I want to play like this guy, how do I do it?

[ragman1]

I cannot find any contact details other than his youtube channel which appears to have a south African phone number in the description.

From the UK: 00 27 07 33 77 57 41

From the US: 011 27 07 33 77 57 41

The forum time says 17 49. South Africa's only 1 hour ahead. Do it NOW!

[padraig]

From the UK: 00 27 07 33 77 57 41

From the US: 011 27 07 33 77 57 41

The forum time says 17 49. South Africa's only 1 hour ahead. Do it NOW!

Yeh this all got a bit weird didn't it. Nevermind.

Thanks for the help people who tried to help.

[pamosmusic]

Broadly speaking, with respect to playing that kind of chord solo ...

I was looking to see if Allan had recommended this one, but I bought this one when he was posting about it and it's a very good book for the chord soloing kind of thing generally.

It's geared toward swing guitar (the kind of thing Jonathan Stout is doing above)but this rhythmic style and that of Les Paul and others probably has more to do with that kind of style than from the bebop sort of thing or the 6th diminished stuff. Though also the strategies in the book could be used for the 6th diminished stuff with a little creativity. Which is also very fun.

Early Jazz Guitar Chord Soloing - GuitarVivo

If you’re not looking for stylistic stuff, this is the solution. This will help you do something like what’s in the video.

Great book. Good luck Godspeed.

[starjasmine]

There's nothing wrong with trying to emulate any player who appeals to you. If you want to copy Mouton's playing, go ahead and do it.

I always read, I cannot just sit down and "improvise" and never try. If I do "improvise" melodies I'm simply using the chords from whatever tune is on the music stand in front of me and play an improvised melody against the accompaniment.

If you are saying that you have never studied harmony/theory, perhaps that would help. Not every great improviser uses theory, but many of them do. It helps you to understand WHY certain notes are on the page and WHY they sound good or bad. It's a way to create a mental model that connects notes on paper to sound in your ears - whether in your "mind's ear" or real-time listening/playing.

As I mentioned in another post, studying harmony in conjunction with ear training (i.e. not only knowing how to read or spell a chord but what it sounds like) will teach your ear to "just know" that a certain sound is a major third, or a 13th chord, and so on. There's no thinking involved. It's like seeing a color or tasting something. You immediately know that you see green or that you taste something sweet. You're not saying "hmm thats a mix of blue and yellow, so it must be green."

More to the point, you'll be able to hear exactly what Mouton is doing and figure it out for yourself with far less trial and error. Additionally, you'll be able to modify it, rearrange it, do whatever you like with it.

Additionally, your improvisation will no longer be constrained by the chords on the page but can be whatever you imagine in your "mind's ear," for example, substituting chords that are more interesting than what's on the page.

Gaining this skillset requires serious daily effort over a period of years. But if you want some quick rule-based shortcuts, search the forum for threads on improvisation. An example of one such rule would be that you can always extend any chord; for exmple, if the music says C7, you can use C9, or C7#11, or C13 in its place. And you can yse those chords as the basis for your improvisations, as well. Let your ear be your guide: if something sounds good, do it. If not, don't.

[grahambop]

Well I had nothing to do this afternoon, so I figured out the main chords the guy uses, let the OP make of it what he will. Of course it would be better if he did it himself, but I haven't really got the impression from everything he's said that he has enough guitar chord knowledge or theory to do it. Apologies if that's not the case.

A couple of points - the guy in the video sometimes just plays the melody on the top 2 strings (as has been pointed out) e.g. xxxx77 (to harmonise a high B note), and although it sometimes looks like he is fingering the 5th string, you can hardly hear any note on that string. So either he's barely fretting it, or his picking technique is missing the string. (He does use it occasionally).

Anyway this is what I got:

G6 xx545x (then he adds an F# on the first string)
F#7 xx435x
D xx7775
Ddim xx6767
C#7 x4342x
Cdim (or B7b9) xx4545
C#7 x4342x
A6 xx767x
then shifts it down to
A9 xx545x

plays some melody etc. then

B7b9 xx7878
B xxx877
B7 xxx875
C9 xx878x
B9 xx767x
G6 xx545x
G xx543x
D6 x5443x

[AllanAllen]

This guy has a video with grips and a neat little 48 bar exercise that takes you around the 12 keys.

Might help the OP. If you like this, it’s similar to the stuff in the early Jazz chord melody book Peter suggested. Which I also recommend.

[grahambop]

Here’s Jonathan Stout doing some great chord solo stuff on it.

[ragman1]

Note also that the Merle Travis style uses the left thumb on the fretboard a lot whereas Mouton doesn't. Jonathon Stout doesn't either.

[padraig]

Well I had nothing to do this afternoon, so I figured out the main chords the guy uses, let the OP make of it what he will. Of course it would be better if he did it himself, but I haven't really got the impression from everything he's said that he has enough guitar chord knowledge or theory to do it. Apologies if that's not the case.

A couple of points - the guy in the video sometimes just plays the melody on the top 2 strings (as has been pointed out) e.g. xxxx77 (to harmonise a high B note), and although it sometimes looks like he is fingering the 5th string, you can hardly hear any note on that string. So either he's barely fretting it, or his picking technique is missing the string. (He does use it occasionally).

Anyway this is what I got:

G6 xx545x (then he adds an F# on the first string)
F#7 xx435x
D xx7775
Ddim xx6767
C#7 x4342x
Cdim (or B7b9) xx4545
C#7 x4342x
A6 xx767x
then shifts it down to
A9 xx545x

plays some melody etc. then

B7b9 xx7878
B xxx877
B7 xxx875
C9 xx878x
B9 xx767x
G6 xx545x
G xx543x
D6 x5443x

This is what I was looking for, thank you. This is more or less what I thought, all the chords on the top three or four strings, keeping them very close together, all falls nicely under the fingers, very little movement between them, utilising the same few familiar shapes to good effect. This is similar to how we would approach harmonising a tune at the piano. On a piano we would be thinking about keeping all the chords straddling the A below middle C and we would use whichever inversion was closest to the chord we're coming from. Of which there are only 4 choices by the way, not three thousand and twelvty seven different options or whatever there is on the guitar.

Thank you for this, I appreciate it. Now to think about how to apply a similar approach to all tunes.

[ragman1]

Thank you for this, I appreciate it.

You realise we need to hear you play this now, right?

[pauln]

[AllanAllen]

You realise we need to hear you play this now, right?

Patience, grahmbop just gave him the fish. He needs time to re-invent the wheel.

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

Patience, grahmbop just gave him the fish. He needs time to re-invent the wheel.

Oh baby - you sure know how to mix metaphors!

[AllanAllen]

It's getting to be a hobby with me.

[ragman1]

Patience, grahmbop just gave him the fish. He needs time to re-invent the wheel.

Graham gave him the fish but it's the sauce that makes the dish

[grahambop]

just the fish, no scales.

[ragman1]

just the fish, no scales.

Well, first of all, thanks for doing the chords, it got me off the hook! To be honest I started, and it's not that hard, but I realised that he's basically using the shapes as background to the melody and running a lot of lines over them.

It's the melody that comes out far more than the chords. But he's still going to have to work out how to strum the whole thing so it all works together and I'm pretty sure I couldn't give him that. Some of those chords are a bit off anyway.

But he got what he wanted so well done. Good job

.

[grahambop]

I like that run down from B7b9 in the second bit, it’s neat. Shows you can do a lot just with 3-note chords.

[benhatchins]

He is awesome! Developing that kind of skill takes time, but every step along the way is rewarding. It’s not just about replicating someone else’s style, but finding your own voice too. I often play while streaming music on spotify spotify.pissedconsumer.com/review.html, which helps me study phrasing and rhythm in a natural way. It feels like having a virtual teacher guiding me through.

[Kenn]

That's an interesting approach!

[LanBaul]

He’s using compact jazz shapes and bass notes. Joe Pass style chord melody is similar