I recently had an opportunity to have a closer look at the Jamorama guitar course, so here’s my official Jamorama Guitar Review:

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Jamorama Guitar Review

Requirements

• Just a guitar. Seriously -- Jamorama starts at the beginning.

Suited For

• Newbies. Either you’ve never touched a guitar before, or you know a handful of chords already but want to know more.

The Good

• Starts at the beginning. You can be a stone cold newbie, never touched a guitar or read a note of music before, and Jamorama will get you started.
• Exceptionally thorough in describing things. For example, chords are shown using sheet music, tab, pictures, diagrams AND videos. All methods are used, almost exhaustively, each time, so you basically have no excuse if you still don’t get it.
• Video examples include: strumming pattern, metronome, timing, separate shots of both hands, chord names AND an animated fretboard that changes fingerings along with you.
• Covers chords (all common types), strumming, reading music and tab.
• Software is pretty easy to use. Compatible with both Mac and PC.
• Good members site, with a very responsive support staff (my question was resolved within an hour by email).
• 56 Day satisfaction guarantee. Try it, if you don’t like it, you can easily get a refund within 8 weeks.
• Physical option is available for those who prefer hard copies and don’t like learning on the computer.

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The Bad

• Doesn’t really deal with the theory aspect of the guitar (remember -- this is my opinionated review, and in my opinion theory is an important part of learning any instrument). Jamorama will tell you how and what to play, but doesn’t really get into the why.

Conclusions

Overall I’d have to say that Jamorama is a fairly strong guitar course for beginners. If you’ve never taken any previous lessons, then this would be a good place to start. Jamorama will introduce you to the guitar, to music, and to the chords and strumming patterns you’ll need before going to the next level.

In this Jamorama guitar review, as in any review -- it is extremely important for me to stress that Jamorama will not make you a rockstar. It doesn’t deal with scales or any form of soloing; however I don’t think that was ever the intention with this product either. They’ve identified the goal as teaching a solid base of chords, reading music and tab, and working with the chords. If you want to go further with the guitar, you’ll likely need to pickup something else after Jamorama; however keep in mind that even with traditional lessons (with a guitar teacher), you need to keep on coming back to learn new things as you get better, and occasionally even switch to a more advanced teacher. The fact that this deals only with the basics does not make it less of a course; because it deals with the basics very well.

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So that’s it for my Jamorama guitar review, if you’ve got comments or questions, please leave them below.

Here’s a fun yet easy progression you can jam with in A pentatonic minor. The chords are simply Am7, Dm7 and Em7.

Try experimenting with your own riffs in between chord changes, or replace one of the changes entirely with a 1 bar solo.

Don’t be afraid to go nuts with it!

Seriously -- if you’re playing along with another guitar player -- this lesson will help you find something different to play. Puh-lease don’t play exactly the same thing -- unless you’re specifically trying to play in unison!

Triads are cool because once you get the hang of them, you can easily throw them in anywhere to spice up your playing. Additionally, they are in a higher register than the open chords, so they’ll cut through the noise of the band without turning up your volume.

In this particular video the triads I showed are based on the open D and open Dm chord patterns. For example:

6-5-4-3-2-1 (String number)
X-X-0-2-3-2 (D)
And
X-X-0-2-3-1 (Dm)

Where X means you don’t play that string, and numbers indicate the fret position. As I move these chords up the fretboard, I simply stop playing the 4th string as well.

This video lesson has a few cool guitar riffs that you can use. I always find it fun to learn new riffs, but sometimes you come across a particular riff on a song somewhere that you absolutely love. Ever try figuring out those riffs? It can be tricky.

Using a tool such as RiffMaster Pro can really help, because it lets you slow down the song while keeping the pitch constant. So even if the guy is shredding away like a wood chipper, you can still hear each note slowly and clearly with this software. If you’re into figuring out cover songs, this one is probably worth checking out.

Leave a comment below video and tell me which riff you liked best, and I’ll have more for you next time!

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