Free guitar PDFs on modes, pentatonics, chords, and improvisation.
Systems you can actually use, not chord charts to play through once. Each one gives you a specific way of thinking about the fretboard, so you understand why something works rather than just what to play. Every PDF here is pay what you want with a minimum of zero, so you can take the lot without paying anything.
Your solos live in one box
Start with the Horizontal Soloing System — one sequence that runs the whole neck instead of five positions.
Get it freeModes have never made sense
Modes for People in a Hurry gets you playing them today and explains the theory afterwards.
Get it freeYou practise but don’t improve
The Practice Journal is the one below — logs, tempo tracking and a review every four weeks.
Get it freeThe Guitar Practice Journal
An actual system for practising — weekly logs, tempo tracking, a repertoire tracker, ear training, and a review every four weeks. Works alongside any guitar book you own.
Scales & the fretboard
4 PDFsModes for People in a Hurry
The quickest, most direct way to explain modes on guitar so you can start practising and using them right away.
Get this free PDFHorizontal Soloing System
A simple sequence that unlocks the modes of the major scale, then applies the same logic to harmonic and melodic minor.
Get this free PDF3NPS Scales
The three-notes-per-string system revamped into an efficient way to learn a wide variety of scales all over the fretboard.
Get this free PDFMelodic Minor Scale
Focused less on theory, more on getting the scale onto the fretboard first — the theory comes after you can already play it.
Get this free PDFImprovisation & soloing
5 PDFsPentatonic Substitution
Not more scales — more places to put the one you already have. A rule that finds six chords for any pentatonic shape by looking at your hand, with thirty diagrams.
Get this free PDFPentatonic Chord Tone Soloing
A system for soloing over simple and complex chord changes from day one, using the pentatonic scales you probably already know.
Get this free PDFThe Pentatonics Handbook
Over ten in-depth lessons deepening your understanding of pentatonic scales and the many ways they can be used.
Get this free PDFChord Tone Soloing Course
Chord tone soloing is uniquely difficult on guitar — this course fills the gaps most players have by the time they get here.
Get this free PDFDiatonic Arpeggios You Can Really Use
Stop drilling patterns you’ll never use. Pull every diatonic arpeggio straight out of scales you already know, then solo with them over the changes.
Get this free PDFChords
3 PDFsThe Note on Top
Three triad shapes per chord on the top three strings, filed by the note on top — the one a listener actually hears. All twelve keys.
Get this free PDFThe Blues Chord Book
The chords that make a blues sound like the blues — 9ths, 13ths, the Hendrix 7#9, sixths and half-diminished — open and moveable.
Get this free PDF184 Open Chords
Chords unique to the guitar’s open strings — useful if you’re after a more individual voicing anywhere on the neck.
Get this free PDFA few things worth knowing
FAQAre these guitar PDFs actually free?
Yes. The download page has a price box and the minimum is zero — type nothing and the file is yours. Nothing is held back for a paid version, nothing expires, and there’s no trial period.
So why is there a price box at all?
Because some people want to pay for something they got real use out of, and I’d rather let them than pretend the option isn’t there. Anything that comes in pays for making the next one. There’s no bonus for paying, the file is identical either way, and there’s no reminder if you don’t.
Do I need to give my email to download them?
Yes. Each PDF comes through Payhip and you enter your email at checkout, with the price left at zero if that’s what you want. That gets you the PDF and adds you to my list, where I send a handful of emails over the following fortnight and then go quiet.
What skill level are these for?
Mostly intermediate players who already know basic chords and scales and want to understand how to actually use them. A few, like the open chords collection, are useful at any level.
Do they work together, or should I pick one?
They’re built to work together and many reference the same underlying ideas. Start with whatever matches what you’re working on right now.
Is there more structured material if I want to go deeper?
Yes — my books cover the same systems in much more depth, with full practice routines and fretboard-wide application.
More structured guitar study
If the PDFs are useful, the books go deeper into scales, improvisation, fretboard systems and practice methods — in Kindle, paperback and PDF.
Browse the books →Free browser tools
A drone in any key, random note cells to improvise on, and a chord builder that shows the structure across the whole neck. No sign-up.
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