Fingerstyle Guitar

This instructional method is pretty dated, but unlike most of the books this beginning self-taught fingerstylist has bought, this is more than a beginning song book with some instruction. Mr. Perlman has surrounded each song with excellent background and technique. The author has chosen each song as a building block for a true fingerstyle course. No book is really complete by itself, and this book works well used with Tommy Flint's method book, even if the sequence doesn't sync completely. Yet, I'm really glad I bought this book. Mr. Perlman's photographs and text are unlike those found in the Flint, or even the highly rated Harmon books, and give the best technique hints I've found in all my books. (I've got to note the thumb over bass notes in the F and Dm fingerings work for me--even though they are pretty unique) This book moves along at a pretty fast clip--at least so far as I have gotten through the first half--- and I'd recommend some other books for true guitar beginners. But when one's ready for fingerstyle--perhaps after a few months of plectrum playing--this book shines. I'd give the book 4 stars, but if purchased along with the companion DVD-- it's truly a full-fledged course--and together the products earn a full 5 stars. Thank you Ken Perlman.

This is a well-designed book by someone with a good sense of how to teach a complex subject in a manageable way. It gave me my start, back in the days before YouTube. Bought this one for my niece.

I bought this book after a shoulder injury steered me away from flat picking, which I was not that adept at anyway. I had started with a couple of the Bruce Emery books and had found them very helpful- and easy to read. Most of the positive attributes of this book have been covered by other reviewers, so no need to repeat them here. My main criticism has been mentioned in at least one other review: the numbers for fret notation in the tablature are often illegible due to font size and/or print resolution. I often resort to the use of a magnifying glass to sort it out. I am seconding this criticism in hopes that if there is a reprinting the quality of tablature printing might be improved. Otherwise, it is a very useful resource.

I would recommend this to anyone wanting to learn finger-style. Everything is laid out well and explained in depth. There are lots of tunes in different styles and they are ordered from easiest to most difficult for each genre that is explored.

Check out my in-depth YouTube video review ("Guitar Books Review #13: Fingerstyle Guitar by Ken Perlman " by Joe McMurray) in which I objectively go through the book chapter by chapter and play through some examples. You can also hear the full review on "Guitar Books the Podcast" - Review #13. For context, I’m a professional player, teacher, author, and recording artist. Ken Perlman’s Fingerstyle Guitar is a method book for learning to play solo fingerstyle guitar in the folk, blues, fiddle tune, Celtic, and ragtime styles. The book becomes progressively more difficult – the beginning is appropriate for beginner fingerstyle players, and the end is challenging for intermediate and even advanced players. The book is extremely long (232 pages) and extremely detailed with sections of dense explanatory text. While I enjoy many of the tunes in this book (especially the Irish, English, and Scottish fiddle tunes), some of the arrangements are clunky, difficult, and not worth the effort. While I’m happy to have worked through Fingerstyle Guitar, I would not recommend this to most players unless you are specifically interested in older styles of music and you’ve already exhausted other options. The book quickly introduces alternating bass (Travis picking) arrangements and gradually presents standard guitar techniques including hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, etc. I like that Perlman provides exercises and lots of short, accessible tunes like Elizabeth Cotton’s “Freight Train” to build your technique. The tunes and arrangements are stylistically similar to those in Stefan Grossman’s “Complete Country Blues Guitar Book” and “Complete Celtic Fingerstyle Guitar Book” but with more technical explanations. The book also provides types of tunes similar to those found in Mel Bay’s “Complete Chet Atkins Guitar Method” although with a very different teaching approach. While the first five chapters of the book are accessible with some fun 20 second tunes, the book’s difficulty increases starting in Chapter 6. The tunes move higher up the fretboard, utilizing alternate tunings, and requiring much more fretting with your thumb over the top. These are important things to learn and prepare you for the fun repertoire heavy chapters at the end of the book. The final four chapters of the book provide repertoire tunes organized into categories: “Southern Fiddle Tunes,” “Old-Time Songs and Ballads,” “Irish, English, and Scottish Fiddle Tunes,” and “Rags.” There are some nice arrangements in these chapters, but I found that many of the arrangements seem to be especially difficult. I believe that a good arrangement should find a balance between the complexity of the tune and playability, and many of these arrangements just feel clunky to me. Lots of difficult passages and fingerings even after putting in serious practice. There are detailed explanations of techniques (hammer-ons, slides, etc.), but little explanation of how to actually play through an individual tune with a smooth performance. Other books like Richard Saslow’s “The New Art of Ragtime Guitar” provide smoother arrangements and much more tune-specific help. If you are a performing musician, you will find that most of these tunes are too short to actually play out at gigs without coming up with your own variations. The exceptions are the rags in the final chapter which are quite lengthy and difficult. For the shorter tunes throughout the book, there is no discussion about how to go about extending them for performance. Perlman provides some cool background information on styles and specific tunes. The Celtic fiddle tune chapter has great information on the differences between single jigs, double jigs, slip jigs, set tunes, reels, hornpipes, and slow aires, with great examples of each. The book provides examples in both TAB and standard notation (treble clef). Each tune/example is presented in its entirety in TAB, and then again in standard notation. This is great in that it minimizes page turns if you are reading the tune. It is also highly annoying because all of the fingering details are only included in the standard notation, so if you are reading the TAB version of the tune, you have to constantly flip over and search through the standard notation version. The author/publisher should have included the fingerings in the TAB. Also, after the beginning of the book, there is no right hand fingering. Overall, this book contains a wide scope of valuable information and fun old folk, blues, fiddle, Celtic, and ragtime tunes. Many of the arrangements feel clunky and difficult to me even after putting in a lot of work. Many of the explanations of techniques are helpful if you’ve never used them before but are hard to read. If you want to play fingerstyle guitar, don’t start with this book. The book doesn’t get into the modern percussive techniques used by modern players like Michael Hedges, Don Ross, Andy McKee, Mike Dawes, etc. No thumb slaps, guitar body percussion, or tapping. I recommend using an acoustic steel string guitar rather than a classical guitar since there are many tunes that utilize the fretting hand thumb over the top.

I began fingerstyle with Zeppelin's "Babe I'm gonna Leave You" - learning from a tab, and picked up this book on a friend's rec. It is outstanding, there are a handful of great tabs provided that sound great and are fun to play (ie, "Freight Train"), while learning the basics. A bunch of Mississippi John Hurt tabs are in there, and after 4-6 months anyone should be able to play 'Candyman' with expertise. If you like fingerstyle and don't know Hurt, get his 'Best of' Live at Oberlin on vanguard. Anyway, an outstanding book for any willing player.

This book is perfect for me. It has easy to understand detailed explanations. It features real songs and practice exercises in both tab and music annotations. I have worked through the first chapters and am very happy with my selection.

Great book easy to follow along with. I have only been playing for a couple of years and so I find myself struggling for instruction that is not to easy, yet does not just fly over my head. After just a few weeks of dilegence, i find that my finger independance has dramatically improved!

This is a lovely book for those looking to develop their fingerstyle. It covers the basics well, has a good selection of music and the author comes across as pleasantly human.