Flamenco Guitar - Total Training

A comprehensive flamenco guitar curriculum with 4 levels of difficulty

Total Training contains 110 separate lessons that cover 4 palos, and 7 techniques.

Watch trailer here

Features

4 levels of difficulty

Flamenco Guitar Total Training is structured similar to a university curriculum.

Lessons start very basic, dominantly using the technique being presented in its simplest form with the exception of remates and some rasgueado compas sequences. As you move along towards the higher levels, pieces get gradually more complex and incorporate more aspects of both left and right hand techniques in a stepwise fashion.

For well structured learning, you simply start at level 1, complete the lessons, then move on to level 2.

If you take your time and make sure you clear every level before switching to the next one, when you complete the final level, you will have developed a well rounded flamenco guitar technique.

Keep in mind, if you have no prior experience with flamenco guitar, then you need to complete the Flamenco Guitar Fundamentals course before starting the Total Training.

All techniques, what you can do with them and how they are combined

Total Training presents a comprehensive directory of every right hand technique available to a flamenco player, namely picado, free stroke, arpeggio, tremolo, pulgar, alzapua, and rasgueado.

In the form of original falsetas, each technique is applied to 4 flamenco palos: solea, buleria, fandango, and tangos.

The choice of these palos is based on their fundamental differences from each other in terms of meter, rhythm and musical expression.

As the difficulty level goes up, the specific technique used in individual lessons will appear less in isolation and more in dialogue with other techniques to serve better the ideas presented in the music.

Therefore, the harmonic and expressive complexity of the compositions also increase as you move up the levels.

These are not just small pieces of flamenco music - follow every single instruction

Each of the 110 lessons in the Total Training is a small piece or falseta composed with a musical idea for sure but main driving force behind every single note is to get your fingers to behave a certain way so you can develop your technique properly.

To this end, the scores (tabs) come with precise fingering indicators.

Follow exactly both the left and right hand guidelines for every lesson.

Also, pay close attention to the left hand screen on the videos as there are aspects of left hand fingering (i.e. holding down some fingers to aid in position switching etc.) that cannot be represented in tablature or scores.

The split screen slow video demonstration, on screen tabs with moving cursor, interactive tef and pdf files work together to leave no doubt as to how each note is to be played to achieve the full benefit.

Download the free tef viewer from the following link:

tefview

Understanding flamenco music

Every video lesson is designed with a compas counter, accent points and the meter appropriate for the palo being presented. Also the main sequences are always sandwiched between standard compas sections so you can attach the different lessons together easily like lego. The full speed presentation of the lessons are edited with compas backing track so you can hear the final outcome in a more flamenco context.

The compositions demonstrate the various ways melodic ideas are incorporated into the compas structure. As in, what happens if you start a melody on the 10th beat of buleria, or why some melodic sequences start on beat 5 in fandangos.

When you reach the end of the course, you will have developed a general understanding of flamenco guitar music as a solo performer.