Does anyone have this or has anyone worked through this book by Colin Tribe? Please let me know what you think of it. I'm particularly interested in the tune "The Keel Row" after hearing a variation of it on piano in Charlie Chaplin's Gold Rush.
I'll be interested to hear from anyone who's actually looked inside the book
errrr....I actually own both books. And I've learnt a few of the tunes I like.
Some of my students have wanted to learn Colin Tribe arrangements. I've found his stuff to be very... shall I say... "specifically" arranged. Meaning it's painstaking tabbed *just* like the video. This is good if you want to play it as such, but I seldom find that is the most useful approach. For me, learning to play (and teach) in this style of solo arrangements, it's much more useful to have a general outline that I can color myself than scratching my head wondering how to make all the extra stuff in the tab fit. Colin is a great player who has his own style. His style is easy for him to play, but will befuddle the crap out of most others trying to figure it out from a tab.
Just my two cents. Not knocking his stuff at all - it's very high-quality, but over-detailed for casual study use, in my opinion.
Sorry Jon, I wasn't trying to be difficult
I missed the point you made about actually owning the books. Did you find the tab to be adequate, or do you work from the notation?
OP here.
Yes, I'm interested in just that one tune, "The Keel Row," and I thought if I liked that English folk tune, I might like the others in the book. But after checking out Mr. Tribe's videos and reading that his tabs precisely reflect what he plays in the videos, I'm thinking his arrangements may be well beyond my level. Well, I then did some googling and found a free tab of just the melody. Perhaps a more productive way of learning the song is to work it out for myself, with this free tab as the jump-off point. Nonetheless, thank to everyone for their input and thoughts!
Haha, OK! I use the tab, wich is very thorough but being folk there are often techniques that aren't easy to notate in any form, such as the Scottish snaps in this particular arrangement of the Keel Row. Some performance notes are included and I have to listen to the recordings on the CD to replicate some techniques. Personally, I find that a great way to learn.
Bill. I think that sounds like a good takeaway fro Colin's approach. He has a few picking patterns and strums that you can apply to any arrangement. To learn his strums, you need to look at the videos, but he is generous by having a vid for each tune.I am glad Colin has taken the time to publish the music. If you can sight read and already play a bit, you don't have to turn into a Colin clone and copy him exactly. You can use his good work to break the ice, and then use the material to come up with your own approach, then mark up a copy so you remember what you did. For a teacher maybe the goal for the students would be to come up with their own arrangement through a learning process based on Colin's work?
Some of Colin's arrangements require a lot of finger stretching I think he wrote them on a soprano uke.
His strumming , picking styles are Colin's unique style. Without his right hand , none of the songs sound right. :-(