Allan Holdsworth - Reaching for the Uncommon Chord (Master Classes)

I love this book, lost my copy in a move so I've bought it twice now. It shows many unusual chords and gives music and tab to Tokyo Dream and other earlier songs. Allan Holdsworth was really a musician's musician and this book provides a great place to start learning.

This book by the late great Maestro Allan Holdsworth is a treasure among my collection. It's invaluable for getting a glimpse into the other-worldly harmonic language that Holdsworth pioneered for guitar. It's not for beginners! The transcriptions aren't always spot-on (which is why I gave 4 instead of 5 stars), but they are close enough to get you into the ballpark. A well-tuned ear can get you the rest of the way.I will be coming back to this for a long time!

The compositions listed in this book are some of his best from his early years. I would have liked more of the solos transcribed, but alas, mere mortals such as myself will have to remain satisfied with learning more about his harmonic style than his applied melodic genius from a book. I recommend you rent or buy Live At Yoshi's for some video instruction ;) The other reviewers are absolutely right-on about the biography section of this book. I am becoming a Holdsworthian fanatic!

This musician is a jazz Rock God. If you're looking for a new way to approach music and harmonic content you can't go wrong. Don't expect to learn top 40 songs with this, Mr Holdsworth was extremely intelligent and always reaching for something that no human has ever accomplished.

For those who can't quite capture by ear what Allan Holdsworth is doing on a particular song, this book lays out the roadmap for understanding AH's path. Select tunes are laid out clearly. It'll help with your own ear training in picking out how Allan structures his lines. A valuable resource.

Hey, it's an Allan Holdsworth book and has transcriptions of arrangements (Not much in the way of solos - since he improvises a lot) and it offers insights into chord arrangements and writing more than actually playing the material. Some of the transcriptions are wrong, but passable if you want to learn the material.

This is cool, but NO one really has a def. anything on Holdsworth where he really lays it out.He's an enigma, just like his playing. Cool "guide" however.

Good study material

Good reading material & tab!..

Das Buch ist kein Lehrbuch zu Holdsworth Chord-Melody-Spiel, sondern eine genaue Transkription von Gitarrenparts verschiedener Stücke auf verschiedenen CDs.Sauschwer und nur für fortgeschrittene und zu allem entschlossene Gitarristen, die zudem noch HOldsworth-Fans sind.

Allan Holdsworth is my favourite electric guitarist.Totally unique in his approach and as this book states, is the founder of the "Allan Holdsworth school of guitar playing".This book is very interesting, it provides some much needed information for the Holdsworth fanatic, such as an insite into the mans influences, a timeline of his career and some stories about the road from the man himself.The transcriptions of the various songs are very good, althought i was slightly dissapointed at the lack of transcribed solos, however, i'm sure Holdsworth would encourage players to improvise their own solos rather than copy his, but it would still be nice to at least attempt some of his solos.Overall a fantastic book for anyone into Holdsworth.(I first reviewed this item back in 2010, this is an update from 2014. I have continued to use this book as a reference since I bought it, there is so much to be gained from having it on the bookshelf!As a companion to this book, i would recommend the Instructional video and the corresponding book 'Just for the Curious'.)

This book has a lot of tunes from the early holdsworth era and the selection is well made. comments on every tune and biography is really helpful to understand holdsworth's view of music and life, but I have to say that i think some voicings from almost every tune are wrong and also including the chord changes charts for soloing it would have been nice.

Pochi i segreti di Allan qui svelati. Trascrizioni di accordi soprattutto, un assolo, ma niente che faccia capire il suo stile inimitabile che evidentemente Allan vuol far rimanere tale. Però se vi piacciono i pezzi e ne volete le trascrizioni solo per suonarne i "non comuni" accordi allora va bene.