Four on Six Theme & Improvisation (Wes Montgomery)

In this lesson, you will learn how to play Four on Six, a standard written by Wes Montgomery. In 1960, Wes Montgomery’s album “The Incredible Jazz Guitar” was released with on it two of his most famous compositions, “West Coast Blues” and “Four on Six”. Four on Six is a great song to play and your audience will love it!

Btw, if you were wondering what the meaning of the song title “Four on Six” is, it refers to a 4/4 rhythm superimposed over a rhythm of 6/8.

Here’s a video of Wes Montgomery performing Four on Six:

 

Here’s how the complete them sounds like:

Here’s a backing track to practice your solos:

Four on Six – The Theme

The Intro

Four on Six has a great intro that is made entirely out of fifths and played in unison with the bass and piano.

Here’s is how the intro sounds like:

 

And here’s how you play it. I mute the strings a bit with the palm of my right hand:

 

 

The Break

The intro is followed by a break that can be a bit challenging in the beginning:

 

 

 

The Melody

The melody is a modal line that moves around the notes of Gm9:

 

 

 

The Chord Accents

The melody is followed by a II V sequence with strong accents. The II Vs follow the harmony of the intro:

 

 

 

The accents are followed by the theme again, then the break before the solos start.

 

Four on Six – Improvisation

Here are the chord changes for the solos:

 

|Gm7          |             |             |              |
|Cm7    F7    |Bbm7   Eb7   |Am7    D7    |Ebm7   Ab7    |
|Gm7          |             |             |Cm7    F7     |
|Bbmaj7       |Am7b5  D7    |Gm7          | D7           |

 

The chords are not very hard to improvise over, although the tempo makes it challenging (202 bpm).

 

Bars 1-4

Over the Gm7 chord, Wes Montgomery generally plays the G Dorian mode, blues scales, and arpeggios.

G Dorian

Here’s the scale diagram for G Dorian in root position:

 

 

Don’t limit yourself to this position though, learn to play the scale over the entire neck, like this:

 

 

G Minor Pentatonic and G Minor Blues Scale

Another guitar scale Wes uses over Gm7 is the minor pentatonic scale or the minor blues scale.

Here are the 2 main positions of this scale, but the same applies as above, learn the scale over the entire neck.

The blue notes are shown in orange, use them to slide, hammer or pull into the notes D or C.

 

 

Here Wes Montgomery uses a unison-interval blues cliche.

 

 

 

Gm7 Arpeggio

Wes also uses arpeggios over the Gm7, most of the times a Gm9 arpeggio.

He often makes big jumps on the fretboard, like in this example:

 

 

 

Sometimes the G minor goes to C7, like in the following example:

 

 

 

Gm/maj7 Arpeggio

Wes also uses m/maj7 arpeggios. A minor/major7 chord is a minor chord with a natural 7.

In this example Wes plays a Gm/maj7 arpeggio first, followed by a Gm7 arpeggio resolving into the 3rd of C7:

 

 

 

 

Bars 5-8

These are a series of 4 II-Vs.

On the theme, the dominant chords have a natural 9 and a sharp 11 (F9#11).

The scale played on chords with these tensions is the melodic minor scale.

 

Cm7 F7

Play the C melodic minor scale here.

On the F7 the name of this scale is the Lydian dominant scale (4th mode of the melodic minor scale).

 

Bbm7 Eb7

Here you play Bb melodic minor, the same scale as in the above scale diagram, but 2 frets lower.

Am7 D7

A melodic minor

Ebm7 Ab7

Eb melodic minor

 

Wes Montgomery doesn’t think in scales on this part, but in melodic patterns.

That’s a good idea because the tempo is so fast, which makes it difficult to play scales musically. He usually plays a pattern on the first II V and transposes it down the neck for the rest of the II Vs.

Here’s an example where he uses a minor 9-11 pattern.

 

 

 

Here’s another example, this time Wes Montgomery uses his famous octaves.

Wes “strums” the octaves with his thumb, but you can also play them with thumb and index finger.

 

 

 

Bars 9-12

The same modal part as bars 1 to 4, the only difference is a II V to Bbmaj7 in the last bar.

 

Bars 13-16

In this example, Wes plays the D altered scale over bar 14: