Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #55773 in Books
• Published on: 1980-01-01
• Released on: 1980-01-01
• Binding: Paperback

Customer Reviews

Very simple, but incredibly useful.
This is about as simple as you can get. Eight pages long, including a one-page introduction from Segovia. The transcriptions of the scales are designed for classical guitarists, with major and melodic minor forms for every key. This is an incredible tool for learning the notes up and down the fretboard, and exactly what anybody studying classical guitar in a university setting will need.

Excellent, Essential
These scales are simply spectacular for developing both the left hand and the right (especially if you follow the right hand fingerings indicated by Segovia). At first it seems a little unreasonable to practice them for two hours a day, as recommended in the preface, but if you do as Segovia suggests and play each scale seven times, according to each fingering pattern, it takes at least that long to simply play through the book, which I would highly recommend doing every day.

Great resource for beginners or professionals
This book contains all of the major (ionian mode) scales and all of the minor (aeolian mode) scales. These minor scales ascend in melodic minor form; meaning that the scale progresses in natural minor form until the seventh degree (tone) which is converted to major but then descend in natural minor form; meaning that the seventh degree converts back to a minor seventh (tone). A few notes worth listing are: The book itself is very light and thin, fitting easily on a music stand; it contains the encouraging words of Andres Segovia; it contains all of the scales in the aforementioned two modes; all of the scales are written in musical notation, allowing the beginner or professional to practice their sight reading skills; and all of the scales are written in ascension and descension. I commend anyone who has a desire to learn the guitar and this is a good resource to have. Perseverance, practice and most important of all asking oneself questions in exploration are what lead to mastery and creative expression on the guitar. A strong understanding of intervals is the key. Intervals are what form chords and scales and are also necessary for free improvisation.