The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary
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  1. #51

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    Quote Originally Posted by Kojo27
    You're saying the ear will take care of itself - will catch up with the fingers' pathways? If so, that's a good point.
    That has been my experience. Sprinkle in liberal amounts of listening to jazz albums and you're good to go.

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  3. #52

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    Quote Originally Posted by FrankLearns
    I just wish there would be an equally rigid training on timing and phrasing. Without that the greatest notes and scales don't sound right and jazzy. Practicing with backing track or metronome helps, but Elliot has us playing straight eight notes pretty much all through the book and that bothers me a bit.
    How about we start a supplemental thread for practicing rhythms?

    We could use the Elliott exercises but add rhythm elements to them.

    Frank, could you elaborate a bit more on what your thinking and were you have difficulties. Maybe, a lot of us have the same problems.

    Some of my thoughts...

    Are you interested in working on various phrases?

    Are you interested in getting tight with a metronome with 4 to the beat and 2 to the beat?

    Are you interested in working on tricky rhythms like quarter note triplets, or sixteenth notes mixed with triplets, or straight eights mixed with triplets and swing eights?

    How about syncopation?

    How about odd time signatures?

    How about note placement (i.e. on the beat, ahead of the beat, laid back)?

    I think we could make up exercises where any of those could be practiced while practicing the arpeggios or the connecting exercise.

  4. #53

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    Quote Originally Posted by fep
    Are you interested in working on various phrases?

    Are you interested in getting tight with a metronome with 4 to the beat and 2 to the beat?

    Are you interested in working on tricky rhythms like quarter note triplets, or sixteenth notes mixed with triplets, or straight eights mixed with triplets and swing eights?

    How about syncopation?

    How about odd time signatures?

    How about note placement (i.e. on the beat, ahead of the beat, laid back)?

    I think we could make up exercises where any of those could be practiced while practicing the arpeggios or the connecting exercise.
    Yes. I think this is a good idea. Rhythm is an area that I need to address. That said, I have my hands full now keeping up with the group just using 8th notes.

    If the group goes this way, I'll be sure to subscribe and return to it a bit later.

    Brian

  5. #54

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    Quote Originally Posted by FatJeff
    That has been my experience. Sprinkle in liberal amounts of listening to jazz albums and you're good to go.
    I wonder if that's true for everyone. When I started playing I thought I was tone deaf. I couldn't make out anything by ear. I continued that way for a few years, until I started including specific ear training, solfege and transcribing. I'm a lot better with single note lines now, but I still have issues with chords.

    I feel that it varies among people. I know people who were able to pick things up be ear easily without much training. Maybe they sang a lot when they were younger, but developing the ear seems to take some longer (and more work) than others.

    And it's such a personal thing, I doubt that two people perceive things exactly the same way. I used to hear people say that the ear will come by just playing or listening to music, and I don't doubt that's how it happened for them, but it didn't happen that way for me.

    I think some people just need to put more time and effort into it before they'll see results. I just say this from my experience, it may be different for others. I probably still have more years of struggle before my ear gets to where I want it.

  6. #55

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    Well I guess you caught me in a lie, jsep. I didn't mention that while I was listening to lots of jazz and practicing lots of exercises, I was also enrolled in theory and ear training classes (4 semesters each), and was playing with lots of other people. So there was probably a lot that my ear picked up from that as well.

    Still, I am not too worried that my shedding these exercises is going to turn me into a worse player. :-)

  7. #56

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    Quote Originally Posted by fep
    How about we start a supplemental thread for practicing rhythms?

    We could use the Elliott exercises but add rhythm elements to them.

    Frank, could you elaborate a bit more on what your thinking and were you have difficulties. Maybe, a lot of us have the same problems.

    Some of my thoughts...

    Are you interested in working on various phrases?

    Are you interested in getting tight with a metronome with 4 to the beat and 2 to the beat?

    Are you interested in working on tricky rhythms like quarter note triplets, or sixteenth notes mixed with triplets, or straight eights mixed with triplets and swing eights?

    How about syncopation?

    How about odd time signatures?

    How about note placement (i.e. on the beat, ahead of the beat, laid back)?

    I think we could make up exercises where any of those could be practiced while practicing the arpeggios or the connecting exercise.
    Thanks a bunch fep for being so accomodating! I think i am thinking more about relatively elementary training. I guess the key is to really know and understand where to start a phrase and where to end it and where to put the accents. I don't have too much trouble with a metronome clicking on every beat (thatf was different a little over a year ago when i picked a guitar again after a loooong time) and i guess it is alright to play straight eigth notes to a backing track. With all these Elliot exersizes i can count one-and-two-and... I think that is more or less under control (except, of course, for getting really fluent on these arpeggios and theor connections - but i feel the light is in sight at least). I find it so much harder to keep time and be aware of time when i don't play something regular but really improvise and try to be melodic. And many jazz phrases start offbeat and end off beat. I also find it harder with my westernized ears to accentuate beats 2 and 4 instead of 1 and 3. I noticed in much of the arpeggio recordings in this thread that people put emphasis on 1 - me too. It is quite natural as we are changing arpeggios on this beat. Yet, in order to sound really jazzy, we should start on one-and or two and put the accents on the even beats. If we could train that along the way i think it would help matters. I am not looking for odd meters or other rhythmic oddities - just a better way to find into a jazz specific groove. I know that it is probably not a good idea to try to do everything at once but i do feel that it is a subject that deserves attention.

    More recordings soon :-)

  8. #57

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    Hey guys - I had to travel for work this week (sans guitar) and had some time to work on my Arpeggio tool. I added the following pattern pairs:

    MP1 - mP2
    MP2 - mP3
    MP3 - mP4
    Mp4 - mP5

    I've already identified one error on the Maj Pattern 3 IMa7 arpeggio.

    Let me know if you find any more.

    I also started a page including the minor scales and whole-tone.

    Brian

  9. #58

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    Quote Originally Posted by onetruevibe
    Hey guys - I had to travel for work this week (sans guitar) and had some time to work on my Arpeggio tool. I added the following pattern pairs:

    MP1 - mP2
    MP2 - mP3
    MP3 - mP4
    Mp4 - mP5

    I've already identified one error on the Maj Pattern 3 IMa7 arpeggio.

    Let me know if you find any more.

    I also started a page including the minor scales and whole-tone.

    Brian
    One issue: you can't move the overlays except on the MajP1 - minP2 version. But this thing is becoming very sweet.

  10. #59

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    Quote Originally Posted by FatJeff
    One issue: you can't move the overlays except on the MajP1 - minP2 version. But this thing is becoming very sweet.
    Thanks for the feedback, Jeff.

    Yea, the movable overlays are coming soon. I ran out of time and don't have Adobe Flash on this computer. They should up and running on Tuesday, though.

    Please keep the ideas coming on how I can improve the tool or what I can add that would be a useful resource to folks.

    Brian

  11. #60

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    I'm really thinking of FrankLearns post wanting rhythm practice in the Elliot studies. Frank, what do you think of this?

    I remember a post by Matt discussing using a phrase from a tune to practice with.

    So I'm using the 1st two measures of Confirmation as a Rhythmic figure. Of course any rhythm you like will do fine for this kind of practice.



    This is the arpeggios from Pattern IV major, using that rhythmic figure. I wish I could swing this better. Work to do.

    Last edited by fep; 05-26-2012 at 11:31 AM.

  12. #61

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    Quote Originally Posted by fep
    I'm really thinking of FrankLearns post wanting rhythm practice in the Elliot studies. Frank, what do you think of this?

    I remember a post by Matt discussing using a phrase from a tune to practice with.

    So I'm using the 1st two measures of Confirmation as a Rhythmic figure. Of course any rhythm you like will do fine for this kind of practice.



    This is the arpeggios from Pattern IV major, using that rhythmic figure. I wish I could swing this better. Work to do.

    Frank ,i believe that you are possibly doing something you might not be aware of .That is you are showing people how to learn,i too think of Joe Elliots book more as a book of concepts rather than a book to be worked through.Its then up to us to take those concepts and apply them to real musical situations as you have demonstrated brilliantly here.Thank you for showing us the way oh great sage.I will be unable to post for a while but will be back here soon i hope,so bye for now and happy playing.

  13. #62

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    Quote Originally Posted by onetruevibe
    Thanks for the feedback, Jeff.

    Yea, the movable overlays are coming soon. I ran out of time and don't have Adobe Flash on this computer. They should up and running on Tuesday, though.

    Please keep the ideas coming on how I can improve the tool or what I can add that would be a useful resource to folks.

    Brian
    Forgot to add: the ability to switch between note names and relative intervals is great!

  14. #63

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    Hey guys,

    I wanted to document progress (or lack thereof) and uploaded some videos on YouTube. These are situations 1-4 in five positions at 95 bpm. There are many rough spots and mistakes. Conclusion is that more work is definitely needed.

    Enjoy practicing and have a nice weekend!

    Situation 1:


    Situation 2:


    Situation 3:


    Situation 4:


    the audio and video are slightly out of sync. This is the best I manage with Garageband.


    Fep, while doing this, I just saw what you posted - this is great! Very nice idea. I will try to work on that. I feel that this will help a lot.

    Have a nice day everybody!
    Last edited by Frank67; 05-26-2012 at 12:42 PM. Reason: Changed YouTube videos to include the backing tracks

  15. #64

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    Quote Originally Posted by FrankLearns
    Hey guys,

    I wanted to document progress (or lack thereof) and uploaded some videos on YouTube. These are situations 1-4 in five positions at 95 bpm. There are many rough spots and mistakes. Conclusion is that more work is definitely needed.
    Hi Frank, the one thing that concerns me is that I think you're tending to not strictly play down the full arpeggio, especially when the quality of the chord changes. This results in you favoring certain phrases to the exclusion of others. At least the way I've interpreted the connecting game, you start as low or as high as you can be in any given position, and you play up/down through the chord changes as far as you can go before you have to change directions due to running out of space in that position. Just an observation.

  16. #65

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    Quote Originally Posted by FatJeff
    Hi Frank, the one thing that concerns me is that I think you're tending to not strictly play down the full arpeggio, especially when the quality of the chord changes. This results in you favoring certain phrases to the exclusion of others. At least the way I've interpreted the connecting game, you start as low or as high as you can be in any given position, and you play up/down through the chord changes as far as you can go before you have to change directions due to running out of space in that position. Just an observation.
    Hi Jeff,

    thanks for your feedback. Yes, not playing every arpeggio to the end was on purpose to "randomize" the fingerings. At least that was my understanding of what we are supposed to do.

    If I do play every arpeggio to the end I think it would be easier but then I would end up with the same fingerings all the time. In the way I have been practicing it - far from perfect - I really have no idea where exactly on the fretboard I change from one arpeggio to the other which forces me to be more aware of all the notes that the next arpeggio contains and not just on my "canonical entrance point". I still have certain favorite notes at which to start an arpeggio in a given position (tends to be better on the and low high strings and worse on the middle strings) and during the exercise I have been trying to get rid of that by changing direction frequently.

    I'll try to follow what you're suggesting and post that tomorrow. Now I also have a nice rhythmic figure to practice thanks to fep.

  17. #66

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    Re: the previous two posts.

    Elliott writes in the highlighted box on page 16:

    Note:
    To avoid repeating yourself, try changing direction in the middle of the arpeggio sometimes.

  18. #67

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    OK, gotcha Frank. Not trying to pick apart anyone else's playing...God knows I need lots of practice myself.

    As far as the rhythmic thing goes, I'm going to just stick with the continuous eight notes, as the author has us doing. Enough of my brain's CPU % gets used trying to follow the changes that I don't want to divert any of it to thinking about rhythmic variety in my phrases. The point here for me is to ingrain these fingerings to the point where they're automatic, and then I can start to think about rhythmic phrasing. I figure if it was that important to get rhythmic variety into these exercises then Elliot would have told us to do that. And anyway, soon enough things are going to get exponentially more difficult, with chord subs and alterations.

  19. #68

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    Quote Originally Posted by FatJeff
    OK, gotcha Frank. Not trying to pick apart anyone else's playing...God knows I need lots of practice myself.

    As far as the rhythmic thing goes, I'm going to just stick with the continuous eight notes, as the author has us doing. Enough of my brain's CPU % gets used trying to follow the changes that I don't want to divert any of it to thinking about rhythmic variety in my phrases. The point here for me is to ingrain these fingerings to the point where they're automatic, and then I can start to think about rhythmic phrasing. I figure if it was that important to get rhythmic variety into these exercises then Elliot would have told us to do that. And anyway, soon enough things are going to get exponentially more difficult, with chord subs and alterations.
    I'm pretty much with your way of thinking on the Rhythmic variations also. I posted that as FrankLearns had specifically requested some rhythmic phrasing work.

    My attitude, is learn to do it Elliott's way first. After that, I feel free to try whatever variations I can come up with.

  20. #69

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    I'm struggling with keeping your pace on this. Been away one week i France, and it didn't help. Just finished a 20 min workout on situation I, and I have a way to go still. I'm doing better if I'm free to make melodic patterns based on arpeggios, but running them up and down is hard work both (lack of training ... but also on my patience). Will try to catch up with y'all.

    BTW: If any of you are interested in the Lego brick harmony thing, the situations in Joe Elliott would be (according to my interpretation):
    1: Cadence (|ii|V7|I|I|)
    2: Compact cadence (|ii-V7|I|)
    3: Sad cadence (|iiø7|V7|i|i|)
    4: Compact sad cadence (|iiø7-V7|i|)
    5: Long cadence (|iii7|VI7|ii7|V7|I|)
    6: Compact long cadence (|iii7-VI7|ii7-V7|I|)
    7: Sad POT+On (|i7|viø7|iiø7|V7|i|) POT=Plain Old Turnaround
    8: Compact Sad POT+On (|i7-viø7|iiø7-V7|i|)
    9: Launcher (|ii7|V7|)
    10: Launcher (|ii7-V7|)
    11: Rhythm bridge (|III7|./.|VI7|./.|II7|./.|V7|./.|)

    From John Elliot the thing Joe Elliot is missing is the very common major plain old turnaround. Hence, I'm suggesting:
    12: POT+On (|I|vi7|ii7|V7|I|)
    and if we want a compact version of the same
    13: Compact POT+On (|I-vi7|ii7-V7|I|)
    Last edited by gersdal; 05-28-2012 at 12:24 PM. Reason: Corrected in accordance with comments from John Elliot

  21. #70

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    Oh my. The MP3 and mP4 arpeggios are really putting me to task. Very little symmetry. Anyone else feeling the pain?

    I guess I would also like to ask if the group is learning all of the arpeggios for the MP3 and mP4, or just the arpeggios used in Situations 1-4?

    Thanks

    Edit: Strike that. I spent a couple hours this morning "making friends" with Pattern MP3. I like it - it has a unique personality to be sure - forcing you to either shift or stretch. It sounds like folks here are able to make that decision on the fly, but stretching seems to be working best for me at this point. I hope to make some recordings this week.
    Last edited by onetruevibe; 05-28-2012 at 01:49 PM.

  22. #71

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    Hi guys,

    this afternoon I have practiced that rhythm pattern that fep suggested a bit. Attached is a rough take that contains many more mistakes than I was hoping for. But I thought I share anyways.

    I have also worked on situations 5 and 6 and a little bit on chapter 7 as suggested by fep, but now I am too tired to record a video. Will follow hopefully soon.

    Have a nice day and enjoy practicing!


  23. #72

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    Quote Originally Posted by onetruevibe
    Hey guys - I had to travel for work this week (sans guitar) and had some time to work on my Arpeggio tool. I added the following pattern pairs:

    MP1 - mP2
    MP2 - mP3
    MP3 - mP4
    Mp4 - mP5

    I've already identified one error on the Maj Pattern 3 IMa7 arpeggio.

    Let me know if you find any more.

    I also started a page including the minor scales and whole-tone.

    Brian
    Quick update on the Interactive Arpeggio Tool:

    1. Added final pattern pair - MP5 and mP1
    2. Made all of the shapes/arpeggios moveable (drag and drop)
    3. Added labels to each shape/arpeggio so you can more easily identify what was selected
    4. Updated the intervallic fretboard so shapes/arpeggios default to the relative root position


    One way that I've been using this tools is by opening two instances of the webpage in separate windows and arranging those windows so both are visible. This way I can compare side-by-side the note location/intervals of the same arpeggio in two different patterns (e.g. looking at ii7 using Major Pattern 1 and Major Pattern 5)

    Ok - enough of this - time to play some guitar!
    Brian

  24. #73

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    Hey Frank,

    I just listened to your last 5 videos. They sound great, I like the way you are varying the arps now, I think this gets us closer to 'real' music. And of course you get a lot of extra credit for running them through all the patterns.

    I'm glad you are using the rhythmic variation I put up. What I really like about that idea, is you can vary it by using the rhythms from any phrase from any melody or solo. That's enough for, well, just about forever.

  25. #74

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    Hi Frank,

    thanks a lot for your feedback! It does motivate me to work through this together with others. Adding the rhythm element felt more like making music and that was fun, especially upon varying the pattern a bit. But binding myself to a basic pattern helped me a lot not loosing a sense of time (as unfortunately I tend to when let it go freely).

    I am presently over the atlantic and about to touch down in Washington. Will spend a week in Pensylvania but I have my guitar with me and hopefully can keep recording a bit.

  26. #75

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    I could definitely use more review on chapter 5, but I think I'm ready to at least start on chapter 6 now. After reading through chapter 6, I'm left wondering about the other arpeggios for pattern III major and IV minor. He gives us the IImi7, V7 and Ima7 for pattern III major and IImi7(b5), V7 and Imi7 for pattern IV minor, but nothing for the other arpeggios. Should we only focus on the arpeggios needed for the connecting game in situations 1 to 4 in this chapter?

    Does Joe ever fill in the arpeggios in the other patterns? I see some of them in worksheets later in the book, and I have the PDF from gersdal (which is great BTW, thanks gersdal!), but I wonder what Joe considers official? I could come up with my own fingerings, but I'm not sure they'd mesh with his goals. For example, left to my own fingerings, I wouldn't play pattern III major the same way, I'd likely stretch for the 7 with my pinky on the 4th string rather than shift positions. Fitting the arpeggios within the same scale pattern is part of what makes Joe's system work, so I'd like to get this right.