 5-star. I have to first say, this ain't a book that teaches you HOW to play the guitar but definitely the best book yet on describing what the guitar is.
Believe me, I have been playing guitar for over a year now and have no clue what's the different between Brazilian Rosewood or cedar top, spruce top, etc. Larry Sandberg explains all that, including on the differences between string gauges and what the varieties of guitar physiology. So just because you're a good guitar player doesn't mean you know about guitars. You have to read this book, one way or another if you are planning to play the guitar. If not, you'll regret it, because this book gives you a general idea of what you need to know about the guitar from top to bottom.
The Acoustic Guitar Guide: Everything You Need to Know to Buy and Maintain a New or Used Guitar.......2005-09-17
A must have resource for anyone about to enter the guitar marketplace. Clear, concise and informative. Very highly recommended.
Good Reference Book.......2005-08-02
Has a lot of basic information. Well written in a informal style. Good foundation for someone interested in the variations and basics of guitar construction including materials, body shape etc. As I was bewildered by the vast amount of choice in the acoustic guitar market, I found it useful for determining the right guitar to purchase for myself. Photography is b&w and not particularly sexy if you're looking for lots of eye candy.
FANTASTIC! Don't Buy A Guitar Before You Read This.........2002-09-09
Face it - you can't hang-out with guitar people if you have
no idea what nut width is! I decided to get one book
to comprehend the "acoustic guitar', and chose this one.
It is fantastic.
It's not necessary to read beginning to end. The author
organized it so well that a quick look up will fill you
in on the spot. I have become knowledgable enough about
guitar construction, woods, parts you name it, that I
can carry on an intelligent conversation with any guitar
head out there.
The author is a wonderful writer. He keeps it simple,
very informative, and he has a fun personality which
makes the reading fun. It sounds strange to say but
it's an exhiliarating read too because the information
is vast and very interesting.
Anyone planning to buy a guitar in any price range
should read this book first. Making a purchase will
be much easier for you. You'll know so much that
you won't get taken, and you'll know how to know
if you like a guitar or not.
If you want the skinny right now without any
blah-blah-blah or difficult to understand
technical terms, here's your book. It will
be something you'll look at for years to come.
A "Must Read" for Serious Buyers.......2001-09-13
As an "older-boomer-beginner" returning to guitars after a thirty-year absence, I read about this book in the Unofficial Martin Guitar Forum ....
This is a very readable book for anyone thinking of purchasing a high quality acoustic guitar that wants to understand much more about what they are buying. This Second Edition contains just enough up-to-date technical and historical background to give you what you need to select a great new or used acoustic guitar. It clarified many things that I found confusing when I first started reading about model sizes, nomenclature, woods, strings, and everything else. I now feel like a very informed buyer, even though I'm not much of a player. I suppose there is a certain slant towards Martin guitars, but I think that is unavoidable given the history of the company.
Mr. Sandberg is correct in that no book full of adjectives will help you evaluate either sound or action. You need to go out and play as many guitars as you can. However, this book gives you a great start, and gives you a lot of good reasons to pass over a lot of what is on the lower end of the market today. Highly recommended.
Book Description
Acoustic guitarists can now better understand their instruments, preserve and protect their value, and get the sounds they really want, thanks to this new book from the experts at Acoustic Guitar magazine. This indispensable guide begins by acquainting players with their instruments and laying to rest some pervasive guitar myths, then proceeds through various aspects of basic care, setup, common repairs, and pickup installation. Whether it's cleaning and polishing a beloved guitar, protecting it from theft or changes in humidity, selecting a case, or performing diagnostics, readers will become more savvy acoustic guitar owners and repair-shop customers and can forego dubious advice from well-meaning friends and anonymous "experts" on the Web. Includes a primer and glossary of terms.
Customer Reviews:
A valuable investment.......2005-08-27
As a long time guitar player, I was surprised that something like this for acoustic guitars was not available sooner. I subscribe to Acoustic Guitar, and their tips have been very valuable, since acoustic guitars are far more fragile than the extensively discussed electric guitars. I guess the increasing "unplugged" movement has finally given the acoustic the due it desearves to the younger musicians, and old dogs like me needed to know too. A valuable investment for anyone with an acoustic, especially one of quality.
Book Description
The acoustic guitar is the instrument of the people and Play Acoustic tells the people how to play it. This detailed and beautifully illustrated book explores the history of the acoustic guitar, from the jazz age to the folk revolutions of the early 1960s and late 1990s to the current rebirth of bluegrass and the singer-songwriter boom of the past decade. Skilled professional musicians and experienced tutors coach the reader through 11 styles, using exercises suitable to novice players new to each style and working up to full pieces and advanced techniques. Entire chapters are devoted to folk, rock and pop, blues, country, bluegrass, jazz, and more, with detailed guidance through both musical notation and tablature, diagrams, and explanatory text. An accompanying CD also offers listening examples of the most crucial of these exercises, to help players master each style.
Customer Reviews:
a very good guitar course.......2007-05-13
a very comprehensive course, i havent't started it yet but my guitar teacher has and thinks its great.
An idea book, not an instruction book.......2007-02-06
I compare this book to the companion volume on Classical Guitar in the same series, and the comparison is not favorable. The book on Classical Guitar begins at the beginning and proceeds in an orderly way into more developed techniques. This book on Acoustic Guitar only claims to be a "graded course": most of the content is for the guitar player who wants to try other "styles" of playing. The author seems not to know how to deal with the beginner, who gets a mere 16 pages. I give the publisher credit for trying to compress a lot into the book, and the diagrams are very clear (not always correct); but the beginner or intermediate player needs to proceed from the known to the unknown. One can find answers to many questions about guitar technique in this book, but finding them is very difficult, as there is no index. The typeface and notation are too small for my eyes: again, this problem is not found in the volume on Classical Guitar, which would have been a much better model for this book.
Book Description
Learn the tools of the trade for recording acoustic guitar parts in your home studio! Topics covered in this one-on-one lesson with MI faculty instructor Dallan Beck include miking techniques, direct recording, EQ, compression, recording techniques, and effects such as chorus, reverb and delay. The accompanying CD features 48 demo tracks.
Customer Reviews:
Very thin.......2007-01-12
I read the drum recording book by the same author and it was fairly good, so I bought this one.
If you have absolutely no clue how to record an acoustic guitar, at least the book is not expensive, and it does contain a small amount of valid information. It is a very thin, very basic book.
Average customer rating:
- Lite Workshop-like Treatment of Misc. Acoustic Blues Topics
|
Inside Blues Guitar (Acoustic Guitar Guides)
Manufacturer: String Letter Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 Guitar
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Strings
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Songbooks
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Blues
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Instruction & Study
| Theory, Composition & Performance
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ASIN: 1890490369 |
Book Description
Boost your blues I.Q. with this lively, comprehensive introduction to one of America's most vital musical legacies - from the origins of the blues in the rural South and early masters like Charley Patton and Blind Lemon Jefferson, to the guitars and techniques used by acoustic blues players, then and now. Leading roots-music performer and recording artist Steve James answers 50 key questions for contemporary blues guitarists and fans alike and provides invaluable reference information on essential recordings, books, websites, workshops and more. With Inside Blues Guitar, you'll find the right gear, repertoire and resources to play the blues and truly appreciate America's most accessible and enduring musical tradition.
Customer Reviews:
Lite Workshop-like Treatment of Misc. Acoustic Blues Topics.......2002-05-31
One thing that I would have thought should be made more clear in the book's title is that it is NOT about electric blues guitar or all types of blues guitar... it is solely concerned with the somewhat esoteric topic of fingerpicked ACOUSTIC blues guitar, (also know as pre-war, rural blues, country blues, delta blues, etc...). This is fine with me, but Stevie Ray Vaughn wannabes might be disappointed or let down.
The overall tone of the this very light and quick read, (63 small pages only!!), is conversational and takes the format of some general info, advice, recomendations and history lessons from an excellent player and proponent of the genre. It is pretty much like attending a 3 or 4 hour folk festival "workshop" with Steve James where you and a crowd of fellow blind-lemon-wannabes get to ask all the usual questions.
Note: No actual music instruction is included beyond a few cursory lines and chord shapes included in an appendix.
If you are interested in this topic... by all means.. go ahead and grab it... cheaper than travelling across the country to some guitar workshop!
Book Description
Dropped D Guitar: Bach to Blues provides in-depth strategies to help the seasoned beginner to intermediate guitarist gain familiarity with the patterns of dropped D, utilizing a series of hands-on exercises for playing in dropped D tuning. Actual music is provided (no scales here) in the major keys of C, G, D, A, and the minor keys of Dm, Am, and Em. In addition, the guitarist is given a wide-ranging source of music, in a variety of musical styles and keys. There are works written by classical masters, traditional music, and early blues—all arranged for fingerstyle guitar in dropped D tuning in both standard notation and tablature. Background narrative is given on musical periods, composers, and the music to add to the reader's understanding and interest. All instructional and solo material is played by the author on the accompanying CD.
Customer Reviews:
A So-So book that has some good points...........2007-09-09
This book, Dave Marshall's "Dropped D Guitar - From Bach to Blues" is another one of those "do I like it.....or not" books from Mel Bay.
This book has a pretty good selection of songs, tho most of them are in the Bach vein. There are 51 tunes total, ranging from Classical, Traditional, and Rag Time and Blues, to Canadian, English, Irish, Scottish, and Welsh tunes. The CD has a decent quality to it, and tho it is not up to the level of some of the other CD's I have got thru these type of books, you can still just put it on listen to it.
This book really shines because of all the Bio information that it gives on the songs and performers. This, and the "mini" music lessons at the front of the book are some of the best parts of the entire book.
But there are some problems. A full 3rd of the book is classical, and that's OK, but the other selections are played like a Classical player would play them, not a true Blues player, etc. Out of those "51 tunes", "Pachelbel Canon" is repeated 4 times, and "Scarborough Fair" 3 times, in different keys. But they are listed as a "different tune". Each Tab is different in typesetting and size, like the Master Anthologies reviewed elsewhere.
The book is BRAND NEW, but came with a errata page with 29 "corrections" for the book! I am talking missing lines, measures re-arranged, and entire songs out of order with the CD. It looks like a Jr. High School class put this thing together. I have wrote to Mel Bay about this (Oct.30 2006) and still have not received an answer on how to get this fixed. If I would have paid their full list of $22.95 I would be more upset than I am.
And to top it all off, the tempos at which these are performed at, and written for, would put an audience asleep in 10 min.....I almost fell asleep just listening to the CD! Only 5 of the tunes could even be called close to a "medium tempo", and that might even be a stretch.
It is hard to find a lot of stuff written for Dropped D tuning, so when I found this one and the Tom Ball one, I jumped on them. But both have been a let down really, even tho the Tom Ball one is light years better than this one.
If you would like to learn some Classical Guitar pieces in Dropped D, and are at an Advanced Beginner - Intermediate level in your playing, I would say go ahead and grab this...AFTER you check to see if it has been corrected. Then find it used.
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