Resources

14 Free Full Length "Hot Licks" Instructional Guitar Videos Online

Jesse Paliotto

Jan 11, 2015 • 2 min read

Update: It looks like "Music Sales" company has asserted copyright on all these videos and blocked them from YouTube. So if you're interested in the old Hot Licks series of guitar instruction videos, I would suggest searching YouTube or clicking the Amazon.com links to view the original DVDs. Fresh uploads are bound to be posted sooner or later.

Remember the 80’s? No, well how about the 90’s? Still no? Well, learning guitar back then was different. No tablature websites, no ‘how to’ videos online, and no Skype lessons. You had to get lessons one-on-one at the local music store. And if you wanted to learn a song, you played it over and over again from cassette tape (or later CD’s) and strained to hear what they were doing. If you were like most guitar students, you also probably watched instructional videos on VHS to learn from the great players.

The "Hot Licks" series of instructional videos by Arlen Roth were the most popular of these video series. Great rock, jazz, and country guitar players would record an hour or more of lessons, describing how they played their ‘licks’.

Cruising through YouTube recently, I realized that a lot of these 80’s and 90’s instructional videos have been uploaded to the 21st century. You can find full length versions of Hot Licks videos from guys like Eric Johnson, Joe Pass, and Buddy Guy.

Here are 14 videos from the past that can still teach you a thing or two… or at least give you some nostalgia.