billabel.org

Welcome to My World

Fretlight Ready Hal Leonard Video-LENNON & MCCARTNEY VOL.12

PC ONLY! Mac Coming Feb. 2012. This is a Fretlight Ready™ video. As you watch the video in the Fretlight Studio software the Fretlight lights-up exactly what the instructor is playing. A Step-by-Step Breakdown of Guitar Styles and Techniques.

Format: Fretlight Video file (.fvp for play in Fretlight Studio software)
Composer: John Lennon
Composer: Paul McCartney

The Guitar Play-Along series lets you hear and see how to play songs like never before. Just watch, listen and learn! Each song starts with a lesson from a professional guitar teacher. Then, the teacher performs the complete song along with professionally recorded backing tracks. You can choose from three viewing options: fret hand with tab, wide view with tab, pick & fret hands close-up.

Volume 12 includes:
Back in the U.S.S.R.
Blackbird
Day Tripper
Get Back
A Hard Day’s Night
I Feel Fine
Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)
Ticket to Ride.

INSTALLTION NOTE: When you receive the disc simply copy the .fvp file on the disc to your computer. Then launch the Fretlight Studio software and navigate to where you saved the .fvp file and play it!

“Teaching” guitar helps you learn without fretting excessively about it – Jim Bray Saturday, February 11, 2012

Have you ever wanted to learn the guitar but couldn’t afford the lessons? Has the inability to read music stymied you? Do guitar tablatures cause your eyes to glaze like a fresh donut?

Well then, friend, if any of those scenarios describes you you might find Optek’s $499 Fretlight FG-421 teaching guitar to be a gift from above.

This Fender Stratocaster lookalike is not only a real electric guitar, it can be interfaced with your computer to give you note by note guidance as you learn new tunes. And while I may be merely a has been hack when it comes to playing guitar in 2012, others (Guitar World Magazine, for example) think the Fretlight is pretty special product. So there.

I used to play when I was much younger and, while I was never great, I could strum a reasonable rhythm guitar, as long as the tune didn’t deviate too far from your typical three-chord rocker. That was decades ago, however, and whatever skills I had have atrophied mightily since then.

But that’s why I got excited when the Fretlight folks offered me a sample to try, and thoughts of getting my immaculately callous-free hands onto such a device and using it to rocket me to the forefront of home studio practitioners began dancing through my head.

Heck, maybe I could even write a few songs again!

So the Fretlight folks sent me a bright red (other colors are available) “traditional electric” version of the guitar that comes with a fixed bridge (with adjustable saddles), a humbucker and two single coil pickups. It also includes tone controls, a five-position switch, and a volume knob. And, of course, its maple neck includes Fretlight’s patented “Advanced Polymer” with the “world’s only built-in LED learning system.”

That LED system is what differentiates the Fretlight from other generic “Stratocaster-compatible” axes. The LED’s built into its neck illuminate under the string and on the fret in question when you’re playing a particular song, showing you where and when to put your finger(s) at any particular time, the guitar getting its “fingering orders” via a DIN connector and cable that, at the other end, interfaces with your computer’s USB port.

What a marvelous idea! It’s like having a real teacher on hand, and a far less judgmental and temperamental one than my folks signed me up with when I was a teenager.

It works, too, though I had problems getting the system up and running initially. As it turned out, however, it was operator error – or at least operator assumption – that raised its ugly head. Since the guitar plugs into the computer, I assumed I could play it through the computer, using its speakers and not having to worry about an amplifier. This is not the case, however.

Fortunately, I was able to borrow a Peavy amp from my son and once I had that part figured out the rest was history. Or it would have been history and full speed ahead if not for the ravages of Father Time. Yes, I must reluctantly admit that the reality of the Fretlight was somewhat different than the dream – but I can’t blame the Fretlight for that!

You see, the guitar works as advertised, and it works very well. What doesn’t work anymore is these stubby old fingers which, while still adequate for typing (and the occasional rude gesture), no longer fly up and down a guitar’s neck like they did before the years and the arthritis took their toll.

It’s always something…

The Fretlight works with the Guitar Pro 6 software application that’s chock full of interesting stuff, including a variety of guitar sounds and riffs, effects and stuff. As a classic rock-kind of guy, I sought out that genre immediately and was confronted by some virtual sheet music in the software’s window, outlining a basic three chord rocker I remembered but whose chords I’d long since forgotten. It seemed like a good place to start. And it was.

There’s also the Fretlight Studio software app that includes an advanced chords and scales library as well as numerous text lessons and insight into musical theory. Fretlight’s website also offers for sale a bunch of videos that show you how to play the music of such guitar legends as Eric Clapton (and if you think HIS hand is slow, you should see mine!), Bob Seger and many others. I didn’t try it, but you can supposedly watch these videos right from the Fretlight Studio software and the guitar’s LED’s will light up in concert (no pun intended!) with your virtual mentor.

I was a tad disappointed at the limited number of tunes that come with the product, but there’s plenty of other stuff available for purchase and that means you can tailor the library to your tastes and/or needs. Prices range from about $3 for a single song to $80 for a complete course, which seems reasonable.

Fortunately, the software lets you slow down the tempo or loop parts of a piece, which is a great way to get a handle on a particular chord, riff, or whatever. It will even let you improvise (ah, you brave souls!) with “virtually any scale over custom progressions,” according to Fretlight.

The manufacturer claims the Fretlight method allows players of all levels to learn “over 10 times faster than traditional methods.” This, coupled with the fact you can learn quietly at home when no one else is around to laugh at you, is a real bonus.

Okay, I’ll admit freely that I’m not the best one to talk about the Fretlight’s playability as a guitar, but I did find that it had good action and I was quite satisfied with its sound. I also found the “on neck” fingering help marvelous, despite my slowness and discomfort trying to bend my old fingers into positions they haven’t tried in years. And you know, it’s very cool to watch the lights flow across the neck as the robot teacher shows where your fingers should go.

The software is very good – the chords section, for example, gives you mouse-over click access to a picture of the illuminated LED’s or the actual finger positions on the neck for a particular chord. And of course you can play something over and over again until it sinks in or your spouse objects – whichever comes first.

Will the Fretlight make a virtuoso out of a hack? Well, I can only speak for myself and in that case the answer is a resounding “no!” But I haven’t spent months and/or years dedicating myself to the process, nor have I spent long hours practicing (which is, after all, how you get to Carnegie Hall). On the other hand, I am having a lot of fun rediscovering some of my musical past.

Who knows, maybe in a year or so I’ll be ready to tackle something really complicated, like “Louie Louie.”

Copyright 2012 Jim Bray
TechnoFile.com

The ‘Take Care of Me’ Society is Wrecking the USA

By MAUREEN MACKEY, The Fiscal Times
January 28, 2012

You’ve played by the rules. Worked hard to put yourself through school. You’ve gotten a decent job and you pay your taxes. You’re faithfully paying down your mortgage and saving money in a 401(k) – all to secure your finances and your future. But now there are a lot more “takers” than “makers” in this country – and the impact is systemic and long-lasting.

A prevalent new “moocher culture” is changing the character of this nation – that’s the core message of A Nation of Moochers: America’s Addiction to Getting Something for Nothing, a new book by Charles J. Sykes, senior fellow at the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute and the author of six previous books.

“This has been the flash point in American politics for the last several years,” Sykes toldThe Fiscal Times in an interview this week. “In the wake of the Great Recession, we’ve shifted from a culture of celebrating and encouraging those who are productive and hardworking, to a culture where handouts, bailouts, freebies and entitlements dominate. You start to wonder, Why am I paying the freight for those who have been reckless and irresponsible, whether it’s on Wall Street or in Washington or anywhere else in the community? I think we’re becoming a very different nation.”

Excerpts from our conversation with the author follow:

The Fiscal Times (TFT): With so many people out of work and so many suffering – through no fault of their own – how do you draw the line between real need and a so-called “culture of mooching”?
Charles Sykes (CS): That’s obviously the most difficult part, the gray area in the middle. There’s a distinction between needing temporary aid versus using a vast network of dependency as a way of life. Unemployment compensation, for example, is necessary for an amount of time. But when you start getting into 90-plus weeks of unemployment, hasn’t a temporary stopgap now become an excuse for people to avoid taking jobs? A number of economic studies have shown that the longer these benefits are extended, the higher the unemployment rate is. People make a rational calculation that it’s easier to stay on the couch than to get a job that maybe isn’t as great as what they had before.

TFT: Isn’t it a big leap to go from someone on unemployment to a wholesale expansion of dependency?
CS: If we have hungry children, of course we as a compassionate society have an obligation to take care of them. But I think we’re going through a massive concerted effort to expand the number of people who are dependent, who are looking to the government to buy them free breakfast, lunch and dinner, far beyond any reasonable definition of genuine need.

TFT: Is this new learned helplessness, as you describe it, a replacement for the employed-for-life, taken-care-of-for-life notion that many in earlier generations have known?
CS: Maybe. But ultimately the use of other people’s money and the vast expansion of benefits won’t substitute for what used to be provided for by the private sector. You can certainly understand the attraction of the bailouts, the freebies, the handouts, the dependency – for people who are nervous about the economy. But some politicians play upon this anxiety by promising things that are ultimately unaffordable and unsustainable. This endless promise that there’s always enough money in someone else’s pocket won’t work. It’s very seductive in some ways, but it’s not a solution to our economic problems, and it’s changing the culture and character of our society. It’s not the self-reliance and sense of independence and industry that our nation was founded on.

TFT: You worry about the children and the young people coming up.
CS: Yes, I do. Other people take a slightly more optimistic view. They say the reality is that most Americans still have the belief of working hard and being rewarded for it, that we still have a middle class that wants to do the right thing, and that these folks don’t become somebody different even if we are in economically tough times. That’s true. But I also see a new class of dependency. How many generations does it take before the younger people look around and say, “Of course somebody else is going to pay for me. Of course there’s a bailout. If I screw up or don’t save any money, it doesn’t matter.” I say we’re living on borrowed time. We’ve drawn down the balance of our bedrock values. Once the stigma of being dependent is eliminated, more and more people want to be that way.

: As the economy improves, do you foresee a swing back to bedrock values?
CS: If you change the incentives, you change the culture and the character. The expectation of getting handouts began before this recession. And a lot of the policies we’ve put into place are intended to be in place long after. So we have to ask, At what point does this country stop running trillion-dollar deficits? When are we going to understand that now’s a good time to become fiscally responsible? We have lived off our children and grandchildren long enough. It’s time to turn things around. But like other binges, the debt binge is difficult to stop.

TFT: Do you hope that in this presidential election year some pragmatic solutions take hold and move forward?
CS: I’m somewhat frustrated by some of the dialogue right now. I know that the president would like to make this society fairer between the rich and the poor – the 1 percent and the 99 percent. But rather than a discussion of class warfare, I hope we make this a debate about the makers vs. the takers. We won’t get ourselves out of our economic problems by increasing spending and debt, and increasing the number of people who are dependent on others. And no matter how responsible our young people are – and I have two kids in college right now – my generation is leaving our young people with an economy of crushing debt. They’re going to inherit a completely different country than what we inherited. We’ve spent it all. That’s tremendously worrisome.

TFT: Your commentary in a chapter entitled “Step Away from the Trough” attempts to change this. How?
CS: We can say no to the things we want but can’t afford. We can’t have everything. But I don’t know that we have the political will to do that right now. Europe is the distant mirror for us. That’s not a talking point – that’s reality. We have to change the dynamic in which everybody is at the trough. People won’t step away from it until everybody else steps away, everyone else from Goldman Sachs, to farmers, to Hollywood celebrities. It needs to be a culture-wide understanding that this is just not sustainable. But if the notion of inter-generational transfer of wealth takes hold, then we might have a more serious willingness to make that distinction between needs and wants.

TFT: Who among the current presidential candidates would accomplish that, in your view?
CS: Unfortunately the person I’m politically closest to is not running. That’s Paul Ryan. He’s just about he only political figure who has tried to grapple with this and say, How would we slow this entitlement world – slow the growth of spending? And if it proves to be the third rail of politics in this election season, then I think we will have squandered one of the best opportunities we’ve had in a generation.

Eric Clapton – The Solo Years…now available from Fretlight!

PC ONLY! Mac Coming Feb. 2012. This is a Fretlight Ready™ video. As you watch the video in the Fretlight Studio software the Fretlight lights-up exactly what the instructor is playing. A Step-by-Step Breakdown of Guitar Styles and Techniques.

Publisher: Hal Leonard
Format: Fretlight Video file (.fvp for play in Fretlight Studio software)
Author: Doug Boduch
Artist: Eric Clapton Run Time: 1:13:00

Riffs and solos from 8 classic Clapton songs, including:
After Midnight
Cocaine
Forever Man
Lay Down Sally
Motherless Children
Pretending
Running on Faith
Wonderful Tonight

Video bonus: Guitar techniques section, jam-along songs, and practice tips.

http://www.store.fretlight.com/product.php?id_product=761

Keith Wyatt Rocking out on a Fretlight!

Fretlight is changing the way musicians learn how to play the guitar. With the planet’s best “learn to play guitar” system, the notes and chords are right where you need it most – at your fingertips. This is the fun way to learn to play the guitar fast.

Keith Wyatt Rocking Out On A Fretlight! – YouTube

Keith Wyatt is a Los Angeles-based guitarist, educator performer, teacher, writer, and developer of music curriculum and educational media. Since 1996, Wyatt has toured and recorded with renowned LA-based “American Music” group The Blasters and is featured on 4-11-44 (Rainman Records). He has also worked with a variety of other groups and artists including Albert Collins, Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce and Robben Ford in Los Angeles and internationally as a solo performer.

Hal Leonard Fretlight Partnership Brings Guitar Videos to Light

Reno, NV & Milwaukee, WI (November 29, 2011) — Optek Music Systems Inc. (www.fretlight.com), makers of the Fretlight® Guitar, today announced they have partnered with Hal Leonard Corporation (www.halleonard.com), the world’s largest music print publisher, to make Hal Leonard’s vast catalog of instructional and play-along guitar videos Fretlight Ready. For the first time, Hal Leonard’s instructional guitar videos will simultaneously light the fretboard of a Fretlight Guitar in real-time, enabling players to concentrate on the neck of the guitar and see the exact fingering positions played by the professionals featured in the videos.

By giving guitarists the information they need where they need it, the patented interactive learning system on the Fretlight guitars allows a player to learn guitar faster and with better retention. Now, for the first time, top-notch instructional content from Hal Leonard’s bestselling DVD’s have been modified as Fretlight Ready videos to light a Fretlight Guitar. The videos enable players to see the exact fingering positions for playing signature songs by artists ranging from Albert Collins to ZZ Top.

“Fretlight Guitars offer a unique and effective instructional path for people to learn guitar,” said Brad Smith, Senior Sales and Marketing Manager for Hal Leonard. “Our unparalleled video content coupled with their innovative system will enable players to advance their skills faster than ever before, and to have fun while they are doing it.”

The following Fretlight Ready videos are available immediately and Optek plans to roll out additional titles on an ongoing basis.

  • Eric Clapton – The Solo Years
  • Classic Rock Guitar Play-Along Vol. 1 – Kansas, Ted Nugent, Cheap Trick, ZZ Top, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Free, Mountain, Rick Derringer
  • Bob Seger – Guitar Play Along – Vol. 18
  • Lennon & McCartney Guitar Play-Along Vol. 12
  • Blues Classics Guitar Play-Along Vol. 23 – John Lee Hooker, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Elmore James, Albert Collins, Bobby Bland, BB King, Eric Clapton

“The Hal Leonard video library represents the most complete catalog of video instruction in the world. Enabling our customers to enjoy this great content while seeing it light up on their Fretlight guitar is a dream come true,” said Rusty Shaffer, CEO of Optek Music Systems. “We look forward to expanding the title selection over the coming months to accommodate guitarists of all levels and styles.”

In addition to Hal Leonard instructional videos, Fretlight guitars come complete with Fretlight Studio software. Free with every guitar, Fretlight Studio allows a player to slow down the tempo, loop specific parts, and improvise with virtually any scale over custom progressions. With the addition of the industry-leading tablature editing software, Guitar Pro 6 Fretlight Ready, a Fretlight Guitar user can download tabs via the internet and watch them instantly come to life right under their fingers.

Fretlight Ready videos featuring Hal Leonard instructional content are available immediately at the suggested retail price of between $18.99 and $23.99. For more information or to place an order, visit http://www.store.fretlight.com.