Learning extended guitar arpeggios

[tacofarm]

I didn't read everything, but one valuable thing you can do with the major scale is practice the intervals of it in 3rds, 4ths, 5ths, 6ths, and 7ths. Do it horizontally and vertically. This was good for me.

[christianm77]

Fmmaj7 - Fm7b5 - Ebmaj7#5

thats the stuff ... Though I guess for our purposes it would be a Bmaj7b5 instead of Fmin7b5 eh?

That's a nice sound. Didn't think of that one.

[christianm77]

I find massive lists of chord/scale relationships incredibly intimidating, but some people can and do think this way, and play great on it. Whatever works for you.

For me I spent years tiptoeing around the altered scale. I couldn't do it.

I've made my peace with it though, having heard Lage Lund say 'I'm not a scales guy' at a masterclass. He has his own approach that works for him, based around triad pairs and voice leading AFAIK

For me, I find it helps me when I do a transcription and have a line that links to a certain theoretical concept.

I have my own weird ways of doing things. Aside from my 3-9 chord obsession ATM, I have a little concept I use that works like this:

For example, when I play a ii-V-I in C, Dm G7 C, I like to think Fmaj7, flatten some notes (perhaps the 5th, 3rd and/or 7th of the chord) -> resolve into Cmaj7

So for example Fmaj7 - flat the A and C - resolve in Cmaj7

In minor you could do the same, but obviously the 3rd on the IV chord is already flat.

The result of this is chord/scales sounds - for example the second chord chord be analysed as a Harmonic Major sound (it could be written E/F or G13b9 (no root), but that's not what I'm thinking - I'm aiming at it in a voice leading way. I like the sound of the lines it produces. I got the idea for this from listening to Pete Bernstein talk about his playing, and transcribing Bird and Lester Young.

That said I am getting back into running stepwise scales through changes, usually just the standard major and minors. Whole tone is a nice sound if you can flirt with it.

I also think it is important to really get inside one scale before moving on, like tacofarm re: the major scale. You could make a lot of music on the major scale if you really get inside it.

You can always think of modes and so on as alterations of the major scale too. If you know your major scale inside out, it's much easier to flatten this or that note.

I think diversity is good.

[christianm77]

Oh, whole tone on minor sounds epic. For example on C minor, we play:

B C# D# F G A (B WT)

[Munk]

I seems to me that Charlie Parker and maybe others at that time (?) mostly used ‘just’ arpeggios. I think I also hear he copy his own frases in different numbers. But did the scale focus come in later years and did scales itself start other styles?

Anyway, one reason why I chose the jazz journey, was to get a room to experiment and possible reach a level, where I could express some fast changing moods in each moment. So I find the scales and many rules a little restricting or dictating here. I also have a little anti against the use of licks. They are nice to hear one time and then forget, and I don’t want to incorporate them. It like running around with another mans football shirt. If I improvise for 10 minutes to band-in-box, I often suddenly begin to repeat some stuff and I don’t like. It’s as if the music die with lack of ideas and when the spontaneous element disappears. But scales have probably many advantages in communicating with other musicians, and maybe the same, just at a higher technical level with more possibilities once mastered.

[christianm77]

I seems to me that Charlie Parker and maybe others at that time (?) mostly used ‘just’ arpeggios. I think I also hear he copy his own frases in different numbers. But did the scale focus come in later years and did scales itself start other styles?

Depends what you mean by 'scales.' A scale is itself a set of notes moving up or down in series. A 'mode' I suppose in jazz is more a palette of notes that you could combine freely over chords - you can come up with some fantastic sounds this way.

It's usually ascribed to Miles Davis and the modal revolution in the late 50's - after that people got into applying modes in different contexts. George Russell was another important figure in scale based improvising (Miles got the idea from him IIRC.)

Bird, like all good melodicists used a combination of step wise (scale like) and leap (arpeggio and intervallic) movement that clearly outlines harmonic movement (although not necessarily the movement in the original progression!) Pure arpeggio movement is as boring and predictable as pure scale motion.

Much of his stepwise playing was based on neighbour tones, enclosure patterns and so on. Here's a great workshop/lecture here that goes into these techniques in some depth (and lots of singing, which I like!):

Scales are lovely things, but it's important to learn to play around chord tones. Then you can decorate them with all the scalic stuff you like, borrowing neighbour tones from the chromatic and diatonic scales by ear.

Learning how to add notes to scales to make sure chord tones come out on the beat is a common technique in bebop playing - see David Baker's how to play Bebop books, or Barry Harris's added note rules for scales.

In terms of modes - well we can analyse Charlie Christian using this or that melodic minor etc, or Django using the harmonic major, but this concept wasn't really developed in the way we understand it today. Modal colour did exist though, because it sounded good and musicians used it intuitively.

So I think your instincts are good - focus on chord tone playing, decoration of chord tones and get the fundamentals together. Later you can add in more modal colour if you fancy.

[christianm77]

There are 2 x 13th arp patterns diatonic to any given key in any given position. Every other scale note starting from the first note in a given position, and the same thing from the second. The diatonic 13th arps are the same pool of notes for every extended chord in the key.

Now it depends, of course, on how you utilise them and resolve them, but any run of notes in these arps will be either chord tones, extension tones or a combination of the 2. It's a very easy thing to try and sounds "modern". About the only thing that might sound a little off (depending on context) is the unaltered 11th against major in a descending arp.

So before you spend 1000 hours learning a gazillion new arps, spend just a few hours on the above idea, at least to road test the sound of extended arps to see if you wanna make it part of your own thing.

Altered extended arps are another story of course, but with some clever re jigging, it's often a just matter of substituting a shape you know into a different position/context. It's best if you figure out the connections for yourself, that way they become "yours".

Good luck.

I missed this first time through. I like this approach. It seems to me that the melody to Donna Lee has a lot of this type of things. I have practiced scales as stacks of thirds quite a bit.

Wes Montgomery likes this sound on modal (i.e. dorian) minor

[princeplanet]

I seems to me that Charlie Parker and maybe others at that time (?) mostly used ‘just’ arpeggios. I think I also hear he copy his own frases in different numbers. But did the scale focus come in later years and did scales itself start other styles?

Anyway, one reason why I chose the jazz journey, was to get a room to experiment and possible reach a level, where I could express some fast changing moods in each moment. So I find the scales and many rules a little restricting or dictating here. I also have a little anti against the use of licks. They are nice to hear one time and then forget, and I don’t want to incorporate them. It like running around with another mans football shirt. If I improvise for 10 minutes to band-in-box, I often suddenly begin to repeat some stuff and I don’t like. It’s as if the music die with lack of ideas and when the spontaneous element disappears. But scales have probably many advantages in communicating with other musicians, and maybe the same, just at a higher technical level with more possibilities once mastered.

Don't forget that Bird used many "licks", it's all about how you use them!

[princeplanet]

I missed this first time through. I like this approach. It seems to me that the melody to Donna Lee has a lot of this type of things. I have practiced scales as stacks of thirds quite a bit.

Wes Montgomery likes this sound on modal (i.e. dorian) minor

I take the idea a lot further by incorporating target devices for each pitch in a 13th stack. Playing snippets of these devices here and there without thinking about them too much will nearly always sound good against almost anything.

Note that I said "nearly" and "almost"- the hard bit is doing it enough to get a feel for what works and what doesn't....

[christianm77]

Don't forget that Bird used many "licks", it's all about how you use them!

And lest we forget - blues licks!

[Patrick2]

Gret thread! I've been following it closely. I just love all of the different turns it has taken . . . way beyone the OP's intent. This is 3 months worth of theory lessons in one easy read.

[targuit]

Voice leading is the key. And use your ears.

[Reg]

Yea... voice leading is one of the keys to being able to solo, but when you get right down to just what voice leading is...

That's where it becomes interesting, generally most are just trying to get to the point where they can connect, create melodic/ harmonic lines, melodies... how ever you want to describe soloing, anyway most just want to sound good, sound like they know what they're doing.

So generally they do what they're told to do, copy others best they can... maybe use their ears and brains and come up with something they think sounds good... or just maybe feels good because they can actually perform something that seems like it works... Voice leading is one of those devices that at least makes you sound like you understand what your doing, it can imply an organized method of connecting notes or chords.

Playing right notes... is cool, but is only a short term goal. Eventually your going to have something to say, and if your lucky maybe even develop your own voice to say it with. The use of standard voice leading with arpeggios does a great job of spelling out changes, and takes a little work... but who's playing you or the changes.

Arpeggio, scales, voice leading etc...are all technical skills... they should become tools or skills which eventually help you find what you hear and want to play. While your working on your technical skills you should be also developing your ears... through listening and you might even think of what are the technical skills of the actual music. Approaching chords with II V's is a musical technical skill, when you also get right down to it.... theory is just a technical skill of Music. Harmony, structure of Form... all the BS are just technical skills of music. When you hear rock players... performing Jazz... they might have great technical performance skills.... they generally don't have the musical skills of the music, jazz.

Just something to think about... when you practice your arpeggios.

[targuit]

See, here is where I find some objections in part to the methods some use to study and practice. Many guitarists think that they have to learn every inversion of every chord everywhere on the fret board. So the practiced inversions. What is important is to understand what an inversion of the chord as a voicing is and how it is constructed. I see no value especially in practicing inversions, but rather understanding that they are fundamental to voicing.

[mr. beaumont]

I think you can practice inversions, in the course of shedding a tune...you try and play through the changes and stay in a small area...it forces you to find different ways to play chords, you start hearing connections...

[Munk]

... but who's playing you or the changes.

I liked this line


I am working on some bebop tunes and the non scale approach doesn’t seem that difficult.
Of course I have a lot to learn the next many years, but when the tempo is fast there is lot of freedom to add other notes in the arpeggio frame, use rhythmic ideas, have awareness on where impro is leading, and sometimes in even be able to predict where a new upcomming long phrase will land, or if something ugly unintended suddenly elements appears, try to make use of it in a good way.

But I think it’s much more demanding to play slow melodic impro! Yesterday I wanted to try, and picked one, which I guess is supposed to be very easy – Take the A train. Already in bar 3 I met a D7b5 challenge, which I have no arpeggio for.

Maybe I’m wrong, but if I wanted to follow a scale approach, I couldn’t even find 7b5 on Reg’s list of chords derived from common scales, major, minor, melodic minor, harmonic minor. I mean if even easy ones can not be covered through use of so many scales. I changed -7b5 arp to a major third. But to fill in other good notes than is the arp in a slow tempo, takes more time than bebop 'shredding'

[mr. beaumont]

But if you know a D7 arpeggio you know a D7b5!

You gotta know WHAT you're playing, not just shapes. Take the D7 arpeggio, move all the fifths one fret down...

[Munk]

Sure I also now D7, but the result is the same if I alter this or the -7b5?

[targuit]

You just made the point, Jeff. If you know what a D7b5 is you can find it in first position, fourth position, fifth position..... You don't have to practice inversions per se. You find them in the context of the voicing of the chords and moving from one to another. Ultimately, voicing creates individual lines in a polyphonic context.

[mr. beaumont]

I think you gotta practice things in a way that'll make them "stick" for you...

I just don't like seeing folks who spend months on every inversion for a Cmajor7 and they can't play "All of Me."

[Munk]

Drop 2 inversions have been fine to learn for me so far. To know the fretboard, If I want to make chord melodies, to comp and they are easy to extend.

[wolflen]

the tri-tone scale will help with 7b5 chords..but first realize how this wonderful chord works..

D7b5 = D F# Ab C - 1 3 b5 7..and due to the tri-tone function it is also - Ab7b5 - Ab C D Gb

so in effect you now have (with inversions) 8 chord forms..scale fragments, arpeggios, and licks in all the locations of the chords

and the tri-tone scale is a very cool hexatonic addition : D Eb F# Ab A C/ 1 b2 3 b5 5 b7..nice trick is using each note of the scale as the root to begin another tri tone scale..Eb E G A Bb Db .. play with it .. very cool scale

Also-- note the diminished scale..which these 7b5 chords are built from -
(C Eb Gb A) Dim Scale - C D Eb F Gb Ab A B / / D7b5/Ab7b5

so there are many ways to weave lines around this wonderful chord..its no wonder the early bop kings liked it so much

[Reg]

Mink
the chord is really a D7#11, built from the 4th degree of melodic minor
D F# A C. Extensions of E or 9th, G# or #11th and B or 13th

the spelling of the chord as D7b5 is a mistake, it's D7#11. But is used so often that it is taken for granted that D7b5
means D7#11. There is a natural 5th.

[sgcim]

One interesting way of playing extended arps is to use Johnny Smith's three octave arps and superimpose them over another chord.

[Munk]

sgcim, have to read this book The Complete Johnny Smith Approach?