Hello everyone, been a little while since I've done one of these. I was inspired to do this little article by a french youtuber, Seb, that i will properly credit at the end.

Let me start by saying this. What if the most listened musician on the planet isn't who you think he is? I mean, if I'd ask the question, most would say something like The Beatles, Michael Jackson, Queen or if we talk about modern artists, perhaps we'd talk about BTS, Beyonce, Drake or our good old friend, Kanyer West...!

But what if I told you that all of the above are wrong? What if I told you that the person I want to introduce to you has composed over 2700 songs? That you all listen and are familiar with his song without even realizing it?

Without further ado, let me introduce to you Kevin MacLeod!



... doesn't ring a bell, ugh? Not familiar with his face I bet...?

Well, that's actually fairly normal! Kevin composes copyright free song that he lets anyone use for free with the ONLY condition being to credit him... that simple! And those songs have been used in multiple videos across the years on Youtube. so much so that his music is omnipresent and that if he decided to copyright in one day all his song and ask for take downs, well, youtube might just collapse. No seriously, there are 4 BILLION videos uploaded daily on youtube and there are for sure a bunch of them with his music. But Kevin has been there since the beginning....

Worst case scenario aside, this wouldn't actually happen. See, a lot of people wonder why would he do that? It's only natural for one person to protect what he creates, right? All of us musician who create songs and hope to live from it, we wouldn't just let it be used like this, right? Well, the answer, as easy as it is, is that it's just his philosophy that music is meant to be shared. He is a simple man who loves what he does and he still does that to THIS day!

But I've been talking about his music a lot and it might not have clicked with you yet so before I conclude this, let me post some songs and see if you recognize them....

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You've certainly heard at least one of those in either a youtube video, or a tik tok, movie, etc.... but now, you have the story. It simply is unbelievable in my opinion! We all had this idea of who people listen to the most as being a legendary band or a super popular modern artist and yet, it's this quiet but intensely passionate man who takes the crown, becoming a legend in his own right!

This is pretty much just a simple story I wanted to share! Full credit for not only the inspiration but also most of the infos centralized in one place to Seb, a french youtuber. His content is amazing but since there is a language barrier, I thought I'd condense it in this little article. Here's the link to his video!

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Have a great evening/day Synners and I will see y'all around!


- Rad

I love to play guitar and I am screenplay writer for movies. Hacking on bugcrowd is a hobby.

Heres a song I made.
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Hey all!

So recently a friend of mine asked if I was able to teach her son guitar! And of course I agreed! Only thing is I’ve never formally taught someone music, I’ve only ever been the student (mostly piano). So I pose this question for anyone who has insight.

Where would be a good place to start other than explaining the different parts of the guitar and how to hold a pick lol?
I plan on following along with the beginner lessons here on the school and such, but any tips is greatly appreciated

Hey guys. I have decided that I want to progress with more lead playing, more specifically writing lead lines. Whilst I am not too happy with how clean my technique is (it has definitely come a long way though), I am confident enough to use different techniques in my playing such as sweeps, alternate picking and tapping.

The thing I am struggling with is, as someone who has only been learning songs or scales, trying to turn what I have learned into something that sounds sonically interesting whilst also being fairly technical. I find more often than not that I either play very technical and the musicality goes away or I play slow and I can come up with something that sounds a bit more melodic.

I also find myself just playing the scale up and down or using the same pattern throughout a scale run (going up in 3s etc) so everything sounds predictable. I tend to lock myself into one or two positions and use one scale too. Just wondered if anyone had tips for any of this? My theory knowledge is a long way off but I feel like with the scale knowledge and chord knowledge I have I am still not utilising it as much as I could be.

Thanks,
Slim

Oh I work at Hacker 1 and Music Student.
I enjoy screen play writing and playing guitar as hobbys.

Anyone have any tips on learning to improvise over chords?

So I took a break for a while. Well yesterday I picked my guitar back up and played songs that I never tried before. I feel as if I am better now than when I was before my break. Does this happen to anybody else?

Hey all!

Just a gentle reminder that the second live stream of Papa Gates is coming in next Tuesday June 21st at 4pm CT/7pm EDT/ 1am CET for all legends!

And here comes round #2 with Papa Gates!

Don't forget to mark it in your calendar and come join us!

- Rad

Hey, it's been a few months that i'm learning Save Me (i have 2 years guitar experience so i didnt learned the crazy solos) And i was wondering if some of you guys were interessted about doing a "band cover" of this song; if there is a second guitarist, a drummer, a vocalist or anything, just let me know and we'll do it

Hi friends,

So is there any stop to all this insanity?

1. Topics of discussion
2. Major 9th chords
3. Dominant 9th chords

1. Topics of discussion

In this tutorial, we are going to talk about major 9th and dominant 9th chords. So, let's have some fun.

2. Major 9th chords

Major 9th chords, notated as maj9, are fairly easy to understand. They are basically maj7 chords, on top of which we add another note, the 9th note, to be exact. Thus, the formula for these chords is 1 3 5 7 9. As you can see, there are quite a few notes there that need to be played, in theory at least. In practice, as long as you have the 7 and 9 notes, that should suffice.

Given the formula above, the notes for the Cmaj9 chord are C E G B D. One way in which you can play a Cmaj9 chord is the following one, which is the C form:


And here it is played back.

Let's move on to the A form:


And here it is played back.

Next in line is the G form:


And here it is played back.

Let's move on to the E form:


And here it is played back.

Anf finally, the D form:


And here it is played back.

3. Dominant 9th chords

Dominant 9th chords, notated with the 9 digit, are formed by adding the 9th note on top of a dominant 7th chord. Thus, the formula for these chords is 1 3 5 ♭7 9.

The C9 chord consists of the C E G B♭ D notes. Here are some ways to play it. First off, the C form:


And here it is played back.

Next in line is the A form:


And here it is played back.

Let's move on to the G form:


And here it is played back.

Next in line is the E form:


And here it is played back.

And finally, the D form:


And here it is played back.

That about covers it for this one. Next time, we will discuss the remainder 9th chord types, minor 9th and minor 9th flat five. See you then.

Whaddup Synners,

I am considering buying some used gear of Reverb...I saw a guitar that I just have to have......
Here is the thing.

I've never bought stuff of Reverb, the seller has some great Reviews, but the deal sounds too good to be true.

What is your experience with Reverb?

Any tips and advice you have for me ? Stuff I need to ask the vendor?

Thank you all in advance.

First I wanted to start with an update on my playing since I havent been on here in a good while.

Recently (within the last month/month and a half maybe), I have noticed that I have made some monumental progress with my playing. One of the biggest issues I had was having was tension and motion of the picking hadn't and since then this issue is almost non existent. I changed shape of my picking hand, albeit to a very strange one, and worked on reducing the size of my picking motions and this helped dramatically with getting rid of tension and playing more accurately. I can say now that I am starting to become the guitarist that I aimed to be and always wanted to be and it is such a great feeling.

Now for the question part.

Whilst there are multiple issues that I have been able to sort out, one issue that has persisted is difficulty with moving parts of my body which make direct contact with. This mainly occurs with the forearm of my picking hand and the thumb of the fretting hand (not as much as the forearm). I find that the movements are not natural and feel very concious like I am saying to myself "move now" instead of it being a natural fluid motion.

I understand that there is meant to be a level of friction there to stop the arm from sliding around everywhere but it seems like my arm is almost sticking to the guitar body.

If you all enjoyed the greatness that PG brought on the last stream, get ready for some more!

The second episode of Parental Guidance with Papa Gates will be June 21st at 4pm CT/7pm EDT/ 1am CET for all legends!

We shall see y'all very soon!

And here comes round #2 with Papa Gates!

- Rad

Hi I'm on the caged system lessons and papa gates taught the d major scale and major pentatonic scale positions in those lessons so how do i use caged system to find other scales on the fretboard?

Thanks to all who watched! So fun to dig deep into subjects and show how to actually apply all this stuff. Great questions, too!
Such a fun hang. See you next time!

Hello everyone!

We are less than a week away from the second dual stream. I know for a fact that both Papa Gates and Syn are ready.

But the question is…. ARE YOU READY?

Really excited for this one. We always thrive to up ourselves and do better every time and so we’re ready to bring it to you.

It will be live on SynTv exclusively on Tuesday June 7th 2022 9h30 (PST)/ 12h30 (EDT)/ 18h30 (CET) for Legend+ Only!

Syn/PG Dual stream #2

- Rad

Hey syn. This is completely out of left field but have you ever thought of trying to go on the Joe Rogan Experience? It was just a random thought but it would be a good way to promote this site and the NFT stuff you guys are doing and whatever else. It's completely random I know and maybe overstepping my bounds alittle bit. You may not even read this but I thought I'd mention it.

I am learning sweep picking. I am doing pretty well in downstrokes but I suck at the upstrokes. It isn't getting better. What should I do?

Today marks a year since I joined Synner on my old account. When I first joined Synner, I had no idea what I was doing and I had just started playing guitar. I was doing school remote and since the classes were shorter I would spend the rest of my day practicing lessons from here. When summer came around, I had even more time to practiced and eventually started a band with my best friend and its brought us closer than ever. I never knew that within a year I would be capable of growing so much as a musician. It's even been able to bring me and my dad closer since i can teach him things from here than he didnt learn when he started playing. To anyone starting out on this site or has a lack of motivation: hang in there! You may not notice it but the more you practice, the more you grow as a musician, even if you don't see it in the moment

Hey guys, over the past few weeks I decided to take on the paradigm riff and so far its going okay but there is one main issue and that is how I am fretting the notes. Due to starting positioning having both the 5th fret on the C# string and the G# string I barred them however I think my technique is way off as i end up barring the two strings as if I am barring them all (using the whoe finger instard of the fleshy side of the finger tip).

This is causing all my other fingers which dont need to bar to lay flat across the frets as i am doing the descending chromatic which is reducing the accuracy pf my fretting in those fast moments.

Does anyone have advice for finger independence to help eliminate unnecessary barring?

Another smaller issue I had is loosing the sextuplet rhythm as the speed increases as i begin to focus more on making sure my picking is accurate and up to speed, is this more of a metronome issue or are there other ways of keeping track of it like emphasising the start of each grouping?

Vid on the fingering issue will go online tomorrow

cheers
Slim

Hello everyone!

Those who were on the stream yesterday got to know a bit in advance but now it's time for everyone to know: YOU CAN NOW BOOK A LESSON WITH PAPA GATES!!!

You can either book a 1 on 1 lesson
OR
A group lesson!

These lessons are limited so book yours soon to start learning from the legend himself and recieve the wisdom and knowledge that comes from YEARS of experience!

Simply follow the link below:

Have a great day!!

- Rad

Hey Syn and Papa Gates, I am in Huntington Beach for the next week and a half for NAMM and vacation, and I would love to talk guitar and music with you guys and buy you a beer or a shot of Ardbeg.
If you have time, let me know. I’ll meet you at Johnnys!
Forgive me if I’m overstepping, but you don’t know if you don’t ask!

So in one of the recent livestreams, I mentioned that I was about to celebrate my 20th wedding anniversary with my wife, Lisa. I also mentioned that I had made a compilation video slideshow of those 20 years, and some asked to see it. Certainly not mandatory or especially exciting viewing, but if you want to understand more about me personally and why a couple of you think I'm not half bad for an old guy, this is a good starter. There's even some guitars in there and a couple pics with Syn from 2019, cuz that was part of our vacation that summer.

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We've done a bit of travel. The kids are now 28, 25, and 16. If you have any questions or comments, happy to hear 'em. Unless it's about how I've "grown" over the years. Y'all can keep that to yourself - I know .

Hey guys - recently put heavier gauge strings in my SGS Custom-S than the factory standard, which is resulting in string buzzing even with action set relatively high. I think this will require a truss rod adjustment, but am struggling to get it right. It seems like I can eliminate buzzing from the high e string with low action, but still have a lot of buzzing on the low e string with significantly higher action. Any good guides out there or thoughts on how to set up the truss rod and action perfectly? I am using Ernie Ball Skinny Top Heavy Bottom strings.