Hi everyone,

I just finished editing the 10-string Classic tuning version of the Greg Howard Songbook.

Many deepest thanks to my posse of proofreaders, Claire, DBro, Luc, Glenn and Scott who laid eyes on these new versions of the charts. It's a lot of data points to check!

Should have hard copies at SE in a couple weeks, and the book will also be available from my site.

For more about this detailed repertoire and instruction book please see:

http://www.stick.com/instruction/books/greghowardsong/

PS, next step will be a companion CD for the book, and another new book I'm also working on for release later this year.

Congratulations!

Hey Greg! how about a thumb nail sketch about what your next book is going to cover? Is their going to be any cd/dvd action with it??
Already waiting!!

Hi Randy,

I can let you know more about it when it closer to completion. Thanks for asking!

As a person considering buying (and learning) a stick, somehow I was under the impression that the bulk of educational materials would be for classic tuning.
However if this material is only now coming out for classic tuning, is that assumption mistaken? Which tuning will the best array of training or arrangement material for getting started? Not that it would really affect my choice of initial tuning, but I just want to have a clue. If most stuff is out there for MR or something, it would be good to know.

Your impressions are correct. Emmett's book, and Bob's and Steve's materials are specifically written for the Classic tuning, and there is a version my The Stick Book, that is also specifically for Classic, and my DVD works equally well for Classic, Bari Melody and MR (with melody up two frets).

I wrote the songs in the Songbook on a Baritone Melody 10-string Stick (melody side a 4th lower than Classic), so the first version of the book was for that tuning, then I made a version for Matched Reciprocal with only a few octave changes for the melody. The Classic version required much more modification because the low melody range just wasn't there, so a few pieces had to be taken up an octave completely in the melody. I order for this to make sense, some of the parts hard to be re-fingered, so it took a lot longer to do.

Apart from the MR version of my Songbook, the only other instructional piece that is specifically written for the Matched Reciprocal is the MR version of The Stick Book.

It's not hard to translate materials that are written for Classic to MR, though, all you have to do is play the melody parts two frets higher.

What's your reason for choosing MR, if you don't mind my asking? Have you considered Baritone Melody? It's pretty rockin'...

Hah, ALL your stuff is rockin!

Actually I'm mostly thinking of classic tuning for now, which is why I wanted to double check, but MR is my second runner up (it appeals to the pianist in me with the symmetry). In my case I don't necessarily want to start with lower register tunings/strings, I'm looking for expressive mid and upper ranges too.

Not that I know *anything* about this instrument, because I don't. My goal is to try some more ... acoustic centered ... playing and leave the rockin' bass for a smaller percentage of the time I spend with the instrument.

As someone else pointed out to me, I'll probably go through four tunings in my first year or two just to find what I like.

End of the day, I have no idea what I should get, maybe I should just buy h3dg3hogs's 10 string with DMR tuning and start there, except for this notion of wanting to start with some higher registers and being too clueless to want to attempt a retuning of an instrument I've never played on day one.

Any more advice appreciated. This instrument and what people do with it is inspiring! I can't wait to try try it out. (At which point I'm sure animals will fall dead from nearby trees because of the horrible sounds I'll make).

- Dave

Thanks Dave,

Based on what you wrote I'd suggest MR or Emmett's new Raised Matched Reciprocal, which has the highest melody range and the bass side is up a whole step so the chords are more in the piano range as well.

http://www.stick.com/instruments/tunings/10/raised/

I have a 10-string in this tuning now to explore it and I really like the tuning...

Mate.!

I'll be ordering mine, real soon. Thanks so much.!