chord tone soloing pentatonic

They just ooze that minor bluesy vibe or sweet major vibe. 12:53 – Part 4: Adding in the Remaining Diatonic Scale Notes to Each Pentatonic Box Pattern I’m old af now and still at it! A more advanced approach that comes closer to how great blues guitarists apply Chord Tone Soloing, is to use the D dominant pentatonic scale. Most of these guitarists think they’re doing it the correct way, but actually they only use a very basic method of soloing. And this is the D dominant pentatonic scale: Notice how all the notes in the chord are covered in this dominant pentatonic scale. Try experimenting with different notes and listen to the feeling they give you! It means using only the pitches within a given chord to construct an improvised melodic line over the top of that chord, and then repeating that process for whatever chord is next. A more advanced approach that comes closer to how great blues guitarists apply Chord Tone Soloing, is to use the D dominant pentatonic scale. Let me break it down for you why this is.The A7 chord contains 4 notes, which we already looked at. In the near future, I will be adding a course that goes much deeper into this topic into the Lead Guitar Improv Member’s Vault. In addition to everything else that is included with a Full Access Membership, many lessons include “Full Access Extras”. 17:51 – Taking the “Soloing with Pentatonics” Concept even Further…. Chord tone soloing is one of those things that either eludes guitarists, or they shy away from it in favor of the one-scale-fits-all approach. For example you could play some of it using the C major pentatonic and some using the ideas above. The chord tone for the 1 chord – D major would still be first finger on the 3rd string but this time it would be on 7th fret. I mentioned some of this in Part 3 but let’s take another look. The pentatonic scale is the most common scale used for playing rock lead because it sounds great over every chord change in a key, and you can begin to make music with it almost immediately. Try this out for yourself on your guitar, play a C note and play a C# note an octave higher; not the best sound in the world right?Of course, a little dissonance never killed nobody and sometimes that dissonant C note might even be the perfect sound that we are after. This lesson on chord tone soloing for blues guitar is one of my favorite ways to teach my students how to play licks and lines that make more sense than just going up and down a pentatonic or blues scale. To start, after messing around with the A minor pentatonic scale, try using a major pentatonic scale on the A chord, and when switching to the E7 chord, keep on the major pentatonic scale. If we analyze the D7 chord and the D minor pentatonic scale, we see that the chord contains an F#, while the scale comprises an F note. Since the first chord of the progression is F#m, we can just go ahead and call this a “minor progression in the key of F# minor”. In the key of G, that translates to the notes of G minor pentatonic, G Bb C D F, as shown in FIGURE 1. You should experiment with all options and mix them up. Chord Tone soloing does not restrict you to play "inside" the track: you can choose to deliberately violate it to sound "outside" like some Jazz players do. I have learned the CAGED patterns in diatonic scale and their corresponding pentatonic patterns. Here is what is included when you pay the one-time fee to upgrade your account. I took the pains to rule up a sheet, even using a stencil to mark/circle each scale note. If we were writing a song in C major, we could pick three chords: C – Dm – G – C Verses usually have melodies that are lower in pitch. The “method” could be divided into 4 steps: Step 1 – Apply the Basic “Pentatonic Box #1” to Each Chord. While this "does the job" as far as creating that bluesy sound, there is a far more effective and expressive way of playing through blues … Just as in improvising, or soloing, the pentatonic scale avoids problematic dissonance. In that case we raise the F note to an F# and also play the 9th, which is the E note. Further on, I will elaborate on the correct approach and teach you how to apply it correctly. Here’s what each pentatonic box would look like…. These kinds of ideas form the basics of chord tone soloing. Hence, if the D minor pentatonic is being played over a D7, these notes will clash and it will sound horrible. Chord tone soloing takes quite a lot of practice but stick with it and you’ll get there. There’s another jazz pentatonic scale over a dominant 7th chord that gives off a different vibe. We’re using pick and fingers to enable shifting to more conventional flatpicked linking phrases, but fingerstyle is a completely valid option here, too. For now though, just realize that you aren’t simply just playing the F# minor pentatonic scale over all of the chords within the progression. When soloing over minor chords using this “pentatonic box #1” method, the 7th is part of the pentatonic shape. To illustrate how chords and scales are very deeply intertwined, we start from a standard 12 bar blues progression in the key of A, with the following chords:The most common and basic approach would be to improvise over this progression using the A minor pentatonic scale. This again is a way of thinking that is common among beginner/intermediate guitarists, but definitely not a good approach. Any thoughts? I am 78 and comtinue to play. As you mastered the minor pentatonic scale completely, you may have noticed that you got stuck and your soloing didn’t improve much anymore. You can see this for yourself below. Once again you will have accentuated the chord change. Beginner’s Guide to Expanding the Pentatonic Scale, Creating 10 Different “Sounds” Within Pentatonic Position #1, 1 video backing track which uses the same chord progression as in the video, The video contains a full fretboard diagram displaying the key of F# minor with “moving pentatonics” as the chords change in the rhythm section, For a minor chord, you would locate the “pentatonic box” with your index finger, For a major chord, you would locate the “pentatonic box” with your pinky finger. For the E major chord, you would locate the “box” with your pinky finger on the 12th fret, which is the note ‘E’. King’s interpretation of, ‘The Thrill Is Gone’, is a great tune to start experimenting with soloing over chord changes. Discover that scale in the next tip. About the author: You will also find however, that things will sound kinda “jumpy” since you will be jumping around to different areas of the fretboard. We made it to the third video in the series where we take a moment to stop and really listen and analyze why each note in the pentatonic scale has a different flavor over each chord in a Blues progression. For the D major chord, you would locate the “box” with your pinky finger on the 10th fret, which is the note ‘D’. Pentatonic scales are killer scales to play over blues and over I-IV-V changes. A large share of beginner and intermediate guitar players only make use of the minor pentatonic scale to solo over a dominant blues progression. I always appreciate your comments! The beauty of this method is that for every major chord, the chord tones of the underlying chord will always be found in the “G-Shape”, and for every minor chord they will be found in the “Em-Shape: Note that for the minor chord, I also included the 7th scale degree (the blue dot) to be a chord tone. Why not try both and see how it influences the tone? Thinking of pentatonic scales this way is really powerful. Depending on whether the chord is major or minor would determine whether you use your index finger or your pinky finger to locate the box. As you may have noticed, the A minor pentatonic scale doesn’t contain the C#-note. This is especially common in blues based music, and it works great. In this article we will talk about a few simple techniques to break through these limitations and take your blues guitar soloing to a whole new level. Basically, such a dominant seventh chord is built up using 4 notes: -    The Root note (R) : A-    The major 3rd (3) : C#-    The 5th (5) : E-    The flat 7th (b7) : GAs the A7 chord contains these four notes, they are also a great choice to land on when soloing. That’s the reason the article I refer to is called ‘How To Break Through Your Guitar Soloing Limitations – A Story About Chord Tone Soloing And The Dominant Pentatonic Scale’. Just transposing the minor pentatonic scale over the D chord is done by A LOT of beginner guitarists, but NO professional blues guitarist would ever dare to do this! By targeting the specific chord tones contained in each chord we break out of the box of minor pentatonic playing and bring emotion, articulation and some great-sounding note choices to our blues guitar solos. With this approach, you will still be accomplishing the exact same thing, only you will be approaching it from a different perspective. So for instance I know that in Major pentatonic position 1 I can find 3 versions of a triad while in Major pentatonic position 2 I have only two possiblilites to play a triad. Bravo Brian, we are spoilt by the quality and fantastic content included within your lessons. When the chords change from C7 back to G7, try going from B♭ to B, then playing the G7 chord tones. If you want to break through your limitations and come a step closer to sounding like your favorite guitar hero, you need to explore more melodic ways of creating a blues guitar solo. This scale is completely tied to the D7 chord and therefore will sound much more professional when applied over a D7. I wonder if it’s because I make C sound like Am and D like Bm cos I’m used to aiming for chord notes in the minor pentatonic. It felt awesome to be able to play over a backing track, to create your own guitar solos and to express the way you felt by means of guitar playing. Learn exactly how to master blues guitar with the. We’ll call it the Mixo-pentatonic scale, but feel free to give it your own name. Let’s just go with the higher octave because leads sound cooler when played up high :). It really is that simple. Your email address will not be published. In the right colomn you see the five notes of the A minor pentatonic scale.As you see in the table above, the C# note in the A7 chord clashes with the C note of the A minor pentatonic scale. know it. this is so helpful, thank you! First off, let’s take a look at what a lot of beginner/intermediate guitarists think is the correct way of Chord Tone Soloing. If you pick these notes to land on over an A7 chord, you will be able to give a more melodic feel to your lead guitar playing and your solos will have a lot more appeal to them. The chord tones are always going to be the best sounding notes within the scale, so try to land on chord tones just as the chord changes occur. Want to seriously up your guitar game regardless of your level? When all of the chords belong to the same key, we can use pentatonic scales for each chord, apart from the diminished (vii) chord, and still not stray from the key. I have never needed to Chord tone soloing is a technique to make your solo sound "in" the backing track. Let’s look at how this happens and how to overcome these guitar playing barriers. You are literally playing: Each pentatonic scale has its’ own 5 positions. Prior to this, the fretboard just looked a mess, even for someone decently familiar. Determine the key of the chord progression that you will be soloing over, 2.) The late, great B.B. Wish you could bottle this stuff! Here is the scalar framework for the key of F# minor spanned over the fretboard. Published August 30, 2020 by Graham Tippett. The white dot indicates the note ‘F#’: When you are soloing over the F# minor chord or the A major chord, you can always add in some additional notes by simply remembering this “pattern”: If an E major or C# minor chord occurs, you would shift to this box pattern: Finally, if a D major or B minor chord occurs, you would shift to this pattern: Now you see how these “pentatonic boxes” fit perfectly into the overall scalar framework of the key. This is where you can get other modal scales, harmonic minor, etc without thinking about it specifically. They will sound really good, because these tones can be found within the chord. However, if you truly want to sound great with your playing it is essential to have the ability to both play “in key” and “connect your playing with the underlying chords”. Adding up to this, they use the minor pentatonic scale over ALL chords in this blues progression, which makes their solos sound less interesting and definitely not professional. Next cames modes, in all my years of playing all across the country I have never needed When I got to the diatonic scales at the end- bammm. This means that you don’t play in one pentatonic scale over ALL chords, but you connect the chords being played in the progression with a certain scale. Think back to the moment when you just learned to improvise on guitar and played your first licks in the minor pentatonic scale. This is much easier than trying to memorize all the different CAGED shapes in conjunction with all the different scale shapes. You want your blues guitar solos to sound like the ones played by your favorite blues guitarists, but you feel like you’re stuck in the same old patterns and licks. How Do You Use the Pentatonic Scale to Solo? That is what step 2 is for…, Step 2 – Start to Extend each Pentatonic Box into its’ Neighboring Positions. For the A major chord, you would locate the “box” with your pinky finger on the 17th fret, which is the note ‘A’. Chord Tone Soloing – A Simple Method. Step 4 – Finally, add in the Remaining Scale Notes from the F# Minor Scale, This is where the magic really happens. Step 3 – Recognize where the Chord Tones are Located Within Each Pentatonic Box. There are 5 “pentatonic only” video backing tracks which will allow you to practice in each of the 5 pentatonic positions without focusing on chord tone targeting; There are then 5 “chord tone targeting” videos where the chord tones “light up” as the underlying chords change. Once you get used to this whole “one pentatonic box per chord” method, you can then realize that there are only 3 shapes that you will need to remember. Soloing by Key is the easiest method of soloing because you treat the entire song as one entity. For example, if the song has the chords A7, D7, E7, you can sound great just using the A minor pentatonic scale. For example, if in the progression above the D7 chord is being played, a possible (but WRONG) solution would be to play some licks in the D minor pentatonic scale over this chord instead of staying in the A minor pentatonic all the way. Haha thanks so much Phil! Choose the appropriate scale based on the key (ie. Scale shape and awareness of the minor pentatonic scale really goes a long way! That’s why we will use an expanded version of the scale to play over the dominant seventh chord A7: the A minor pentatonic scale with an added major third (see scale diagram below). F# minor pentatonic over the F# minor chord, A major pentatonic over the A major chord, E major pentatonic over the E major chord, D major pentatonic over the D major chord. all these guitar teachers online talk about playing the chord tones and stuff, and you’ve shown me what that means and how it works . And so on (Minor pentatonic is a bit different). Because many blues progressions utilize I-IV-V chord changes you will often be utilizing Minor Pentatonic & Blues and/or Major Pentatonic as potential lead playing avenues. The method given in this lesson is an alternative approach. An approach that many great guitarists use to target the right notes over a chord progression is called “Chord Tone Soloing”. Now, you would simply just apply this basic pentatonic box #1 to each chord. The minor pentatonic and the blues scale are the most common ways to play over a dominant blues progression, but these are definitely not the best ways of soloing if you want to sound like your favorite blues guitarists. Step 1 – Apply the Basic “Pentatonic Box #1” to Each Chord. For example, here is a great Stevie Ray Vaughan lick you can use over the D7 chord:Listen to this sound exampleIf you’d like to know more about how great blues guitarists such as Stevie Ray Vaughan use the dominant pentatonic scale in their soloing you can download my FREE Guide on How To Play The Most Awesome Blues Licks Over Any Chord: Awesome Blues Licks. I have stuck with them for years, but I've plateaued in my soloing abilities. How To Tie Chords and Scales Together So That You Are Picking The Best Possible Notes Over Each Chord. There are three ways to play the pentatonic scale pattern for lead guitar solo: A progression in a major key […] How Your Blues Guitar Frustrations Are Tied To a Very Limited View of How Blues Scales And Chords Work. It is sooooo addictive. Turned out to be a good way to tell your brain what notes are in whatever key you’re currently working on. Therefore, I will leave it up to you (or you can just watch me do it in the video), to try and figure out how to confine your playing to just one area of the fretboard at a time. Skipping ahead a few bars, I’m spelling out the B minor chord with a quick rake into a short pentatonic phrase, before combining some pentatonic doublestops to make an A minor 9th-7th descending phrase lifted straight from Little Wing. Why? Required fields are marked *. I personally like to use the “upper extension” for each box as you can see here: By doing this, you are still “switching pentatonics” over each chord, but you are extending the range such that your playing sounds less jumpy. For each of the 10 chord progressions, you can choose which key that you want to jam in as well as the concept that you want to work on – Pentatonic Scale, Blues Scale, Diatonic Scale, Scale Combining or Chord Tone Targeting. Amazing how a lesson has the ability to trigger or complete some scattered idea you had all along but couldn’t quite nail down. I’ve been trying this with a simple G, C, D chord progression but it always sounds a bit odd when shifting pentatonic. I In this instance, it would be derived from E Mixolydian … What I have been explaining now, is Chord Tone Targetting. It’s important that you realize that there are better options that we could choose than only using the minor pentatonic scale. For the first time, I have been able to lay out the entire fretboard by hand, starting with the root note on each string, then from there, knowing I’m in minor for instance, just fill in the pattern starting with each root note. Each video is over 9 minutes long; There are HUNDREDS more “chord tone … am studing if now. This isn’t always true for major chords, so only focus on the triad tones for those. You know your guitar playing can improve, but you have no clue how to do it. Instant access to chord tones means it’s easier to think about soloing patterns and licks. Applying what we explained in the previous paragraph, we can raise the F note in the D minor pentatonic to an F# and thus play the D minor pentatonic with added major 3rd, but there are even better ways. In blues and rock, the most prevalent scale used for soloing is minor pentatonic, which is intervallically spelled 1 (root), b3 (flatted third), 4 (fourth), 5 (fifth) and b7 (flatted seventh). Depending on which of the four notes you pick, you will produce a different emotion. Soloing Over Blues Progressions - A More Effective Approach. You can think of this scale as a pentatonic version of the Mixolydian mode, which has a formula of 1–2–3–4–5–6–b7. This scale is completely tied to the D7 chord and therefore will sound much more professional when applied over a D7. How To Break Through Your Guitar Soloing Limitations – A Story About Chord Tone Soloing And The Dominant Pentatonic Scaleby Antony Reynaert. I simply play the diatonic and pentatonic scales and try not to linger on notes that don’t sound good. With this technique you are able to choose the notes that will sound best at any given moment in your solo. to know them, but i shall. That is the way a lot of guitarists approach the whole concept of “soloing over a chord progression”, and that’s completely fine! Brian, you put a warning sign on this lesson! To clarify this, we start from the same standard 12 bar blues progression in the key of A as in the previous section. They have no clue why their guitar playing doesn’t even come close to that of the guitarists they admire; they are using the WRONG scales! In this article specifically we’ll look at how to overcome these barriers by learning how chords and scales work together. Overcoming Your Blues Guitar Frustrations By Understanding How Chords and Scales Are Related. You also know where the chord tones are located within each pattern. if the chord progression is in A minor, then you would choose A minor pentatonic/A minor blues/A natural minor scale), 3.) Over the IV chord, you also have the choice to solo using the minor pentatonic that relates to the IV chord. In this chord tones lesson we will learn to target the notes in each individual chord of the 12-bar blues progression and adjust our soloing approach slightly for each one. While you can get by without necessarily learning chord tone soloing, the extra dimension it adds to your playing really makes it worthwhile investment of your practice time. This will allow you to practice chord tone targeting in each of the 5 positions. Why Altered And Whole Tone Scales Are Easier Than You Think Most guitarists are taught to play minor pentatonic or the flat 5 blues scale when soloing over a 1 4 5 blues progression. 2:59 – Part 1: Playing “Pentatonic Position #1” over each Chord 1:31 – Intro to the “One Pentatonic per Chord” Approach You saw your improvisation qualities improve rapidly and it felt like some kind of magic. 9:44 – Part 3: Locating the Chord Tones Within These Movable Pentatonic Boxes You can simply just “noodle around” within each of these pentatonic boxes as each chord is playing. See Everything that Zombie Guitar has to Offer! Hope to see more. We can see why this works if we break down the scale and chord notes. Taking Your Guitar Playing to Blues Heaven By Applying Chord Tone Soloing. Thanks Brian. Are you starting to see why beginner blues guitarists get stuck in their progress on the guitar? Additionally, if you have been soloing using the major pentatonic over the I chord, then switching to the minor pentatonic will add greater variety to your soloing. You see these notes again in the left colomn below. 3. My teacher has pointed me to chord-tone soloing. For example, in the key of G blues, we start on the 3rd fret for G7, then move to the 8th fret for the C7 (4 chord). The problem is that it is somewhat difficult to remember all of these different patterns and shapes. Why You Are You Stuck In A Rut With Your Blues Guitar Playing. In that case we raise the F note to an F# and also play the 9th, which is the E note. In 65 years of music I have never heard of pentatonics. The “One Pentatonic per Chord” Approach to Soloing Over a Chord Progression. By doing this, you will still be playing 100% in-key, but you will notice that your playing will be sounding a bit more “connected” with each chord as the chord changes occur. Pentatonic position #1 can either be major or minor. You have learned about the minor pentatonic scale and learned to improvise a bit, but you’ve come to a point where you don’t make progress anymore. But there will be times where you want to sound more melodically and you want to hit the perfect note at the perfect time. To clarify this, take a look at exactly how this wrong assumption looks on the fretboard of the guitar: By transposing, you would be tempted to believe that the notes in the scale you are playing (the D minor pentatonic scale) will sound much better over the D7 chord than the notes in the A minor pentatonic scale. This gives me a lot of fretboard visualization and I'm able to connect chord tones and create licks based off of what I'm seeing.? When the chords change from C7 to D7, try going from F to F#, then play the D7 chord tones. Great blues guitarists will use the D dominant pentatonic scale when improvising over the  D7 chord in a dominant blues progression. Using the major or minor pentatonic as a base and then hitting the chord tones of the current chord at the right times. This opening phrase is as much about the rhythm as any melodic content. 6:09 – Part 2: Expanding Beyond Pentatonic Position #1 into Neighboring Positions The chord tone for the 5 chord – A major would still be the first finger on the 4th string. Full Access Member “Video Backing Tracks” for this lesson: If you have been improvising or composing solos for any length of time, you are probably accustomed to approaching soloing in the following manner: 1.) Unlike the other chord changes this one leaves 2 changes in the notes of the modes. As long as you know the notes of your low E-string, and you apply the appropriate box to the appropriate chord, your playing will sound VERY connected with the chords! There are 5 major and 5 minor chord progressions. You could call this the “shortcut method” if you’d like, because it involves simply moving this basic pentatonic box around to different areas of the fretboard: By doing this, you will still remain 100% in-key (provided that the underlying chords in the progression are all part of just one key). This course was especially rewarding and pleasurable for me, as I am currently concentrating my learning efforts on the subject of Pentatonics.

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