To me, the most important thing is to learn to hear this stuff. Practice a fingering for a musical component within a Key Position slowly. The object is to hear them as part of the phrases you hear, and have your hands find the notes automatically. Another aspect of this is that if you think "that was part of a G7 arpeggio", your creative flow is weakened. A good question to ask your inner self is "how does this scale / arpeggio / chord voicing, make me feel". Your feelings are what summons the notes you use in a phrase, and the rhythms you put them in.
Dave Woods
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From: jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com [mailto:jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Petri Sent: Sunday, November 08, 2009 10:42 AM To: jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com Subject: [jazz_guitar] Re: Learning arpeggios
--- In jazz_guitar@ <mailto:jazz_guitar%40yahoogroups.com> yahoogroups.com,
John Amato <jamato316@...> wrote: > In fact, a close examination of their music reveals a strong reliance on
"Chord Tones," arpeggios, and very few scales. The scales they do play act as transition phrases between sections of their solos, otherwise marked exclusively by phrases, or cells, of chord tones and arpeggios...
Yes!
If you ask me, to "learn arpeggios" is to be able to play the chord tones in a melodic fashion all over the fretboard. Whatever that takes. You can base your visualization of the chord tones on CAGED system, other systems, three-note-per-string fingerings, whatever. The point is, learn to find the chord tones for any chord. And to be able to play the notes in any order. That is, IMO, a lot more important than scales in learning to improvise over chord changes.
A good question to ask your inner self is "how does this scale / arpeggio / chord voicing, make me feel". Your feelings are what summons the notes you use in a phrase, and the rhythms you put them in.
Dave Woods
__
Dave, Therein lies guitar craft wisdom......
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When a teacher says "learn arpeggios", what exactly does this mean?
I know this sounds like a stupid question ...
Is it specific fingerings for specific arps and scales?
Is it simply knowing which notes are in which chords?
Is it knowing how to finger an arp for each major chord form in the CAGED system?
I'm really unclear on this.
When I was told this years ago, it referred to learning Chuck Wayne's fingerings for basic arps at four places on the neck.
--- In jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com, "will_halligan" <will@...> wrote:
> I few years ago I attended a master class with Bobby Broom and I clearly remember his advice "Get on the bandwagon – learn your scales and arpeggios."
> One really great way start learning what actual notes are used in certain arpeggios is to sit down with the sheet music (not tab,) to Pacbell's canon in D and work through it. This is not hard and very worthwhile.
I have the impression that many jazz greats play by thinking about chord tones and passing notes. They then get their diverse sounds by knowing which chord to juxtapose over the harmony. So, at a basic level, someone might play Am9 or Gmaj7 over Cmaj7. At a more sophisticated level, someone might play Emaj or Bbm over G7 (creating G13b9 and G7#9#11, respectively) and, at an advanced level who knows what. That, and they have a big repertoire of licks that go over the various chords.
Rick
> If you ask me, to "learn arpeggios" is to be able to play the chord tones in a melodic fashion all over the fretboard. Whatever that takes. You can base your visualization of the chord tones on CAGED system, other systems, three-note-per-string fingerings, whatever. The point is, learn to find the chord tones for any chord. And to be able to play the notes in any order. That is, IMO, a lot more important than scales in learning to improvise over chord changes.
I few years ago I attended a master class with Bobby Broom and I clearly remember his advice "Get on the bandwagon – learn your scales and arpeggios."
One really great way start learning what actual notes are used in certain arpeggios is to sit down with the sheet music (not tab,) to Pacbell's canon in D and work through it. This is not hard and very worthwhile.
> In fact, a close examination of their music reveals a strong reliance on "Chord Tones," arpeggios, and very few scales. The scales they do play act as transition phrases between sections of their solos, otherwise marked exclusively by phrases, or cells, of chord tones and arpeggios...
Yes!
If you ask me, to "learn arpeggios" is to be able to play the chord tones in a melodic fashion all over the fretboard. Whatever that takes. You can base your visualization of the chord tones on CAGED system, other systems, three-note-per- string fingerings, whatever. The point is, learn to find the chord tones for any chord. And to be able to play the notes in any order. That is, IMO, a lot more important than scales in learning to improvise over chord changes.
Best wishes,
Petri
YES! .. to me, it's a better approach ... scales seem to play "around" and "on top" of the changes, chord tones play "IN the Changes" .... like Metheny says, playing chord tones is like "getting your hands dirty"....
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> I would subscribe to this method over the years and also teach it ... > but lately, as of a few years ago, I realized that you really don't > hear many top players like Martino, Metheny, Burrell, Pass, Wes, et. > al. play "scales" per se ...
One doesn't practice scales to directly plug them into solos, like a "paint by number" approach to pseudo-creativity, though. The idea is to make something creative and personal with them, an idea which has been explored thoroughly by guys like David Baker. On this list list, Dave likes to call it "working with key centers". "Scale players" sound like "scale players" - that's true - but my guess is that they would be non-creative no matter what tools they were taught. But real creative players learn them for the many positive things they offer, not least of which is knowledge of the instrument in the first place - soon to be a lost art.. Pat Martino, for example, knows his scales inside and out, and has a lot to say about them.
The students I have who willingly apply themselves to practicing them always learn everything exponentially faster than those who don't. Of course, nowadays guitar "students" want to dismiss all the things of knowledge - reading, arps, scales, pieces, theory, &c., &c., leaving nothing except that which they feel like learning. Perhaps they'll eventually and finally break it down to the belief that the best way to play is to not play at all, or even to own an instrument, for that matter,
Oh, that's right. They already have - "Guitar Hero". Lots of good players there...
Sorry to insist, Guys, but I am extremely surprised none of you mentioned intervallic formulas as the first step to learn arps!
- Familiarize yourself with generic relationship of notes on the fretboard - Learn the basic arps by heart, generic way (1 b3 5 b7, etc, etc, name it) - Play them generically on the fretboard, in several keys, octaves, fingerings - Ear them in relation with the matching chord(s) (ear training) - Match them with scale/melody/chromatic cells
I few years ago I attended a master class with Bobby Broom and I clearly remember his advice "Get on the bandwagon – learn your scales and arpeggios." ...........
I would subscribe to this method over the years and also teach it ... but lately, as of a few years ago, I realized that you really don't hear many top players like Martino, Metheny, Burrell, Pass, Wes, et. al. play "scales" per se ...
In fact, a close examination of their music reveals a strong reliance on "Chord Tones," arpeggios, and very few scales. The scales they do play act as transition phrases between sections of their solos, otherwise marked exclusively by phrases, or cells, of chord tones and arpeggios...
_
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Then play them through the cycle of 4ths, then starting at the top and going down, then starting on the 3rd of each chord, then the 5th, then 7th, then any other extension, then trying joining the 3rd of each to the 7th of the next going through the cycle of fourths. Use all the different chord types, but most important learn tunes and melodies by ear and memory. Work on voice leading and melody more than chord scale relationships. Use chromatic voice leading and embellishment, delayed resolution etc. Learn genre specific applications of any of the above. Just my 2c
In jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com, "will_halligan" <will@...> wrote: I few years ago I attended a master class with Bobby Broom and I clearly remember his advice "Get on the bandwagon – learn your scales and arpeggios." One really great way start learning what actual notes are used in certain arpeggios is to sit down with the sheet music (not tab,) to Pachelbel's Canon in D and work through it. This is not hard and very worthwhile. Will Mings: I agree (and as suggested by Mr. P) also harmonize all scales in three parts with open chords a good place to start is C(5th fret, 2nd finger)A (up a 6th on 3rd string) E (up a 10th on second string) Go up and down in the key of C, observing the string crossing points (duplicates). There will be 3 sets of four strings and each has a slightly different fingering. not that many actually Now change keys, for example 4 flats...and so on. lots of music here.
It's OK to learn arps from someone else, but there is always the danger of sounding stilted and similar to someone else. I work with the great Joe Diorio, who teaches you how to develop arps off chord shapes, slash chords, stacked chords and patterns based on the work of Slonimsky (sp?) and many other ethereal sources. As I explore these sources, which are limitless, I find some very interestiing new ideas. He recently showed us how he took some phrases from works of Bach and created, right before our very eyes/ears, some great arps.
Arpeggios are similar to verbal expressions that reflect the cognitive depths to which you are capable of going. These things take time and, if you devote the time to creating original ideas, you will create them.
RV CT/USA
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--- In jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com, John Amato <jamato316@...> wrote:
> In fact, a close examination of their music reveals a strong reliance on "Chord Tones," arpeggios, and very few scales. The scales they do play act as transition phrases between sections of their solos, otherwise marked exclusively by phrases, or cells, of chord tones and arpeggios...
Yes!
If you ask me, to "learn arpeggios" is to be able to play the chord tones in a melodic fashion all over the fretboard. Whatever that takes. You can base your visualization of the chord tones on CAGED system, other systems, three-note-per-string fingerings, whatever. The point is, learn to find the chord tones for any chord. And to be able to play the notes in any order. That is, IMO, a lot more important than scales in learning to improvise over chord changes.
--- In jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com, Greg Macmillan <gregmac@...> wrote:
> Then play them through the cycle of 4ths, then starting at the top and > going down, then starting on the 3rd of each chord, then the 5th, then > 7th, then any other extension, then trying joining the 3rd of each to > the 7th of the next going through the cycle of fourths. Use all the > different chord types, but most important learn tunes and melodies by > ear and memory. Work on voice leading and melody more than chord scale > relationships. Use chromatic voice leading and embellishment, delayed > resolution etc. Learn genre specific applications of any of the above. > Just my 2c
I really like this post about how the chord/scale/ arpeggiomakes you feel! Great idea to think about!!!
Nat Janoff
Nat,
When playing in so many situations like the Blues and other genres including jazz, I find myself playing mini versions of scales as connections to chord, chord tones, arpeggios and other "chordal" figures. Very rarely would I consciously think of playing a whole scale per se for fitting into a key tonic or modulation UNLESS a scale becomes unconsciously heard by the "ear" ... then ANYTHING GOES because it's from the heart/mind/body/soul.
John Amato Isaiah 55:11
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Practicing arpeggios enables one to practice hearing chord tones melodically. To that end one essential part of the practice is singing the arpeggios. It is important to sing them with AND without the instrument, at first in root position, then in inversions. The ear takes time to develop, you should start with triad arpeggios, and once you can hear them clearly and can sing them, move onto 7th arpeggios etc. Sadly too many students dive straight into 7th arpeggios when the can't even hear basic triad arpeggios. The mechanics of playing them is important, but hearing them is essential, again sadly in today's "rush to the finish line mentality" students focus on the mechanical, the visual rather than the auditory. In the end unless they are heard and are in your ears they are not very useful, so mechanically executing all the patterns in the world will not result in non-mechanical improvisation.
--- In jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com, "Dave Woods" <david_woods@...> wrote:
> All of this sounds very comprehensive, and thorough, but I still say work
> all of this stuff out around a tune.
Very true. Most of the building blocks of music (scales, arpeggios, chord prpogressions) never made too much sense to me before I started to hear them in the context of a tune. It's much easier to relate to them that way and also, it's the pathway to feeling them as Dave mentioned.
It just takes work, being around these things, marinating oneself in them. Like learning a foreign language: none of the words initially made you feel in any particular way (except frutrated when you couldn't recall a word when you needed it). It takes years and years of using the language to develop that emotional connection with the components of that language. But it's worth it.
This is why I think that paedagogically always using tunes to drive any point across is the only way to go. You can say something like "the dominant on the II degree tends to be a #11 or b5" and it means little until you play tunes like Take The A Train or Desafinado.
--- In jazz_gui...@yahoogroups.com, Greg Macmillan <gregmac@...> wrote:
> Then play them through the cycle of 4ths, then starting at the top and > going down, then starting on the 3rd of each chord, then the 5th, then > 7th, then any other extension, then trying joining the 3rd of each to > the 7th of the next going through the cycle of fourths. Use all the > different chord types, but most important learn tunes and melodies by > ear and memory. Work on voice leading and melody more than chord scale > relationships. Use chromatic voice leading and embellishment, delayed > resolution etc. Learn genre specific applications of any of the above. > Just my 2c
All of this sounds very comprehensive, and thorough, but I still say work all of this stuff out around a tune. You should not only know the melody, you should be able to hear the Key and chord changes through the notes of the melody. Once you can do this, begin working gradually away from the melody into the key and chord changes, always keeping the melody in mind. This is the arena that we all apply all this stuff to. This is the practical focusing of it.
If something musical, expressive, and creative is going to happen, you will never just play the straight arpeggio. It will be a melodic idea that incorporates the arpeggio. I say once you have an arpeggio under your hands, "PLAY" with it, work out melodic ideas within it for your expressive vocabulary, and bit by bit try to use them in the tune. It's necessary to always keep an overview of the entire process in mind, and a tune is what gives that to you.
Dave Woods
_____
--- In jazz_guitar@ <mailto:jazz_guitar%40yahoogroups.com> yahoogroups.com,
Greg Macmillan <gregmac@...> wrote:
> Then play them through the cycle of 4ths, then starting at the top and > going down, then starting on the 3rd of each chord, then the 5th, then > 7th, then any other extension, then trying joining the 3rd of each to > the 7th of the next going through the cycle of fourths. Use all the > different chord types, but most important learn tunes and melodies by > ear and memory. Work on voice leading and melody more than chord scale > relationships. Use chromatic voice leading and embellishment, delayed > resolution etc. Learn genre specific applications of any of the above. > Just my 2c
> cheers Greg
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