Introduction to Jazz Guitar Soloing Chapter 12

[fep]

Adding one more scale to our connecting game.

The Locrian #2 scale, another 'mode' of the Melodic Minor scale played over the mi7b5 chords in our connecting game.

[Frank67]

Dear friends,

I played around with this a little bit this morning. The recording is a bit hasty and has plenty of rough spots but I thought I share nevertheless.

I love the loc#2 sound blending into the altered scale. Plenty of tension that nicely resolves.

My example is situation 3 in A minor (so B-7b5 E7b9 Am7 Am7). I played twelve cycles:

1+2) the straight arpeggios
3+4) substituting D-7 for B-7b5 and B07 for E7b9
5+6) substituting D-7 for B-7b5 and the altered scale for E7b9
7-12) Locrian#2 over B-7b5, the altered scale over E7b9

The only note that is too disonant for my taste is the Db in the loc#2 scale that clashes pretty badly with the D in the chord. Otherwise I really like the sound.

Enjoy practicing and have a nice sunday!

[JazzReggie]

Dear friends,

I played around with this a little bit this morning. The recording is a bit hasty and has plenty of rough spots but I thought I share nevertheless.

I love the loc#2 sound blending into the altered scale. Plenty of tension that nicely resolves.

My example is situation 3 in A minor (so B-7b5 E7b9 Am7 Am7). I played twelve cycles:

1+2) the straight arpeggios
3+4) substituting D-7 for B-7b5 and B07 for E7b9
5+6) substituting D-7 for B-7b5 and the altered scale for E7b9
7-12) Locrian#2 over B-7b5, the altered scale over E7b9

The only note that is too disonant for my taste is the Db in the loc#2 scale that clashes pretty badly with the D in the chord. Otherwise I really like the sound.

Enjoy practicing and have a nice sunday!

I think it's sounding pretty good! Your 5th cycle sounded particularly good to me. One interesting thing I noticed - you sometimes put an accent on the first beat of a bar, typically when you're playing on the treble strings. Not necessarily a good or bad thing, but perhaps something to be aware of.

[Frank67]

Thanks JazzReggie,

This is useful feedback! I know that the accents that i am putting are often "wrong" and should generally be on 2 and 4. fep manages this much better from listening to his videos. It is definitely something that I have to work on to better find into a jazzy groove (have more of a rock background). I tend to be so focused on the actual notes that it happens subconciously.

[Frank67]

Dear all,

here is another take at minor substitutions on situation 3. The chords are again B-7b5 E7b9 Am Am.

It was pointed out to me by my teacher that instead of locrian #2 (D-melodic minor in this key) the D-minor-major-seventh arpeggio would sound good and the altered scale over the dominant chord (F melodic minor in this key) might as well be replaced by F-minor-major-seventh arpeggio. These are arpeggios that we haven't practiced in the study group but they are fairly straightforward because we know how to do the major seventh arpeggios and minor seventh arpeggios and the minor-major seventh differ by only one note from these. To my ears the sound of the F-minor-major seventh arpeggio over the dominant seventh chord is quite similar as the D-7b5 arpeggio (they only differ by one note) that I tried earlier but it creates even more tension.

I played around with the various substitutions and found that I really like the sound of the minor-major seventh arpeggios in place of the scales. I think they capture the essence of the tension created by the scales really well. But of course they each hold their own.

The recording has 18 cycles (again, up and down): (The fourth measure of each cycle I have left free. That helps concentrating on the next round and the overall orientation.)

1+2) straight arpeggios

3) D-7 arp E7 arp Am7arp up-direction
4) D-7 arp B07 arp Am7arp up-direction
5) D-7 arp D-7b5 arp Am7arp up-direction
6) D-7 arp F-m7 arp Am7arp up-direction
7) D-7 arp altered scale Am7arp up-direction

8) D-7 arp E7 arp Am7arp down-direction
9) D-7 arp B07 arp Am7arp down-direction
10) D-7 arp D-7b5 arp Am7arp down-direction
11) D-7 arp F-m7 arp Am7arp down-direction
12) D-7 arp altered scale Am7arp down-direction

13) loc #2 scale altered scale Am7arp up direction
14) loc #2 scale altered scale Am7arp down direction

15) D-m7 arp F-m7arp Am7arp up direction
16) D-m7 arp F-m7arp Am7arp down direction

17) D-m7 arp B07 arp Am7arp up direction
18) D-m7 arp B07 arp Am7arp down direction

this is a bit "industrial" but it facilitates comparison of the various sounds IMHO. There are, as always, a few rough spots in the video but I thought I share nevertheless.

[fep]

Good work Frank. Excellent example for listening to the various options.

They all seem to work and it's a bit hard for me to pick a favorite.

I like, 1 & 2, 6 & 7, 8, 12, 13,14, 15 thru 18. Heck that's about all of them. I guess if I had to narrow it down... I do like the locrian #2 and the altered scale, maybe my ear is becoming accustomed to them.

Is your instructor making any comments on your progress and/or this course?

[Frank67]

Good work Frank. Excellent example for listening to the various options.

They all seem to work and it's a bit hard for me to pick a favorite.

I like, 1 & 2, 6 & 7, 8, 12, 13,14, 15 thru 18. Heck that's about all of them. I guess if I had to narrow it down... I do like the locrian #2 and the altered scale, maybe my ear is becoming accustomed to them.

Is your instructor making any comments on your progress and/or this course?

Hi fep,

Thanks for the quick feedback!

It is also hard for me to pick a favorite sound. I tend to like the arpeggios a bit better than the scales - they sound a bit more musical to my ear but of course ither the scales or the arpeggios have their charmes and especially if one wants to play a fast phrase a scale comes in nicely. I really like the sound of the diminished arpeggio (a bit strange that Elliot doesn't include it in his course). Maybe because I like gypsy jazz and they do that a lot.

My instructor did not know the book before but when I showed it to him he said he really likes it. He has a university degree in music and I always marvel how fluent he is on the guitar in all genres (I guess most of the kids who take lessons want to learn heavy metal). He really knows the things that we are doing here inside out and is admirably melodic and groovy in jazz. He said that he can tell that the book and the study group is helping me quite a bit (he also liked the idea). The overriding problem that I keep having is that I tend to loose time while improvising and run ahead of the beat when I get nervous. My own assessment is that the mechanical practice implied by the connecting game is helping a lot in these matters - like developping a feeling for where the bars start and end and when and how to switch to the next chord (sounds silly but i just can't count while improvising to safe my live :-)) - there are occasional, fleeting moments at home when I feel relaxed and improvise over a tune and think that it starts to sound like music .... but since mother nature has not equipped me with the greatest rhythmic feel there is a lot of work to be done before it will all be relaxed and natural. But it's worth it and I am happy that I can share practice here with others. I guess I should have learned these things when I was fifteen but like so many of us there was a huge break of several decades without playing and I only picked up a guitar again two years ago.

Ouups, that became a bit longwinded answer - sorry for the rant.

Enjoy practicing all!

PS: I have been writing and disguising a few licks while working on a tune and wanted to share that too. So maybe we could open that section? I don't know how to best present it as i don't have good music notation software. Will think about it.

[fep]

Frank, I have that same problem. In me it is that I can't get my lines to flow is well when I'm boxed in by keeping track or measures. I agree that these exercises are good for overcoming that weakness.

I'll read through those lick writing chapters today and start a thread so you'll have a place to post your licks.

Have you checked out MuseScore? It's a free notation software that is quite good. Like anything there is a learning curve. I think you should check it out.

[FatJeff]

Hi everyone. Checking back in...I've been out of the loop for quite a while now (probably almost two months). I've completed my move and just got my computer back up and running. I've got my axe out and my little studio and practice area coming back together. I plan to start up with these exercises again tomorrow.

[Frank67]

Hi everyone. Checking back in...I've been out of the loop for quite a while now (probably almost two months). I've completed my move and just got my computer back up and running. I've got my axe out and my little studio and practice area coming back together. I plan to start up with these exercises again tomorrow.

Hi Jeff, welcome back and enjoy practicing in your new music room!

[Frank67]

Dear all,

here is another loc#2 / altered scale study in the key of A-minor from this morning. This time through the five positions and a bit faster. Making progress but there are still awkward moments.

Enjoy practicing!

[fep]

Dear all,

here is another loc#2 / altered scale study in the key of A-minor from this morning. This time through the five positions and a bit faster. Making progress but there are still awkward moments.

Enjoy practicing!

I missed this post; I see it now.

Great job Frank. The whole neck and moving up a few notches on the metronome! Sounds good.

[fep]

It's time for me to get moving on all this.

I liked the four step method from chapter 11 for the altered scale. So, I wrote up a similar 3 step method for the Locrian #2 scale.

After running the Locrian #2 scale a bit in Pattern II & IV minor, I think these are some good steps to get this down.

Step 3 is what the author wants us to complete on this chapter (for the first pass through the book). (I show this in Cm, in practice we should do this in various keys):

[fep]

Here is the three steps from above for Sit. 3 Pattern II

I was looking at Sit 4 Pattern IV. After doing that we will have done 4 of the 5 melodic scale fingering patterns. I don't think there's many fingering patterns left to learn in this book after that.

[Frank67]

Hi Frank,

That sounded really good! Congratulations. It sound very smooth and melodic. I also liked the melodic embelishments that you put in.


I got a bit stalled - our rock cover band plays a gig tonight And I was a occupied with rehearsals. But will go back to the Elliot book over the weekend.

Enjoy practice time everybody!

[fep]

Thanks Frank, I finally did another

Locrian #2 over the Bm7b5 (Once I messed up and played a Bm7b3 arp)

Altered over E7 or E7 arp

Apr over Am7