Hi, can someone please clear this up for me, when soloing over a tune say in A major starting at the fifth fret and using the first position of the major pentatonic scale E shape or should i be using the first position of the minor pentatonic G shape starting on the A note 6th string 5th fret and work towards the neck end of the guitar ,for reference i understand that would be maj / min relationship, i think part of the problem is i am self taught for many years but would be very pleased if someone could please explain this to me, it may be only a matter of preference or there is a right and wrong way how to use them, Kind Regards Dave

Hi. I’m new to reddit so apologies if I’m posting incorrectly but recently realised reddit (specifically these guitar communities) could be really helpful in moving me beyond the ‘many years of playing guitar without getting better’ stage. Particularly in terms of understanding theory.

Regarding guitar soloing and trying to ‘jam’ with more purpose by targeting chord tones, there is one concept I’m really struggling with despite all the material I read online. I appreciate there are no rules as such but to help conceptualise I’d like to think about this in terms of soloing over basic progressions in a particular key rather than more abstract approaches like playing outside the key or just playing what feels right. I need to get my head around the ‘framework’! I’ll try explain with a simple example.

If I play 1,4,5 in Cmaj and think about soloing with the c major scale as my ‘framework’, I might noodle around the c major scale on the c chord while targeting the c,e, g notes to outline the chord. When I move to another chord - f or g, my intention is to play arpeggios and target the notes from those chords. But if I want to embellish those arpeggios a bit or noodle around them, would more advanced players generally still be thinking of their solo framework as being a c maj scale i.e. outlining c major scale shapes but aiming to land on the relevant chord tones for each chord change, or would they be thinking about the f maj scale when on f and g maj scale when on g as separate scales for each chord?

I realise there is only one note difference between the major scales c and f, c and g but the note differences (between parent scale and other scales derived from the notes in the key) for other chords/progressions and extended chords would increase.

When I noodle on the c major scale when the rhythm is on the g chord for example, if I was targeting notes g,b,d but also hitting other notes around those to create melody lines, would for example players be hitting the f# instead of the f? from memory the f sounds better which I presume is because of the resolution to the c (I’m not targeting the f or f# when on the g chord, just passing over it). This leads me to think that keeping c major as the framework In my mind over those chord changes is the way to go generally speaking for now - so I hit the 1,3,5 from each chord but any other filler notes come from (or are based around) c major even when not on the c major chord. In the example given, if I was to play the f# instead of the f when on g chord, this to me suggests I’m now using a separate scale for each chord change.

If that ramble makes any sense, I’d really value and appreciate peoples thoughts. I realise it’s about feel and no right/wrong and that’s fine but I really want to get an insight into how people generally approach this as a concept rather than the specific example given.

Many thanks

I was watching a demo on YT and the person was playing I believe, 5 x 0 4 x x and was moving that shape around, moving his 1st finger on the 3rd string back a fret respectively. I believe the chord I mentioned is a sus chord? What I'm trying to do or understand rather, how it works moving that shape around, what the shape is called and how it can be used. Thanks in advanced!

Update: If it helps I forgot to mention, the tuning being played in is B standard. As well, I guess a TLDR, what I'm really asking is if anyone knows what kind of shape this is. IE minor shape, 3rds.. etc

https://youtu.be/qIe04DO_PGI?feature=shared

What would be a good strum pattern for this song. I tried folk strum but it doesn’t quite fit. It’s more like base strum down up down ?

Hi,

I'd like to ask for advice/help in developing my ear and transferring that to guitar playing. :)

Quick background: I've been playing guitar for quite a few years and have written many songs. I've played with bands and my technique in a number of genres is decent.

But I feel I've neglected my ear training.

Maybe it's because it's never been very good to begin with :))

I can hum the melody of most songs, and with enough work, I can usually find them on guitar.

But my knowledge has a lot of holes. For example, I am bad at figuring out intervals and remembering the chords/notes of songs I have played in the past.

I could never figure out tougher songs like Eruption or the solo to Mr. Crowley on my own. But I could probably sing the damn guitar parts.

How can I work to fix disconnect?

Can anyone suggest a program that I can use? And do you have experience of it working for you or others?

I am genuinely happy for any feedback.

I don't usually make these offers , but i am taking a break from the different projects I worked on lately, and my team and i decided to make a small initiative to assist anyone starting with a limited budget as we have worked with many uprising talents that impressed us with their motivation and dedication. And so today we are giving back to that community and helping out all aspiring artists because we realize that many talents are lost just because their work isn't properly presented at first.

If you are just starting/ want to build your personal brand from scratch , then your designs will be my priority. (No crazy prices and no big deadlines , starting from 5-10$ if all you need is a basic pack of designs or a flyer for you event...). Have a nice day.

I'm particularly interested in fusion, in the style of Nick Johnston, Rick Graham, John Nathan Cordy, etc. and learning how to improv better by truly unlocking the fretboard and having full creative freedom.

I've been playing for 20 years and I'm proficient at most techniques but I feel like I need a combination of an online course with videos so I can go at my own pace but also the ability to reach out to and send videos to an instructor to help me connect certain dots. Kind of what people do on Patreon.

Any suggestions of players who offer anything like that?

I'm learning my spread triads and im wondering if there are any guitarists or songs that use spread triads i could learn to find a real application for these? thanks

I know the e minor pentatonic scale and all the positions. . I know the e natural minor scale and all the positions. I know both of what I would call the regular version and the 3 note per string version but I've practiced the 3 notes per string version alot alot. . Using this I've been able to just mess around and have fun making riffs or melodies, but sometimes I wish I knew more things. like what notes sound good with other notes when I'm making something. Sometimes I can play what I hear in my head but other times I have no clue how to make the sound and I know it's some complimenting chord or something like that and thats the stuff id like to learn i think. I like metal. Just into distortion and cool riffs and some lead sections. One of the bands I recently started learning some riffs from is trivium. I learned over years I liked rhythm better then lead. I really like melodies and coming up with a catchy one and appreciate the ones I hear in music. I play in e standard alot because that's just what I like at the moment. I have guitars turned in other tunings like drop d/c/ c# and a 6 string setup like a 7 string missing the high e. Thanks for any tips.

I have been playing guitar for about four years and I don't know much about music theory except for the c major scale and I'm wondering what I should start learning next to get better at playing guitar. Thanks.

Tissanabadee sirisaup 67070503609

Recently my teacher showed me C major arpeggio (with 7th) and told me to learn them without 3rd, 5th, and 7th. He said that people on jams sometimes play chords without certain intervals, like without 3rd and that's why I should learn them. I have never heard of such thing. Is it necessary for playing on jams? Did any of you learn such arpeggios?

Hi there, I am currently tabbing out some blues licks that I have found from various sources and I am struggling with a particular pair of dyads. They are tabbed as G5 D6 and G4 D5. I understand that two-note chords will imply a larger chord with more than two notes and I understand that the notes in the first dyad are C and G# and that those in the second are B and G. These notes, relatively to the scale in which they'd be played (A), would be biii + VII and ii + bVII respectively. What chords would these dyads imply? I have a guess that the first might be a biiiaug, but I don't know. Any advice from someone more knowledgeable than myself would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Hello,

Im trying to understand a somewhat strange chord progression from a classic pop song from the 80's. The song is called l'Aziza by Daniel Balavoine.

The verse is Bb, Eb, Ab, Bb so assuming it would be in Bb major given that there are 2 flats on the key where is the Ab coming from?
Then in the chorus we have Cm, Ab, Bb, F, Fm7 G7 so Im assuming here that there is a modulation to Cm but then where are the F and the G7 coming from?

Many thanks

here is a link for those who would like to listen to the song
L'Aziza (youtube.com)

EDIT: title should be *differences between finger picking and picking with a pick

with a fast 16th note picking motor motion, we typically can go from strumming to picking individual strings in
a smooth fashion.

X = strum, n = individual note on some string

1 e & a 2 e & a 3 e & a 4 e & a
X X X X n n n n X X X X n n n n

because the wrist is rotating consistently

with fingerpicking, we instead have to stop our wrist going from X to n so its harder. we attack individual strings with finger motion, with a motionless hand (typically).

i also see some fingerpickers get scratch sounds with a different motion; instead of a strum motion, they attack the strings perpendicularly.

so instead of down up down up strumming, they do in out in out slapping/touching (with all 5 fingers typically).

just an observation that this makes some patterns more difficult for fingerpickers. most notably to me, with the in-out motion, when u end on an out motion, ure not close enough to the strings to be as accurate or fast. with down-up motion, its like clockwork.

does anyone have any advice on this?

Hi,

I need some help regarding playing a shuffle in the 12 bar blues.

I understand what the 12 bar blues and the 1,4,5 of the scale. But what I’m struggling to understand Is how to play a shuffle.

For example in the key of A, do I play the A7, D7 and E7 or a variation of A,D and E in the shuffle?

How does one play a riff in the shuffle. Pointless searching online, as you get 10 different answers.

Thanks all!

so i’ve been learning the positions of the minor pentatonic scale and i get that you can use the different positions so you can use the whole fretboard. every video i’ve watched says that to change the key you just go to that note on the low e string and start with the first position from there and then so on. so what happens if i want to play in the key of d#/eb? how do i use the low end of the fretboard? if i go to eb on the low e string and start from position 1 you run out of fretboard for all the positions and you can only use high notes? how can i play lower on the fretboard with a key like eb, or even a? you can’t use the first 4 frets for a? i’m definitely missing something.

I’ve been banging my head against my tele for about 5 years trying to figure out this song snippet.

Does anyone know the chords or the full title of the song itself?

https://youtu.be/KbNKMlrkHMc?si=nYBRDouo2WlvWtf6 - timestamp 4:27

Sorry if this is in the wrong place lol

I like how it sounds but I didn't know if it's all in the same key and if it sounds off to other people?

Hey thanks for reading first of all. So I just got back into playing a year ago after like a 15 yr break. I’ve tuned my 7 string to drop A but instead of tuning the highest string to E (I think) i tuned it to C which gives my to highest strings even open a natural dissonance. Is there a specific name for this type of tuning?

Basically it played like a 6 string and uses the highest string to help create some easy to access dissonance. But also access to some cool moody chords in clean tones. Didn’t know if this type of tuning has a name.

Can someone clarify for me how to use modes? I know the fingerings for all of the modes of the major scale. My question is, if I’m playing in the key of G, for example, then I’d play Aeolian with E as the root note, ionian with G as the root, etc? It just seems so bland to me because it’s the same 7 notes. But maybe it’s my playing Lol.

This might be a stupid question but I am wondering what Scales I can integrate into a chord progression. Let's say I'm in C major. Would I play the A minor pentatonic? What about the blues scale? And if I was playing a 1-4-5 for example, could I throw in the F and G major scales when hitting those particular chords?

Hello guys, I'm beginner in playing guitar and only knows limited music theories from youtube. Now, I'm want to learn how to change chords that sound a little different from the original song but can have the same melody. So for this example, how can I change this chord progression E A C#m B.

Check out the latest jam track from Jam Track Adventures. Jam Track Here!

This Jam Track moves between two non-diatonic chords. This means that the notes of the two chords do not fall into a single scale. So you have two switch scales for each chord.

C: C E G

E7: E G# B D

The C chord has a G note but the E7 chord uses the G#. The chords essentially clash. Learning to play over clashing chords is the doorway to interesting melodies and original sounds.

Remember to switch scales as you solo across the chord change. See what you can come up with!!!

I love Jam Tracks and make plenty for myself. Jam Track Adventures is just my way of sharing them with you, free of charge, no strings attached.

Feel free to post a video of you jamming to this track. Just include a link to my video.

Happy Jamming!!!

Harmonic or Melodic

Popular songs (Electronic, Country, Pop) 2015-2020 using Guitar 10ths, please tell me songs that have them.

So I was just messing around and made a looping of myself playing the chords E - A - B on my guitar and was trying to figure out how to solo in each key. I was using the E shaped guitar chord and played the pentatonic on the A. Then I moved a whole step down to the B and played the exact same notes and said woah. That’s how guitarists to do it. Switching so quickly without thinking about it. Sad that it took me years to realize that but my mind has been blown away by discovering this.

Disclaimer: This is a VERY long post. If you are new to theory, I really don’t think it will be helpful for you to read this at all at this point in time. You can of course read anyways if you want, but this is really something I should make into video format, and once again it was written with advanced levels of theory in mind. Without further ado;

I just made an observation that the whole half diminished scale that contains the root note and the second degree sounds pretty cool over chord progressions that are in melodic minor and or Dorian… interchangeably.

Example: C melodic minor = C D Eb F G A B

Some easy chords would be Cm, FM, and GM. (Little m is minor big M is major)

Melodic minor is just one note away from being the regular major scale as you can see, the E natural has been flattened so the scale has a minor third.

The Dorian mode is the melodic minor and then just has the flattened 7th. Dorian mode = C D Eb F G A Bb

EDIT so Cm, FM, Gm. Note that the G is minor along with the C minor, but the F remains as a major chord in Dorian. If you’re a blues or jazz guy, the Dorian scale is your friend over those dominant 1-4-5 jams. Also not as relevant, but the Dorian mode has it’s root note sitting in the center of a symmetrical horseshoe shape in the circle of fifths. I love this mode. Speaking of the blues, this next paragraph is where my point all comes together, and you can justify adding the Tritone into your minor pentatonic to play the blues scale over melodic minor and Dorian chord progressions like this…

…The C whole half scale is an 8 note scale also just one note missing from the melodic minor scale, but this time with a flattened 5th AND sharp 5th. So that’s why the melodic minor is acting as the hypothetical glue here: C whole half dim = C …D …Eb …F …Gb …G#/Ab …A …B

And also you may observe that the whole half scale is just two plain diminished scales pressed up next to each other. It’s much easier to visualize this on a fretboard than a piano because the shapes stay the same and you just glue the exact same shape on one fret away across the entire neck, or switch between the two diminished scales on the fly. If you’ve read this far, I’m not going to type out the degrees of the diminished scales, this post is getting long and if you’re advanced I’m assuming you already know how to build a diminished scale at this point by stacking minor thirds until it loops on itself, and that there are only three unique diminished scales. Two of which diminished scales make up the whole half diminished in my example.

Basically playing all of these concepts together at once on the fretboard helps you get new unique sounds that still truly make sense together because of the frequency of shared notes, and challenges the way you see the fretboard and play because you’re not operating on muscle memory playing pentatonic or diatonic scales. But of course the pentatonic and diatonic options are always there alongside these less embraced approaches in western harmony.

Plus who knows, you might be able to write and shred some very sick songs with awesome solos if you are able to see the hypothetical connection between the diminished scale and the Dorian mode.

Oh one more thing. The Dorian mode is just the major scale moved a whole step back. So C Dorian would be taking C major and moving back to Bb major. I’ve been thinking of the modes like that for a while now because it’s much easier to navigate the same major shapes and then just use your ears to play them differently when you’re improvising.

Just one of my infrequent rambling posts on this sub. If anyone at all thinks this is cool please let me know. I’ve made several contributions in this text format and I’m thinking of just creating videos to explain what I’m saying because I’m worried with this wall of text it falls on deaf ears. And this sub is where I want to share my occasional insights because it’s particularly easy to implement the information within this post on guitar because the shapes are replicable in cool ways, especially in this example.