9. What to buy

Very often guitar players ask which product they should purchase, where to start. Obviously that depends on what you are looking for, and what your background and skill level is. Here are some guidelines to choose the right products.

First off: if you want lessons with audio examples, backing tracks very extensive TABS/notation, with some supporting videos and fretboard videos, you should go for the The Jazz Guitar Exercises and/or the Refills. It contains supporting videos as well, but video is not the main content.

If you want mainly full video lessons, there is Talking Jazz Guitar, Private Sessions, Blues Forms. Talking Jazz Guitar and Blues Forms are now on the Podia online course platform.
A new course on Podia is the basic course Jazz Guitar The Basics, with video and TABS/nptation.

For all products you need basic guitar skills, these are not ''how-to-play guitar'' courses. 

If you want an introduction to (jazz) linear improvisation, the Jazz Exercises package is your best bet. It starts with basic principles of building licks and phrases, and works up to soloing over chord changes. It has extensive notation and tabs, backing tracks, and a fretboard display, plus an e-book where everything is explained. By the way, the Jazz Exercises are also very useful if you already know improvisation principles, but you need some inspiration and ideas to play better solos. If you don't read notation or TABS at all, you can use the fretboard display / fretboard video.

If you have a basic improvisation skill, but want to learn from advanced soloing examples, the Smooth Jazz Refill and All Jazz Refill are the best choices. They are also great as a follow-up of the Jazz Exercises. They contain full and mature jazz solos, fully notated/and tabbed with backing tracks and explanations. Some solos are quite advanced, so be ready to work, if you want to play them! But, you will learn a lot from playing them and reading about how they are constructed. Also just listening to the solos, and picking out some ideas that you like, will help you along with your musical vocabulary.

So, the stuff above is for studying from notation/TABS, and fret board display, and some supporting video. The stuff below is primarily video, also with fretboard display video, but not with TABS.

If you are a true beginner in jazz, and don't know (many) scales or jazz chords, go for Jazz Guitar - The Basics .

If you want a little bit of everything, playing real jazz with full instrumental backing, and you want something just to watch and listen to (not much reading), then the online course Talking Jazz Guitar would be good. It contains extensive video lessons based on full (original) jazz tunes: you learn to play the melodies, the chords, how to solo over them, how to comp, etc. Fretboard videos are integrated in the video lessons.

If you are looking for video lessons, with some jazz standards, chords, theory and practice, tips, examples, etc, the DVD Private Sessions gives you nearly 4 hours of instruction, recorded in a very informal way, and covering a wide range of topics. Very accessible and informative for aspiring jazz players.

If you are looking for a book with jazz standards for solo (chord melody) playing, the book Solo Jazz Guitar Standards is the thing for you. This is not a tutorial book per se, but a book with great and extensive arrangements to perform solo. This book is popular among both jazz and classical guitarists: jazz guitarists like the rich jazz harmonies, classical guitarists like the subtlety of the arrangements,  which sound great on nylon string guitar. 

If you want to play blues, and understand how blues is played by jazz players, the Blues Forms for Jazz Guitar is the ticket: An extensive set of video lessons based around 11 different blues tracks, from basic 3-chord blues to advanced jazz blues.