One Hour Method – How Did it All Start
Even in childhood Reijo Hiltunen hated learning by rote. He wanted to understand the logic behind various things, then learning became easier. He was a real pain to his parents.
The same thing with music. Hiltunen loved the Beatles, and when he got interested in doing chord melody style arrangements for guitar, the sheet notes with standard chord grids turned out to be insufficient. It became clear that the only way to really master chords was to understand them. Without understanding, chords remain “dots on diagrams” forever and playing stays at “monkey see, monkey do” level.
He also fell in love with Brazilian guitar. He learned to play “One Note Samba”, “Desafinado”, “Samba de Orfeu” etc. Of course he had to learn by rote a lot. He also made own arrangements with exotic sounding chords which he had no idea how to call them. That really began to bother him. To understand the logic behind chords, he started studying. He even saw a book with a cover telling that the book had 40 000 chords in it, but he never understood what the point of trying to memorize even a fraction of all those chords was.
He realized, that mastering chords on guitar couldn´t be all about good memory, and there had to be an easier way to learn than traditional music education. Some magic that anybody could use.
”One weekend I took a train to visit my parents. I had a pile of theory books with me. I started sketching the intervals on the fretboard. In the middle of the three hour journey it stroke me like a lightning. I realized that instead of 12 different matrixes I was expecting, one for each root note, just one matrix was needed. The rest of the journey went in a dream finishing the sketch and by the end of the trip the skeleton of my book ”Only Complete” was ready.” (Actually in one hour)
The book sold incredibly well in Finland and got praising reviews in international guitar magazines. Thousands of guitarists have benefitted from that ingenious consept of really understanding chords, instead of merely playing some grips you´re told to.
The introduction of mobile devices, like iPad, ignited a brand new fire. What if the book could be interpreted into an app that would be more simple to use than reading a book!
Now, that the app is reality, it makes learning guitar a whole new ball game! It´s easy, fast, thrilling and FUN!
The most pleasing part for us as developers of the OneHourMethod app is, that in the times of googling and all the music around you, anybody with an iOS device, regardless of race, nationality, geography or genre of interest, can play the instrument we all love. We´re proud to introduce you the app that teaches you how to form ALL the guitar chords. And that in less than one hour, plus a lifelong experience of digging deeper into the music you love, with our app. One Hour Method gives you THE Swiss Army knife for guitar chords, for a few dollars, thanks to the digital revolution and Mr Hiltunen.
