Beginning Guitar Curriculum
The guitar curriculum contained in my book, Beginning Guitar for the Classroom, A Comprehensive Approach, focuses on three distinct areas of study: popular-style, classical, and guitar ensemble. All three of these areas are integrated into every lesson, each reinforcing the same objective of that lesson. Below, you can download a pdf of the entire beginning book or, utilize the eBook format, which includes audio recordings of all the exercises, songs and repertoire (and a few tutorial videos). All gratis.
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Thank you for your holistic approach to guitar music education. [Your materials] are such a powerful tool in my classroom. My students are reading better than they've ever read, playing better than they've ever played, and enjoying music they never imagined they'd enjoy. Your love for guitar and music education are so evident in the pages you've written. Thank you so much for sharing it with us. – Kelsey Snyder, Maricopa High School
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I used your online book and curriculum last year with a first year guitar course and I cannot express how effective this system is. Even after one year, I was being asked to add another section of guitar after the word got around! – James Mock, Ed.S., Richmond Hill Middle School
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Let me thank you for creating this amazing curriculum for guitar classrooms. It is very rare you find a guitar book that is designed for group lessons. I have been using your book for three years and it still amazes me how well-written this method is. Because of this book, the number of students interested in playing the guitar and music, in general, has increased greatly! – Akzhol Issin, QSI International School of Astana,
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I just discovered your beginning guitar materials, but from what I can see so far, your approach is fantastic. It's sequenced perfectly and I'm really grateful for the way that you provide a musically meaningful context for the beginning player. Your website is just a wealth of materials and it's organized so easily. I'm excited to explore some more. Grateful. – Jill Reese, PhD, Associate Professor of Music Education, The State University of New York
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Beginning Guitar for the Classroom
eBook Format
Below is the Beginning Book in an interactive eBook format, with audio and video recordings of the material.
This format is highly recommended for teachers to use in the classroom as well as for students to use while practicing.
This format is highly recommended for teachers to use in the classroom as well as for students to use while practicing.
1st Semester
Lesson 1
Pace of the Book
I've been asked by other guitar educators how to pace the book. First, since the book is divided into two semesters, the long-term goal is to complete each half of the book by the end of the fall or spring semester, respectively. Within each half, the pace really depends on a few factors. How often does your class meet per week? How long is each class session? Are the students able to practice at home? In my school, each class session is 1.5 hours long and will rotate between meeting twice or three times a week a week. I do expect my students to practice at home, particularly on days class doesn't meet. In that context, I am able to comfortably get through the book at a relaxed pace. To give perspective on my pace, in each lesson below, I've indicated where I generally am in the school year:
I've been asked by other guitar educators how to pace the book. First, since the book is divided into two semesters, the long-term goal is to complete each half of the book by the end of the fall or spring semester, respectively. Within each half, the pace really depends on a few factors. How often does your class meet per week? How long is each class session? Are the students able to practice at home? In my school, each class session is 1.5 hours long and will rotate between meeting twice or three times a week a week. I do expect my students to practice at home, particularly on days class doesn't meet. In that context, I am able to comfortably get through the book at a relaxed pace. To give perspective on my pace, in each lesson below, I've indicated where I generally am in the school year:
WEEK 1
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Part 1 – Overview of the Guitar
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Part 2 – Lesson 4 Walk –Through
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Lesson 2
The students should first become proficient in transitioning between the E and A chords before playing the following strumming patterns. I suggest that they at first learn Hollywood Nights on page 8.
Songs
I introduce Hollywood Nights by the third class session to help prepare them to transition between the E and A chords in the strumming patterns on page 7. I wait until the fourth class session to introduce Chasing Cars and No Rain. All three songs are reviewed in each class while in this lesson and I make it a point to come back to Chasing Cars (one of the student's favorites) even in subsequent lessons. Note that while I introduce Chasing Cars in the fourth class session, I will postpone the 8th-note strumming pattern in the final chorus until the fifth or perhaps even the sixth class session, when students will have had more practice strumming eighth notes to a bit. Barton Hollow, on the bottom of page 7, is a very perfect, one-chord song, that allows students to practice eighth-note strumming without being distracted by chord changes.
Lesson 3
The G & C Chords, Reading Music
This lesson introduces the G and C chords. Below is an exercise and three songs to help facilitate proficiency in these two chords.
Reading Music
This lesson also introduces the student to reading standard music notation, which will prepare them to play classical guitar and ensemble music in the spring semester as well in subsequent years in the guitar program, which is heavily dependent on students having solid music-reading skills. Students will begin by learning the natural notes in first position, one string at a time, and always in the context of learning duet melodies. In this lesson, students will learn the E, F & G notes on the first string. When playing the duet melodies, it is important that students use a rest stroke and alternate between the index and middle fingers.
While the duets in this and subsequent lessons in the first-semester portion of this book are an effective and engaging way to learn to read music, they are not reliable when assessing music-reading ability. Keep in mind that the goal of learning these duet melodies is not necessarily to have students accurately play these melodies, but to read them. Since these duets are learned and reviewed during class, If there is no way to determine if the student actually learned it by reading it. Because of the repetition of the review and the reinforcement of hearing other students playing the melody, some students could easily have learned the melody by ear or even by placing tablature indicators in their music. Therefore, to accurately asses true music-reading ability, and to give incentive for student to actually learn to read the music, in each lesson through lesson 9, I give my students a sight-reading test.
On the bottom of page 13 below, there are some sight-reading examples that will closely resemble test examples. All the examples are four measures long and incorporate the rhythms discussed in Lesson 2 and 3, including quarter note and eighth note rhythms.
If you are interested in getting a copy of the actual test(s), send me an email and I will be happy to forward you a pdf of that test. (We don't want to post the actual test here...) 😏
Duets
Below are two recordings of each duet. One is the melody and metronome only, the other is melody with accompaniment. In order to grasp a better understanding of rhythm, I suggest that the student first learn to play these melodies in the context of a beat only. At this early stage of music-reading development, the accompaniment can sometimes be a distraction from the student truly understanding the rhythmic component of the melody, which could create a significant deficit in the student's music-reading skill.
Duet No. 1
Duet No. 2
Duet No. 3
Duet No. 4
Sight Reading Practice
lesson 4
Melodies With Notes on the 1st & 2nd String
In this lesson, students will learn the notes in first position on the 2nd string. The first three duets use notes only on the 2nd string so that they begin feeling comfortable with these notes before playing melodies that combine notes on both the 1st and 2nd strings. Students are also introduced to pickup measures and the 3/4 time signature.
Dust in the Wind
2nd String Player
The Beast Ring
Melodies With Notes on the 1st & 2nd String
Note: In some of the duets, such as BE BE String and Dance de las Hachas, the accompaniment track will not have a metronome. In such tracks, the beat should be clear in the accompaniment.
BE BE String
Dance de la Hachas
Pavana III
Andantino in C
Study
Sight-Reading Examples
Again, if you are interested in assessing your student's music reading skill and would like a copy of my sight-reading tests for this and/or other lessons, send me an email, and I will be happy to send it/them to you.
Lesson 5
Lesson 6
Again, page 33 below has a note review as well as 4-measure sight-reading examples that closely resemble the examples in the actual sight-reading test for this lesson. If you would like a copy of the actual test, send me an email.
The two duets below are no longer contained in the book, but I kept it here in the eBook, just in case you find it useful.
Duet 1
Duet 2
Lesson 10
WEEK 15 (1 week prior to finals)
Adding Notes to Chords
The Allegro duet below, which introduces 16th notes, was in older editions of the book. The current edition of the book does not contain this duet any longer. (16th notes are now introduced in Lesson 12.) I've kept this duet in the eBook just in case it might be useful to you.
2nd Semester
Lesson 11
Lesson 12
Lesson 13
Rock
Add9 Chords
Stairway to Heaven
Stairway to Heaven will be the final for the rock portion of the class. Each lesson will tackle one section of the song as it correlates with the objectives of that lesson as well as the technical abilities of the student at that point in their skill development. For instance, we cannot begin learning the intro of Stairway yet since students have not learned bar chords, nor do they have sufficient finger style skill yet. At this point in the curriculum, students have learned the sus2, sus4, and in this lesson, add9 chords, and they should be adequately proficient in their strumming technique. Therefore, they are prepared to begin learning rehearsal letter E of Stairway, the section just before the guitar solo.
Admittedly, this is a rhythmically-demanding section. There are time signature changes in every measure and there are a couple of spots that will be particularly challenging. It will take awhile for most students to get this section down, but we have time. I've intentionally left out rock and ensemble material in the next lesson so that time could be spent on this section of Stairway to Heaven.
To the guitar teacher, I've found that by breaking this section down into smaller segments, isolating those trouble spots, and going over these sections daily will be most effective in getting students proficient as quickly as possible. Also, to assist you in helping prepare your students, I've provided three recordings of this section. The first is with acoustic guitar and click track only, and is at a slightly slower tempo than the actual recording. The second is the same version as the first, but with the recording added, just so they can begin hearing and playing this song in the context of the band. The third is the actual recording of this section of the song at normal tempo.
Admittedly, this is a rhythmically-demanding section. There are time signature changes in every measure and there are a couple of spots that will be particularly challenging. It will take awhile for most students to get this section down, but we have time. I've intentionally left out rock and ensemble material in the next lesson so that time could be spent on this section of Stairway to Heaven.
To the guitar teacher, I've found that by breaking this section down into smaller segments, isolating those trouble spots, and going over these sections daily will be most effective in getting students proficient as quickly as possible. Also, to assist you in helping prepare your students, I've provided three recordings of this section. The first is with acoustic guitar and click track only, and is at a slightly slower tempo than the actual recording. The second is the same version as the first, but with the recording added, just so they can begin hearing and playing this song in the context of the band. The third is the actual recording of this section of the song at normal tempo.
Classical Guitar
p-i-m-a Pattern
Note: I use Prelude in A as the primary piece to learn in this lesson. Prelude in C is a good "extra credit" piece.
Guitar Ensemble
Finlandia - Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
arranged by Lou Warde
lesson 15
lesson 16
Rock
The A Formation Bar Chord
Stairway to Heaven
B
Before learning the B section of Stairway to Heaven below, I suggest first learning one of the classical pieces on pages 86 or 87.
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Classical Guitar
Two Notes Played Together, Pedal Notes
Again, it is not necessary to learn all four pieces below. One from each page is fine. If you are restrained for time and only have time for one, I suggest learning Andantino on page 87. It's short (only 8 measures of material), and technically, the easiest to play.
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lesson 17
lesson 18
Classical
Patterns Emphasizing the Ring Finger
Classical Guitar Final
Estudio and/or Prelude are the last classical guitar pieces to be learned in the beginning curriculum, and thus, I treat these pieces as the classical guitar final, as Stairway to Heaven is the rock final.
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Rock
Stairway to Heaven (A)
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lesson 19
Fingerstyle Patterns in Popular Music
Travis Picking
Below are a couple of songs utilizing the Travis picking pattern. (The pattern in Freight Train is a slight variation to that in Dust in the Wind.) Besides a recording of the songs at normal tempo, I've created a Travis picking exercise as well slower versions of the songs to help prepare students.
Dust in the Wind
Freight Train
Hallelujah
Guitar Ensemble
Yosemite – Lou Warde
lesson 20
Stairway to Heaven
Rock Final
Led Zeppelin's recording of Stairway to Heaven is over eight minutes long! In the context of testing students individually, it's not practical or necessary to have them perform the entire song. Since the length of the song is due largely to the multiple repeats of most sections, reducing the number of repeats will shorten the length of the song without altering its basic form. Note the places where the repeats have been reduced: i.e. "(Final: 4x only)"
Note that in the recording of the Final Version below, the repeats at letter F & G are not reduced, as it shows in the music. (I had a hard time justifying cutting short Jimmy's guitar solo.) So, with the solo at full length, it made structural sense to also keep G full length too. Therefore, if the student will be testing with the recording, they will play letter F (10X) and letter G (7X), as the full length recording. Like any song learned, it is essential that students learn to play along with the recording. Not only will this develop technical proficiency and fluency in the song, but also, it gives perspective and context to what they're playing. Remember, this song is accompaniment to a vocalist. If someone is playing an acoustic version of this song (which my students do, when testing – they do not play with recording), they are still obligated to play with the same feel as when playing with a full band.
Note that in the recording of the Final Version below, the repeats at letter F & G are not reduced, as it shows in the music. (I had a hard time justifying cutting short Jimmy's guitar solo.) So, with the solo at full length, it made structural sense to also keep G full length too. Therefore, if the student will be testing with the recording, they will play letter F (10X) and letter G (7X), as the full length recording. Like any song learned, it is essential that students learn to play along with the recording. Not only will this develop technical proficiency and fluency in the song, but also, it gives perspective and context to what they're playing. Remember, this song is accompaniment to a vocalist. If someone is playing an acoustic version of this song (which my students do, when testing – they do not play with recording), they are still obligated to play with the same feel as when playing with a full band.
Below are two recordings of Stairway to Heaven. One is the full length and the other is a reduced, class final version.
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Songs from the Beginning Book
(Note: The songs below are also found in the lessons in the eBook above.)
