Greetings, Neil,
Thanks to you, and particularly your excellent "Acoustic Genius" segments on the major and minor pentatonic scales, I've gone from unable to play any lead less than 2 years ago to being able to do so at jams in any key to the point of gaining high fives from more experienced players. Now I'm wondering where to go from here. I'd like to expand my lead playing and would love some guidance. In general, I'm a pretty typical intermediate player, to give you an idea of level.
By the way, I share your love of tennis and am a native Californian (Santa Barbara, 1953).
Thanks so much,
Pete Burkard
Florida
lead playing
Hi Dave! I thought I'd chime in on this one. I've followed the same path you have but you may be a little ahead of me in lead playing. But I'm working hard on it.
IMHO, the next step in lead development would be learning triplets, vamps and riffs that make leads fun. All the adornments. Slides, vibratos, trills, mutes etc. that separate single note lead playing from the pros. It seems to me that the great lead players like Clapton, Page, Vaughn, Hendrix, Knofler all played small chord fragments rather than single notes all the time. Neil is brilliant at this too. Especially for a fingerstyle guitarist. The great exceptions to that rule would be Gilmour and Santana, even Hank Marvin going way back, who are masters of the single note and note economy.
Finally, I would work outside the major and minor scales into the blues and jazz scales and then get into modal lead playing. If you can conquer modal playing you are way ahead of most players. Neil just posted a lesson on Find the Cost of Freedom and he does a fascinating "doodling" segment showing different ways to play lead for that song. I loved it. If you ever wonder just how good Neil is, just watch that segment. He never misses a note in about 5 minutes of playing. His command of scales and modes is incredible.
Good luck and let us know what you come up with!!
Cheers! :cheer:
IMHO, the next step in lead development would be learning triplets, vamps and riffs that make leads fun. All the adornments. Slides, vibratos, trills, mutes etc. that separate single note lead playing from the pros. It seems to me that the great lead players like Clapton, Page, Vaughn, Hendrix, Knofler all played small chord fragments rather than single notes all the time. Neil is brilliant at this too. Especially for a fingerstyle guitarist. The great exceptions to that rule would be Gilmour and Santana, even Hank Marvin going way back, who are masters of the single note and note economy.
Finally, I would work outside the major and minor scales into the blues and jazz scales and then get into modal lead playing. If you can conquer modal playing you are way ahead of most players. Neil just posted a lesson on Find the Cost of Freedom and he does a fascinating "doodling" segment showing different ways to play lead for that song. I loved it. If you ever wonder just how good Neil is, just watch that segment. He never misses a note in about 5 minutes of playing. His command of scales and modes is incredible.
Good luck and let us know what you come up with!!
Cheers! :cheer:
davesnothere wrote:
Thats a great question for the weekly news wrap up..I just went to see the lead playing lessons on the traids (top three strings) again and try to jam along with Neil..not yet there but I am busy..
Willem
Greetings, Neil,
Thanks to you, and particularly your excellent "Acoustic Genius" segments on the major and minor pentatonic scales, I've gone from unable to play any lead less than 2 years ago to being able to do so at jams in any key to the point of gaining high fives from more experienced players. Now I'm wondering where to go from here. I'd like to expand my lead playing and would love some guidance. In general, I'm a pretty typical intermediate player, to give you an idea of level.
By the way, I share your love of tennis and am a native Californian (Santa Barbara, 1953).
Thanks so much,
Pete Burkard
Florida
Thats a great question for the weekly news wrap up..I just went to see the lead playing lessons on the traids (top three strings) again and try to jam along with Neil..not yet there but I am busy..
Willem
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davesnothere
- Posts: 44
- Joined: Tue Jun 30, 2009 10:21 am
- Status: Offline
Thanks to Neil for mentioning my question on the weekly update and also to Big Bear for his thoughtful response. Neil said that he needed more information, so here goes. I'm loving putting into practice what I've learned from you regarding playing lead based on pentatonic scales. This has made jams tons more fun...going from having to stumble along trying to learn every chord change to being able to freely improvise for the whole song by only knowing the key. Now my ear has gotten better and I can often find the key myself from songs on cd's or the radio and I'm then off and running. I just want to keep getting better. For instance, I love what you did with the final segment of the lesson on "Cowgirl in the Sand". I'm expecting you to say that one needs to learn the triads or partial chord shapes but perhaps you could put together a more detailed lesson on that. (I know there is already one that introduces the topic.) It was the detail you provided in the Acoustic Genius lessons on pentatonics that struck home for me...basically, learn these five patterns and how they tie together and you are off and running. So it seemed to employ the mathematical part of the brain, an area I was always strong in. You made something that was mysterious much more accessible. Can you do that with the next step(s) in lead playing?
Thanks so much,
Peter Burkard
Florida
Thanks so much,
Peter Burkard
Florida
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davesnothere
- Posts: 44
- Joined: Tue Jun 30, 2009 10:21 am
- Status: Offline
Greetings, Neil, and others interested in this topic,
At Neil's suggestion, I've studied his excellent multi-part lesson on playing leads based on triads. While there is much to learn here, in the end it seems to get down to playing the same notes as one would play when playing lead based on pentatonic scales. As Neil says, he does not put down the entire triad shape but is able to visualize it and knows all the non-harmonic additions. But when I compare his diagrams which include those additional notes, it is virtually identical to the pentatonic shapes. My question revolves around this similarity: What is really the difference in the end?
Thank you!,
Pete Burkard
Saarsota, Fl
At Neil's suggestion, I've studied his excellent multi-part lesson on playing leads based on triads. While there is much to learn here, in the end it seems to get down to playing the same notes as one would play when playing lead based on pentatonic scales. As Neil says, he does not put down the entire triad shape but is able to visualize it and knows all the non-harmonic additions. But when I compare his diagrams which include those additional notes, it is virtually identical to the pentatonic shapes. My question revolves around this similarity: What is really the difference in the end?
Thank you!,
Pete Burkard
Saarsota, Fl
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thereshopeyet
- Posts: 131
- Joined: Thu Jun 25, 2009 4:19 pm
- Status: Offline
Great Question Pete
I got here after watching the weekly news.
I'll have a look at some of that stuff Big Bear mentioned too.
Thanks
Dermot
I got here after watching the weekly news.
I'll have a look at some of that stuff Big Bear mentioned too.
Thanks
Dermot