ROOTS RAGS & BLUES - TIM SPARKS
Anticipated Release Date: February/March 2007
Produced by: Acoustic Guitar Workshop

The collection of tunes on ROOTS RAGS & BLUES finds Sparks returning to his own roots, the music he learned growing up in rural North Carolina.

It was a world of tobacco fields, fire-breathing itinerant preachers, cornbread and collard greens, bluegrass and barbecue, moonshine on Saturday night and rapturous gospel singing on Sunday morning...and the country blues that seemed to come right up from the earth, out of the sun-baked, red clay Piedmont bottom land.

Tim Sparks plays and explains new and original versions of three classic fingerstyle standards: Willie Brown's Mississippi Blues, Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag and The Victory Rag, made famous by Mother Maybelle Carter. In addition, he does a country gospel workout on Amazing Grace, shows some New Orleans style on the Original Jelly Roll Blues and finishes with a Klezmer classic recorded in the 1920's, Tanst Yiddlekh.

Click forward arrow to launch Flash video

ROOTS RAGS & BLUES features interactive video
Everything is presented using a fast-learning, cognitive approach featuring interactive video which shows both picking and fretting hand simultaneously.

See how Tim breaks a tune down into easy to understand bite-size chunks. The Flash video on the left is Tim's intro to the program. To check out just 1 of over 200 video lessons, click here. This video shows Tim demonstrating his fantastic arrangement of Mississippi Blues

Interactive Tablature
ROOTS RAGS & BLUES boasts two tablature systems that show both tab and standard notation:

PDF TABLATURE: this is high quality professionally engraved music that is ideal for printing out. See the image on the left or to download a sample see the download panel below.

POWERTAB: this is midi-based tab that you can hear as well as see. What's more, you can slow and speed up the tempo down, without losing pitch. This makes Powertab a fantastic learning tool. Free Powertab software is included with the program.

Extra Bonus Features
Apart from detailed instruction on the 6 tunes, ROOTS RAGS & BLUES also features a bonus CD of video footage featuring Tim Sparks playing a whole bunch of great rootsy and ragtime fingerstyle. Plus a bonus audio CD of all this tunes for your listening and learning pleasure. Listen now...

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