8/12/2019 Guitar Licks Jazz http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/guitar-licks-jazz 1/117 Guitar Licks: Wes Montgomery Montgomery The next great guitarist to stand up after Charlie Christian was Wes Montgomery . It took him a long time to become famous, but during the last years of his life he had great commercial success. It's the release of the album The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery in 1960 that made him famous in the jazz world. Unfortunately he died of a heart attack at the height of his success, only 43 years old. Wes Montgomery's trademarks are picking with his thumb rather then with a pick (he actually did up and down strokes with his thumbs) and his use of octaves . His influence can still be heard today in many players. Jazz guitarists like George Benson , Pat Metheny and Emily Remler say to be influenced by Wes Montgomery. Recommended listening : Smokin' at the Half Note (live) Related Wes Montgomery article : Wes Montgomery's Guitar Gear II V I Licks 1) The first lick starts with a series of arpeggio's. The first 4 notes make a Dm7 arpeggio, followed by a Cmaj7 arpeggio, then again a Dm7. The Cmaj7 arpeggio in the first bar contains all the tensions of Dm7 plus the b7 : C(b7), E(9), G(11), B(6). The Last bar is build around a C triad arpeggio.
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The next great guitarist to stand up after Charlie Christian was Wes Montgomery .It took him a long time to become famous, but during the last years of his life hehad great commercial success. It's the release of the album The Incredible JazzGuitar of Wes Montgomery in 1960 that made him famous in the jazz world.Unfortunately he died of a heart attack at the height of his success, only 43 yearsold.
Wes Montgomery's trademarks are picking with his thumb rather then with a pick(he actually did up and down strokes with his thumbs) and his use of octaves .
His influence can still be heard today in many players. Jazz guitarists like GeorgeBenson , Pat Metheny and Emily Remler say to be influenced by Wes Montgomery.
Recommended listening : Smokin' at the Half Note (live) Related Wes Montgomery article : Wes Montgomery's Guitar Gear
II V I Licks
1) The first lick starts with a series of arpeggio's. The first 4 notes make a Dm7arpeggio, followed by a Cmaj7 arpeggio, then again a Dm7. The Cmaj7 arpeggio inthe first bar contains all the tensions of Dm7 plus the b7 : C(b7), E(9), G(11), B(6).The Last bar is build around a C triad arpeggio.
Bebop guitarist Tal Farlow didn't pick up a guitar until he was 21 and it took himonly a year to play professionally. From 1949 to 1953 he played with the Red
Norvo Trio , and he got famous in the jazz world of that time.
In 1953 Tal Farlow started his own band, but by 1958 he dropped of the scene .He moved to New Jersey , only played locally and made one recording as a leaderin the period between 1960-1975. He stopped regularly touring in the early 1970's.He made a living (in semi-retirement as a jazz performer) as a sign-painter.
In the last ten years or so of his life he was still going here and there in the US andto Europe every summer for the occasional performance. From 1976 to 1984 he
recorded 8 records for Concorde, before disappearing from the scene again.
Tal Farlow died in 1998
Recommended listening : The Swinging Guitar of Tal Farlow
II V I Licks
This first lick in the style of Tal Farlow uses a number of chromatic notes tooutline the ii-V-I underlying chord changes. Tal loved to use chromatic notes in his
lines, so working out phrases such as this will go a long way when working Tal ssound into your lines and solos.
In bar 1, you see the G-Gb-F-E grouping which comes from the G Bebop scale,
anticipating that chord by two beats before it arrives in the second bar. There is a Bdim7 arpeggio in bar 2, B-D-F-Ab, outlining a G7b9 sound, leading to
another set of chromatic notes from Ab to E, the 3rd of Cmaj7.
Listen & Play
00:00 / 00:00
Some things to notice in this ii V I lick:
This phrase uses the Melodic Minor sound over Dm7, by playing an Fmaj7#5
arpeggio (F-A-C#-E) over Dm7.
There is a nice chromatic approach to the 3rd of G7 at the start of the second bar (A-
A#-B) which uses chromaticism to lead the listener to the chord that is coming next. Lastly, there is a G Altered Scale (7th mode of Melodic Minor) being used to create
tension over G7 that is later resolved to the Cmaj7 chord in bar 3 of the lick.
the C#-D motion in the last part of the phrase. Both of these ideas, Enclosures andMelodic Minor over tonic minor chords, were commonly used by Tal and are funitems to explore.
In this minor ii-V-i phrase, you can see:
An Am7 arpeggio being used to outline the A7alt chord, as the note C produces a
7#9 sound over that chord.
As well, there is a 3 to 9 arpeggio over the Dm7 chord, F A C E, which
superimposed an Fmaj7 arpeggio over Dm7 to highlight the 9th of that chord.
Arpeggios were a big part of Tal s soloing ideas, especially shapes such as these
where you use two different shapes, Am-Fmaj7, to outline the underlying chords,
Gypsy jazz guitarist Stochelo Rosenberg is the lead guitarist of the Rosenberg
Trio . He started playing guitar when he was 10 and was taught by his father anduncle. Stochelo formed a band with his cousins and won several contests when hewas young.
Stochelo's musical hero is of course Django Reinhardt and his favorite compositionto play is Nuages .
Stochelo plays on a Selmer guitar , a typical guitar for gypsy jazz . The serialnumber of his guitar is 504. Django Reinhardt played the same model of guitar
with serial number 503.He received a golden guitar from the magazine Guitarist in1992.
Recommended listening : Live at the North Sea Jazz Festival
Major Lick
Stochelo plays this lick on 'How Insensitive', the beautiful Antonio Carlos Jobimcomposition.
The lick consists of a series of arpeggio's: he starts of with a Dm7 arpeggio (acommon substitute for Bbmaj7) and continues with a Bbmaj7 arpeggio. Heanticipates the Ebmaj7 with a Cm7 arpeggio (the VI substitute) and goes on withEbmaj7 and Eb6 arpeggio's.
Scott Henderson is a well known blues and fusion guitar player. He was votedbest jazz guitarist in Guitar Player Magazine (1992). He was the original guitarist ofthe Chick Corea Electric Band, and recorded with Jean-Luc Ponty and JoeZawinul. His own band is called Tribal Tech . Scott Henderson teaches guitar at
the Guitar Institute of Technology .
Here's a little trick I saw Scott Henderson do on a video somewhere. This first oneworks on minor chords . He starts from the root and then plays two perfect 5ths, aminor 2 and then again two perfect 5ths:
1) This lick is king of bluesy and uses the A minor blues scale . Play it over A minoror A7 blues.
Dominant Lick
2) This is a dominant lick that uses the G minor blues scale. Notice the alternationbetween the flat and the natural third. The flat third gives us a bluesy sound on adominant chord.
Pat Metheny Pat Metheny's versatility is almost beyond compare to other musicians. It seems
like he masters every style and he succeeds in blending those styles in a naturaland elegant way.His musical diversity shows if you have a look at some of the people he played with: from Steve Reich to Ornette Coleman to Jim Hall to DavidBowie to Noa to Herbie Hancock to ...
Pat Metheny manages to combine virtuosity with accessibility , resulting in musicthat is pleasing for 2 kinds of audiences , hence his popularity.
Recommended listening : Question and Answer
Minor Licks
1) This is a typical Pat Metheny lick. Use it over Emin or Dmaj and make sure you
get the picking right : down stroke for the beats and upstroke for the off beats.
5) This is a montuno-like guitar lick that Pat Metheny plays on 'Phase Dance' fromthe album called Pat Metheny Group . There's also a live version of 'Phase Dance'on the CD Travels .
A montuno is a repeated syncopated vamp usually played by the piano in salsamusic .
The Bm7 and Bbmaj7 can also be seen as D/B and Dmin/Bb. This is also what Ithink when I improvise over 'Phase Dance' : D major over the Bm7 and D minerover the Bbmaj7.
In the coda of 'Phase Dance' the montuno goes through a series of very interestingand beautiful modulations.
6) Metheny plays this famous guitar lick on the solo break of 'Third Wind'(roundabout 1.35), a Metheny composition from the album Still Life (Talking) . There are a lot of transcriptions of this lick circulating on the internet, but I've neverfound a correct one.The lick uses a lot of chromatic notes and pentatonic scales.It's a good Pat Metheny technique exercise.
While learning classic licks, getting them under your fingers and working them in12 keys is important, many players hit a roadblock when it comes toactually making them sound good during improvised solos.
In this lesson, featuring videos from Chris Standring (author of the immenselysuccessful guitar course Play What You Hear ), you will learn how to take small,manageable licks and connect them in a musical way to build longer lines in your
jazz guitar solos.
By breaking down longer lines into short, easy to play licks, you will not only addsome great sounding Bebop lines to your vocabulary, but you will give yourself thebuilding blocks needed to create hip-sounding lines on your own .
Mini Licks
To begin, here is a “ master list ” of all of the mini -licks used in the longer linesbelow.
It would be good to start this lesson by playing through each of these smaller
ideas , learning how they sit on the fingerboard and how they sound as individualideas. This will help you learn to recognize these small yet important licks later onwhen you begin to explore the longer Bebop lines below.
Feel free to refer back to this master list as you work through the longer Beboplines in order to refresh your memory with these short licks, as well as use theseshort ideas to create your own Bebop lines later on in the practice room.
In this first example, which is played at both slow and fast speeds in the video ,
you can see how Chris takes 5 short licks and connects them to form a longer,three-bar Bebop line over an Em7 chord.
Work this line slowly at first, paying attention to the lick as a whole, but also theshort licks that are connected in order to build the longer phrase. It s j ust asimportant to see the small licks as they come together as it is to get the longerline under your fingers.
This second example, which you can see at both slow and fast tempos in the videobelow, uses some of the same licks as the previous line, but now adds some newideas to the mix over the course of these 3 bars.
If you can get the long line under your fingers, as well as understand and hearhow it was built by connecting the smaller ideas , then you not only get a coolsounding lick to use in your solos, but you are well on your way to building linessuch as this on your own.
In this third and final example, you can see how four licks from the first and second
lick are connected in new ways to derive a unique sounding phrase .
Check out the video for a demonstration of this lick in both slow and fast speeds,then take this lick to different keys and tempos around the neck.
Miles Davis Miles Davis
Writing a short introduction to Miles Davis is not an easy task , it's like trying tosummarize the history of jazz from the 40's to the 90's.
Miles Davis' professional career spans 50 years during which he was on top ofalmost every important innovation in jazz. He played his trumpet ina melodic and introspective way, often employing a mute .
Miles Davis impressed by his performance, recordings but also by his choiceof sidemen .Getting picked to play in a Miles Davis band was like putting a dose of steroids in
your musical career. The list of guitarists who played with him speaks foritself: John Scofield , Mike Stern , John McLaughlin an dRobben Ford .
Miles began playing the trumpet when he was 13 and had his first professional gig
when he was 17. He was 19 when he played in Charlie Parker 's band and at 23he made his first influential album as a bandleader: Birth of the Cool .
The list of following influential albums is simply too big to produce here.
Recommended listening : Kind of Blue
So What
This lick is the theme of So What from the Miles Davis album Kind of Blue . Thisfirst-take, unrehearsed Miles Davis session from 1959 is a true masterpiece. It wasthe key recording of what became modal jazz , a music free of fixed harmonies andforms.
The band itself is extraordinary (proof of Miles Davis's masterful casting skills),listing John Coltrane and Julian "Cannonball" Adderley on saxophones, Bill Evans(or, on "Freddie Freeloader," Wynton Kelly) on piano, and the crack rhythm unit ofPaul Chambers on bass and Jimmy Cobb on drums.
If Kind of Blue is not part of your CD collection yet, don't hesitate and BUY IT , it'sclassic jazz's best selling album ever . Also a very interesting read : Kind of Blue:The Making of the Miles Davis Masterpiece
The Play-A-Long book and CD set Jamey Aebersold (Vol. 50) The Magic ofMiles has four tunes coming out of 'Kind of Blue', including 'So What'. The
Aebersold CD's are are excellent backing tracks to practice your improvisationson.
So What is based on a D dorian scale . The composition itself alternates betweenD and Eb minor. A chorus looks like this : 2x 8 bars D minor, 1x 8 bars of Eb minorand 1x 8 bars of D minor.
ii V I Licks
This ii V I Lick in Bb uses typical Miles techniques as it snakes it s way throughthe underlying chord changes. Check out these voice leading techniques that Milesused in his solos:
Notice the b9 drop in bar one, from the Eb down to the D, which is a characteristic of
Miles playing.
The use of the B (#11) to start the second bar, allowing for a half-step resolution of
the C in the last beat of the first bar.
The Eb-D movement (b7 to 3rd) that connects the last two bars.
There is a typical shape to this line that you hear in many of Miles improvisedsolos.
The lick moves down and octave from D to Eb in the first bar,
then back up to that same D half way through bar two,
before repeating this same up and down movement one more time to finish the line.
Direction is a big part of Miles lines, and so it is worth looking at in your practiceroutine, as well as what scales, arpeggios and chromatic notes Miles used to buildhis licks and phrases.
Here is a Dm7 lick that uses a few chromatic notes, the A# lower neighbor and C#,
hinting at D Melodic Minor, to build tension during the phrase.
Also notice these two approaches that Miles liked to use in his minor 7th chordsoloing ideas:
The use of the C triad to outline the b7-9-11 intervals over Dm7.
The line finishing on the 6th (B).
In this Dm7 lick, you are only using the notes from the D Dorian Mode to createthis snaking line over the underlying chord. Notice the three, 4-note groups in thesecond half of bar 2 and throughout bar 3 of the line. These three groups are allclassic Miles mini-licks that are worth exploring further as you expand on this lick:
Mike Stern started playing guitar at 12, studied at Berklee under Pat Metheny andbegan playing in the band Blood, Sweat and Tears at the age of 22.
Leaving this band he played with Billy Cobham a short time, before moving to NYwhere he got recruited by Miles Davis to join his come back band in 1981. Heappears on 3 of his albums: The Man With the Horn , Star People and We WantMiles .
In 1983 Mike Stern went touring for a year with Jaco Pastorius ' Word ofMouth band and then returned to Miles Davis for another year of touring. In 1985He released his first album as a leader: ' Neesh' and many albums followed since,
including 3 Grammy Award nominations .
Recommended listening : Standards
Rhythm Changes Lick
The first lick in this lesson outlines bars 5 to 7 in a Bb Rhythm Changes chordprogression . One of the most interesting parts of the lick is the second half of thefirst bar, where there is a classic bebop phrase being used to outline the Bb7chord, before it resolves to the 3rd of the Ebmaj7 chord on the downbeat of the
next bar. This five-note pattern is worth extracting from this lick and expanding upin your practice routine, as it is a common part of the jazz guitar language andsoloing vocabulary.
Dominant Lick
Here is a line that uses two characteristic Mike Stern soloing ideas:
The first is the use of the Lydian Dominant (7#11) sound to outline a 7th chord (in
this case G7#11).
The second idea is the use of repetitive melodic phrases , in particular with triplet
rhythms. Mike is a master at building tension in his lines by repeating phrases as the
band builds energy behind him, and this lick demonstrates a bit of that energy as you
This lick is a short, Major ii-V-I outline in the style of Mike Stern that uses half-stepmovement to shift between each chord in the progression.
We see the b7 of the iim7 chord (G) moving by half step to the 3rd of the V7 chord
(F#).
The b9 of the D7 chord (Eb) moves by half step to resolve to the 5th (D) of the Gmaj7
chord to end the line.
Moving by half step from one chord to the next is a staple of Mike s soloing, and issomething that is worth expanding on as you practice these ideas further in yourown playing.
Lenny Breau was born in Maine on the 5th of August 1941. His Frenchspeaking parents were professional country musicians. Lenny began playingguitar when he was 7. When he was 12 he performed the role of lead guitarist inthe band of his parents, playing Chet Atkins-style instrumental songs.
Lenny Breau was an outstanding fingerpicking guitarist who merged country,flamenco, classical and jazz guitar techniques into his own personal sound. Lennywas very good at simultaneously playing single note lines and chordaccompaniment. He was one of the first guitarists to play in the style of Bill Evans,using harmonics and seconds in his chord voicings. Near the end of his career hebegan using a 7- string guitar .
Unfortunately Lenny Breau had drug problems . He died on the 12th of August,
1984, aged 43. He was found dead in a swimming pool and it was soon discoveredLenny Breau had been murdered . The case remains unsolved until today.
Recommended listening : Swingin' on a Seven StringRecommended Reading : One Long Tune (Lenny Breau's biography)
1) This first Lenny Breau lick is based off of his chord-melody arrangement ofthe classic Jazz Standard Emily . The phrase is played without time, rubato, but
feel free to work it out both freely and with a metronome in order to get a broadervision of how these chords can be translated into your solo and chord melodyperformances.
2) One of the things that Lenny was great at, was walking a bass whilemaintaining a melody line on top of those bass notes . Here is an example ofthis concept over the first four bars of an A Blues, using the A Blues Scale over top
of a chromatic, ascending bassline that moves from root, to the IV chord and backto the I7 chord with the 5th in the bass.
3) One of the most characteristic sounds of Lenny Breau s playing is his useof artificial harmonics . In this sample lick, you are mixing harmonics (the diamond
notes in the staff) with plucked notes as you ascend an Am11 chord on the 5th fret.When playing this lick, make sure to let all the notes ring over each other so that itimitates a harp, getting that true Lenny sound when applying this idea to your ownarrangements and improvisations.
4) This next lick is influenced by Lenny s playing on one -chord modal tunes suchas his classic versions of McCoy Tyner s “Visions.” Here, you are applying 4thintervals to create 3-note shapes that you then run through an E Dorian Mode ,being played over an open-E string pedal. Both ideas that Lenny loved to explorewhen playing over modal tunes such as “Visions.”
5) Last but not least, here is a chordal riff based on Lenny s love of using 3rdsand 7ths as the basis for any chord or comping idea in his playing. In this lick, tryto visualize the 3rds and 7ths below the melody line as being separate from themelody itself. Almost as if there are two guitarists playing this phrase rather thanone.
1) This fast minor lick comes from Lee Ritenour's guitar solo on 'Stolen Moments' ,
as played on the CD Stolen Moments .
The lick is played on the IVth degree of Cm7 (Fm7). Lee starts with an arpeggiopattern (9 11 5 b7: a Cm7 arpeggio started on the 5), transposes the pattern inthirds like one would do with diminished patterns and resolves with some chromaticnotes to the b3 of Fm7.
Larry Coryell
Larry Coryell was born 2 april 1943 in Texas. He began playing guitar at the ageof 7. When he was 22 he gave up his studies and moved to New York to be aprofessional musician. Later that year he played in drummer Chico Hamilton 'sband, together with Gabor Szabo , whom he replaced by 1966. In Chico's bandLarry Coryell made his recording debut: The Dealer. In 1967 Larry Coryell startedplaying in Gary Burton 's band and in 1969 he recorded an album with HerbieMann.In 1973 he started his own band, called Eleventh House .
During the 80s Larry Coryell only played acoustic guitar . He toured with JohnMcLaughlin and Paco De Lucia, before being replaced by Al Di Meola . Some othermusicians he played with during that period: Eric Clapton , Jimi Hendrix, PatMetheny , John Scofield , John Abercrombie , Larry Carlton , Tony Williams, DavidSandborn, Michael Brecker, Sonny Rollins, Stephane Grappelli, Chick Corea, Lyle
Some of the people he played with: Steely Dan , Joni Mitchell (on her Court andSpark album), Quincy Jones , Donald Fagen (on his excellent album), MichaelJackson , Steve Lukather , Lee Ritenour and many more.He also played in the bands Fourplay and The Crusaders .
His most important influences are Wes Montgomery and Barney Kessel , butalso B.B. King and Joe Pass .
Recommended listening : Last Nite (live).
Minor Lick
The following tablature comes out of Larry Carlton's solo on Steely Dan 's 'KidCharlemagne' on the album The Royal Scam . Rolling Stone magazine calledCarlton's solo one of the 3 greatest guitar solos in rock history.
Kurt Rosenwinkel
Kurt Rosenwinkel studied in Berklee , but dropped out after 2 and a half years to goon tour with Gary Burton . With the help of Burton he soon became one of themost successful jazz guitarists of the East Coast .
He toured with people like Paul Motion , Joe Henderson and Joe Lovano andearned the praise of jazz guitarists like John Scofield and Pat Metheny . He
featured on many albums with people like Gary Burton, Seamus Blake and PaulMotion.
In 1995 he won the Composer's Award from the National Endowment for the
Arts. In 2000 he released the album Intuit , a collection of jazz standards .
Recommended listening: The Next Step
Minor Lick
This is a slippery lick in the style of Kurt s playing, which uses the Aeolianmode over an Fm7 chord. Though many of us associate m7 chords with theDorian sound in jazz, especially in a Modal context, sometimes using the Aeolianmode can be a secure choice when soloing over m7 chord vamps, as is the casewith this lick.
ii V I Licks
In this lick, there is a strong sense of legato , which is a characteristic of Kurt splaying, as well as a number of altered tones over the G7 in this line.
In bar 2 , you will see #9, b9 and b13 intervals (Bb-Ab-Eb) used to create tensionover a G7 chord. All of these tensions resolve during the same bar, Bb-Ab resolveto the tonic note G, and Eb resolves to the 5th (D) allowing each tension to resolveproperly and musically during this phrase.
Another major key ii V I lick, this phrase stays diatonic throughout the entirephrase, though there is a sense of space and 4th intervals over Cmaj7, both ofwhich are idiomatic of Kurt s playing. Notice the D -G-D and D-A intervals overCmaj7, which are diatonic 4ths from the C major scale, as these are commonlyused intervals found in Kurt s playing, as well as the playing of many popularmodern jazz guitarists.
Kenny Burrell has been a high in demand guitarist during all his career (hewas Duke Ellington 's favorite guitar player). Some of the jazz giants he playedwith : Dizzy Gillespie , Sonny Rollins , Quincy Jones , John Coltrane , JimmySmith , Stan Getz , Billie Holiday , ...
His most famous record is Midnight Blue with the Latin flavored hit 'Chitlins ConCarne', later covered by blues giant Stevie Ray Vaughan .
He has a cool guitar tone and is able to perform some very smooth jazzguitar. His main influences are bop , blues and latin and you can hear a lotof pentatonics and blues scales in his improvisations.
Recommended listening : Midnight Blue
II V I Licks
1) This first lick in the style of Kenny Burrell is a nice way to change position on thefret board.
John Scofield arguably is one of the big three of modern jazz guitarists (the othertwo being Pat Metheny and Bill Frisell ).
He started playing guitar at high school and studied at Berklee from 1970 to 1973.Soon after he began playing and recording with leading jazz figures such as ChetBaker, Gerry Mulligan and Charles Mingus.
From 1982 to 1985 John Scofield toured and recorded with Miles Davis. Heappears on Star People ,Decoy , You're Under Arrest and other albums. In 1977 hestarted making records as a leader. The first album being 'East Meets West' wasmore funk orientated than his later albums.
Scofield has a very personal and recognizable guitar sound. It is a rock-bluesorientated sound and is often a bit distorted.
Recommended listening : Hand Jive
1) This is a very melodic lick over a V going to I minor and uses the C minor
harmonic scale . John Scofield uses a technique called double stops. A doublestop is when you play 2 notes at the same time and can be used to outline theharmony in your solo's.
2) In this Scofield inspired lick, there are a few triads being superimposed over
the underlying chords to create interest at various points in the phrase. Using triadsfrom the 5th of any chord is a great way to highlight the 9th of that chord while notrelying on the root in your phrases.
The first is the Em triad over Am7 in bar one, which outlines the 5-7-9intervals of that chord.
The second is the Adim triad over D7 in bar 2, this time highlighting the 5-7-b9 intervals of that chord.
3) Here is a slippery little G7#11 lick that uses both the Lydian Dominant Scale , aSco favorite, as well as a number of hammer-ons and pull-offs during it s
construction. A lot of Sco s lines are full of slides and other slurs, especially from aweak beat to a strong beat. So, having a strong control of these concepts will go along way into bringing a Scofield sound into your solos.
4) This line over a minor ii V I chord progression features:
Broken arpeggios over the Am7b5 and D7alt chords, where only some of theunderlying arps are played during the line.
The half-step motion between the b7 of the Am7b5 and the 3rd of the D7alt
chord, G-F#, provides for a smooth transition between the iim7 and V7 chordsin this progression.
A few bluesy bends and an overall focus on the b5/#4 interval (G# in this key)throughout the lick.
A major 3rd passing tone used over the Dm7 chord during the second half ofbar 2. This note helps to connect the b3 and 4th intervals of the chord, beforeresolving up to the “Dorian” note, the 6th of the chord.
John McLaughlin
John McLaughlin started playing guitar when he was 11 and was initially influenced
by blues and swing players. In 1969 McLaughlin started playing with Tony Williams'band Lifetime .
John McLaughlin became famous as the guitarist of Mahavishnu Orchestra , agroup that combined the power of rock with the sophisticated improvisations of
jazz.He also played on 2 classic Miles Davis albums: In a Silent Way and Bitches Brew .
In 1975 McLaughlin switched directions and began playing acoustic guitar andIndian music with his band Shakti .
Recommended listening : Shakti with John McLaughlin [LIVE]
This lick uses the D minor harmonic scale . In the second bar John McLaughlin
applies a sweep picking technique before resolving down to the 9th, E, andfinishing the line from there.
This McLaughlin inspired minor ii V i lick is built off of the Harmonic MinorScale from the tonic key of A minor. Though not every note of this scale will fit overeach chord individually, when navigated in the right way, as is the case with thisline, you can and hear how this scale can produce just the right sounds needed foreach chord in the progression.
The last minor ii V i McLaughlin lick we ll look at again uses the A Harmonic MinorScale to outline the changes in this progression.
You can see how:
1. The G# in bar two helps bring out the sound of the underlying E7alt chord.
2. The G# in bar 3 brings out the raised 7th sound (mMaj7) over the underlying Am7
chord.
Minor Licks
Here is a highly chromatic Am7 lick in the contemporary style of McLaughlin splaying. Using the Dorian mode as it s underlying sound, this lick brings in the b9(Bb) interval as well as the C# (major 3rd) interval throughout the phrase.
While it can be difficult to use these tensions in your lines and phrases when firststarting out with jazz guitar, by studying phrases such as this, you ll be able to hearhow masters like McLaughlin uses these notes in their lines, allowing you tonavigate these chromatic phrases in your own jazz guitar solos over time.
This McLaughlin style lick uses the A Harmonic Minor Scale , along with two lowerneighbor notes (C# and F#) to produce a cool sounding, longer-form phrase over
Am7. Though not as chromatic as the previous lick, this fairly straight-forward lineis a great introduction to the minor chord approaches that McLaughlin takes in hissolos.
John Coltrane's career only spans 12 year between 1955, the moment he first gotnoticed as a sideman, and 1967, the year of his death.
Coltrane played in Miles Davis ' band from 1955 to 1957. The second half of 1957he played with Thelonious Monk , before joining Miles Davis' band again in 1958.This time he stayed till 1960 and played on 2 important Miles Davis albums: Milestones and Kind of Blue .
In that period he also recorded two influential albums of his own: BlueTrain and Giant Steps .
After his time with Miles Davis John Coltrane picked up the sopranosaxophone and formed a quartet with pianist McCoy Tyner , bassist JimmyGarrison and drummer Elvin Jones , with whom he recorded spirituallydriven albums like A Love Supreme . In this period he was influenced bythe modal music of Miles Davis and the music of Ravi Shankar.
In his last years Coltrane got interested in the free jazz of Ornette Coleman.
Recommended listening : A Love Supreme
II V I Licks
There are a few key items to take away from this first John Coltrane lick:
The first thing to notice is the half-step approaches to the G7 chord tones in the first
bar of the lick. Each chord tone, F-D, is approached by a half-step above, creating the
line B-Gb-F-Eb-D, and is something that you should apply to other arpeggios on the
guitar.
The second item is the Em7 arpeggio outlined in the second half of the G7 chord,
which hits the Root, 3rd, 5th and 13th of the underlying chord along the way.
In this John Coltrane inspired lick, you can see an Am7 arpeggio being usedover Dm7 , which produces the intervals 5-b7-9-11, or a Dm11 sound.
Playing a m7 arpeggio from the 5th of a minor chord is a great way tospice up these chords.
As well, there is a bebop scale being played in the second bar as there is an addedpassing tone between G and F over the G7 chord. The Bebop Scale is animportant Coltrane technique to check out in order to bring a Trane vibe to yoursolos and lines.
This lick uses several superimposed chords to bring out different colors and
tensions throughout the line.
The first is the Bbmaj7 chord over C7, which outlines a C13sus sound in that part of
the lick.
The second superimposed chord is the B6 chord in the second half of the 3rd bar,
which is a tritone away from the underlying root chord, Fmaj7.
Joe Pass
Joe Pass started playing guitar when he was 9 and he was already playing atweddings when he was 14. In his 20's he moved to New York, where he couldlisten to some of the best jazz musicians of that time. Joe Pass got captured by thesound of bebop , but unfortunately he also picked up a habit well known to jazzmusicians of that time : heroin.
The next decade was wasted for Joe Pass, spending time in jails, until he enteredSynanon, a drug rehabilitation center . In the center he formed a band with otherpatients and recorded the album Sounds of Synanon , which was very well receivedby the jazz critics.
After 3 years in the center he was cured of his addiction and he could move on withhis musical career. He started playing in Los Angeles and got involved in the studioscene. In 1973 he recorded Virtuoso , an album that made him famous for solo
jazz guitar playing .
He recorded a duo album with Ella Fitzgerald and played with a lot of famous jazzmusicians like Count Basie , Dizzy Gillespie , Duke Ellington and OscarPeterson .
Joe Pass died from cancer in 1994.
Recommended listening : Guitar Virtuoso
V I Lick
In this lick, a Db diminished scale is played over the C7 chord. This results in thefollowing sounds over C7: b9, #9, 3, b5, 5, 13, b7 and 1.
Notes of the Db diminished scale: Db D# E F# G A Bb C (to create adiminished scale, alternate between whole steps and half steps). The diminishedscale is a symmetrical scale, what means that it comes back every minor third: Dbdiminished is the same as E diminished is the same as G diminished is the sameas Bb diminished.
A great way to create tension on the dominant chord: play a diminishedscale that is a half step higher compared to the root of the dominantchord.
In this Joe Pass inspired chord lick , you can hear many of the idiomatic soundsthat make up many of Joe s solo guitar licks and phrases. For this lick, try breakingit down into the mini phrases that make up each bar, that way you will be able toextract these ideas and use them in different combinations when coming up withyour own solo jazz guitar lines.
The last lick that we ll look at uses a favorite rhythm from Joe s solo guitar work,you can hear a similar idea during his version of Have You Met Miss Jones . Theidea is that you break up the chord into the bass note and the top 3 notes of theshape, alternating back and forth until you get to the chromatic approach notes in
the last two 8th notes of each bar. Try accenting the chords only, not the bassnotes, to bring an added Joe sound to the mix with this line.
Jimmy Raney
Jimmy Raney was born in 1927 in Kentucky. His first big job was in 1948with Woody Herman .
He had a relaxed, confident guitar style and a quiet tone. His phrases are bopinfluenced, but his sound is in the tradition of the cool jazz .
His best work is together with Stan Getz with whom he worked in 1951-1952,1962-1963 and in the Red Norvo Trio (1953-1954). After his last work with StanGetz he disappeared from the music scene , but had a revival in the 70s.
Jimmy Raney has a guitar playing son, Doug Raney , whom he made severalrecordings with. Jimmy died in 1995.
This is a fast lick in the style of Jimmy Raney. The lick begins with an Em7
arpeggio, followed by an F#m7 arpeggio. The phrase starting on the second half ofthe second beat is a chromatic approach to the next phrase.
Jim Hall Pat Metheny and Bill Frisell regularly drop the name 'Jim Hall' as their greatestinfluence , and not without a reason.
If your looking for speed then Jim Hall's not your man. In his own words:
"I don't really play fast, speed has never come easily for me. Little by littleI pared down my playing to suit my personality."
Jim Hall's playing is very advanced harmonically , what compensates his lack ofspeed . His guitar tone is very intimate and subtle , a good match for cool
jazz players like Lee Konitz and Paul Desmond with whom he both played. On
the other hand he also played with Sonny Rollins and Ella Fitzgerald .
Jim Hall's playing also works very good in duo situations like 'Jim Hall &Basses' and 'Jim Hall & Pat Metheny' .
1) This lick works over an F pedal bass note and is basically a simple 6th intervalpattern transposed down the scale, a typical Jim Hall technique that also inspiredPat Metheny, who uses similar kind of ideas.
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2) This major ii V I lick uses a common rhythmic device that is found in many ofJim Hall s classic jazz guitar solos. Here you will find a number of “off -beat” notes inthe first two bars of the riff, that then resolve rhythmically into more straight 8th-notes in the last half of the lick. Using displacement to start a line, and then ending
the line with more static rhythms, is something that stands out in Jim s playing, andgives him that rhythmic edginess that is characteristic of his soloing lines.
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3) One thing that Jim loves to do in his single-line solos is double up on notes,especially in 3rds . In this example, you can see a line built with these ideas in
mind, repeating notes that move around in diatonic 3rds over a ii V I chordprogression in the key of D Major.
Also note that the pattern starts on the & of 1 , something that Jim does a lot,which helps displace the pattern and make it sound more musical and less like astatic pattern down a scale.
4) In this minor ii-V-I lick , you can see some of Jim s most commonly usedtechniques and concepts. In the first two bars you find notes being slide down onone string, where they could have been played on two strings but Jim likes to useone string for multiple notes during his solos. From there, you find a G MelodicMinor scale being used in bar 3, and a very Jim Hall like riff in bar four where thereis a double stop, C and D, leading into a chromatic, legato triplet.
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5) Here we have a chord lick in the style of Jim Hall, featuring characteristicvoicings and a chord sub that Jim loves to use over minor ii-V-I progressions. In
the first bar, Jim often uses an A7alt chord instead of Am7b5, creating a V/V to V toIm7 progression in place of the normal ii-V-I chords you are used to seeing. This isa fun and relatively easy way to spice up any minor ii V I phrase that you areplaying, using chord and/or single-notes to outline that sub.
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Grant Green
Grant Green was a master jazz guitarist of the highest level, and it is definitely a
good idea to spend some time learning Grant Green Licks in your jazzguitar practice routine.
Known as a bluesy player , and later on a father of modern funk, Grant was also atalented bebop soloist who had a strong handle on bebop vocabulary andsubstitutions.
In this lesson, you ll learn five different Grant Green licks for jazz guitar, but beyondthe licks, you ll learn the building blocks for each phrase so that you can learn howto create your own Grant Green sounding licks in your jazz guitar solos andphrases.
The next lick uses a melodic minor scale over the Gm7 in bar one, implying
a GmMaj7 sound in this context. Applying a Melodic Minor Scale to the iim7 chordin a ii-V- I is a characteristic of Grant s playing, and i t can be heard further duringhis solo over So What , where he uses Melodic Minor over large portions of thattune.
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The next ii V I lick uses a few subs to create a focus on the iim7 chord, in this caseby playing Gm7-D7b9-Gm7 , rather than outlining the written changes in the firstthree bars of the progression.
This type of substitution, playing a V7b9/iim7 in the middle of a ii V I, in order toput more focus on the iim7 chord , is something Grant loved to do and i t s a greatway to expand your ii V I vocabulary and bring a bit of Grant Green s sound to yourlines at the same time.
This lick uses a quick turnaround sub over the last two bars of the phrase. Ratherthan just playing over the Fmaj7 chord that s in the progression, Grant would like touse turnarounds to create more interest over a static chord. In this case, you cansee the Imaj7-bIII-bVI-bII-Imaj7 turnaround being used, otherwise known as the“Ladybird” turnaro und since it is the last two bars of the Tadd Dameron tune“Ladybird.”
This is a pretty straight-forward Dom 7 lick in the style of Grant Green, but there
are two items worth looking at further in your practicing.
The first is the use of the note C (the b3) to create a bluesy sound over the A7 chord
in this lick.
The second is the last four notes, which is a common bebop phrase where you play
one note, F#, then want to play the note below it, E, but you get there by playing the
diatonic ascending triad to that note, in this case and A major triad.
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George Benson George Benson is arguably one of the greatest jazz guitarists that ever lived andhe is certainly one of my favorite jazz guitar players . Most people know him as asinger of soul & pop songs and don't realize what a fantastic guitarist he is.
He plays just about any style, has a beautiful tone, great improvisational ideas,terrific speed, swings like hell and has very much his own style, although you hearwhere he got his initial inspirations from : Wes Montgomery and Charlie Christian .
Have a look at these great licks and be inspired by the master of smooth jazzguitar:<:p>
V-I Licks
1) The first lick starts with a Cmaj7#5 arpeggio (E7b13) and continues in an Amelodic minor scale.
2) The first bar of the next lick uses a Dm7b5 arpeggio, which gives an alteredtype of sound over E7 : b7, b9, 3 and b13.In the second bar George plays a Abmaj7 arpeggio : 3, b13, 7 and #9. The use of amajor 7 on a dominant chord is a bit unusual, but sounds ok here because it is partof a series of arpeggios that are used to build tension.
After the Abmaj7 arpeggio follows an Ab#5 triad arpeggio : 3, b13 and 1 going tothe 9 of Amin.
You can hear this lick on the standard 'Stella by Starlight' on the CD 'Tenderly'' .
Frank Gambale was born on December 22, 1958 in Canberra, Australia. Hestarted playing guitar at the age of 7 and he became a student at the GuitarInstitute of Technology (GIT) in Hollywood.
Frank started playing in Chick Corea's Electric Band in 1986. The group just dida reunion tour and released a new album, called To The Stars. He's also the leaderof his own rock orientated bands.
Frank Gambale is known for his technical mastery and extreme fast guitar solos .His signature technique is sweep picking , but a different method of sweeppicking . His sweep picking involves not only arpeggios, as is traditionally the case,but also scales. To learn more about his speed picking technique, check out one ofhis instructional DVDs: Monster Licks-Speed Picking
Recommended listening : Present for the Future
1) The following lick comes from a song called 'Isola d'Elba' from thealbum Coming to Your Senses , featuring Frank on acoustic guitar .
Emily Remler There are not a lot of female jazz guitarists . Emily Remler was one of them, but
unfortunately she died much too soon after a heart attack at the age of 32.Emily Remler's main influence was, like many other jazz guitarists, WesMontgomery .
Between 1974 and 1976 Emily studied at Berklee where she graduated at the ageof 18.
In 1980 she recorded her first album : Firefly . She was only 24 when she recordedthis album, but listening to her playing you would think she had a lot more
experience behind her.Following this album she played with a lot of well knownplayers like Monty Alexander and Larry Coryell , with whom she recorded a duoalbum.
1) The first bar of this lick uses a D major 7 arpeggio which is a commonsubstitute for Bm7. Playing a Dmaj7 arpeggio instead of a Bm7 arpeggio gives us
a richer sound because of the 9 (c#, the 7 of Dmaj7).
The rest of the lick Emily uses a rhythmic idea which she transposes harmonically.
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2) This is a bluesy lick that you can take from Emily s style of playing and add toyour Jazz Blues repertoire. The trill lick that starts bar 2 is something that Emilyused a lot in her playing. Notice that the 3rd of G7 (B) is played on beat 4 of thesecond bar, anticipating that chord by a full beat before the harmony catches upwith the lick.
3) A short but fun lick, this phrase uses two of Emily s characteristic linear conceptsto build a two- bar line over C7:
The first half of bar 1 features a string-skipping phrase, that starts on the 7thand the uses the 9th and a lower-neighbor tone to complete that idea, bothconcepts that Emily liked to use in her lines.
There is a descending 3rd line that finishes the lick, moving chromaticallydown the neck from the 6th to the 5th of C7, with 3rd intervals below eachdescending chromatic note.
4) This next lick uses triads to outline the ii-V-I7 chords that would be found in thelast phrase of a jazz blues chord progression in C.
The Am triad is used to outline the 5-7-9 of Dm7 and the 9-11-13 of G7. Then, there is a G triad over G7 which finishes on an Ab triad over C7,
outlining the R-#9-#5 of that chord.
Using triads, both inside and outside the changes, was something that Remlerloved to used in her playing, and something that should be explored outside thecontext of this lick.
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5) This lick sums up a lot of the previous ideas we ve seen in this lesson.
There are triads in bar 2. The trill lick in bar 3. The descending chromatic 3rds in bar 4. And just for good measure there are ascending stacked 4th intervals in bar 1,
This lick is brilliant in it's simplicity. Sometimes I wonder why I don't come up with
licks like these myself all the time.
It starts with a chromatic leap to the 9 of E7, followed by an E7 arpeggio. On the Am Django plays a A minor triad with an added 9. This is a nice idea to avoidplaying too much 7th arpeggio's in your improvisations. Make your own personalarpeggio's : take a triad and add a 9 or an 11 or leave out the 5th and replace itwith a tension.
Minor Lick
The following tabs are a sample transcription from Django's 'Nuages ' (click andscroll down to listen to a sample mp3). The lick is played in the Hungarian gypsyscale (1 2 b3 #4 5 b6 7). In the second bar Django Reinhardt plays a major 3.Mixing between minor and major thirds is a sound you can hear a lot in orientalstyles of music.
Charlie Parker Charlie Parker was one of the greatest and arguably the greatest saxophoneplayer of all times. His playing is so fluent and fast, still every single note in hislines makes sense.
Charlie Parker (or "Bird") is considered as one of the founders of Bebop . He wasthe master of chordal improvisation and that's the reason why he is so interestingfor guitarists to study. Even if you would leave the band out and listen to Parker
playing solo, you can still hear every chord of the tune's chordprogression. Outlining the chords in your improvisations is a way to make yoursolo's more interesting and give them more structure. Having a look at someParker licks can help you a great deal in accomplishing that.
Make sure you have a look at the 'Charlie Parker Omni book ', a book withtranscriptions of Parker's compositions and a great resource for every jazzimprovising musician.
Recommended listening : 'Boss Bird' (CD box with 101 of his most representativerecordings)
2) This is the opening lick from 'Anthropology', a standard written by Charlie 'Bird'Parker and John 'Dizzy' Gillespie.
Charlie Christian
Charlie Christian was the first successful electric guitarist and although heplayed in swing bands mostly, he was very much influenced by bebop players.
He was a student of Eddie Durham - a jazz guitarist who invented the amplifiedguitar - and was one of the first guitarist who played amplified. Electricguitar opened up a range of possibilities because guitarists could concentrate on
other things besides volume.
Unfortunately Charlie Christian died at the early age of 25 after contractingtuberculosis.
Charlie Christian Licks Hom e Jazz Guitar Licks Charlie Christian
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Charlie Christian was the first successful electric guitarist andalthough he played in swing bands mostly, he was very much influencedby bebop players.
He was a student of Eddie Durham - a jazz guitarist who invented the amplifiedguitar - and was one of the first guitarist who played amplified. Electricguitar opened up a range of possibilities because guitarists could concentrate onother things besides volume.
Unfortunately Charlie Christian died at the early age of 25 after contractingtuberculosis.
Recommended listening : Charlie Christian: the Genius of the Electric Guitar
Full bio and more about Charlie Christian's guitar technique: The CharlieChristian Biography
Find out which guitar, amp and strings were used by CharlieChristian: Charlie's Guitar Gear
This typical Charlie Christian lick is played over A7. The first 4 notes form
a C#m7b5 chord shape , a common substitute for the A7 chord. It gives us the 3,5, b7 and 9 of A7. Licks like these are nice to play on a B section of a rhythmchanges .
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In this classic Christian sounding lick, the major blues scale is being used tooutline an A7 chord, producing a bluesy, swing-sounding lick. Using the majorblues scale (the major pentatonic scale with an added b3) is a great way to bring aChristian and swing sound to your lines, so feel free to explore this idea further asyou take it past the context of this single lick in your practice routine.
Here you see an enclosure over the 3rd of the underlying A7 chord, where D andC and being used to enclose the note C. This type of tension and release line (akaenclosure) is something that can be found in many of Charlie s and other solosfrom the Swing era.
Enclosures have been used by just about every great jazz soloist over thepast 80 or so years, and so it is an important concept to have under your fingersand in your ears as you advance your jazz guitar skills in the woodshed.
This Charlie Christian inspired lick looks at the use of a lower neighbor tone in
the first bar to highlight the large leap between the 9th (A) and the 13th (E) of theG7 chord. By landing on a chromatic note after a leap, before resolving it to achord tone on the next note, you can bring a strong focus to both the leap and theresolution point in your lines, something that Charlie and other Swing musiciansliked to do in their solos.
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This Charlie Christian lick uses an idiomatic riff that runs from the b3 to the 3 to the5th of the underlying chord, in this case G7 and Cmaj7. Mixing the blue note (b3)with the diatonic 3rd and 5th of any chord is something that Charlie and many otherSwing artists like to do in their soloing lines and phrases.
Bireli Lagrene Bireli Lagrene was born in 1966 in a family of gypsy musicians. Hestarted learning guitar at the age of four by copying Django Reinhardt 's solosnote by note. In the early 80s he emerged as the child prodigy who soundedexactly like Django Reinhardt. He recorded his first album, 'Routes to Django', in1980 at the age of 14.
A few gypsy jazz records later he wanted to take some distance from his Djangosound and started playing jazz-rock fusion . In 1986 he recorded an album withbass player Jaco Pastorius , called' Stuttgart Aria' (see lick below).
More recently Bireli Lagrene decided to pick up his roots and released a gypsyguitar concert DVD, with other big gypsy guitarists like Stochelo Rosenberg,
Angelo DeBarre, John Jorgenson and Gary Potter :Bireli Lagrene & Friends GypsyProject .
Recommended listening : Gypsy Project
1) I picked this guitar lick from the album Stuttgart Aria , which Bireli Lagrenerecorded with Jaco Pastorius . The tune is called 'Chicken', composed by Pee Wee
Ellis (it's a fun song to play, you should check it out if you never heard it).
The song is in Bb. The lick transcribed here starts on IV (the 5th bar of a chorus).The lick opens with a phrase in the Bb minor pentatonic blues scale. Bireli plays an
A dim arpeggio over the D7: 5, b7, b9 and 3 for D7. The lick concludes with abluesy chromatic phrase.
Bill Frisell is a unique jazz guitar player due to his original technique andsound . His guitar sound is unlike any other guitarist: he makes his guitar soundlike something between a pedal steel guitar and a horn player thanks to the use ofa volume pedal and guitar effects like delay and reverb.
Bill Frisell takes elements from a lot of different genres (rock, country, bebop, ...)and manages to blend these elements in a way of playing that's never been heardbefore. He's not afraid to play a folk chord in a jazz situation and doesn't rely onplaying fast to make things interesting. Be sure to check him out if you didn'talready!
Recommended listening : 'Have a Little Faith'
1) The first lick looks at Bill sneaking in a b9 interval over the V7 chord (G7),before resolving this chord to the Imaj7 chord (Cmaj7) at the end of this phrase.Mixing both the natural 9 (A) and the b9 (Ab) into one bar over a V7 chord issomething that Bill often brings to his lines.
4) This phrase uses mixed rhythms to build interest, as well as 4th intervals tobegin the line, and a large dose of chromatic notes . Though the lick is highly
chromatic, it does target very specific chord tones, such as the 3rd of Cm7 (Eb) tostart the second bar, which helps to resolve the tension put in place by the variouschromatic notes in the lick.
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5) This lick looks at a string-skipping idea over a turnaround progression in thekey of C Major. Skipping strings, and using large intervals, is something that Billloves using in his solos, and it s a great way to break up the step-wise motion ofany scale-based line you are using in your improvisations.
Barney was a fan of big, 5-note chords , and here is an example of Barney-style
chord shapes being applied to a ii-V-I-VI chord progression in the key of C major.Notice how the G stays on top of each chord, as this was also something Barneyliked to do, and something that can help bring a cohesiveness and thread to yourchord changes as you bring this idea to your own comping and chord soloing.
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Here is a bluesy lick that borrows from the C minor blues scale over the G7 chordin the second bar of this ii-V-I lick. Mixing the b3 and #4 (the blue notes) into the
underlying scale is a quick way to bring a blues sound to any of your lines, andsomething that you can find i n Barney s classic recordings and live shows.
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Barney was a fan of the Honeysuck le Rose lick that you can hear in the first 6beats of the lick below. This lick, based on the opening line to the jazz standard
“Honeysuckle Rose,” runs down from the root of the V7 chord, C -B-Bb in this key,before playing the iim triad from that chord up to the resolving note A. So, ratherthan playing R-7-b7-6, Barney plays R-7-b7-2-4-6, causing a diversion of sortsfrom a straight chromatic run during this line.
This Kessel-inspired lick uses a descending scale pattern , which features andascending interval as it moves down the underlying scale fingering. This type ofpattern is characteristic of not only Barney s soloing, but of other players from thelate Swing and Bebop era. Check it out, great sound and easy to finger on theguitar.
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Dissonance, Resolution & Note Enclosure
Dissonance is the use of notes that fall outside of the key signature of the tune. Inturn, resolution is the return to consonance, to bring the melody back home.Consonant phrases can sound very good, in small doses, but quickly becometedious over the length of an entire solo.
The contrast between dissonance and consonance, used at opportune momentsin a solo, is what keeps both yourself and the listener interested. Lets take a look atsome phrases, over the same chord progression, but this time take advantage ofdissonance.
Dissonance & Resolution
All examples in this guitar lesson are played over a II V I in G major :
Bar 1 has no dissonance, as indicated by the absence of accidentals. However, when
we hit beat one of bar two we are playing a B flat, which is not in the key of G. This
tone is dissonant and creates tension in the melody. The last eighth note in bar two is
F natural, this tone is also dissonant. The F natural appears to want to resolve to Fsharp, which it does on the first beat of bar three.
Even though we are using notes outside the key signature, it still sounds good, but
why? The reason it works, is due to chord substitution . We won't go into any depth
on chord substitution here, as it is a huge topic in itself, but we can have a look at
what substitute chords are being implied by this phrase.
Bar one starts on a non-chordal tone, relative to Am7. The note B is not part of the
Am7 chord, but it sounds good because it implies an Am9 chord. In beat three we hitthe minor third of Am9 (C), and move up to B again in the final note of bar one. This
re-enforces the sound of the implied Am9.
The first note in bar two is a B flat, implying the D9 chord has been substituted for a
D9#5 chord. The B flat is quickly resolved to the ninth (E) to release that tension.
Holding a dissonant note for too long can often sound incorrect or unpleasant !
The best place to use dissonance in a chord progression is the dominant chord .
This is because the dominant is the least stable chord and naturally wants to resolve.
" I f you h i t a wron g no te , then make i t r igh t by w hat you p lay af terwards ... "
In bar 1 , we enclose the note B between C and B flat. The chromatic tone B flat, is
played on the up-beat, the 'and' of the pulse.
In bar 2 , we enclose F natural between G and F sharp. Both examples fit perfectly
over the Gmaj7 chord, because they resolve to the chord tones. Note that because
the dissonant (chromatic) tones are on the up-beat, there is no chord substitution
implied, but it does add flavor to a phrase.
This is the simplest form of note enclosure, using only a three fret range, makingit easy to play without much thought.
Here is a handy trick for guitar that makes this type of note enclosure easy to use:
Anywhere a scale has two notes that are one fret apart, the lower tonecan be enclosed by one fret above, and one fret below. So looking at barone in the example, the notes B and C, of the G Ionian mode, are one fretapart. The lower tone B can then be enclosed between C (one fret above)and B flat (one fret below). The sequence of notes is then C, B flat, B.
The following exercise is good practice for this type of note enclosure, and unlocks
its full potential. Practice groupings based on the two examples above, adding a4th note, within the key signature, to the end of the note enclosure.
Here are some examples to get you started:
Practice ending on different notes of the scale, especially the chord tones of theprogression. Also try playing the same groupings at other parts of the fretboard. Aswith the consonance exercise you will eventually be able to link these smallgroupings together to create some basic bebop phrases.
Here is a phrase exclusively using this type of note enclosure concept, over the GIonian II V I progression:
These implied substitutions create a very effective dissonance over the Am7. Thegroupings can be played starting on any down-beat , or for more variety, any up-beat . Playing them on an up-beat creates far less tension much like the previousforms of note enclosure.
The following phrase uses this form of note enclosure exclusively:
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Bar 1 implies AmMaj7
Bar 2 implies D7#11 for two beats, followed by D7b9 for two beats.
Note Enclosure Combinations
Once you are comfortable with both types of note enclosure you'll have a hugeimprovisational vocabulary to play with.
Let's take a look at the note enclosure forms combined into a single phrase:
We will now take a look at four different ways to add chromatic notes to the majorscale . All of these riffs will be two beats (four eighth notes) long in order to getthem under our fingers quickly and transpose them easily.
The first bar of this example uses what is normally referred to as thedominant bebop scale , played over a major chord. It is normally used over a
dominant chord, G7 in this key, but it can also be used over any chord in the parentkey, C major.
The second bar outlines a very common chromatic passage. This is where westart on the third, in this case E, of the major scale and then play #1, 2 and back to3. Think of it as starting on the third and playing back to the third using a chromaticapproach to the 2 nd note, D, of the scale.
The third and fourth bar are the same chromatic idea applied to two different
scale tones. The best way to approach these licks is to think of it as connecting thetwo half steps within the major scale. The first connects the 4th note, F, of thescale to the 3rd note, E, by way of two chromatic approaches from below E. Thelast example is the same concept, only this time applied to the root, C and the 7th ,B.
Once you have these under your fingers in the key of C we are ready to move onto example 3. You can practice punching them into scale fingerings you alreadyknow, or treating them as separate entities and thinking of them as individual units
that you can move around to different chords.
Example 2
Here we have a bebop sounding line written in the key of C major using thepatterns outlined above. In the first bar there are the 1st and 2nd line (fromexample 1), the second bar has the 3rd and 4th line, the third bar has the 1st and2nd lines and the last bar has the 3rd line. We might notice that the line sounds likean exercise, and it should. At this point we are trying to get these shapes under ourfingers and these sounds into our ears. Once you have them down it will be easierto develop more creative and musical lines.
Now that we can apply these two beat ideas we can add some basic harmonicsubstitutions to the chord progression. The chords that we will be adding will beone half step , one fret, above the following chord. So in this example we haveadded a Db7 that resolves to the Cmaj7 in the next bar (tritone substitution ). Againfor the purposes of this exercise the line is written in eighth notes, once you havethis line down try changing the rhythm to gain more interest in the line.
In this line we are now adding an Ab7 chord that resolves to the G7 chord ( tritone
substitution as well). Even though we are stepping further "out" with this and thefollowing lines, the fact that our two beat motives outline the harmony so well helpsto keep the idea from falling apart.
Example 5
We are now at the limit of adding chromatic approach chords with the Bb7resolving to the A7b9. Once we have these substitutions under your fingers and inour ears we can choose which ones we want to use and when we want to usethem. Remember just because we know all of these cool harmonies does notmean that we have to saturate our lines with them. The biggest lesson to learn is
that "out" lines only work when they are played after or in between "in" lines thatgive them their contrast.
Since the first four two note ideas have been highly chromatic and mostlydescending in nature we can now look at three ways to play ascending and more"inside" the scale/chords. As was mentioned above, playing out only works if wedefine what is in, so these three ideas are great ways to outline the harmony andhelp "setup" our outside ideas.
The first idea is what is commonly referred to as "1235" , where each chord isoutlined using the 1st , 2nd , 3rd and 5th note of the scale or mode thatcorresponds to it.
The second idea is the arpeggio , 1357, on each chord in the progression, and thelast idea is the arpeggio with a chromatic approach tone below the root. Thoughthese ideas have been written out over the chords in the progression, they can beused over any chord in the key we are playing in. So for example in thisprogression, in the key of C, we can outline Cmaj7, Dm7, Em7, Fmaj7, G7, Am7and Bm7b5, all of the chords found in the key of C major.
We will now apply these three ideas to our chord progression. In this example westart out with a mixture of the new and old ideas. Notice how each bar starts offsounding inside on the first two beats and then is led into a more chromatic soundin the last half of the bar before resolving on the downbeat of the following bar.This helps create a tension and release element to the line and makes the majorscale that we are basing our lines off of sound much more in the jazz idiom.
In the next line we will add the chromatic approach chord leading into the Cmaj7chord in bar 3. This idea is similar to what we have already done but notice howthe arpeggio in the first half of the 2nd bar really sets up the substitution nicely.
Example 9
Here we are adding a chromatic approach, Ab7, to the G7 chord in bar 2.
In this last example we are adding the Bb7 resolving to the A7b9 in bar four. Asbefore, now that we have all of the chord substitutions added we can choose whichones we would like to play at any given time. Sometimes a really simple, wellplaced "outside" lick is much more effective than a longer more complex line thatweaves in and out against the harmony.
Here is a solo written out over the chord changes to a famous Miles Davis tune,
here it is called Tune Down, see if you can guess the original name. Try and readthrough the solo with a play along CD or Band in a Box to get a sense of how eachline sounds against the underlying harmony.
Once you have these exercises under our fingers try playing them in differentkeys , and if you haven't already, play them on different parts of the neck .Learning to play a line from memory is only the beginning of the process, once wecan manipulate a line, by changing the rhythm, playing it in different octaves anddifferent areas of the neck, we have truly ingrained the concept.
In this lesson on guitar scales we'll talk about horizontal playing .
When we first start learning guitar scales, we usually play the scale vertical on theneck, from the lowest to the highest note in a particular position. This is a
necessary step, but don't limit yourself to that because it's hard to see theconnection between the different positions that way.
Playing horizontally is a more advanced method of playing guitar scales andmeans we start left on the guitar neck and advance to the right or the other wayround. This can be done on two adjacent strings or three or four or with a skippedstring, the possibilities go as far as your imagination goes. I'll help you on your waywith some examples.
In this guide we work with the C major scale, but remember that C major has thesame notes as D Dorian, E phrygian, and so on (if you have a problemremembering this, check out this tutorial on modes ).
Playing Guitar Scales on One String
This is a very good ear training exercise. Think like a sitar player and play allguitar scales on any of the 6 strings. Don't think about where to place your fingers
too much, but pick a scale and work with your ears. This simple example is themajor scale played on the high e string. Also try other strings, other modes, thealtered scale, diminished scale, ...