Over the course of the last couple of weeks, I've been working up a couple of new (new for me) tunes on guitar. One is Andy McKee's "For My Father" and the other the Don Ross arrangement of David Essig's "Berkely Springs". In both cases, I was able to find "official" charts of the tunes, pay the artist directly, and download a PDF. Off and running.

So this begs the question (and yes I know this comes up periodically but it's always worth repeating) ... where is the repertoire?

After Greg posted his "Quince Street" video, I opened up his songbook and started working out the tune and daydreamed about how cool it would be to have this opportunity with other Stick player's tunes.

So what do we have to do to get more original material available out there?

No one is tabbing/staffing this stuff Glenn. The pool is too small....that's my opinion anyway. Maybe in 50 years, but not now..
Hope I read your post in the proper context.


cheers,
k

ps
Andy Mckee is God..

You are reading in the proper context yes.

I guess I'm wondering how the ball starts rolling. Certainly there are some folks right here on this forum who've written original pieces and could probably chart them yes? Or maybe work with someone else to get them charted? These don't have to be earth shattering pieces. The skill level required to play them can range from beginner to seasoned veteran. There's room for everything right?

I guess once everyone finishes a new song and has it under his fingers just moves to next one... It takes a bit of time to write things down...
But it really would be cool

I agree. There are actually some things I've recorded that I've forgotten parts of (how embarrassing.) On the other hand, writing a part out in tab is even more complex than just writing it out. I'd imagine people get away from tab after a while ... I hope.

I thinks it's a lot of work to tab things....and once you have it under your fingers.....its a question of, ....well, screw it...I know it now, why bother to tab it?

Is there software that can track your notes and "tab" as you go...? Prolly, but I'm just not tech enough. I hear you cats talking about Sibilus (spelling..?) but don't know what it means..does this program automatically tab your tunes?

cheers,
kev

For sure. Although how many of us have taken that route and ended up completely forgetting something that slipped out of our rotation for a bit?


I've never tried tracking while I play. I think some other people can chime in on that one. I know that if your charting guitar with a program like Finale, you can either do standard notation or TAB and then use one to generate the other. It's quite handy but you have to be able to start with one to get the other. With the TAB part, you can customize the instrument (tuning, number of strings) so you could set it up to generate Stick automatically but it wouldn't be StaffTab unfortunately. That is still a very manual process.

Glenn,

This is a great subject. We need more music for Stick players. Emmett saw this early on, and included several charts in Free Hands. For my part I've published charts for 17 of my original pieces and several familiar classical and jazz pieces.

It doesn't have to be StaffTab. Just a lead sheet with chords ad melody is good enough. People like to work out their own arrangements anyway. But it can be a big help to spell out things like note placement and fingering.

The problem becomes one of tuning reference points. Having written three different versions each for the Stick Book and the Greg Howard Songbook, I can tell you that even tabs aren't adequate, as we have so many different reference points.

If you are willing to put in the time, however, you ca give people a really clear path to learning the piece.

Here are a couple of examples of videos posted by one of my students, Lorenzo Spicci, who worked from the Songbook:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONFciWQOHO8[/youtube]

on this one the whole solo was notated in the book, and Lorenzo really nails it.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNhqxKudrfc[/youtube]

So if you're willing to put in the time we can develop this much further.

For more about the Songbook see:
http://www.greghoward.com/free_hands/books/

Yeah ... that's definitely a tough thing to get around. It's easy for guitar as acoustic players are used to moving from one tuning to another so you just say "here is the tuning" and you expect everyone to simply tune to it. In my current list of solo guitar tunes I like to play, I go through a half dozen different tunings easy.

I think you can cover a lot of ground though if you use any of the more popular Stick tunings and assume that the reader can make the adjustment from ... say ... Classic to MR.

But I agree it doesn't have to be StaffTab or even a full grand staff notation. Just something to get people playing and even get them to take on something that's beyond their current ability.

I transcribe everything I play and study; I have a sort of system I use in Guitarpro6 as I don't really understand Stafftab too well at the moment; plus, it looks really cumbersome and time consuming to enter in, and I just want a score to help me remember an arrangement or an exercise. Lol quick and dirty, like a screwdriver to the face haha

I wonder how tough it would be to export from GP6 to Finale so that those who DO want a good Stafftab score could put one together from a GP6 file?