Mel Bay Learn to Play Brazilian Jazz Guitar
Brazilian jazz is the combination of the energizing rhythms of Brazilian and North American jazz music. Playing this style requires special skills not normally taught to the guitar student. This comprehensive book is designed to provide the guitarist with all that is necessary to understand and play Brazilian jazz such as chord structures, chord progressions, rhythms, decomposition, memorization, arranging, improvisation, notation, chord symbols and accompaniment as well as an overview and history of this coloful music. Solos are provided that implement various concepts and skills learned. They include: Amor Docy (Sweet Love); Passaciaille (Theme and First Variation); Bossa Barocco (Bossa Baroque); Bossa Improviso (Impromptu Bossa); Minuet (from “The Notebook of A.M. Bach); Choro Classic (Classical Choro); Choro Menor (Minor Choro); De Vez em Quando (Once in a While); Marcha Populaire (Folk March); Melodo de Lua (Moody Melody); Samba Sonolento (Sleepy Samba); Samba Feliz (Happy Samba); Sonhador (Day Dreamer); Amor Descuidado (Careless Love); Play the Bossa Nova; and Samba de Amor (Samba of Love).
User Ratings and Reviews
4 Stars A Fine Primer for the Intermeditate Guitarist
If you have mastered the basics of nylon guitar fingerstyle playing, then this book will ease your musical journey into the world of Bossa Nova, Samba, Choro, and related South American styles. The book includes a very good chapter on how to read rhythm (probably the biggest challenge to newcomers of Brazilian style guitar), and chapters on chord construction and progressions. David Marshall’s writing style is informal and friendly. He covers some music theory — as it relates to the Brazilian guitar — in a comprehensible, non-intimidating manner. He includes numerous rhythmic examples written in standard notation and tab, along with a CD to help you learn those difficult patterns. The latter half of the book consists of fifteen solos written in standard notation only (no tab). The solos range from moderate-beginner to intermediate in difficulty.
For anyone interested in pursuing the Brazilian jazz style, “The Brazilian Guitar Book” by Nelson Faria is a good place to continue after working through the Marshall book. Faria’s instruction is more comprehensive, but geared more towards the advanced-intermediate guitar player.
I was very impressed with the well-structured layout of “Learn to Play Jazz Guitar”. Marshall obviously loves this type of guitar playing, and manages to convey his enthusiasm and expertise to the reader. Studying from this book is almost comparable to attending private lessons with a competent Brazilian guitarist. Highly recommended.
4 Stars Title should be “Learn to play Classical style Brazilian Jazz Guitar”.
This is follow up to Russell’s fine review.
I’m a jazz and classically trained guitarist who has been teaching for 12+ years. Every year our studio gets a fair number of students that list learning Brazilian guitar as one of the styles they are interested in. I finally broke down and bought this book a year ago hoping I could recommend it to those students (at the time there weren’t any helpful reviews on Amazon I could use to determine which method book would fill that need). While this book is very thorough, those who would benefit most from it would be intermediate classical guitarists looking to learn to play Brazillian style guitar.
One thing I would have liked to have seen less of is his arrangements which are mostly classical guitar pieces with Brazilian jazz style rhythms. Had he provided more traditional Brazilain pieces I would have given this book 5 stars.
Hopefully soon someone will come out with a good beginners Brazlian guitar book that features examples and songs that are authentically Brazillian.
