Donovan Jennings 
A lot of guitar students spend time learning how to play individual chords and learn the chords of songs, but they often fail to understand why the songwriters chose the chords they did. As a music teacher and guitar player for many years, I’ve seen this lack of knowledge prove limiting to many of my … Read more
Electric Harmonix is very much in-tune with the people who buy their products. They always have been, and the existence of the Nano POG and Micro POG octave pedals are nothing if not evidence of this. The community, myself included, cried out for a smaller POG and they delivered the Micro POG. That wasn’t small … Read more
If I did a survey from all my students over the past 10+ years (literally thousands at this point), the majority would say learning the guitar is top on their list of musical desires. The guitar is one of the most idolized and loved instruments of the past 100 years. People love it! But for … Read more
Learning the guitar is easily the most sought after skill by the average person. Over 10 years of teaching, I’ve asked students from as young as 4 to as old as 70 what instrument they’d love to learn someday. Most of the time, the answer is the guitar. But private lessons get expensive, so many … Read more
After over 15 years of teaching hundreds of students how to play guitar and also playing guitar as a hobby, I’ve learned a lot about what makes a guitar pedal great. Multi-effect pedals are my go-to tool for playing around with sound, and Boss has always made great ones. You don’t want to spend hundreds … Read more
When students approach me for lessons, they’ve often tried guitar at some point. Usually, they try to learn it on their own which results in frustration. They ask me for lessons on guitar, but at some point early on, they ask me some variation of this question: Guitar is too hard. Should I try to … Read more
As a guitar teacher, I always get asked questions about songwriting and the general idea of “putting it all together” by guitar players. Many guitars players’ ultimate goal is to be able to freely play and move around the guitar in whatever key they want. Part of achieving this goal is understanding all the different … Read more
Jazz can be a really daunting area for guitar players to move into. It seems on the surface like a vastly complex network of crazy chord changes and mind-bending, but believe it or not, you can start from an easier place. As a guitar teacher, I have helped many students get into jazz playing from … Read more
It doesn’t matter what genre of music you choose to follow, everything, at some point ties back into the blues. As a guitar teacher, I have shown this to many students over the years. It has always helped them trace the musical history and influence of their favorite performers. It doesn’t matter if you like … Read more
Once you get to grips with the basics of how chord progressions work and how you can start to build them in any key, you can start having some real fun. As a professional guitar teacher, I’ve always encouraged my students to learn how theory and various guitar concepts work from a practical standpoint. In … Read more