The first movie shows the positions played as chords, then
played as single notes. (I have kept the movies short to
save bandwidth.) Requires Quicktime.
The second movie is an example of improvising a quick melody
over the first seven frets. Don't worry too much about the
line I played. All I was doing was using those main notes
and linking some of them chromatically to create the melody.
There are an infinite number of ways to this, so concentrate
on your own ideas. If you do want to play the line:
Don't worry about playing fast, just worry about getting
to those notes smoothly, musically. As always, you must
think ahead, you must know in advance what you're going
to play.
If you're still wondering what the "trick"
is to being able to instantly see these patterns, whether
7th, minor, augmented, flat five...whatever...then you should
order my book PlaneTalk: The Truly Totally Different Guitar
Instruction Book. It reveals the underlying layout of the
fretboard imposed by Music herself.
I purchased Plane Talk about six months ago and have to
say it is by far the best book I have come across. I do
have Fretboard Logic, but I like Plane Talk much better.
It is clearer an easy to follow. I have learned more from
this book than all the other ones I have. Plus, the slide
rule is a GREAT tool. Highly recommended!
Mark.
...Believe me, it is WITHOUT DOUBT the best
general guitar instruction/theory book I have ever come
across in my 36 years of guitar playing:The best by a long
shot!!!...you WILL derive great benefit from Kirk's approach
to music in this book. Buy it with confidence. I can't recommend
it highly enough.
GuitarJIM
From the same thread at the AcousticGuitar.com
forum.
I recently ordered your book Plane Talk from
your web site. I have found it to be the best book I have
ever read....It will definitely change the way play and
learn forever. I will be recommending your book to all of
my friends that play the guitar.
Ben Preston
Kirk,
I got your book in the mail today--in a word: FANTASTIC!!!!
Kudos to you for such a well-thought-out, illustrated and
produced book ... You are a wonderful teacher. Your writing
is clear, your method is simply taught and your technique
is so easy to understand...Any teacher could learn something
about their skill by reading how you tackle such a lengthy,
difficult subject in as many pages as you did ... Thank
you for all of your correspondence and for sharing your
knowledge ("the trick") with other guitarists!
Mike Andrews -- (USA)
Melody from
chords
Hello once again fellow twanger.
I'm back with a "get that guitar out of its case
and play it" pep talk, and I'm going to show you
what I reckon is the best way to start inventing your
part as you go - otherwise known as improvising. I recently
came back from a two day workshop at a high school, and
the overwhelming majority of players said what they wanted
most was to learn the secret to improvising.
First of all, I'll try to
define what I mean by 'improvising'. Because it requires
a chunk of time, I'd have to say improvising is a process.
It is the process of stringing together various elements
of music on the fly, as they say. The most basic would
be playing a single note melody line to a predetermined
chord progression; a more complex form would be combining
single notes with double stops and chords.
The main thing to remember
is that the chords are calling the shots. In this example
I'm about to go into, the chord is D7.
What does that mean to say
that we're going to play along to a D7? The vast majority
of players and teachers will start going through all the
scales that you should use. I don't recommend that myself.
My brain just doesn't think in scales, I guess because
a long time ago I realized that music isn't scales, it's
chords. I wouldn't know where to begin improvising thinking
scales and modes. Scales and modes are not music, they
are the raw ingredients. Chords and time turn scales and
modes into music.
So, a D7 chord is a chord
consisting of 4 notes, the 1-3-5-and b7 of D, namely D
F# A and C.
Let's look at the first 7 frets
of the fingerboard and find positions for D7.
The first is the familiar open
D7 chord:
Its
notes, from bass to treble are 1-5-b7-3. Play these as
single notes, don't make a chord out of them. Experiment
with them as melody notes. If you want to hear and 'in-between
note' in the melody you're experimenting with.
The next position up the fretboard
for D7 is this:
It's
like a C7 chord shape moved up 2 frets. Since D is 2 frets
away from C, a D7 chord is 2 frets away too. In this case,
the order of notes from bass to treble is 1-3-b7-1. Play
these as single notes. Resist the temptation to hold all
notes down as the chord. Free up your hand and attack
the notes as if you're playing lead. Try sliding up to
a couple to get the feel for it.
The next position up the fretboard
for D7 is this:
It's
like an A7 chord shape moved up 5 frets and barred. Play
around with these notes as single notes. Here, the order
is 1-5-b7-3 and another 5 on top. Again, don't play this
as a chord, play the notes as single notes, as if you're
playing lead. Let it sink in that what you've done is
moved an A7 shape up five frets to create this D7. Let
it sink in that this shape ANYWHERE on the fretboard ALWAYS
means 7th.
An 'in-between position has
emerged from combining the last two. This is it here:
The
order of notes here, from bass to treble, is 3-7-1-5,
so it's still a D7 chord. Have a fiddle with these notes,
thinking melody. Play with the timing. After hearing the
four notes for a while, you should be able to hear a simple
melody in your head and play it with ease. KEEP IT SIMPLE
TO START WITH. Once again, let it sink in that this shape
on this particular treble string set can be moved up or
down and will always be flavored "7th".
Play around these positions
as separate entities for a while. Be aware of how the
fingers feel playing these notes as simple melodies.
Now, bring all these shapes
together into one long template.
These
notes, which we know work because all we've done is connect
up all the D7 shapes, represent all the 1-3-5 and b7 of
D, for the first seven frets. They continue on up the
neck of course, until after 12 frets, the pattern repeats.
These notes represent the essence of D7. They are all
great notes to begin and end melodies on. Remember that
improvising is creating melodies, and melodies begin and
end. Any great solo is really a series of shorter melodies.
Phrases are another word for these shorter melodies, so
you can liken a solo to a paragraph within the story of
the song, consisting of phrases. Hang your 7th phrases
off of the notes as you see them above, shape them around
the framework.
You will of course be using
more notes than the 1-3-5-b7. All 12 notes are eligible
to be part of a 7th flavored melody, but most just as
passing notes. The four notes in our pattern can be played
repetitively all night and will sound right, so long as
the chord remained D7. It would sound boring however.
The rest of the scale notes are there to link these, and
the chromatic scale underlies everything to connect any
whole tone intervals left. Every fret of the fingerboard
can come into play, timing being the ruling factor. The
important notes -- the 1-3-5-b7 -- must fall on the important
beats for it to hang together.
This same principle applies
when the chord changes to a new one. For example if the
next chord is G7, then the same configuration of notes
for G7 will come into play, and your melody will automatically
be centered around the new chord flavor.
Click here
to go to PlaneTalk - The Truly Totally Different Guitar
Instruction Book
Its
notes, from bass to treble are 1-5-b7-3. Play these as
single notes, don't make a chord out of them. Experiment
with them as melody notes. If you want to hear and 'in-between
note' in the melody you're experimenting with.
It's
like a C7 chord shape moved up 2 frets. Since D is 2 frets
away from C, a D7 chord is 2 frets away too. In this case,
the order of notes from bass to treble is 1-3-b7-1. Play
these as single notes. Resist the temptation to hold all
notes down as the chord. Free up your hand and attack
the notes as if you're playing lead. Try sliding up to
a couple to get the feel for it. 
It's
like an A7 chord shape moved up 5 frets and barred. Play
around with these notes as single notes. Here, the order
is 1-5-b7-3 and another 5 on top. Again, don't play this
as a chord, play the notes as single notes, as if you're
playing lead. Let it sink in that what you've done is
moved an A7 shape up five frets to create this D7. Let
it sink in that this shape ANYWHERE on the fretboard ALWAYS
means 7th.
The
order of notes here, from bass to treble, is 3-7-1-5,
so it's still a D7 chord. Have a fiddle with these notes,
thinking melody. Play with the timing. After hearing the
four notes for a while, you should be able to hear a simple
melody in your head and play it with ease. KEEP IT SIMPLE
TO START WITH. Once again, let it sink in that this shape
on this particular treble string set can be moved up or
down and will always be flavored "7th".
These
notes, which we know work because all we've done is connect
up all the D7 shapes, represent all the 1-3-5 and b7 of
D, for the first seven frets. They continue on up the
neck of course, until after 12 frets, the pattern repeats.
These notes represent the essence of D7. They are all
great notes to begin and end melodies on. Remember that
improvising is creating melodies, and melodies begin and
end. Any great solo is really a series of shorter melodies.
Phrases are another word for these shorter melodies, so
you can liken a solo to a paragraph within the story of
the song, consisting of phrases. Hang your 7th phrases
off of the notes as you see them above, shape them around
the framework.