Christopher Schlegel Update 08-17-2010

The second annual Nashville Amp Expo is this weekend!

http://www.nashvilleampexpo.com/

Last year I was honored to meet with the guys from Reason Amps.  They made me an officially endorsed artist for Reason Amplification.  Thanks to my old friend, Obeid the best tube amp designer in the world, and to my new friend Anthony, the best amp cabinet man in the world!  Scroll down the list to read my blurb.

http://www.reasonamps.com/artists.php

The show is open to the public.  So, come on down if you are in the area.  I’ll be visiting as many rooms as possible.  But, I’ll spend the most time in the Reason room, of course.  Fair warning, though, it’s going to be loud.

If you combine that with my Epiphone endorsement, you get this nice little video with both machines (Epi Joe Pass Emperor and Reason Bambino) that is still in rotation at the Gibson lesson site:

http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Lessons/InstrumentLessons/Combining-Lead-Rhythm-111/

Enjoy!

Christopher Schlegel Update 05-20-2010

Another George Gershwin gem, “The Man I Love” is the sixth tune on my Solo Jazz Guitar Standards, Vol. 1 disc.

http://cdbaby.com/cd/schlegel8

The legend behind this tune is that Gershwin attempted to craft an entire song starting with the typically throw away ending of many show pieces, “That’s all folks!”.  Or if you’ve ever sang the campy ending to “Happy Birthday To You”, it’s the part tacked on the end, “And many moooooo-re!”.  It’s also the well-known, bluesy ending to Gershwin’s own “Rhapsody In Blue”.

The tune Gershwin built is a masterpiece of beautiful melodic themes perfectly integrated with a brilliant harmonic structure.  Learning this song and making my own arrangement of it was a milestone in my development as a solo artist.

Here’s an old studio practice version.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-NTieZAXnQ

Here’s a more recent live version.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-VrI6xYvUY

Enjoy!

Christopher Schlegel Update 04-16-2010

I was born and raised in St. Louis.  So, this tune had to make the cut on my first album of standards.  William Christopher Handy’s classic blues is the fifth tune on my Solo Jazz Guitar Standards, Vol. 1 disc.

http://cdbaby.com/cd/schlegel8

W. C. Handy was an amazing man whose life deserves a little study if you aren’t familiar with him:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Christopher_Handy

I did a whole tutorial series on GuitarTricks.com on how to build a chord melody solo guitar arrangement.  I used “St. Louis Blues” to do it.  It really is a great tune for that kind of thing.  Much of the lesson material grew out of my own arrangement.  This vid on my YouTube channel is a highlights overview of those lessons:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbfGJzfFBRU

Later on, the Gibson Guitar company website picked up my “St. Louis Blues” video lesson and embedded it on their lesson pages.  It has been in rotation as a featured Lesson Of The Day.  If you play guitar and want to try my arrangment, I suggest the Gibson lesson page because they included my musical score along with the vid.

http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Lessons/InstrumentLessons/Learn-St-Louis-Blues-320/

For those of you with Guitar Tricks subscriptions, you can see the whole tutorial series of lessons here:

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=759

Enjoy!

Christopher Schlegel Update 02-17-2010

“Mood Indigo”, Duke Ellington’s classic ballad, is the fourth tune on my Solo Jazz Guitar Standards, Vol. 1 disc.

http://cdbaby.com/cd/schlegel8

What is there to say about Duke that hasn’t already been said? A genius of American music, an amazing composer & arranger, outstanding (and in my opinion highly underrated) pianist, bandleader, performer, overall first rate musician. Always dressed to the nines and always on the top of his game.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duke_Ellington

Along with Gershwin, Mr. Edward “Duke” Ellington’s songs form the backbone of the Great American songbook. “Mood Indigo” is a tune I’ve known and loved for many years.  Like many jazz tunes, for years I never knew the lyrics to the tune. Or even that it had lyrics!  I’ve intentionally avoided grandstanding on this one. Just the melody, a simple bass line, and inner chord color tones that are my personal tribute to Duke’s beautiful music that I’ve loved for many, many years.

I’ve been testing my video studio setup with a new mic & subdued lighting. I recently filmed some test footage which included a pass at “Mood Indigo”.  This is very similiar to the arrangement on the CD & how I typically perform it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvN26FYSFHA

I also recently filmed a series of blues lessons for Guitar Tricks. I used my Reason Amps Bambino for all of them!

http://www.reasonamps.com/

Here are a couple of the play along performance sections I extracted from the lesson footage.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-9eA4jWfkw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3E5tgDeRX8

Happy viewing & listening!

Happy new year! My web vendor CD Baby now has an Artist Overview page, on which you can view my currently available catalog of discs on CD Baby. And also get links to direct digital downloads.

http://www.cdbaby.com/Artist/ChristopherSchlegel

I need to get some of those Download Cards and give them away to people or something like that which might resemble “Marketing”.

I still haven’t finished posting about all my jazz guitar CD tunes individually. I intend to finish that project this year. So keep watching this e-space for a blurb about each tune in order!

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/schlegel8

I am also working on some exciting projects involving performances & clinics this year! More details to follow.

Gibson.com has posted another of my video lessons. I have at least a couple more like this ready to go for the beginning of the year. I enjoy doing these simple blues things very much!

http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Lessons/InstrumentLessons/Blues-Orchestration-In-A-112/

Happy viewing & listening!

Christopher Schlegel Update 11-16-2009

A couple of months ago I attended the very first Nashville Amp Expo.

http://www.nashvilleampexpo.com/

As a result, I am officially an endorsed artist for Reason Amplification. Thanks to my old friend, Obeid the best tube amp designer in the world, and to my new friend Anthony, the best amp cabinet man in the world! Scroll down the list to read my blurb.

http://www.reasonamps.com/artists.php

I wrote it for them to stress how my name on their roster is best mutually beneficial. And, it’s true! I am a pioneer and leader in online video instruction with over a thousand lessons on various websites. I’ve had over 1,000 video lessons in total on various sites for a while. But as of yesterday I have over 1,000 on Guitar Tricks alone!

http://www.guitartricks.com/instructor.php?input=155014

I did a series of six videos to demostrate the tonal range and potential of the amp I got from them, a Reason Amp Bambino. If you haven’t seen them yet, you can check out all 6 on my YouTube channel.

http://www.youtube.com/user/ChristopherSchlegel

I’ve been incorporating my new Reason Amplifier in every possible lesson I’ve done lately. The first of these to show up on the Gibson site has recently been posted.

http://www.gibson.com/en-us/Lifestyle/Lessons/InstrumentLessons/Combining-Lead-Rhythm-111/

Happy viewing & listening!