The GuitArchitect’s Guide To Modes: Harmonic Combinatorics

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If you are looking for new ways to explore  the fretboard, or new sounds to investigate – the books in The GuitArchitect’s Guide To…. series are for you!!

The GuitArchitect’s Guide to Modes: Harmonic Combinatorics 

(410 pages)

Print and PDF editions of this book are available on lulu.com and print editions can be found on Amazon (amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, or amazon.fr).

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In The GuitArchitect’s Guide to Modes: Harmonic Combinatorics, I’ve gone into the nuts and bolts of chord construction and analysis by taking a systematic approach to generating thousands of chord variations that can be utilized intuitively in any key. In addition to being a vast harmonic resource, I also show you ways to make melodic lines from this material allowing the book to double as a melodic resource as well.

 

Harmonic Combinatorics?

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As a general rule, I’m not a big fan of jargon, but in this case I think its applicable as it helps define what this book is, and what it isn’t.

This is not a traditional chord book. The purpose of this book is not to teach a number of stock voicings and typical chord progressions for the reader to default back to as there are dozens, if not hundreds, of books that already do that.

This book centers around a series of methodologies for developing unique harmonic and melodic voicings for compositional or improvisational use that can be adapted to any tonal system.

Harmonic Combinatorics refers to a process of identifying “countable discrete structures” harmonically. In this case, it means examining unique combinations of notes on all of the possible string combinations for the purposes of developing harmonic and melodic possibilities.

The book is divided into approximately 110 pages of instruction and 300 pages of reference.  It covers a lot of theory – but makes it accessible even to the novice and shows how to apply it.  It’s a modular text that can be read in either a linear or a non-linear way.

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There are a couple of posts that I’ve put up that excerpts and adapts material directly from this book.  To get a sample of the book’s style you can check out :

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CREATING CHORDS AND LINES FROM ANY SCALE – A HARMONIC COMBINATORICS / SPREAD VOICINGS LESSON

Slash and Burn – Creating More Complex Sounds With Slash Chords

RECYCLING CHORDS PART II: TRIAD TRANSFORMATION

RECYCLING CHORDS PART I OR WHERE’S THE ROOT?

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I’ve included jpegs of some of the pages from the Harmonic Combinatorics book below.  Since the jpegs were converted from the pdf of the book, there’s some pixelation in the jpegs that’s not present in the pdf,  but these will still give you an idea of what’s in the book.

(Click on any graphic to see it as a larger size.)

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Reviews/Feedback on the GuitArchitect’s Guide To books:

“I’m really enjoying it thanks. It has a lot of ideas which you’ve laid out very well. I can see it being a valuable resource that I’ll refer back to for some time yet.”

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“Scott, there is a ton of good info in these books so I’ll be taking my time to work through them. From what I have accomplished so far, and what I have seen by scanning through the books, you have done an excellent job of envisioning a unique approach to all of this.”

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“The material really seems to be thorough and comprehensive and more importantly written in a nice, plain way that’s easy to understand. Great work!”

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“That was a great read, thanks very much.  It was bit hard pushing on though as I wanted to start working through some of the ideas in the earlier chapters as I read which is a great sign….”

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“Your books really are a terrific accomplishment. I wish i knew a small fraction of what was contained there.”

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“If I could sum up the entire work so far in three words, I’d call it ‘musician’s brain food’.”

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“Awesome, thank you very much, it’s been such a great idea sparker so far,”

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“The books are great. I have them loaded up on my kindle so i can use them and practice.”

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“Yes, they’re great. I think you have a really interesting approach.”

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” I highly appriciate the depth of which you went in to your subjects and all of the tabs and patterns are just awesome.  It will give me a great platform whenever i feel like writing some real music.”

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“Scott, thanks for that, I grabbed my guitar and got right into it. When I first learned how to play guitar I was learning by playing along with records and never learned to read music,play scales or any music theory, I’ve bought books but never saw anything that grabbed me and made sense like your books, so thanks for everything.”

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“I’m very much enjoying the guitarchitecture pdfs thanks. My head hasn’t (yet) exploded :-)”

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“Your approach seems a natural match to the way I conceptualise things, so I hope to pick up a lot.”

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“Been meaning to tell you that your material is fascinating. I’m an engineer, and I have to say your approach could easily be called ‘An Engineer’s Deconstruction of Harmonic and Melodic Concepts’. Kudos, sir.”

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Print editions of this book are available individually here (lulu.com) or on Amazon (amazon.com, amazon.co.uk, or amazon.fr).

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