Search - Accelerate Your Guitar Playing DVD on DVD

Great teacher/player shares useful exercises for guitarists

Eddie | 09/21/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Tomo Fujita is not only an excellent player, but also a superb teacher (Berklee).

The DVD starts off with Tomo playing for approximately 3 and a half minutes, and then introducing himself and the DVD, as well as his gear. He then proceeds to show how to use a metronome in terms of emphasizing the 2 and 4 beats, like a snare drum, and briefly explains some basics on holding the guitar, picking, etc.

At around 6 minutes, we begin with exercise 1.



The DVD is divided into 4 sections, and demonstrations by professor Fujita.

The 4 exercise sections are also included in an accompanying booklet (around 80 pages).

Section 1: Fingering and picking exercises.

Section 2: Understanding the fretboard intervals and ear training.

Section 3: Rhythm, muting, and sight reading.

Section 4: Blues changes and one chord grooves.



The exercises should give the student an idea of what to practice (i.e., maintaining the fretting fingers close to the fingerboard, reducing the distance the pick travels, using dynamics, etc.). They are useful to illustrate what to do and how to do it. The DVD provides a clear view of both the right and left hands. With this information, the student can (and should) expand on these exercises. For example, by doing them in different strings or by doing them all across the fretboard. The accompanying booklet also provides many tips on how to practice, as well as the purpose of the exercise and ways to practice the exercise.

Section 1 ends before 11 minutes, but it has sufficient material to keep you practicing for weeks!



This brings my "preliminary" review to an end. While I have watched the whole DVD, I'm still in the first section of exercises. I've been playing for 19 years and have greatly benefited from this DVD. I wish I had something like this when I was starting out.

I am familiar with most of the material included, or variations of it. I'm focusing more on the first section, and probably will go quicker through section 3 for example, since I have done many of those sight reading exercises in the past.

Tomo puts everything in a well organized, easy to use package, and each student can focus more or less of their time and effort in the specific areas they need to improve upon.



Maybe I'll update the review later on, but for now I wanted to HIGHLY recommend this DVD, given that there are no other reviews yet. I've purchased DVDs that I've sold after watching them once. This one is definitely a keeper, destined to be watched again and again.



Thank you Tomo!"

For intermediate/advanced players

Bel | New York, NY United States | 03/25/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This DVD is jam-packed with useful exercises and demonstrations of how to practice to improve your technique, ear, and rhythm playing. Fujita is an excellent player and he shows just how much great music one guitarist alone can make through his demonstrations of different styles.



The DVD booklet has transcriptions of just about everything Fujita plays, but even with the transcriptions it will take most people a lot of repeated viewing and listening to get the subtleties of his playing in the different style demonstrations.



If you are looking for hand-holding, this DVD is not for you. For the more advanced player that is willing to put in the work of listening and thinking for himself, this DVD is a great value."

Really good

Roberto Galvez | Lima,Peru | 02/08/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a really good DVD. To the former poster : try to follow the exercises as slow as possible..you will see the benefits soon!! maybe you wanted some theory..there are other DVD's out there .This will give good technique in short time.

Give a chance to this DVD,try to learn from it and don't have a negative reaction without digging into it...all your questions about the chords is in the accompanying book.

And the most important thing: enjoy it!"

Changed the way i play guitar

Joshua Montez | palmdale, ca United States | 12/29/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"this is excellent. tomo is really passionate about music, you can tell if you've seen him in action before. he taught john mayer before he became "john mayer". if you feel your playing is too sloppy, slow, or just want to learn some cool funk/r&b/blues style playing, then this is the dvd for you. ex 3 and 19 were the most beneficial to me. he teaches you simple enough stuff to improve your playing you wish you came across earlier when you picked up the guitar. he is also has "more accelerate your guitar playing" which i will be picking up soon. check him out on youtube if you haven't and/or buy his cd "right place right time". it'll funk you up, good son."