Over-whelmed.

[JBR_Fusion]

Hello everyone I am new to these forums, just found them and wow what a gem for the budding Jazz guitarist.

Anyway on to my question, as you can see in the title I have been feeling a bit over-whelmed with all that I feel I need to practice. Im somewhat a beginner, have been playing for about 1 year and a month. My goal as a guitarist is to be well-versed in all genres from Jazz to Rock to country.

Things I am currently practicing:

5 Major Scale positions in every key
5 Minor Scale positions in every key
5 Penatonic Scale positions in every key
5 Melodic Minor Scale positions in every key
5 Arpeggio positions in every key

Trying to learn lots of chords for interesting substitutions in Jazz progressions.

Practicing Chord melody.

Finding licks for 2-5-1, blues, rock, fusion rock, fusion jazz and country.

Trying to come up with interesting ideas over a 2-5-1 progression. In Major keys.



As you can see, that is a boat-load of crap, maybe its just me being impatient and trying to tackle it all at once.

Anyone have a logical progression that could help me get through this by looking at that list?

I'm sorry if this isn't welcome here, seeing as this is "The Jazz Guitar Forum" You guys just seemed helpful and this looked like a great forum, thanks!

Oh and one of my main influence is Alex Hutchings. =D

[AmundLauritzen]

You're spot on! Doing it in all 12 keys is the key that so many people overlook and they wonder why the door doesn't open.

You've chosen the essential scales to work with. Those are the essence.
Don't bother with Whole Tone and Harmonic Minor for now, those are not used that much.
When you've got those scales you're working on down cold, learn the diminished scale.

How much practice time do you have? What are your ambitions?
These are both important factors in determining your practice schedule.

When you practice scales, be sure to also practice the arpeggios they contain. You should visualize the arpeggio inside the scale shape. One way is to play the arpeggio and then continue up the scale. You can descend the scale and play into the arpeggio. Mix it up so you get the visual pattern down and relate the scales to the arpeggios.
Do you use a specific fingering system? This is also important for determining your scale practice.

Personally, I swear by practical application. Now once you have the visual and mechanics of the scale/arpeggio down, then you should start practicing music. At that point the exercise has served its purpose and from then on it will be nothing but a finger exercise. Make melodies from the scales and arpeggios, add chromatic embellishments and passing tones etc.

Here are some of my thoughts on common areas of use for the scales you listed.

Major and Minor:
Essential inside sounds that you need to know in order to resolve your lines. The more embellishments you have around the chord tones of the tonic, the better and more elegantly you'll be able to resolve outside sounding lines. Don't underestimate practicing chromatic surrounding and embellishments of chord tones. They are key, especially if you want to learn bebop.

Pentatonic:
These of course have the obvious inside application, but you should also experiment with different substitutions. You can get an interesting sound on m7b5 chords by playing the minor pentatonic scale a minor third up from the tonic of the chord. Try a minor pentatonic built from the b3 of an altered dominant chord. Minor pentatonic from the maj7th of a major chord gives you a lydian sound. You could spend a lifetime getting to know all the possible combinations. So pick out the best ones and concentrate on those first. If you want, I can list them for you.

Melodic Minor. Besides Melodic minor, also learn Lydian Dominant, Superlocrian and Locrian nat2. These are the most used ones.

Once you've learned a scale, a lick, sequence or chord, whatever, then it's always a good idea to apply it to a tune. That way, you create associations so that everything comes together and you start to see the big picture.

If you go into specifics about your goals and your available practice time, I think me and the other members will be able to help you design a balanced practice schedule.

On that note I want to welcome you to the forums and wish you the best of luck in your practicing.

[Electra11]

It's over-whelming for me too. And I'm a middle aged man!

[JBR_Fusion]

Originally Posted by AmundLauritzen

You're spot on! Doing it in all 12 keys is the key that so many people overlook and they wonder why the door doesn't open.

You've chosen the essential scales to work with. Those are the essence.
Don't bother with Whole Tone and Harmonic Minor for now, those are not used that much.
When you've got those scales you're working on down cold, learn the diminished scale.

How much practice time do you have? What are your ambitions?
These are both important factors in determining your practice schedule.

When you practice scales, be sure to also practice the arpeggios they contain. You should visualize the arpeggio inside the scale shape. One way is to play the arpeggio and then continue up the scale. You can descend the scale and play into the arpeggio. Mix it up so you get the visual pattern down and relate the scales to the arpeggios.
Do you use a specific fingering system? This is also important for determining your scale practice.

Personally, I swear by practical application. Now once you have the visual and mechanics of the scale/arpeggio down, then you should start practicing music. At that point the exercise has served its purpose and from then on it will be nothing but a finger exercise. Make melodies from the scales and arpeggios, add chromatic embellishments and passing tones etc.

Here are some of my thoughts on common areas of use for the scales you listed.

Major and Minor:
Essential inside sounds that you need to know in order to resolve your lines. The more embellishments you have around the chord tones of the tonic, the better and more elegantly you'll be able to resolve outside sounding lines. Don't underestimate practicing chromatic surrounding and embellishments of chord tones. They are key, especially if you want to learn bebop.

Pentatonic:
These of course have the obvious inside application, but you should also experiment with different substitutions. You can get an interesting sound on m7b5 chords by playing the minor pentatonic scale a minor third up from the tonic of the chord. Try a minor pentatonic built from the b3 of an altered dominant chord. Minor pentatonic from the maj7th of a major chord gives you a lydian sound. You could spend a lifetime getting to know all the possible combinations. So pick out the best ones and concentrate on those first. If you want, I can list them for you.

Melodic Minor. Besides Melodic minor, also learn Lydian Dominant, Superlocrian and Locrian nat2. These are the most used ones.

Once you've learned a scale, a lick, sequence or chord, whatever, then it's always a good idea to apply it to a tune. That way, you create associations so that everything comes together and you start to see the big picture.

If you go into specifics about your goals and your available practice time, I think me and the other members will be able to help you design a balanced practice schedule.

On that note I want to welcome you to the forums and wish you the best of luck in your practicing.

Thanks so much AmundLauritzen, first of all you are the damn man for such an extensive reply!

More info:

I have a made room for a lot of practice time as I absolutely love music and want it to play a major part in my life.

As for my goals I want Jazz to be THE major influence in all my playing. I love jazz and I feel the possibilities are endless. From Country to Blues to Rock I want that feel in there.

Basically this style of playing is what I live and breathe for =)

Alex Hutchings - Happy as Larry - YouTube

Also some minor info:

I don't anchor my hand at all, no pinky or wrist my hand is free floating above the strings, Ive had some people tell me this is wrong but that's just how Ive always done it. Is it wrong?

Another thing I apparently have always economy picked also. Will this hinder my playing? I never made the conscious effort to switch to economy picking to play faster I just started playing like that.

Again, thanks for the respond!

[Timbell]

A good guitarists should have a feel for economy and traditional picking. Although I do not play with economy alone, many licks I play would be nearly impossible for me to pick without economy technique. Some really great guitarists use only up down picking, but I would think an understanding of economy picking would only help.

and amund I would love to hear some more of your outside pentatonic pointers.

[pierre richard]

make haste slowly man...

a little bit at a time...some things you will learn faster than others and in time you will find you don't need a lot of time with that segment of your study...

its a road that the journey is better than the destination >>>>...

have at it man....

time on the instrument...pierre

[cosmic gumbo]

The key is to have fun and make music. Don't put that second or what's the point?

[Joe Carlson]

Originally Posted by cosmic gumbo

The key is to have fun and make music. Don't put that second or what's the point?

Yup. That about sums it up. Also, learn tunes. If you practice just playing scales your playing will sound like scales. If you practice playing music your playing will sound like music.

[eddy b.]

Learn by ear from the cd's of your favorite JAZZ GUITARISTS it is a steep path and a short cut all in one.

[bluewaterpig]

I think the best advice for you to follow right now is to take it slow and master one concept at a time, rather than practicing all of them at once.

It's impractical to practice pentatonics for 20 mins, then major scales for 20 mins, then melodic minor for 20 mins, etc.

I believe it's much, much more efficient to spend an entire day mastering once concept, and then moving on to the next concept once you've absolutely absorbed the previous one.

[Astronomer]

I'm sort of in the same situation as you, and I find it beneficial to spend time noodling around once you've learned a given scale or arpeggio. You'd be amazed at how inventive you become when you're not forcing yourself to play anything spectacular. A big part of this is avoiding the tendency to run up and down the pattern, and instead mess with various intervals and rhythms. Yesterday, I did this and I came up with a Wes-inspired lick using a minor 7 arpeggio shape I learned...I felt so accomplished haha

[Kman]

That's a good start, but you need to read. In fact, reading is probably more important than anything you listed there. I would practice reading music for a 1/2 hour per day before any of those other things. It's very boring for beginner's but it pays huge dividends later.

[Astronomer]

Originally Posted by Kman

That's a good start, but you need to read. In fact, reading is probably more important than anything you listed there. I would practice reading music for a 1/2 hour per day before any of those other things. It's very boring for beginner's but it pays huge dividends later.

I'll admit it...this is something I like to avoid practicing whenever possible.