John McCarthy (guitarist)

John McCarthy began providing music lessons at the age of 15 and created the first complete rock guitar instruction series on video in 1986. In 2000, John designed the Rock House Method accelerated learning system that combined instruction in video and book form with an on-line support system. In 2001 John began the mission to take "The Rock House Method" to masses.

John currently has authored over 60 instructional method books, 58 instructional DVDs and 1 instructional DVD rom. John designed and developed a Disney Learn Guitar method featuring the songs of Hannah Montana and High School Musical released in 2009 on DVD-ROM. In addition to his own instructional books and programs John has worked with many of the greatest musicians in the world creating personal instruction programs featuring the Rock House Method, Alexi Laiho, Alex Skolnick, Kiko Loureiro, Jeff Loomis, Bernie Worrell, Oli Herbert, Michael Paget, Rusty Cooley, Dan Jacobs, Rob Arnold, Doug Wimbish, Leo Nocentelli and Dave Ellefson are some of the collaborating artists.

John owns and has been running the Rock House School of Music currently with two locations, West Haven and Wallingford CT. Rock House School of Music is a full service music school offering instruction for guitar, bass, piano, drums, singing and ukulele. In March 2019 the school won the CTNOW award for "Best Place to Take Music Lessons in CT" they also won previously in 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018. The school also won first place for the Readers' Choice Award's "Best Music Instruction" in 2020 and 2021.

John began playing guitar at the age of 6 inspired by listening to the vast album collection of his older brother and sisters and states this as the reason he has a wide range of music genres in his vocabulary. When John turned 8 he already had a band playing local camps and parties and at 15 was playing across the tri-state area in clubs. At 15 John opened his first music school called Rock House School of Music. He stayed motivated to further his music studies learning to play Piano, drums, bass guitar, ukulele and sing.

In 2006 John recorded his first solo release "Drive" a full length guitar centered instrumental album. Doug Wimbish of Living Colour fame produced and played bass on the album. Other players on the album include Will Calhoun (Living Colour) on drums, Bernie Worrell (P-Funk and Talking Heads) on keyboards, Leo Nocentelli (The Meters) on guitar, and Jordan Gengreco on keyboards.

In 2020 John McCarthy was awarded a patent for his revolutionary new way to read piano music called KeyTab.

Every once in a while, a new invention emerges that changes the way people learn. For guitar, bass guitar and all stringed instruments it was “Tablature.” Tablature didn’t eliminate the need for standard music notation reading but it enhanced the learning process helping players learn quickly and more effective. In the same fashion as tablature John McCathy created “KeyTab” to help piano players learn chords, progressions and complete songs quickly while getting the feel for the instrument in a positive manner.

McCarthy was awarded a US Patent in March of 2020 for this unique way to learn piano. The KeyTab system comes with a “KeyTab Note Strip”, on this strip every note is labeled and each octave is color coded. The note strip fits perfectly behind the keys on any piano or electronic keyboard. You simply line up the black keys and you are ready to rock.

KeyTab is a great way for a casual piano player to learn to play songs quickly. McCarthy explains: “There are so many people that have a piano in their home but never learn to play it. With KeyTab you can learn songs quickly and easily. Many people want to play piano but don’t want to be a classical player or take years to go through piano methods. KeyTab is a perfect solution to help people wipe the dust off the piano keys and start learning songs.”

Rock House Method plan to have the first Piano KeyTab Songbook ready to release by January 2022. This book will include 30 popular hit songs and the KeyTab Note Strip. People will also be able to access full videos that walk players through each song.

John McCarthy continues to write instructional books for his Rock House Method brand. The Rock House School of Music is expanding and adding locations and John McCarthy plans to franchise his award-winning schools around the world. John McCarthy launched an interactive online learning platform called Rock House U. RockHouseU.com is an interactive learning platform that contains video, audio, text and graphic images along with interactive learning tools to make a complete learning system geared for the future.

• "Rock House Instructor Profile". Archived from the original on 9 August 2009.
• "Rock House Method".
• "SX Guitars Spain".
• "Guitar Center".
• "Musicians Friend".