Cornwall Guitar Lessons Christmas gift vouchers

Its that time of year again, get your Christmas gift vouchers from the CGL website and have them delivered to your door in time for the big day .

christmas gift vouchers

Learn to play day 2014 at Trevada music

I spent Saturday 12th April getting involved in the national learn to play day at Trevada music. It was the first I’ve been involved in and I have to say it was a great day.

Learn to play day is focused on giving people of all ages a chance to have a free taster lesson on a huge range of instruments to see if they like it. The taster lessons are 20 minutes so pretty short and sweet, but they gave me a chance to speak to people about the commitment and dedication needed to learn the guitar as well as all the rewards you get for putting the time in, and more importantly someone a chance to cover some of the basics of the guitar. The lessons were a mixture of acoustic and electric and were all great fun, It was great to meet everyone and brilliant to here the hustle and bustle of people coming and going to have taster lessons on all sorts of instruments.

I want to say a massive thanks to the guys at Trevada for putting in the time to organise my lesson diary for the day. Looking forward to learn to play 2015

Some available lesson slots

It’s been a great start to 2014 with lesson slots filling up very quickly. Truro is now pretty much fully booked apart from a slot between 8-9pm on Wednesday eve and 6:30 on a Friday evening. As I am often booked fore functions gigs on a Friday this slot wouldn’t be available every week.

I still have a few slots available at Trevada music in Camborne throughout the week on Tuesday, Thursday and Friday so please email info@cornwallguitarlessons.co.uk for more information.

Free Marshall Posters, Stickers and Brochures with Cornwall Guitar Lessons

Marshall amps were kind enough to send Cornwall Guitar Lessons some Marshall posters, stickers and brochures for CGL students. If you would like to take any of the FREE Marshall goodies home just ask in your next guitar lesson.

Thanks Marshall amps 🙂

BOSS CS3 COMPRESSOR/SUSTAINER review by Cornwall Guitar Lessons

Here is the first Guitar pedal review of 2014! This times it’s the Boss CS3. I will start with a little info on this pedal, as many people are completely lost when it comes to Compressor pedals.

The Boss CS3 is to be used with an electric guitar; its main function is to compress the high signals and boost the low signals within your sound, helping you create sustain. The compression basically evens out your playing making notes appear to be at equal volumes regardless of how hard you attack the string. This makes it a great pedal for Funk and Country players trying to create an even and rounded sound.

The make up of the CS-3 Compression is pretty straightforward, with just four knobs that each control a different aspect of your sound. On the far right to left you have Level, Tone, Attack, Sustain, you could mess around with this pedal for hours creating different sounds. The build of the pedal is the usual Boss tank job, very sturdy and made to last. I have always liked this design as you can hit it as hard as you want when gigging and you know your not going to break it.

Price wise, this pedal is not to bad, generally costing around £65-£70 and around £35-£45 on EBay. There are a huge amount of pedals in the same price range on the market now, some even cheaper than this. But the Boss brand goes a long way! Which makes it a lot easier to sell if you don’t get on with it.

So what did I think of the pedal? Well I found it very hard to work with to be honest, I bought it on the off chance that it would sit nicely on my board and it would be an essential member of my pedal collection.
At first I loved it and thought it sounded amazing, and I felt it improved my overall guitar tone, but it did seem to create a slight hum which I couldn’t get rid off when being used with other pedals. I am a big fan of my Jimi Hendrix Fuzz Face and this combined with the Boss CS3 just sounded a mess, It also sounded made my Bad Monkey overdrive sound a little muddy. I am not saying this isn’t a good pedal; it just didn’t work for the sounds I want to create. After trying it on a daily basis for over a week I decided it just wasn’t for me, and I put it back into the world of EBay and spent the money on a new pedal ☺

Overall I think the pedal was pretty great, I just struggled to find a purpose for it within the music I enjoy playing. I will continue to look for a Compression pedal that works for me; I have heard great things about the MXR dyna comp, so watch this space.

Cornwall Guitar Lesson slots at Trevada music

So guys and gals, a quick update on my availability at Trevada music. I am currently teaching there on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. 

I have some scattered slots available on both Thursday and Saturday. At the minute Tuesday is fully booked, but if this is the most suitable day for you then please get in touch to go on the CGL waiting list. 

For more information on the exact slots that are available please contact info@cornwallguitarlessons or Darren on 07970 365020

Happy New year from Cornwall Guitar Lessons

Happy New Year everyone, I hope you had an amazing night wherever you were and whatever you got up to, hopefully your heads aren’t to sore today!
I brought the new year in playing cover songs at The Carbis Bay hotel, despite waking up hangover free due to driving I am aching after a 3 hour set and lifting a lot of gear in and out, otherwise my head would be as bad as many others today.

I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to everyone who had lessons with Cornwall Guitar Lessons in 2013, it was a great year and it’s been a pleasure to meet every one of you. I will be starting back at Trevada music in Camborne on Tuesday 7th and in Truro on the 8th.

I’m looking forward to spreading the word of Cornwall Guitar lessons throughout 2014 and seeing some old and new faces. Enjoy your New Years Day.

Darren

CGL Lessons finished for 2013

It’s nearly Christmas and I have now stopped teaching guitar for the holidays. Its been a great month for Cornwall Guitar lessons and a brilliant way to end the year. I am still available to take calls and answer emails over the Christmas period and gift vouchers are still available to buy through the CGL website. Enjoy the build up to Christmas folks 🙂

The changing world of guitar effects pedals

I have recently discovered a whole new world of guitar pedals. There are so many types, makes, and designs of the same guitar pedals that sometimes have the smallest differences between them. It can all seem a little daunting to someone who is new to the world of effects pedals.

The guitar pedal market is expanding on a daily basis and in particular the cloning market is progressing and changing more than any other. If you look on eBay there are lots of small companies here in the UK selling cloned pedals that have appeared on some of the biggest records of the last 50-60 years and they’re doing a very good job of it, making it possible for guitarist’s to recreate their favourite guitar sounds without burning a hole in their pocket.

At the same time there are companies like ‘JOYO’ and ‘MOOER’ who are producing amazing guitar pedals at very affordable prices. On average the ‘JOYO’ pedals are just £29.99 and the ‘MOOER’ pedals £45 – £65. Although these are relatively new companies they are causing a big stir in the pedal world and if you have a spare few minutes make sure you watch some of the great YouTube videos comparing them to some of the higher end pedals on the market. The quality amazes me.

It now seems if you like guitar pedals there really is something within everybody’s budget you just have to look around. Over the coming months I am going to be doing more pedal reviews, looking at some of the ‘JOYO’ and ‘MOOER’ range and hopefully the hype surrounding these pedals.

Xotic EP Booster review – Cornwall Guitar Lessons

I have continued my pedal buying and selling obsession over the last few weeks in search of my perfect combination of pedals! My latest is the Xotic EP booster.

I have previously used a MXR micro amp and Boss GE-7 as the main boost pedal on my board, both of which are amazing but I was never 100% happy with them. After several recommendations and great online reviews I finally decided to buy this pedal. It took me around two weeks to find a shop that actually sells them in the UK, turns out these boutique pedals are hugely popular and sell out very quickly. When it arrived I definitely wasn’t disappointed with the wait.

The EP booster circuit is said to be based on the famous Maestro EP-3 Echoplex made famous by players like Chet Atkins, Chuck Berry, Jimmy page and Eddie Van Halen (the list goes on). At first glance it’s quite surprising how small this pedal is, making it perfect for pedal boards of all sizes. The pedal is extremely simple, stomp on the switch to get a clean volume boost, when stomping the switch a bright blue LED will light up, stomp on it again to switch it off. There is one single knob that controls the amount of boost you have, and it goes stupidly loud without affecting the tone of your guitar. In fact the pedal seems to round of your tone and make it seem thicker in some way, it’s very hard to describe exactly what it’s doing….but when using this pedal the original frequencies in my guitar sound that are pleasing seem to shine through even more. If the pedal wasn’t so expensive I would have two of them on my board.

The tonal options for this pedal are revealed once you remove the back plate of the pedal. There are two dipswitches, which allow you to change the EQ of the pedal. After messing about with all the variations possible I currently have mine set to the default settings. I am currently using the pedal after my drive pedals on my board rather then before them. I have tried it both ways but do prefer it after.

The only down side to this pedal is that you can only mess about with the EQ options by removing the back plate, it would be great if these switches were on the front of the pedal.

Overall I would say this is a must have pedal. It is simple yet extremely effective. It is a boutique pedal and therefore has the price tag that goes with it, but if you are willing to part with the cash you will not be disappointed.