Pedal Points Part 3: Inner-Voice Fretted Pedals

Genius is a much over used term, but Steve Herberman is one of the few who is doubtless worthy of the epithet. His performances and educational materials have made me realize that he is the heir to the throne that George Van Eps left vacant when GVE moved up to heaven. For years I have attempted to plow, though quite futile was my journey till now, a musical furrow in the land of pedals. In other words I thought a pedal was only a sustained note in the bass. Well, I was wrong. Steve has proved to me that pedals provide a way to express a bouquet of contrapuntal ideas. As I began to listen to Steve perform the perfectly transcribed and fingered sounds on the video material I suddenly realized that Steve was revealing, particularly in the open voice triads section the sounds of everything from Ed Bickert's wonderful harmonic concept to Jim Hall's colors to Bach's resounding contrapuntal soundscapes to Joe Pass' flights on his Virtuoso series. Steve has let the cat out of the bag and gives away the store. We all can now be our own chamber music group with just six strings on one instrument. Steve has revealed a way to play that mankind previously thought was only able to be performed by a piano or multiple instruments. This material, while applicable to guitar, is also applicable to arranging, improvising and traditional composing. This class can serve as a lifetime of of ideas about how to make some very real, original honest and beautiful musical statements that others will be glad to listen to. This class will change your musical life. You will be limited only by your imagination when applying this material to everything from the harmonies and melodies of Bach, Bird, Berlin, Gershwin, Paul Simon, Porter, Beatles........