Quick reference guide on Guitar Improvisation using Major/Blues/Min. Pentatonic Scales Combinations

Guitar Improvising Method - ...Subscribe to my blog in order to get your hands on a simple method I have developed in order to break down the guitar in a way to make you SEE its roadmap!!!...

...Subscribe to my blog in order to get your hands on a simple method I have developed in order to break down the guitar in a way to make you SEE its roadmap!!!...

Want to understand why is it so hard for some guitarists to get improvising effectively?

Simple: a lot has been written on music theory, but not enough on the architecture of the guitar.  In other words, there needs to be a bridge between the ever so complicated music theory and the way in which to apply it to the guitar.

This is called: METHODOLOGY!  A lot of very accomplished guitarists and teachers teach from either a 100% theoretical standpoint or a 100% practical standpoint.  Essentially you want both...the perfect combination between theory and practice, but the way to get there can get complicated IF THE TEACHER DOES NOT give the student the "map"

...Subscribe to my blog in order to get your hands on a simple method I have developed in order to break down the guitar in a way to make you SEE its roadmap!!!...

Where to play the "blues scale"?

Simply put, the blues scale in one of the most played scales in all types of music that require some lead guitar playing!

So, where do we play it?  More specifically, over what chords can we play it?

First choice should be any minor chord because of its minor 3rd interval from the root...so play it ins root form over any minor chord (D minor = play D blues)

Second choice should be over any dominant 7th chord because of it b7 interval from the root...(G7 = G blues)

Third choice should be over any other chord belonging to the relative key in which you played the first and second choice above....Example: you decided to play it over a D minor chord (you played the D blues scale)....then, you can use it over any of the chords of the major key in which D is the second, third, or sixth degree.  This choice is bit more intricate, but it also sounds a bit more intricate too!

Quality vs. Quantity: Practically Speaking.

How much time to practice?  A much debated question amongst teachers of guitar and many other instruments.  Here is my humble advise on the matter.  After having taught many students at all levels of expertise (YES! some were experts in their own right), I have an interesting opinion on the issue.

The fact is that TIME does not matter when it comes to practicing.  Especially in jazz or modern guitar, the player should be concerned with "understanding" theoretical and practical concepts well enough to recall these at later times, and transfer these to other musical situations.  So in short, the quantity of time does not matter, but the quality of it does!  Learning an important concept well enough, beats memorizing other pieces of musical information at the expense of long hours of repetitious practice.  This is true especially if we can't translate that practice to real world scenarios. A vivid example at a later post...

Guitar philosophy for beginners and not so beginners!

Many students and sometimes mature players ask me about a specific technique they want to master. As always, I am thrilled to show anyone around the neck.  Even if I don't know the answer to the question (in question), it is always a terrific journey to figure something out with them.  The question could come loaded with a theory or practical issue.

However, at the end of my musical conversation with them, I usually ask "why".  Why as "why"? Well a bit of philosophy here wouldn't hurt.  When the why is answered, the learning curve get shorter and things get done quicker and more efficient.  But, when the idea behind the guitar issue at hand is a bit less altruistic and more about impressing the audience, then the learner usually starts to run into a mental and sometimes even professional fog.  Now, that is not to say that learning a particular needed technic won't bring that stress too, but the philosophy behind our guitar journey should always be looked at from a service perspective.  Therefore, addressing the philosophy or the "why" is almost always one of the most useful questions we could answer as guitarists.  

By the way, this is an issue that can help in many more aspects of music, art, and life!

How to play a Harmonized Scale?

Technically, you can play a major scale by applying the formula of Whole, Whole, Half, Whole, Whole, Whole, Half to any beginning note.  If we applied it to middle C on the piano, you will end up with a sequence that looks like this:  C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F,....and so on.  Therefore, all the white keys, and no black keys will be used.  So, how to insert black keys?  Simple, pick ANY other starting point on the piano, and you will end up with as little as one black key inserted, or as much as all of the black keys.  By the, way, a piano is a good way to visualize a scale, but for the abstract thinkers, a guitar will obviously produce the same results.  

So, how to take that C major scale and make it into a harmonized sort of scale?  Again, technically, ANY combo of notes will do, however, an understanding of chord formula is crucial here.  Harmony is no more that several notes played at the same time.  This will produce chords!  So, a harmonized scale is simply chords.

Take the 1, 3, 5 notes of the scale, and you will make a major triad chord...take the 2, 4, 6 notes of the major scale and your chord now is a minor triad...so here is the sequence of chords that will naturally happen when you take all 7 given triads (1.3.5; 2.4.6; 3.5.7...etc...)

Major triad chord; 

minor triad chord; 

minor triad chord; 

Major triad chord; 

Major triad chord; 

minor triad chord; 

diminished triad chord;

Keep playing! 

How to play an "outside" (interesting) solo with just blues scale?

Simple!  The blues scale could very well fit over any minor chord.  It's minor 3rd interval from its root gives it that minor chord quality.  Therefore, how can we use this piece of info and apply it to our lead guitar playing?

Take C major for example.  Anytime you see a minor chord in that particular key, such as Dm, Em, and Am or the same as the 2nd, 3rd, and 6th chords, you can simple stay on C major or modulate to the blues in that particular key-chord.

Therefore, while in the key of C major, base your lead off of the D blues when in the D minor chord.  The same goes for the rest of the minors that happen in C.  See them as a possibility to take your playing out for a ride, and ride the blues wave.  Please email your questions or comments or simple post in the bottom section...keep playing!

Turn old chord knowledge into new transferable harmonic knowledge!

There is a common belief that chords should be memorized in shapes, and fingerings.  While this is a great advantage when reading chord charts that do not include the tablature for the chord, this methodology of memorization does very little for the musician that wishes to get more from the lesson, or musical playing/composition experience.  You have to remember that the best guitar "know how" is the one that you transfer over to different platforms of styles, methods, etc.  And, the only way to make chord (harmonic knowledge) transferable, is by grasping concepts that go beyond the simple chord memorizing method.  Besides, after learning this transferable knowledge, you could actually apply it to the chords you already knew by shape, and even get the "why"behind the "what".  You will be able to really grasp the logical reason behind the chord shapes.  Therefore, try to identify the chord notes that are played in the guitar and figure the order from lowest sounding string to highest sound string. This way, every chord will be a lesson in itself, and you will be able to identify patterns.  And, best of all, once you deconstruct the chord, you will be able to transfer that knowledge to other styles and even instruments.

How to play the minor major chord?

I got a question asking on how to play a "minor-major" chord.  Although it seems complicated, there is really no complexity to it.  First of all, we should clarify that this is the first chord of the Melodic minor scale and it is also the first of the Harmonic minor scale.  Having said that, the formula to construct it is as follows:

Root - m3 - M3 - M3...so from the Root you count 3 half steps to the 3rd of the chord...from the 3rd of the chord you count 4 half steps to the 5th of the chord...from the 5th you count 4 half steps again.  So, in conclusion, this is nothing more than a regular minor chord with an added major 7th note on top of the tirad.

There you go...keep the questions coming!

How many hours to practice your guitar playing?

Depending on level of proficiency, as you progress into your playing, less is more!  How is that you ask?  Well, the fact is that since our attention span is so limited most of the times, and music practice requires so much attentions, here is my personally recommended technique in 3 steps:

1. Make sure that you block 15-20 minutes of practice time at least 3 times per day.
2. Isolate these blocks of time without any distraction and space these out at least an hour away.
3. The 3 blocks should be comprised of the following: academic, interpretation, and creation.

More on what these terms mean on item #3 at a later post!

Technical vs. Conceptual advise on recording engineering...where to start?

Technical vs. Conceptual advise on recording engineering...where to start?

Many have looked at the technical side of music and then looked away.  However, some advise form a Grammy winner does not hurt.

Terminology in the music and audio engineering field is at its best overwhelming.  Although not a formally trained audio engineer myself, I have come to terms with the fact that the more one knows about “what” goes on with the sound one records (or reinforces live), the more efficient musical art gets expressed.  For highly intuitive folks, this may seem pointless, but for the more analytical kind, just the right dose of technical concepts can get us from point A to point B on a confidence level.  So "just do it" is really an understatement.

Some advise for the aspiring songwriter, guitarist, performer, etc., comes from Sound on Sound. The following list could come in very handy when involved in any studio/live project as terminology questions may arise.  You can find a helpful glossary of terms (and much more advise) on the Sound on Sound page located here.

The never-ending quest for technical knowledge, could be, as stated before, an overwhelming one.  Therefore, once we can get a basic understanding on the technicalities we may be working with, the rest lies on making a viable living at doing what an artist does best:  creating art.  A constant issue for any artist is “compensation”, since most of us do not have a business background.  So, how to work around the issue of keeping art and business separate?  Well, according to the following professional advise, by doing just that! 

Chris Lord-Alge himself, a Grammy-winning audio engineer can be found giving his practical advise on the topic of “money and art” here at about the 1 hour and 4 minute marker.  Although his art is not on a traditional musical instrument, the art of sound engineering touches the art of sound in a very special way. 

To recap, it may sound counter-intuitive at first, but some technical knowledge of studio (and live sound) terms may give any artist the poetic freedom that he or she may need to free up some of the creative objectives desired.  Also, as stated on the video cited in this post, the same could happen when money and art get separated.

Technical vs. Conceptual Music Business...

Technical vs. Conceptual advise on recording engineering...where to start?

Many have looked at the technical side of music and then looked away.  However, some advise form a Grammy winner does not hurt.

Terminology in the music and audio engineering field is at its best overwhelming.  Although not a formally trained audio engineer myself, I have come to terms with the fact that the more one knows about “what” goes on with the sound one records (or reinforces live), the more efficient musical art gets expressed.  For highly intuitive folks, this may seem pointless, but for the more analytical kind, just the right dose of technical concepts can get us from point A to point B on a confidence level.  So "just do it" is really an understatement.

Some advise for the aspiring songwriter, guitarist, performer, etc., comes from Sound on Sound. The following list could come in very handy when involved in any studio/live project as terminology questions may arise.  You can find a helpful glossary of terms (and much more advise) on the Sound on Sound page located here.

The never-ending quest for technical knowledge, could be, as stated before, an overwhelming one.  Therefore, once we can get a basic understanding on the technicalities we may be working with, the rest lies on making a viable living at doing what an artist does best:  creating art.  A constant issue for any artist is “compensation”, since most of us do not have a business background.  So, how to work around the issue of keeping art and business separate?  Well, according to the following professional advise, by doing just that! 

Chris Lord-Alge himself, a Grammy-winning audio engineer can be found giving his practical advise on the topic of “money and art” here at about the 1 hour and 4 minute marker.  Although his art is not on a traditional musical instrument, the art of sound engineering touches the art of sound in a very special way. 

To recap, it may sound counter-intuitive at first, but some technical knowledge of studio (and live sound) terms may give any artist the poetic freedom that he or she may need to free up some of the creative objectives desired.  Also, as stated on the video cited in this post, the same could happen when money and art get separated.

Playing open strings when soloing

How to incorporate open strings into a solo?

Overview of method 1: the solo should be in a key that takes all the open string notes. C major or its relative natural minor. G major or its relative natural minor. D major or its relative natural minor. All these work! 

Overview of method 2: use the open strings in ANY KEY even if they do not conform or fit the key since these could add color to the solo. You may want to use them in the unaccented beats of the solo. 

Keep playing!

The minor chord movable shape.

Great trick to getting around the neck without using bar chords is to look at other open chords and find the closed position within them.

An example is the A minor open chord that we all know and love. It has been a part of many successful tunes!

So you take just the 3 notes that are made with your 1, 2, and 3 fingers and move that around to any other place on the neck. Remember that the root note will be given by the middle note played on the 3rd string with the 3rd finger. 

At one point this note was A, but now it could be anything you'd like. Also keep in mind to only play the notes fingered by your 1, 2, and 3 fingers. 

Over which chords does the blues scale fit???

Well, a debatable question!  But, if you think about it, the blues scale has a minor 3rd in it….so the first is: any minor triad or minor 7th chord….

The scale has a minor 7th so even a dominant 7th fits fine….

Also, the blue scale could even sound well over an altered chord since the minor 3rd will be heard as the #9 note of the chord….

So, in essence: a blues scale has a dominant 7th sound to it as well as a minor chord quality.  Therefore, what chords could one play on say a Bb blues scale???

Here they are:  the 1 - 4 - 5 chords in a minor 7th quality…and a 1 - 4 - 5 progression as well in a dominant 7th sounding quality!

There you have it one scale = 6 possible chords :)

A simple math FORMULA behind guitar improvisation in order to STAY in position!!!

We can't call this improv engineering, but is more of a method.  Take it for what it is and run with it :)

So you are improvising on a tune that called for a change of key that is a 5th up (or 4th down)...example = from C major with all natural notes you will now go to G major with one sharp note which is F# (7th degree).

Here is the formula...

If you are playing on C major and are on the 5th position soloing on the Aeolian more (thus, A on C major), you can do some math, stay in place, and keep playing...so what is the formula?

STAY WITH ME PEOPLE.....PLEASE!!!
You take the mode number you were improvising "on" "in" C major...in this case you were playing on the 6th mode...so you take 6 and add the inverted interval of the key coming up...the key coming up was up a 5th and up 5ths are the same as inverted 4ths...so you add that inverted figure to the 6th we just mentioned, and subtract 1 from the result, but keep in mind that when you reach 7 in the process of adding you must NOT keep going to 8 but rather 8 takes the place of 1...so here is the example applied: 6 (original mode) + 4 (inverted interval) is equal to 3 (6+1=7+1=not 8 but 1+1=2+1=3)....then you always subtract 1 from any result...so the mode is 2....therefore by staying in position you would play the mode of 2 in G major...the mode of 2 in G major is precisely A Dorian...and you will be safe of course playing A Dorian in the key of G major!!! 

"Buyer beware"...this works every time but you must check for "accidentals" in the coming key.  For example once you do your math, the mode number will work, but the 1st note in the mode may need to get sharpened or flatted.  An example is IF you would have gone to the key of B major the formula would have given you a mode of 7...and YES!, you could play that mode but you need to sharpen the A to A# and play the 7th mode pattern a step up.

Hope you stayed with me...sounds complicated but it WORKS EVERY TIME...this lends itself to more vertical playing and seamless shifts of key on the neck.  It gives you the ability to maximize your creativity by not having to think of the shift and simply do some math even before the tune starts (if you get the chance).

I am currently developing an effective methodology to use this formula in a notation format.

3 Octave Major Scale on Guitar

Starting in the root position of the Ionian mode (for example: in F major)...you would play typically with the first finger on the first fret of the 6th string and play your 2 octave scale in position.  However, if you wish to make a 3 octave scale on F major, you will have to travel across the fretboard.

One good piece of philosophy when trying this out is to remember that in order to stretch out and keep playing on F major and ending up in the 4th F above the lowest one on the guitar, you will need to go across until you make it to the 10th position or the Aeolian mode in the same key.

That is pretty simple, however, a good piece of info for when you're improvising and flying across the neck!  You can typically run all your modes from the lowest one you choose and then add 5 more to that.  So if you started on F as your Ionian mode, then you will end up in your 6th mode across and have achieved the 3 octaves.  Now, what you do in the middle could be structured or could not :)

The fully diminished chord

A fully diminished chord is one that sounds very similar to the half diminished but with its b7th tone lowered a half step more. Therefore the intervals are Root-m3-m3-m3. 

The cool thing about it is that you can use the same fingering and move it across the fretboard simply in minor thirds (every 3 frets) since all the notes are a minor 3rd apart. 

Experiment with it!

The "I - IV - V" or "i - iv - v" chord progression...

It is almost automatic the feeling when we hear a progression of a "one" chord going to a "four" chord and then finishing with a "fifth" chord on any key.

Something curious to note is that the same intervals could be found on the relative minor variations of the typical major I - IV - V chord progression...

Taking the key of "A major" for example, we find that the I is A major, the IV is D major, and the V is E major...all major because of their triad formulas. Right?  Still with me?  Post questions if you come up with any :)

Now, if we look at the same key of A major, and we set the 6th degree of that scale as its "relative" minor key (by the way, this is a fact in every major key...the 6th degree of any major key will always give you its relative minor!!!), we find that going from that 6th degree which can now become a "i" chord, the pattern of the minor "i - iv - v" is repeatable here too.  See the example on the paragraph below...

Example applied and explained:
F#m (that 6th degree in A major) - Bm (the 2nd degree in A major) - and C#m (the 3rd degree in A major)...also make a  "i - iv - v" progression.

So, in the same key of A major, we can find 2 sets of "one-four-five" sounding patterns of chord progressions.   The major I - IV - V or relative minor i - iv - v chord sequence.  The first sequence discussed speaks to the major key and the second sequence speaks to the relative minor key within that major key.

Again, this is a constant in every major and of course, relative minor key :)

The 7th mode of melodic minor

Anyone that has attempted to play jazz knows that improvisation is a great deal of the job. Sometimes jazz gets defined by its improv style.

Now, chords are scales broken in pieces or intervals. Therefore, improvising over a jazz harmonic sequence will require that one plays on the appropriate scale over the appropriate chord. Therefore, an academic standard has been created on this issue. Not bad at all until one gets to question the why behind the what. 

There is a particular chord on a minor progression that responds to a scale that is not precisely the one in place of the chord. Even academically speaking, jazz schools of thought will agree on this. 

This phenomenon happens in the altered chord or that fifth chord on the 2 - 5 - 1 minor progression. Often times (more like always) this chord is altered in most of its passing tones. The 3rd and 7th stay, and of course the root and fifth are there. Now, the 9th, 11th, and 13th may get altered. This means a #9, b9, #11, b13, etc. 

So here is the issue to be aware of!  The scale to play here is the 7th mode of the melodic minor scale usually, and not the 5th mode even though the chord is the 5th chord. Of course, you can play the 5th mode as well but we are speaking here about best practices in jazz. 

Again, the issue to keep in mind is that although the chord is acting as the 5th in the progression, the mode to improv on will usually (practically) become the 7th mode of the scale and NOT THE FIFTH MODE AT ALL :)

Why is that? The answer is very much related to the way we hear!  More on a later post.