how to take an intro

[abracadabra]

I was watching some Joe Pass lesson on You Tube and he mentions that many guitar players don't know 'how to take an intro'. I thought: 'Hey, that's me!', so does anyone know of any source of advice on this subject?

Thanks!

[guelda]

Hello,

well one idea is to reproduce what great players have already done.
For example, you can find some Joe Pass comping with wonderful
intros on the site lickbyneck.com. Check "Slow boat to China" with
Ella Fitzgerald, this intro is great !

Another interesting thing could be to now a bit of harmony (well, even
if it's only your fingers who know it, like a lot of great gypsy players),
and have some cadences under your hands. For example if you have to
play an intro that leads to a major I chord, you could play those cadences
(with rythm variations of course) :

iii - iv - ii - V - I
I - bIII7 - bIV7M - II7M - I7M

Other ideas folks ?

peace
Guelda

[mr. beaumont]

a rather generic but always passable idea is to take the last four bars of the tune, and do something with that...

when i'm playing solo, and somebody requests a tune i don't know all that well, that's usually my go to intro idea.

[m78w]

A 5 pedal always works well, either with just the V7 chord underneath it, or with a iii-Vi-ii-V or similar progression going on.

As well, a lot of standards have Verse's taken from the musicals they were originally written for. Joe used these a lot, especially when playing with Ella. I always like hearing a good verse as it was written as the intended intro of the tune.

MW

[Stackabones]

To follow up on Matt's comment about the verses ...

I don't think any of the Hal Leonard Real Books have the verses (they only have the chorus/refrain), but the Warner Bros Just Standards Real Book has the verses to all the tunes that have verses! Most of the the classic standards, those with lyrics, have a verse.

[derek]

I try to find the most interesting 4-8 bars of the melody (to me) and create an intro. There are formulas also for doing this. Jim Ferguson has written a good book on intros and outros, Mel Bay.

Amazon.com: All Intros and Endings for Jazz Guitar: Bebop, Swing, Latin, Ballads: Jim Ferguson: Books

[derek]

Originally Posted by m78w

A 5 pedal always works well, either with just the V7 chord underneath it, or with a iii-Vi-ii-V or similar progression going on.

As well, a lot of standards have Verse's taken from the musicals they were originally written for. Joe used these a lot, especially when playing with Ella. I always like hearing a good verse as it was written as the intended intro of the tune.

MW

Hey Matt. Any chance of a detailed explaination of this? I really dig when guys get pedal tones going, but I am not sure how to get started on this. Thanks

[Jake Hanlon]

I prefer when asked to do an intro to improvise on the tune somehow. Much like Jim Hall or Ed Bickert will play through the form of the tune once in a free manner. It's challenging but very fun if you get it together... I'm still working it out.

[m78w]

Check out the intro on my CM of Fly Me to the Moon. It's got a low E pedal which is the V7 of the first chord Am, then I just played a series of altered dominant triads over it.

MW

[derek]

Originally Posted by m78w

Check out the intro on my CM of Fly Me to the Moon. It's got a low E pedal which is the V7 of the first chord Am, then I just played a series of altered dominant triads over it.

MW

Great. Just sent it to the printer. Will look it over this weekend. Any rule for the chord you select?

[m78w]

If you want it to sound inside try chords from the mixolydian mode, if you want it to sound more outside try using chords from the tri-tone mixolydian mode or the altered scale.

MW

[abracadabra]

Great bunch of ideas. Thanks everyone for your input.