Title: Learning to read music notation on the guitar ? an analysis of various guitar schools on the market with added own examples. Purpose: To analyse currently available teaching materials on the subject of guitar notation on the market. A comparative analysis is made of five chosen books on the topic. Four criteria for the analysis of these five books are stated: 1) Structure and progression of the study of reading music on the guitar.

During my studies to become a guitar builder at Carl Malmsten CTD, I have found an interest in the construction of the classical guitar. I am fascinated by the simplicity of its construction. A simplicity that becomes more complex when you start to study it in detail.In my final thesis I will not try to explain this complexity. The subject is to investigate two different principles regarding its construction. I would like to find out if the sayings concerning one of the principles will yield a guitar with greater ability to produce volume and projection.At a close distance the difference between the guitar?s volumes is not to speak of, but a significant difference can be seen regarding one of the guitars ability to project its sound.

According to tradition transcribed music is an important part of the repertoar for the classical guitar. Baroque music as well as compositions from the Spanish national romantic era are the two most important sources for transcriptions. My research is aimed at finding answers concerning the relevance of transcribing as well as playing different styles of music on the guitar. Are there any basic rules how these transcriptions should be made? I have chosen to take a closer look at the music of J S Bach as a representative of the baroque period because of the great legacy of his music being played on guitar and lute.

As a guitarbuilder it is an advantage if you can control and understand what is creating the character of the tone. To approach this vast jungle of variables that controls the tone in a guitar, I built two guitars and in one, guitar 2, reduced the thickness of soundboard, back and sides.The purpose was to compare the guitars and establish if there was a significant difference and what it was, in the guitars ability to produce sound. The thought was also to try the thesis: loud but short, long but moderate tone. Also if a lighter built guitar has an advantage in producing a loud but short ton and vice versa.The instruments has been examined by five guitarist, one guitarbuilder and a professor in Speech, music and hearing at KTH in Stockholm.The relative obvious conclusion is that guitar 2 is a bit louder and has a clearer base and treble but the more part of the guitarists fancied guitar 1 better. This one has got more mass fore the tone to stay alive with.

As I recently started to record in a studio, I almost immediately came to the conclusion that getting the right sound is not easy. I became curious about my recording procedure. What did I do wrong? How to place the microphone? Use of equipment? How is it possible to modify the sound afterwards? Are there any special methods that are commonly used among producers and/or guitarists? My thoughts ended up in a question ? What do producers and guitarists think of the guitar sound during a recording session in relation to the final production? In my research I interviewed two producers and two guitarists about guitar recordings. The results show that the quality of the guitar sound is in relation to production and style of music.

This study examines the similarities and differences between four guitar teachers in Sweden and the U.S. The aim of the study is to examine how teachers motivate their pedagogical standpoints and to analyze how they experience the frame factors that limit their teaching. Data were collected through interviews with two Swedish teachers and two American teachers. The result shows that the teachers, despite their seemingly different contexts, actually have a lot of common strategies and approaches. Most significant is the tendency to let the students decide some of the content of the lessons.

Den här studien har genomförts för att undersöka hur en gitarrlektion fungerar över internet och hur den upplevs av dess användare. Undersökningen har genomförts genom att jag och två av mina gitarrelever har utforskat två olika gitarrhemsidor. Vi har tagit lektioner från dessa sidor. Där visas materialet genom video, ljud och med eller utan tabulatur. Därefter har mina elever intervjuats där de bland annat har fått svara på frågor om vad de tyckte om hemsidan, lektionen och lärarens kvalitet och hur det kändes att inte ha en lärare närvarande vid lektionstillfället.

I detta konstnärliga arbete förklarar jag min instuderingsprocess och går igenom olika tekniska aspekter i ?Five Bagatelles for guitar? av W. Walton.I inledningen försöker jag ge en övergripande bakgrundshistoria till min relation med musik och speciellt gitarr.Jag behandlar också erfarenheter med personer jag har mött som påverkat mig i min musikaliska inriktning.Efter det skriver jag om Sir William Walton och vilken typ av kompositör och människa han var, för att förstå musiken känns det naturligt att veta vem han var.Sedan följer en övergripande formanalys med text och notexempel, där jag med text förklarar de musikaliska motiven samt behandlar diverse tekniska svårigheter jag stött på under instuderingens gång..

This graduation paper is based on my interest for wood and its different tonal quality?s.After some time of thinking I decided to write my paper on the tonal difference between two of the most common woods in guitars, East Indian Rosewood and European Maple. I had built two identical guitars before my graduation paper in which the difference was the wood the back and sides were made of. One was being made of East Indian Rosewood and the other being made of European Maple.I chose to speak with a number of people with different angle of approach to the two kinds of wood and its tonal difference and quality?s.

This graduation paper is based on my interest for wood and its different tonal quality?s.After some time of thinking I decided to write my paper on the tonal difference between two of the most common woods in guitars, East Indian Rosewood and European Maple. I had built two identical guitars before my graduation paper in which the difference was the wood the back and sides were made of. One was being made of East Indian Rosewood and the other being made of European Maple.I chose to speak with a number of people with different angle of approach to the two kinds of wood and its tonal difference and quality?s.

What amount of knowledge of guitar playing can be expected after completing upper compulsory school? A qualitative research involving three different music teachers provides their view of knowledge. Their expectations have been compared to a quantitative research involving 58 upper secondary students from the social sciences programme. The idea is to compare their pedagogic intentions to the pedagogic realities of music teachings.The study shows a clear advantage for students who has attended some form of external music tuition as well as for those students who have someone in their families who play an instrumentIf the knowledge primarily is due to extracurricular activities perhaps there is time for a reformation of the music subject so that all may enjoy the education, not merely those who already possesses a curtain amount of knowledge...The experience must not be allowed to submit to the vast forests of chords, by doing so one misses the purpose entirely.

My intention with this study is to evaluate, as a singer and a voice teacher, a number of routines for daily vocal practice through practical application. Seven different routines are presented, five of them originating from interviews with Swedish vocal teachers and singers and two chosen from literature. These routines are then tried out and evaluated. Using the results of these evaluations as a basis, I make an attempt at formulating my own personal practice routine, optimal for my own needs. I will also try to address motivational issues related to practice with hints acquired through the interviews.

The purpose of this study has been to examine how Afro-Cuban musical traditions and concepts are integrated in compositions for solo guitar by the Cuban guitarist and composer Ñico Rojas and how this can be expressed in the performance of his music by a classical guitarist. For this purpose a guide to Rojas music, which is included in this report, was written based on literature about Afro-Cuban music. Then a classical guitarist learned to play a piece by Rojas with help from the written guide. The result was examined using recordings of the guitarist's interpretations and an interview with him. The conclusion is that different aspects of the Afro Cuban musical tradition are present in Rojas? music, but that the concept of the clave was the most useful aspect for the classical guitarist that interpreted the music of Ñico Rojas in this study..

Title: Wes Montgomery and his approach to the guitar's fingerboardThe purpose of this study is toinvestigate Wes Montgomery's approach to the fingerboard. It is based not only on audio but also on the visual performance. The tablature matches exactly with Montgomery's playing. The study analyzes the way he moved on the fingerboard and presents a theory why he moved in that particular way. The study leads to a discussion of various possible explanations for Montgomery's special way of playing.Syftet med denna studie är att undersöka Wes Montgomerys förhållande till gitarrens greppbräda.

The main purpose of this essay is on one hand to try to find and explain the formula of success of the rock group Status Quo, and on the other to elucidate and explain the foundation and essence in the music made by Status Quo, but also to study how, if and why the foundation and essence have changed over the years. The method of investigation is partly based on a musical analysis of three albums from three different periods: Hello! (1973), Ain´t Complaining (1988) and Heavy Traffic (2002), and partly on a sociological study of the group?s career between 1962 and today, 2005.The first part of the essay concerns the period between 1962-1973 with an analysis of the album Hello!; the second part concerns the period 1974-1988 and the album Ain´t Complaining; finally, the third part concerns the years between 1989-2002 with an intensified analysis of the album Heavy Traffic. In the forth part of the essay I discuss the career of Status Quo from a sociological point of view.I run to the conclusion that the essence of Status Quo is the boogie-woogie comp on Fender guitar by Rick Parfitt, the riff on Francis Rossis´ Fender guitar in combination with the base, the piano and the drums. This has been the essence through all the years, even though it was more difficult to apprehend it during the 1980s.