Free Resources
Student Albums
Congratulations to all the students who contributed to the CD! It features a wide variety of instrumental & vocalized originals and covers across many styles and genres.
Volume 1 – Click here to listen!
Student Recital
This summer and fall we had a rockin’ student recital and student party in a safe way!
Student Recital – before COVID
And here’s what one was like before the pandemic struck.
“20 Years of Guitar Teaching Wisdom That You Can Use Right Now”
Click here for a complimentary 90-minute audio program through which you’ll be able to assess your strengths and weaknesses as a guitarist in the areas of harmony, rhythm, melody, technique, theory & much more.
It’s relevant to all styles & levels (as beginner, intermediate and advanced level players are addressed separately for each topic). You can download or stream the files.
This unique product that cannot be bought on the market is being given away to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Dennis Winge’s teaching guitar professionally. Dennis is the head teacher at Guitar Lessons Ithaca.
Free Master Class Videos
As a public service to the Ithaca community, Guitar Lessons Ithaca did a weekly master class series for guitarists of all ages in early 2021. Here are instructional topics and video links:
The 4 Ingredients of Improvisation
Building Up Your Chord Vocabulary, part 1
Building Up Your Chord Vocabulary, part 2
Improve Your Sense of Rhythm, part 1
Videos on Learning Various Styles
Scroll to the level or style that you are interested in below.
Rock Guitarists:
This video explains how “implementation” and “integration” are central to our teaching philosophy. Implementation means how to use what you learn; integration is how to use what you learn in conjunction with all the other things you know. Using hammer-ons and pull-offs as an example, rock guitarists can be show how to immediately start using this technique, as well as join it up with a technique such as double-stops.
Acoustic Guitarists:
This video uses the examples of acoustic guitar concepts of fingerstyle and barre chords to show that the process of breaking down what could be complicated and breaking them down into simple, doable steps.
Blues Guitarists:
A lot of people come to the school with “information overload.” The job of a teacher shouldn’t just be delivering information. A great guitar teacher should be not only a teacher, but also a coach, trainer, and mentor. For blues guitarists, this video uses the example of a blues lick and applies it to different keys, tempos and grooves.
Jazz Guitarists:
For jazz guitarists, there are many ways to simplify your thinking so that you can really learn to be creative instead of getting bogged down with chords changes. This video uses this “boiling down” concept as an example to explain the ‘integration’ and ‘implementation’ philosophy that is at the core of our teaching methods.
Funk Guitarists:
Funk is making a comeback among younger guitarists (or maybe its popularity never waned in the first place). But strumming funky rhythms is a task that must be broken down into easy, doable steps. Having a teacher makes the goal of strumming your favorite tunes like this one (“Get Lucky” by Daft Punk) way easier.