where to begin with solo jazz guitar

[Jazzy_Dan]

@Jordan Thanks...........................What I was trying to ask originally was how to be able to improvise more meaningful sounding melodies when playing jazz standards on a guitar by myself without any rhythm section (solo guitar....LOL). After all the people that posted, I realized what I've been doing wrong. When I started trying to write melodies using standards (with no rhythm section), I realized that I had lost sight of the melody being the most important part. I was playing the standards and putting too much emphasis on the "harmony" and rhythm which is why (I think) when I played them, it sounded like a "bland story", as I stated in my OP. A lot of the music I wrote before I started trying solo guitar (playing jazz standards without accompaniment), I didn't have too much problem coming up with melodies because that was always the first thing on my mind. For some reason melody went completely out the window when switching over jazz solo guitar (playing and improvising on jazz standards without accompaniment or rhythm section). I can see that I'm going to have to spend more time getting settled into solo guitar (playing without a rhythm section) and working out melodies before playing them, before moving onto on-the-fly types of improvisation (on the standards).

As for your comments on some of my soloing (in my posted vids), I agree that I could use some clarity going forward. I can't say I feel as comfortable improvising solos as I would like. Then again, honestly, I'm don't aspire to be a master at playing guitar solos (improvising WITH accompaniment and rhythm section) either. The thought of "mastering" something seems rigid, tense, and takes the fun out of music. Others may seek mastery over certain aspects of music, and that's perfectly fine...each to his own... The clarity issue could also be partly attributed to the way I mixed and produced the music; I've only been producing music for about a year, although I'm getting better at it.

[jordanklemons]

I see now. Yeah, I think that solo guitar vs solo guitar thing may have confused some people on this thread... myself included. But now it sounds like your talking about improving your solo guitar WHILE you are playing solo guitar! haha

Yes, utilizing the melody is SO important... and often over-looked.

Be careful though misunderstanding the idea of "mastery" and thinking of it as something that conjures up feelings of rigidity and tenseness... or the absence of fun.

First, mastery is a commitment and a process with a destination that no person ever reaches (except in the minds and opinions of others)... so not wanting to strive towards that ever-receding destination means that one will never commit to the process... which is itself the only form of mastery any of us will ever find.

And second... it's actual the boredom (or the lack of fun) with the topic at hand that allows for the true freedom and fun to be experienced. Think of it like walking. We all take our ability to walk for granted. But for the first many months-years of our life... we couldn't do it at all. Then we could do it but we sucked terribly. Eventually we figured it all out. Now we're (for lack of a better term) "masters" at walking. One could say, based on your views of mastering topics of music, that walking has lost all of its fun... because we're mastered it. But again, that views walking as the end goal itself. Walking is simply a means to explore, move, and enjoy the world. The same could be said of musical topics. The point of attempting to master them is not those musical topics themselves. The point is to be able to explore, move, and enjoy the musical world with them. "Mastering" the fundamentals is what allows us to explore and be creative within the musical realm.



I very much come from the Bill Evans school of thought....

“I think the problem is - I see this in a lot of people that come to me for advice - they tend to approximate the product. Rather than attacking it in a realistic TRUE way, at any elementary level. Regardless of how elementary. But it must be entirely true and entirely real and entirely accurate. They would rather approximate the ENTIRE problem, than to take a small piece of it and be real and true about it. And I think this is a very important thing that you MUST be satisfied to be very clear and very real and be very analytical at ANY level. You can’t take the whole thing. And to approximate the whole thing in a vague way gives one a feeling that… they more or less touched the thing. But in this way you just lead yourself toward confusion. And ultimately you’re going to get so confused that you’ll never find your way out....

They’re trying to do the thing in a way which is so general that they can’t possibly build on that. If they build on that they’re building on top of confusion and vagueness, and they can’t possibly progress.”

Also, I would be careful about ONLY relying on the melody OR the harmony. If you've been in the non-jazz world of guitar for a long time and are working towards entering into the jazz guitar tradition and language... both of them working together are what help define the art of jazz improvisation. We could almost say that it's sort of like nouns and verbs. They rely on, and work off of, each other. So utilizing the melody is FANTASTIC! But don't be afraid to get dirty learning to navigate the chord progression by voice leading through basic triads or by any other means. Especially if your goal is to work on guitar soloing while playing solo guitar where there is no comping instrument or bass player to provide the harmonic landscape for your solo, it's even more of a valuable tool to be able to convey it yourself through lines, chord melody, and comping for yourself during the spaces between your phrases.

[rlrhett]

One last thing that is a pet peeve, and I understand if you ignore this completely. I believe there is a myth or meme in the rock/blues world that "solo's" are improvised on the spot inspirations. They just spring out of the nothing, and the better you are the better you are at doing this. A true musician simply taps into some mystical source for instant improvising.

The most iconic rock guitar solos were usually NOT improvised. They are composed melodies, like the melodies that form the basis for improvisation over jazz standards. For example, David Gilmore has said that he recorded dozens of choruses of noodling over Comfortably Numb. He then when through the recordings and took a bar or two here, a bar or two there. He punched each little bit of tape together until he built his melody. When he had composed a melody he liked, he transcribed himself. He memorized his own pieces of improvisation that he had arranged into a unified melody and recorded that. To this day he plays the same melody over and over live during the solo. He might extend it, or give it a little twist here and there, but it is still a composed piece.

David Gilmore was not alone. Jimmy Page is a lot less forthcoming about his process, but the story is that he worked out the solo to "Stairway" over weeks. Jimmy Hendrix apparently rarely put down his guitar. Again he apparently worked and reworked entire "solos" and played them, loosely and imaginatively, but as composed melodies he worked out in advance.

Too often I think blues and rock players rely on other players to play a melody and never really learn a piece. Whether it is your composition or a standard, and whether it is some avant-garde keyless line or entirely in the people's key of C, you have to KNOW the piece. This is especially true when playing by yourself. You have no one to pick up your slack.

You don't have to be "locked" into a melody when you perform live, but you should have it inside whenever you play a tune even when you "solo".

[Jazzy_Dan]

@rlrhett ...I think those are some goods points. I never thought about compiling parts from different improvs into one good composition. That seems like a very effective and efficient approach. So far when I've attempted improvised solos (playing with accompaniment) they were for recordings that I wasn't sure I would want to perform again (or play live), so I thought..."eh, why bother working out a solo if I'm not gonna play it again." On the other hand, here are a couple of solos that I did work out before recording them, present in the two links below. Each track has a distinct guitar solo. They are jazzy tracks, but more of an indie/experimental type jazz.

Lazy Daze | Here and There

https://hereandthere1.bandcamp.com/t...-reverberation

Among the vids I posted earlier in the thread, the guitar solo in the video, "Water Bomb Swing Dance" is worked out. The guitar work in "The Detective" is also worked out.

[mr. beaumont]

Late to the party here, but I'll throw a few ideas out...

So yes, I'm also big on playing off the melody...on tricky tunes, I'll often intentionally srite a new melody...or two...to give me more material to work with.

I also think there's value in noodling...one of the first things I do when I approach a tune is just play on it for a half hour, and really overplay. Gets it out of my system, but also opens my ears to possibilities.

Let's see, what else? A great exercise is to take the melodic rhythm of the original melody, but play new notes...or sing the melody in your head, and play only in the spaces...we think a lot about melodic content, but generally when we hear a player play interesting "melody," the space and rhythm is just as important.

Just listen to as much Jim Hall as possible, I guess, is the cliff notes version of my post.

[Jazzy_Dan]

I tend to like noodling more than any other part of playing guitar...ie Just sitting back on my bed with my Squier strumming chords and notes aimlessly using the neck pickup and reverb turned all the way up on my amp. I've got one of those Electro Harmonix Holy Grail Reverb pedals that puts a nice splash on it.

I have however come up with several good melodies while noodling.

[destinytot]

My twenty-five-minute video of rambling ruminations:

[jordanklemons]

You seem to be getting really top notch advice from really top notch artists. Keep in mind that Jordan is a pro with a really nice recent album release. He also has an advanced degree in music and dissertation out there somewhere (right?). That means that on top of endless playing (and I mean like eight hours a day seven days a week), probably since he was a wee lad, he must have spent four to six years seriously taking classes with topics like, "a comparative study of the polyrhythmic atonal mystic chanting of Bidayuh of Borneo and the Late Eighteen Century counterpoint of Fux's Gradus ad Parnassum." We may not all immediately get what he is laying down.

FWIW, here is another great primer on solo guitar playing with some actual exercises used by another great pro:

Fantastic video with Kurt... and thank you for the very kind introduction. I honestly have NEVER taken a course on the comparative study of the poly-what now? Haha... but it sounds fascinating! I have been lucky enough to spend a few hours studying rhythm and odd times with Ari Hoenig... and got to play with him a bit. So I think that counts, right? Hahahaha

Talk about heavy $#!t though. I wouldn't even try and begin to type about what he got into. Super-simple in a way... but so deep and intense in where he takes things. Scary.

[LeGrand]

Great thread with immense insight. When I think of "solo playing" I think of trios with a stand up bass, percussion, and one guitar player who provides both chords and lead (and maybe vocals). Brian Setzer comes to mind. His guitar skills provide melody, improvisation, chord changes etc. Brian"s version of "Sleepwalk" is an example. Another player is Chet Atkins. When I look at Johnny Smith's "Walk Don't Run", then listen to what Chet did with it and then the version by the Ventures - to me this is the essence of a song (melody) becoming "alive". Again - great thread.