Jamorama – Review
Reviewed By Shawn Bradshaw (Cyberfret.com)
rated (3 out of 5)

Jamorama

Jamorama is a guitar course that is offered in 2 formats. Format one is a downloadable multimedia learning kit (both Mac and PC), and form two is physical printed books and DVDs. The download version is substantially less money and contains the same material. This review will cover the download version. You can upgrade to the physical version later if you decide you would rather have the books and DVDs.

Download and Installation

First a word about how this product is delivered via download. After making your purchase you will login to a members area on the Jamorama site. There are some different subsections including extra articles, support, a forum, and the download area for the main materials. You will start by downloading the main installation program, which is about 30MB. This initial installation loads a download and viewing management program, and the 1st lesson from book 1. You can then download individual lessons one at a time, or any number of them at once. This is a nice feature for slower connections since the entire kit is over 400MB.

About The Author

Jamorama is written by Ben Edwards. Ben is the former lead guitarist for the band "DegreesK", who he toured with all over the world. Ben also has a degree in Education.

Product Format

The main Jamorama course is made up of two multimedia ebooks in pdf format. Viewing of the material is done via special viewing software rather than with the Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is normally used to view pdf files. This viewer gives some additional functions such as interacting with video and audio files. There is also the option of downloading the books in two standard pdf files that can be viewed with Acrobat reader. You can also download all of the video and audio files separately.

The two books are called “Beginners” and “Advanced”. The “Beginners” book is broken down into 16 lessons (92 pages), and the “Advanced” book is broken down into 29 chapters (151 pages)

Book One – Beginners

The first book covers the basics of both music and the guitar. You will learn the parts of the guitar, how to hold the instrument, hand position, and a lot of fundamental concepts and music terms. While the basics of reading standard music notation is taught, it is very limited. The notes of each string are introduced, with tablature and standard notations. But most of the exercises are exclusively written in tablature format (lines and numbers to indicate where you put your fingers)

Throughout the book there are extra tips on gear, practice and motivation, good technique and more.

Book Two – Advanced

The second book picks up where book one left off and covers some more advanced chords and strumming patterns.  Rhythms like 16th notes and triplets are also explained. There is some music theory taught, but only some very basic concepts. The main focus of both books is chords and strumming patterns.

Bonus Material

In addition to the basic course, there are some extra features that are part of the Jamorama learning kit. There are 2 additional ebooks, and 4 software programs. The 2 ebooks are “Advanced Learning Techniques For Guitar”, and “How To Tune Your Guitar”.

The 4 added software programs are as follows.

Jamorama Metronome – This is a nice software metronome that has the look of an old fashion wind up model.

GuitEarIt! - Ear Training Game – This is a useful tool for ear training.

Jayde Musica Pro – This is basically a game where you have to name notes in standard notation as they appear on the screen. It is a great tool for learning the names of the notes on the staff.

Guitar Tuner Pro – This is not a software electronic tuner, but a gives reference notes that you can use to tune your guitar. Besides standard tuning, there are some alternate tunings, and even reference notes for a 7 string guitar.

The Downside

This guitar course is promoted as the “Ultimate Guitar Learning Kit”. And while it offers good instruction in the areas that it does cover, it is far from the comprehensive course that the sales page indicates.

I wish the sales page for Jamorama would concentrate on what this course is, rather than pumping it up as something that it is not. What it does, it does well. But it just does not do a lot of what is advertised. And unfortunately I have read a lot of reviews for Jamorama that just repeat these features that are not part of the course.

Keep this in mind as you look at the sales page. The video demonstrations you see are not part of the course.  Jamorama does not include videos of the instructor teaching you different techniques or chords. The videos that do come with the course are just short demonstrations of various chords and strum patterns. There is no explanation in the videos themselves. They are professionally shot, multi camera videos with animated notation. And they do add great value to the printed material. But I think “148 step-by-step video lessons” can be misleading if you are expecting video instruction like you might see on a DVD.

This is a quote from the sales page; “Jamorama offers thorough and comprehensive theory lessons.” Unfortunately this is another statement that is not quite true. The course covers a few basics of music theory, but what is covered is very limited. So don’t buy this thinking that you are going to get a “comprehensive” guide to music theory. It isn’t.

Here is another quote: “I teach guitar fluency and teach you how to use your ear to bring you to the stage where you can play virtually any guitar song that you hear. I use well known songs to guide your learning right from the start!” This course does not offer any step by step instruction on how to learn songs by ear. There is ear training software included, but it is not part of the instruction. 

This course also does not use well known songs. The course consists of original tunes and chord progression to teach the material. And they work well, just don’t think that you are going to be learning “well known” songs in the course….you aren’t. And that is OK. So that statement is misleading. There are a handful of folk songs in text tablature format in the members section of the Jamorama site.

This course does not cover basic guitar techniques like hammer-ons and pull-offs and vibrato, even though the sales page specifically lists those as skills you will learn.  There is a course called “Jamorama Lead Guitar” from the same author that does teach these techniques, but that is a separate course.

The scales that are in this course are very limited. Mostly involving the notes in the first 4 frets and using open strings.

The Bottom Line

This is a good course for learning some guitar fundamentals, and many very common chord shapes and strums. It is a very professionally put together product with great graphics and presentation. But there are some missing pieces, and some of the claims on the sales page are just not accurate as explained in the downside part of this review. It is fairly inexpensive for the download version of the course, and the bonus software like the metronome and ear training software add great value.

Some of the missing pieces in Jamorama can be found in a product from the same author called “Jamorama Lead Guitar”. When you purchase Jamorama, you will be given the option to buy that course at a discounted rate if purchaced at the same time.

I give Jamorama 3 out of 5 starts. While there is some good material here, there are also some holes. There is also some advertised features that are just not part of the course. There is a 60 day money back guarantee on the course. So if you do buy it and decide it is not for you, there is no loss. The company that handles the order processing is very reputable, so you will have no problems receiving a refund if that is your choice.

Get Some Free Stuff

If you go to the main Jamorama website, about 1/4 of the way down the page is a form where you can sign up for 6 free lessons from the course. At the very least I would recommend checking these out. You will get to see the format of the course material.

Find more info on the Jamorama website