[Harp-L] Guitarist Howard Morgan RIP

[philharpn@xxxxxxx]

Some of you may know of famed fingerstyle jazz guitarist Howard Morgan if you live in the New York area where he taught and performed and recorded.


I know of him from studying his fantastic video course, Fingerboard Breakthrough, a CD-ROM tour de force that breaks down individual lessons into less than 10 minutes each. 


I was in the midst of watching Fingerboard Breakthrough online when I saw the message last night that he had died.   



FYI from HM home page: Howard has been a guest artist/teacher during Jazz Week at the National Guitar Summer Workshop in Connecticut (1995-1997) and was on the faculty of the Guitar Study Center of the New School in Manhattan and the Jazz Studies Program at C.W.Post Campus, Long Island University.
Among Howardâs students over recent years are singer-songwriter Paul Simon, Edie Brickel, Carly Simon, Christine Lavin. His bio is included in Maurice Summerfieldâs The Jazz Guitar, Its Players and Personalities Since 1900.







TrueFire.com

We are sad to announce that our good friend Howard Morgen has succumbed to a five year battle with Leukemia. Beloved husband of Estelle, Father to Donna and Gary (Susan), Grandfather to Adam, Mathew, Jackie, Jessica, and Daniel, and teacher to thousands. Revered innovator and educator. Author of enormously popular instructional books, videos, and online learning tools. And a wonderful friend. Rest in peace.




His course is the perfect example of using an instrument other than the harmonica to better understand the harmonica and how music works. Even if you don't plan to take up the guitar, the course offers enough insight into how chords and scale works (not to mention how the guitar fretboard works) to make it worthwhile. (Guitar tab and notation explains each lesson, but this is not a music-reading course; Howard shows you where the notes are on the fretboard and explains how the chords are built. 


While studying chords and scales in the abstract can be quite boring -- watching Howard play and explain the same thing on the guitar.


When it comes to understanding how chords and inversions work, They are easier to explain and understand on a chord instrument like the guitar or piano.



(TrueFire offers a huge selection of blues and jazz  courses and for those who would like a quick reference to how blues and jazz works, these courses are a great place to start. For harmonica players, in addition these courses offer a wide variety of backing tracks with the guitar player explaining what he is playing. Plus, once a harmonica starts to recognize some common chord shapes on the guitar, he can figure out what chord he is playing over. And there is the ear training, of learning what a 7 chord sounds like or a diminished chord or minor chord.)


(Dirt Road Blues by guitarist Paul Rrishell with harpist Annie Raines is another excellent course offered by TrueFire.)