Dorfmeister and Ledfingers,

I was just following up on the older thread.

How much do you still use the Doug Doppler stuff in your practices?

How has it helped you?

What is the best thing you got from the DVD?



I would be interested in your now long-term impressions of the material. Any comments you have, would be informative. Positive and negative.

I would welcome input from anybody else who has used this DVD, also.

Thanks.

Well, I haven't dug into the DVD for quite some time because of unrelated distractions (health and work issues). Nothing against the DVD.

There is a 32 page lesson plan which is to be used with the DVD. It is hand-written in a few colors, and very concise. It could be general reference, but is intended as an outline for the DVD. The DVD has much more to it than the lesson plan outline. There are also backing tracks, etc.

Doppler covers all the basic theory you should know: notes; major/minor/pent scales and modes; chords; etc.

I met Doug at NAMM a few years ago. Great guy. We echanged e-mails before and after I got the DVD. For me, after playing 28 years, the DVD was a good structured review and pushed me to nail things down. I was self taught and I approached the guitar from C Major (no sharps of flats made it easy for me to confirm what I was teaching myself). Doug (probably properly) approaches the guitar as an instrument in G. The only relevance of that is I found it good for me to start fresh with this approach.

I still need to get back into it, and I seriously intend to.

I don't know if that helped.

Hey guys. I figured I say hi and jump in on the thread. First of all E-D - thanks for the interest, and Ledfingers, thanks for the props! E-D, the DVD was really intended to recreate much of the experience students had studying with me privately (I've retired from weekly lessons, but do one on one day-long itensives, workshops, and clinics - mostly for Ibanez). As noted by Led, one of the key goals was to map the neck Diatonically in a way that makes sense musically and theoretically. That means being able to link both scales and chord shapes up and down the neck in a common key. In turn being able to move this from one key to the next, understanding the underlying diatonic principles that support why you can play for example a Major chord over the 1, IV, and V Modes (Major, Lydian, and Mixo-Lydian). Virtually every Diatonic (of the same key) Chord Group on the DVD comes with an accompanying progression so you can put the chords and scales to good use. In turn the PDF outlines the approach for doing that. BTW, LED - there is a new Print Format Lesson Plan PDF - please eMail me so I can send it to you. This PDF spends 6 or so pages outlining how to practice the material, and in general how to practice efficiently regardless what it is. That said, the exercises and progressions give most electric guitar players all the guts and glue necessary to master the instrument. That means knowing the scales and chords up and down the neck, how and why they function together, and being able to move that relationship from key to key. The progressions are across a number of key styles and in the process of playing them you get some insight into how to use certain chords stylistically.

What I think the DVD doesn't do (not what I'd consider weankesses, but stuff that I didn't set out to accomplish with this one). There is not a lick by lick break down of what I'm playing as I demonstrate how to solo over each progression. There are not songs by your "favorite band" or "in the style of" progressions. The progressions used are intended to hit key styles, not to show you how to immitate, but instead how to apply what you've learned across a number of key styles.

Where does the DVD fall short IMO? In all honestly, I'm really happy with the end result. I wanted to give people "Doug in a box", and "Diatonic" really does that. There are a lot of players who lack a great single resource to turn to for learning how to play scales and chords diatonically, understand how the fit together, and be able to apply them in a musical framework. And on top of that there is a clear regimen of what and how to practice that stuff. In many ways I wanted to fill a big void that was out there. It's humbling to see the posts out there, and it's great to be a part of serving players and their desire to better themselves. It makes it fun, and it makes it worthwhile, so thanks!!!

Cheers,

Doug

Thanks Doug, I will email you for the pdf.

I hope all is going well. When is the next CD coming out?!!! Must . . . have . . . more!

Doug,

Thanks for posting! Welcome to the Forum.

Yeah, a lot of your DVD is similar to what I've always taught. So, it was great to finally have a reference to tell my students about. Hopefully, you're selling a lot of them!

Anyway, thanks for the DVD. I think it's definately a great resource for intermediate guitarists to use to get to the next step.