Learning how to Improvise without Pentatonics

[fathand]

I've been playing guitar since high school and I consider myself a solid rhythm guitarist. With that said, I can't improvise worth a damn and it's so frustrating! I know about Robert Conti as I've bought a couple of his DVD's with good results but when it comes to soloing over a jazz standard, I still suck!! Is there anything on youtube that someone can direct me to that covers using the melodic minor and/or the mixolydian scales while playing over the changes?? Much appreciated!

[blille]

Good place to start: Free Jazz Guitar Lessons | Learn How To Play Jazz Guitar

And FTR, there’s nothing wrong with pentatonic scales and nothing magical about melodic minor hopefully the lessons above help.

[rlrhett]

I could have written that post myself. After several years now of hitting it hard... I still am garbage.

But, FWI, I feel I know why. I didn’t really before. The aha moment came when someone told me that while jazz is influenced by the blues, it comes from a different place. Bear with me here for a sec, but my friend said the difference can be illustrated by the harmonica.

The point being that in the blues someone can call out a blues “in E”, and the harmonica player grabs an “E” harmonica. Every note you blow on the harmonica is in “E”, and you can play whatever you want on it regardless of what other players are doing. If you sound good, it will work over the whole blues tune. Blues guitar players play like they have one harmonica. You call out a key, find that harmonica on your fretboard and WAIL!

That doesn’t work in jazz, because there is no such thing as being in “E” for a song. You would have to keep a dozen harmonicas at the ready and be switching them all the time. And that is why thinking like a blues/rock player makes you sound like garbage when playing jazz. You still are playing like you only have one harmonica. You need to play like you have twelve at the ready.

You have to unlearn a lifetime of playing and learn a new way of thinking about improvising. It is not based on the key, but the chord of the moment. I think it was John Coltrane who said, “When the music changes, you change.”

There are LOTS of resources on how to learn to play the changes. I’m sure you will get a dozen good suggestions. The hardest part for me has been that I considered myself a pretty darn good player with 30 years under my belt. It was really really hard to feel like I had to start at year one all over again. But coming from blues/rock you really do have to.

So my advice is to surrender to the jazz gods, approach it like you don’t know how to play guitar, and keep an open mind.

[you can skip this part]

The roots of jazz is in a horn section of a professional marching band. If the song calls for an Emaj, you bleat out E-G#-B. You can’t just grab an E chord and strum. If the next bar calls for Amaj, you bleat out A-C#-E. Individual notes, not a chord.

So now imagine you are an ambitious young musician at the beginning of the jazz age and you’ve been playing the same triads or arpeggios over and over, four to six hours a night six days a week. You want to be noticed. So you start to embellish your triad. You IMPROVISE E-G#-(A-Bb-) B. Sounds good! People notice. Now you add a flair to the Amaj. You do that to any/every chord regardless of key. You aren’t “improvising in E“. You are just dressing up those boring triads and arpeggios. It doesn’t even figure in your thinking that there is no Bb in Emaj scale. What matters to you is whatever chord snapshot the rest of the band is playing at the moment and how to make it rock! (Ahem, I mean swing!).

Now do this for nearly a century, add some of the most gifted virtuosos of all time, and voila you have jazz.

That is very different from how blues guitar developed. Early blues players rarely played in bands. They were rarely professional musicians (at least to start). For eg. Mississippi John Hurt, one of the greatest early blues players of all time, cut some records in 1920 and went back to share cropping until he was rediscovered in the 1960’s. Profane hymnals self accompanied with minimal harmonic backing by a guitar. The guitar would mimic a singers voice, or fill the part of the congregation to your preaching. It would chug like a train or clop like a trotting horse. It followed a form relatively closely that set the stage to moving, amusing, and surprising lyrics. It relied on a pentatonic scale that would sound good over any number of backing chords so it could be independent of them.

So to play jazz you really have to approach it from the point of view of that horn player. Horn players play harmony one note at a time. It would be like having only one string on your guitar. The job is to let the audience hear those familiar progressions while enhancing them with new an surprising embellishments. You can’t ever stop hearing and seeing every chord you would play as if you were playing rhythm. You just have to play them like you only had one string AND play them so that a melody or musical idea flows over them at the same time.

Damn if I know how that’s actually done.


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[pauln]

Actually, the blues harmonica player does not choose the E harp for a song in E...

Most good blues guitarists don't play strictly one pentatonic for even a simple three chord blues; they play in what you might call a "reduced" jazz approach that changes their note selection pool with the chord changes, but might only be using two or three pools... like major and minor pentatonic... and probably have something they can do for diminished and augmented when those appear in more complex tunes.

With a blues like Drown In My Own Tears with 72 chord changes in the form if you include passing chords, the pool approach moves closer to the jazz approach, in this case playing the changes when your pool of the past moment chord is no longer supported by the harmony of the subsequent chord... meaning you may be changing every few chords.

Even simple rock tunes have solo changes; like the solos in the Eagles' Take It Easy and Peaceful Easy Feeling, you can't play those sticking in one pentatonic.

[Litterick]

Maybe the OP comes from a rock background, where pentatonic scales are paramount. Every time I pick up a rock guitar magazine, it includes instructions on playing major and minor pentatonic scales, just as the magazines did when I was learning to play more than twenty years ago. It is all rather dispiriting, because there are so many guitarists associated with rock who are not confined to two scales, yet their work is scarcely noticed.

[Drumbler]

In answer to the OPs question...

Forget all that mode crap.

Learn to improvise with the major scale as your next step.

Just add two notes to your pentatonics.

Take the song below.

1st 5 bars are in Ab. Solo in the Ab major scale. You could call it the F-Aeolian scale but why bother? It's all the Ab major scale.

Next three bars are in C major scale.

Try it.

The rest of the tune goes:

Eb to G to E.

Then back to Ab basically.

Can you see it?

So, look at the tune. Get used to seeing the key centers of the parts of the tune. Where does the key change to another? Etc. Solo in the correct key.

[Rob MacKillop]

Don't neglect arpeggios. A high percentage of players use a high percentage of arpeggios. And once you are familiar with them, bring in some passing notes and little chromatic decorations. Scales are used a lot less than you seem to imagine.

[joe2758]

i wrote a huge long thing, but I'll keep it short since I don't think anyone actually cares. I suggest basically just following this guys youtube channel in order. chords come from scales, not the other way around. Stick with major and dominant scales.

[MarkRhodes]

Nothing against what is said here but another thing worth doing is to learn a simple solo over, say, "Summertime" (which is basically a minor blues) or "All of Me" and tinker around with the notes. Why do they work? What's going on? (And it's probably best to think of this in your own terms---how does it make sense TO YOU?) Why does it sound cool? And what about all these rests? Where are they happening and why? How is it that the phrases have similar rhythms?

For that matter, learn some tunes that you like. Just comp the changes and sing the melody. What makes that sound so good? Which notes are accented? How is tension increased and how is it resolved?

You can learn a lot by just knowing the melody and changes of a half dozen good ol' tunes.

Another thing to do---Frank Vignola talks about this---is to take the rhythms of a melody and play different notes. You might be surprised with what you come up with!

[Hatim]

Yes, arpeggios with half notes below.
Thinking in scales didn't work for me. Too vague.

Hans

[emanresu]

Boggles me how some 10-20-yearolds can improvise like seasoned players. Some have it easy I guess.. But whatever, most people can pick it up slowly. For me, it took about 3 years to learn to improvise well enough for background gig in an event or fancy restaurant. "Well enough" meaning that their eaten food doesn't come back up.

Hardest part for me was to start trusting my ears, make the solo to tell a story and last but not least - learn to play so that it sounds like I "mean it". "Play like you mean it" - all about good rhythm&time. Still struggling here but *phew*, not hopeless anymore.

Good luck!

[fathand]

Yes, arpeggios with half notes below.
Thinking in scales didn't work for me. Too vague.Hans

I'm barely starting to learn arpeggios and I'm learning to read music. Actually I'm half way through Leavitt's book volume 1, after I get done with the book, I'm gonna get a jazz guitar teacher to work with. My instructor right now, is not into jazz at all, but she's a great teacher for me right now. It's a shame but it's gonna take me longer to solo when playing jazz. I can play over blues as I'm familiar with that by ear, the oldies R&B, same thing. It's just stuff that's more complicated that's kicking my butt. I've tried picking up chord melody in the hopes that it helps. I just don't sound jazzy, I can hit the right notes but it sucks! I was talking to someone else about this and he said, "nobody can teach you how to improvise ever. They can teach you the lead to a song but that's as close as it will get. Improvisation has to be learned, it can't be taught." Just thought I would share that, I'll just keep at it, all the comments are much appreciated!

[rpjazzguitar]

The only thing I'll add is this.

Jazz is typically taught with attention to playing X scale in Y situation.

But, from a different point of view, you only need two skills to play jazz.

1. You need to be able to think of a melody and play it -- instantly.

2. You need to be able to think of a good melody that fits the tune.

So, one approach is to strum the chords and scat sing a solo. When you sing a melody you like, play it on the guitar.
If you find that you aren't thinking of interesting enough melodies, you have some alternatives. The chord/scale approach may be one, insofar as it gives you a guide for which notes to play. But, another approach is getting recordings of the tune and learning to sing the passages you like. Then put those on the guitar.

Not everyone sees it this way, but it seems to me that there are players who know massive amounts of theory and don't solo well. And, there are players who know absolutely no theory (eg. Andres Varady) and sound terrific.

I also think that, for some, including myself, the theory can be a distraction from the harder work of ear training. When you have an expert ear, the theory may become more useful.

[MarkRhodes]

The only thing I'll add is this.

Jazz is typically taught with attention to playing X scale in Y situation.

But, from a different point of view, you only need two skills to play jazz.

1. You need to be able to think of a melody and play it -- instantly.

2. You need to be able to think of a good melody that fits the tune.

So, one approach is to strum the chords and scat sing a solo. When you sing a melody you like, play it on the guitar.

Great advice. One way to do this away from the guitar. (We've got to be away from it sometime, right?) Scat sing (or hum or whistle, whatever) over a play-along. Jack Grassel took lessons from Tal Farlow at Tal's place and Jack heard Tal do this over Jamey Aebersold play-alongs while doing things around the house. One could do it while driving too.

Jamey Aebersold gives this advice too and one thing he says about it is that when we do this, we rarely sing wrong notes. Granted, we may just sing chord tones, which wouldn't make for a great solo, but if you can do THAT, you can expand on that. Experiement with rhythms. As Carol Kaye says, "Music should be fun!"

[mrcee]

Actually, the blues harmonica player does not choose the E harp for a song in E...

Most good blues guitarists don't play strictly one pentatonic for even a simple three chord blues; they play in what you might call a "reduced" jazz approach that changes their note selection pool with the chord changes, but might only be using two or three pools... like major and minor pentatonic... and probably have something they can do for diminished and augmented when those appear in more complex tunes.

With a blues like Drown In My Own Tears with 72 chord changes in the form if you include passing chords, the pool approach moves closer to the jazz approach, in this case playing the changes when your pool of the past moment chord is no longer supported by the harmony of the subsequent chord... meaning you may be changing every few chords.

Even simple rock tunes have solo changes; like the solos in the Eagles' Take It Easy and Peaceful Easy Feeling, you can't play those sticking in one pentatonic.

The comparison to harmonica is a good one and it's true that most of time if the song's in E an A harp would be used. Playing a harp a 4th up is also called 'cross harp'. Good for Blues. For example A's got a a D natural which is the dominant 7th of E.

[Tal_175]

I think the OP's framing of learning jazz improvisation as "How to improvise without pentatonics and use melodic minor and mixolydian scale instead" misses the mark a bit. This type of mindset in the beginning is understandable however and very common.
Given a tune or any chord progression, it's a very trivial theoretical problem to assign MM and Mixolydian scales (or their modes) to each chord or a group of chords that would work very well. But that's only a very small step towards improvisation.
What's not clear to me is, does the OP:
1- Want a resource that teaches MM and Mixo scale positions on the guitar?
2- OP knows how to play MM and Mixo scales but want to know how to match them to chords (as chord-scales) in a tune?
3- Want to know how to create good jazz lines and connect chords by only using MM and Mixo scales?
If the question is 3, than it's not clear to me why the approach to learning jazz should be limited to these two scales? Or does the OP ask if there is a known teaching method that claims to teach improvisation by using these two scales? I'm not saying that's impossible or a bad approach necessarily (although I would focus on chord tones first personally), just seems a bit too specific.

[boatheelmusic]

Learn the major scale in at least five positions and at least in the keys of C, F, Bb, Eb, Ab and Db . Also learn the arpeggios for major7, min7 and dom7 chords in five positions.

And learn a few tunes.

You will then have the basic tools you need.

Unlearn the importance of the pentatonic scale, and, above all, ignore modes.

Or, just sign up for Jimmy Bruno's workshop and let him guide you through all this.

Just my two cents.

[matt.guitarteacher]

There's nothing "wrong" with pentatonics. You want to learn to use them in a jazz context eventually anyway. People like Willie Thomas even use pentatonics as the jumping-off point for learning to chord tone soloing.

You might check out Jerry Bergonzi' s Melodic Structures. It starts with 1235 patterns (and their minor counterparts 1,b3,4,5) and really works them in depth. These are basically pentatonic-minus-one. Anyway, real players speak really highly of this method of reduction. It's not just dumbing down for beginners or something, but it definitely gets at targeting chord tones in a basic way.

Again, there's nothing wrong with the approach to pentatonic that most of us use in rock/blues. The main difference is that for rock and blues we mostly target a kind of single tonic sound for the whole thing. Jazz is largely the same, except that you're doing this with many more changes. A transitional approach toward more chord tone soloing would be to learn to play your basic blues type thing with a separate pentatonic for each chord. Pentatonic scales are are arpeggios to a large degree. Using a single scale for whole songs probably disguises this far too much.

[Tal_175]

The main difference between blues/rock and jazz is that blues/rock is a more narrowly defined genre. That's why blues/rock players play the same type of shit over and over again from the age 14 until they retire. I'm not saying they can't play anything else, but if they do then it's not blues/rock anymore and the audience will go WTF?
Jazz players have trained their audience to accept wider range of musical content as jazz (or people who are more open to this are drawn to jazz). So a jazz player through out their life explore different melodic and rhythmic content. They get something into their playing, then when they are bored playing that same shit, they move on to explore new things. It's not that the jazz player is objectively better improviser 10 years later, it's just that he/she just playing differently then they did 10 years ago. It's a constant journey to keep things fresh.

[basinstreet]

, we rarely sing wrong notes.

clearly haven't heard me ...

joking aside - i think this works for some but you can also underestimate how bad some peoples natural talent is (myself included in this group)

i think i have ideas going on but in reality they are too vague to be actual notes, and then when i get to a guitar i realise i wasn't really hearing anything at all

[fathand]

I think the OP's framing of learning jazz improvisation as "How to improvise without pentatonics and use melodic minor and mixolydian scale instead" misses the mark a bit.

Hi Tal,
Point taken but I'm not simply talking about the melodic minor and the mixolydian that would be ridiculous. I used those as examples only. The trouble with my soloing is it simply doesn't sound jazzy. It will come together for me it will just take alot more time than I ever thought. Comments appreciated, happy picking!

[Tal_175]

Hi Tal,
Point taken but I'm not simply talking about the melodic minor and the mixolydian that would be ridiculous. I used those as examples only. The trouble with my soloing is it simply doesn't sound jazzy. It will come together for me it will just take alot more time than I ever thought. Comments appreciated, happy picking!

My answer is total and complete immersion in jazz. Since I decided to study jazz and move away from blues and rock, 3 or so years ago, I'm constantly listening to, practicing and thinking about jazz. I'm studying with good players, play in a small combo and take rehearsals very seriously etc.
Also in my experience when you sound jazzy, you don't know that you sound jazzy. You don't go, oh look that sounded very jazzy I'll do it again. It's more like jazz gets infused into everything you do. I'm still a growing improviser but the other day I was testing an amp at a store, the guy next to me said, how do you do that, what scales you play? I said what do you mean? He said, like play jazzy like that? I had no idea I was playing jazzy at that moment. I was just trying to assess the amp, I thought I was being bluesy. I wasn't playing a lick or even anything chromatic. Apparently, I can't string a couple of notes together and not sound jazzy anymore, even if I intend not to.

[fep]

This book is used at Musicians Institute in Hollywood that specifically addresses what you are asking (moving from penatonics and a key center approach to a chord jazz style approach):

https://smile.amazon.com/Introductio...guitar+soloing

[KirkP]

The teachers, books and clinics that have helped me the most on soloing start with an intense focus on arpeggios. Then they’ll show how to create melodies around the chord tones by adding scale tones and chromatic approaches or enclosures. They also show methods to that make interesting melodies that grab the listener and tell a story. Consider dumping your pentatonic and mode based habits for a while and find a teacher who starts with arpeggios.

Note that the arpeggio for a Maj6/9 chord happens to be a pentatonic scale, so you won’t really be dumping the pentatonic, but you’ll make better use of it.

I think of chord tones (AKA arpeggios) as large stepping stones in a pond. The other scale tones are smaller stones, and remaining chromatic tones are smaller stones yet. They are all available to you as you cross the pond, but the large stones are more stable and the smaller provide more tension and a drive to keep moving forward. If you analyze melodies of great tunes from that mindset it might give you a sense of why these melodies are compelling, and might give you ideas of how to improvise on them.

I’ll credit Mimi Fox with being the first teacher to drive the importance of arpeggios home with me. She heard me trying to improvise on Autumn Leaves for two minutes and told me I needed command of arpeggios if I didn’t want to sound like aimless noodling. She happened to have just realeased a new video & book on arpeggios. Tim Lerch has also been a great help — he’s a great teacher and does skype lessions. Mordy Ferber also did a great clinic on creating melodies from this point of view and has some online offerings (but they tend to be advanced level).

[pingu]

Up with Arpeggios ......

Down with scales !

<joke>