A guitar lesson is a long face to face conversation. Most of the time, that works out fine for everyone involved, but once in awhile, it's too weird to handle. This video is a prime example. I was so uncomfortable making eye contact with Aaron Gilmartin I was unable to make it very far past the ten minute mark here.
How did this happen? It doesn't help that he opened up the video by singing. Things get worse when it turns out to be a vaguely "Bossa Nova" song in English with mindlessly antiseptic Hallmark lyrics. Really, though, the biggest problem was Aaron Gilmartin's eyes. I don't know the man beyond this digital artifact, but I am convinced he is tormented by serious psychological demons which constantly scream in silence from his baby blue eyes. However, let's look past that -- even though I personally could not.
Despite what I've just said, Gilmartin is a relaxed and fast-paced teacher who makes pains to craft a lesson for beginners. He spends a lot of time taking the chord shapes new players are familiar with, thanks to their godawful power-chord radio crap taste in music, and translating those cliches into Bossa Nova concepts. He also offers a solid but inaccurate introduction to the song formats and conventions of the form. I would venture that learning it vaguely wrong is not necessarily bad as an introduction -- more advanced lessons from more experienced teachers will set you right, should you choose to pursue Bossa Nova as an artform.
You'd be insane not to.
For more advanced players -- those with exotic chord experience and familiarity with the genre of Bossa Nova -- this is not worth your time.
VERDICT: 3/10 Beginners who have never done psychedelic drugs and demonstrate no latent psychic abilities should be able to get a perfectly good guitar lesson out of this. Otherwise, abandon all hope.
