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Eric Haugen is an accomplished guitarist and experienced teacher who emphasizes composition, subtlety, and tone, and his detailed transcriptions showcase not only classic guitar heroes but also those often overlooked. Currently Eric sits in with Blue Cactus and Birds and Arrows. He writes songs and plays regularly with guitar-pop buddies The Outboards as well as acoustic folk collaborative Nantahala. He also hosts a YouTube channel with over 51,000 followers. Eric knows th... (more) Eric currently offers 83 guitar lessons at JamPlay, with 83 intermediate lessons.
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This course is for beginner to intermediate guitarists who may have encountered potholes in their roads of study. The aim is to discuss and devise exercises to help fix problems with basic theory, ear training, physical mechanics, and musical philosophy.
Eric Haugen discusses the goals of his "Six String Problem Solver" lesson series and what kind of material it covers.
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0.0 Difficulty
Learn to check your guitar's physical condition and solve simple problems.
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Learn 11 chords that will be useful for playing most folk, rock, or pop songs.
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1.5 Difficulty
Learn how to develop exercises that will make your practice musical and relaxing.
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2.0 Difficulty
Work on playing along with a track at your own pace and skill level.
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1.0 Difficulty
Learn how to work with a guitar's electronics and an overdrive pedal to get the sound you want.
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Learn how moving your foot and body can help you to feel the rhythm when you play.
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Learn how to use down and up beats with your strumming motion to help you play rhythm more smoothly.
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Learn and practice a common strumming pattern that you can use in a broad range of styles.
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Learn how to interpret a basic chart like one you would download from the internet using your ear and some basic music theory.
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Do Not Fear Improvisation: There is No Treasure to be Found! In this lesson Eric shows how he generates improv ideas and gives some tips on habits to avoid as well.
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If you don't have a metronome, you can train yourself not to rush your exercises by slowing them down each time you play.
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Eric shows some examples of keeping your practice musical so that it is more engaging and relevant to playing songs.
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Eric walks you through a simple process for developing a strumming pattern around a song you are learning.
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0.5 Difficulty
Sometimes it helps to have something you are working toward in your playing to provide incentive. In this lesson, Eric discusses some activities you might be interested in to take your playing further.
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It's okay to use stock blues licks! In this lesson Eric shows how some simple blues licks can be used as a starting point to generate lots of improvisation ideas.
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Eric shows you how to loosen up and flex your wrist when you play, and gives you an exercise to help you practice this form.
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Eric shows you good picking depth technique, talks about why it matters, and gives you an exercise to practice picking at a good depth.
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Eric gives you a musical exercise to practice your alternate picking technique.
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Eric shows you good thumb placement for your fretting hand and then gives you an exercise to practice supporting with your thumb.
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Eric shows you an exercise that is great for working with the often-ignored pinky finger.
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Eric talks about beginning finger picking techniques and gives you an exersize to help you practice some Travis style finger picking.
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Eric discusses how good dynamic control comes from proper picking hand technique and shows you an exercise to practice your playing dynamics.
Eric shows you some chords where the low E can be problematic, and gives you an exercise to help work on avoiding the E when you need to.
6:44 Runtime
Eric goes over the four basic barre chords and shows you an exercise to practice them.
Eric discusses what it means when you see a "slash chord" in a chart or chord sheet and how to find and play these special, transitional styles of chords.
Eric talks about what the 12 bar blues is and why it is so fundamental to modern music and important in a jam setting.
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Walks you through listening to a song and finding the key, or tonal center, of the song with your ears and your low E string.
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Eric talks about some of the most common chord changes and cadences and shows you an example of finding those changes in a song so you can play along.
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Eric talks about how major, minor, and 7th Chords relate to each other and how to listen for them in a song.
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Eric talks about how the three parent scales are related, why they are important, and how to recognize when each should be used.
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Eric discusses some common time signatures, what they mean with regards to music theory, and what they feel like to hear and play.
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Eric Haugen’s Guitar Zen provides an ideal framework to bridge practice and play. The CAGED system clearly maps chord shapes and chord tones, all over the fretboard, to intuitively guide your rhythm playing, fills, and improvised solos, in any key. For each of the seven sections in the course, you’ll explore new CAGED approaches over a series of play-along backing tracks. Eric starts you off with applications that focus on a particular CAGED shape, and then gradually advances to being able to play over simple 2 and 3-chord progressions, explaining and demonstrating the key concepts and approaches along the way.
Hey, I’m Eric Haugen. Welcome to this CAGED edition of Guitar Zen!<BR></BR>Practicing and playing are two distinct states of mind. When we practice, we’re patient, repetitive and intentional, so that when we play, our creativity can flow freely, mindfully, and tastefully. The key is finding the bridge between those two states.<BR></BR>The CAGED system is the ideal framework for guitarists in particular. Whether you're playing rhythm or improvising solos and fills, CAGED maps chord shapes and chord tones all over the fretboard, in any key.<BR></BR>In this edition, we’ll explore the 5 CAGED shapes, in both major and minor tonalities, along with the Pentatonic scales that correlate to them. We’ll start In open position, and work our way up the entire fretboard. I’ll demonstrate how to practice them effectively. I’ll also show you how to play with them creatively and tastefully.<BR></BR>For each of the seven sections in the course, we’ll explore new CAGED approaches over a series of play-along backing tracks. We’ll start with applications that focus on a particular CAGED shape, and then gradually advance to playing over simple 2 and 3 chord progressions. You’ll also have all of TrueFire’s learning tools at every step of the way, so you can learn at your own pace.<BR></BR>I’ll share a variety of patterns to use with the CAGED shapes to craft rhythmic grooves, on the fly, in any key, up and down the neck. I’ll also show you how to easily find and play a variety of double-stops inside the pentatonic CAGED framework.<BR></BR>You’ll notice my intention here is for everything to be very airy and loose - not difficult to play, so you can rewire your brain to bring musical ideas to life on the fretboard rather than chasing your fingers around hot licks or scales.<BR></BR>Are you ready to get started? Pick up your guitar, take a breath, and let’s begin.
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We sometimes mistakenly associate the open postion with "beginner" playing. However, if we really want to know the fretboard, we should make sure that anything we do up high we can do down low.
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How to see the connection between the C major chord and the C major pentatonic in the open position. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the A minor chord and the A minor pentatonic in the open position. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the G major chord and the G major pentatonic in the open position. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the E minor chord and the E minor pentatonic in the open position. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the D minor chord and the D minor pentatonic in the open position. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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A short etude that combines C, Am, and G with thier respective pentatonic scales in a minimal & soundscapey way. This is to show you how we might use this idea in a song.
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Now lets break it all down in detail.
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Welcome to CAGED going up the fretboard! Every chord has 5 options. That's really all there is to it. Every triad, arpeggio, inversion, lick, run, etc. is somehow connected to one of these. Here they are in C major.
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How to see the connection between the C major chord and the C major pentatonic out of the "A" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the C major chord and the C major pentatonic out of the "G" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
How to see the connection between the C major chord and the C major pentatonic out of the "E" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the C major chord and the C major pentatonic out of the "D" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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Welcome to CAGED going up the fretboard! Every chord has 5 options. That's really all there is to it. Every triad, arpeggio, inversion, lick, run, etc. is somehow connected to one of these. Here they are in C minor.
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How to see the connection between the C minor chord and the C minor pentatonic in the open position. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the C minor chord and the C minor pentatonic out of the "A" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the C minor chord and the C minor pentatonic out of the "G" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the C minor chord and the C minor pentatonic out of the "E" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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How to see the connection between the C minor chord and the C minor pentatonic out of the "D" shape. Also, how to GROOVE on this connection so that it becomes internalized.
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A short etude that combines several of the C minor pentatonic structures in a minimal & soundscapey way. This is to show you how we might use this idea in a song.
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Once we understand the CAGED shapes and their respective pentatonics, the next step is moving them off of the strutures I've presented and onto any other chord you may ever encounter in your life.
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How to move the open position C chord up two frets, thereby creating a "C shaped D chord."
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How to move the open position C minor chord up two frets, thereby creating a "C shaped D minor chord."
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A short etude that combines several of the A minor pentatonic structures in a minimal & soundscapey way. This is to show you how we might use this idea in a song.
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In real life, chords change. That's where CAGED becomes very useful. And yes, tricky! To test our ability to recall the structures we play over simple 2 chord changes.
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A short etude that goes between Bm and G in a minimal & soundscapey way. By using CAGED shapes and thier respective pentatonics, we are able to float across the fretboard.
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A short etude that goes between E and C in a minimal & soundscapey way. By using CAGED shapes and thier respective pentatonics, we are able to float across the fretboard.
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Any time we play 2 notes together we are playing some kind of doublestop. Pentatonics are very unique in their ability to generate so many simple, thouroughly musical combinations.
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From the perspective of the Am barre chord at the 5th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our minor pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved by laying our fingers flat.
From the perspective of the Am barre chord at the 5th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our minor pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat. Now SLIDE those pairs around.
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From the perspective of the Am barre chord at the 5th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our minor pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat. Then, raise the lower tone of the pair while keeping the upper tone static.
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From the perspective of the Am barre chord at the 5th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our minor pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat. Then, hammeron the lower tone of the pair while keeping the upper tone static. THIS IS THE "HENDRIX" DOUBLESTOP.
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From the perspective of the Am barre chord at the 5th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), we look at the possibilites of combining single-note pentatonic melodies with doublestops.
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From the perspective of the C barre chord at the 8th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our major pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat.
3:32 Runtime
From the perspective of the C barre chord at the 8th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our major pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat. Now SLIDE those pairs around.
2:35 Runtime
From the perspective of the C barre chord at the 8th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our major pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat. Then, raise the lower tone of the pair while keeping the upper tone static.
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From the perspective of the C barre chord at the 8th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), take our major pentatonic scale and begin pairing notes that are easily achieved my laying our fingers flat. Then, hammeron the lower tone of the pair while keeping the upper tone static. THIS IS THE "HENDRIX" DOUBLESTOP.
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From the perspective of the C barre chord at the 8th fret (the CAGED "E" shape), we look at the possibilites of combining single-note pentatonic melodies with doublestops.
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A short etude that goes across a simple 4 bar progression in a minimal & soundscapey way. By using CAGED shapes, thier respective pentatonics & doublestops we are able to float across the fretboard.
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A walkthrough what sound tools I'm using for this series and why I chose to use them.
Play slow and elegant. Breathe. Take it easy, my duders! That's the main thing - the more we can relax and give ourselves the time and space we need to play clean, the better we play, the better we feel!
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