Blog

Six String Shaman People begin playing the guitar for many reasons. Some crave stardom, some the attention of the opposite sex. Some just regard it as a constructive past-time; a way to round out their skill-set, something to do at parties. From my experience as a musician and teacher, however, the ones who excel at the instrument are the ones who truly need it. They need it to focus thei …

Petatonic Boxes I’ve often heard guitarists express frustration at being trapped within the “ pentatonic boxes”. Here they are organized to create an A minor pentatonic scale up the neck:  Folks tend to memorize them each vertically, then horizontally, then diagonally. The most fluid players can find then whenever, wherever, and in any key. After a while, though, the ear starts …

Although it’s impossible to say with complete assurance where “the blues” first developed, a strong case can be made for the Texas Blues Guitarist. In their unfinished tome, “The Blues Come to Texas”, researchers Paul Oliver and Mack McMcormick exhaustively detail the geographic and sociological circumstances that made the Lone Star State the perfect incubation zone for such an artform. It’s …

When you visit Charlotte, make sure you have time for A Morning in The Midwood Guitar Studio Acoustic Guitar Lounge. When Rock & Rollers enter our storefront in the historic Plaza Midwood neighborhood of Charlotte, North Carolina, we have to greet them with a drool bucket. A post-industrial aesthetic of brick walls and exposed piping serves as the perfect backdrop for our diverse inve …

Reverb has been an essential part of the electric guitar and all genres of music since the 1960's.  I’m a sucker for reverb. Always have been. I want to live inside my electric guitar. I always play piano with the sustain pedal depressed. Perhaps this preference has primordial roots, an inheritance from our cave-dwelling ancestors. It’s impossible to say for certain, but I’m clea …

Charvel and the Dawn of the Hot-Rod Guitar The “ gear-head” is integral to the advancement of any technology. I am referring to the sort of individual who is rarely satisfied with stock options. While most of us simply buy carefully, play, and let be, gear-heads tend to view new acquisitions as blank canvases rather than completed masterpieces. Not content with simply expressing …

Swart Amplifiers | Midwood Guitar Studio Guitarists and recording engineers alike know that the best studio amp is often small and tweed. There’s something about a tiny, vacuum-tube powered box pushed to its limits that perfectly captures the spirit of rock & roll. Before there were full stacks and arenas full of screaming fans, teenagers learned to channel their angst through diminut …

The Fender Guitar Legacy | Midwood Guitar Studio It’s impossible to imagine where the musicians of the world would be without the innovations of the Fender Musical Instruments Company. From the first production solid-body electric to the first 100-watt amplifier (the latter requested by Dick Dale to satisfy a gymnasium full of ecstatic teenagers), Fender guitars are finely woven into the fab …

What's in a Guitar Finish | Midwood Guitar Studio A group of butterflies is called a “kaleidoscope”, and given the amount of finishes available, that would be an appropriate term for a group of guitars as well. In a sense, guitarists can be classified based on their chromatic (pun intended) leanings. That said, it may also reflect one’s maturity and self-confidence. Case-in-point, my fir …