13 Reasons Why Although I haven’t watched 13 Reasons Why — all of my teenage guitar students are talking about it, and it keeps popping up in my social news feeds. I figured if THIS MANY people are interested, I should probably check out the music. The […]

Opening If you’ve been a reading my blog for any length of time, it’s not hard to figure out that I’m a Gustavo Santaolalla superfan. It all started with the Brokeback Mountain score: acoustic guitar, empty space, minimalism. I had never heard anything like it.  […]

I Kill Giants I haven’t seen the movie yet, but the music by composer, Laurent Perez Del Mar, really resonated with me. Specifically the title theme, I Kill Giants. What beautiful piece of music. I lengthened the title theme, and added little ending riff. Lately, I’ve […]

Smile Into Eyes Free MP3 Download on SoundCloud. I wrote this song while thinking about my son (who’s 3 at the moment). I get to work early each morning on my YouTube channel and blog, so I’ll have enough time to play with him for […]

Starry Night Very rarely do I pick up the guitar and gain inspiration out of thin air. I need an image or thought (unrelated to music) to jump start my creativity. Sometimes, while I’m researching content for this blog, I’ll watch a movie trailer (on […]

The Disaster Artist The Disaster Artist is the true-story of aspiring filmmaker and odd-ball Hollywood outsider Tommy Wiseau (James Franco). Wiseau directed, and is the principle actor in, The Room. Known as a true disasterpiece, The Room, became a cult classic film, where the acting […]

Lady Bird The Lady Bird soundtrack is from multi-instrumentalist composer Jon Brion. Brion’s niche is in creating “unsentimental” scores that fit hand in glove with indie drama/comedies. The music bounces along — like a Beatles song without vocals — never interfering with the scene. Contrast […]

The First Noel I love Christmas and holiday music. For The First Noel I wanted to reimagine it in the vibe of Jeff Buckley’s Hallelujah. I capoed the 5th fret as Buckley does, and I also added a few other parts — an intro and […]

Billie Eilish Billie Eilish is a 16 year-old Los Angeles based singer/songwriter. Her older brother, Finneas O’Connell, is Billie’s songwriting partner and producer. Her song, ocean eyes, is just beginning to hit with my young guitar students. I’ve taught this song a dozen times already […]

Kiss I’m still luxuriating in Benjamin Wallfisch’s score for IT. I have several of these pieces that I’d like to arrange for guitar — so stay tuned. ‘Kiss’ is a very short little tune that I felt would be perfect for beginner guitar players. It’s […]

“The wonderful thing about the creative process is that it connects you with an energy drive beyond the world. It allows you to go beyond time and space. This creative step is a place of enlightenment, of maximum energy where all notion of space and […]

Awaken With Awaken, I just kept it simple, and followed the melody in my head. The reason for the title, is that I was taking an afternoon nap with my 2 year-old son, and literally dreamed the melody. I awoke, and ran to my office […]