Well….

Provided how serious you are and want to distance yourself from default noodling it sounds like some disciplined, focused, consistent interval ear training may be what's in order for that conundrum.
It can be a time vampire but most goals worth achieving will require some sacrifice and dedication.

Hope that helps,

Fukk I knew it would involve tons of hard work with no shortcuts.

I can pick out a few John William’s melodic intervals by ear though lol.

Ha….get used to it weed hopper.
I started playing guitar in '69 which was my last year in the military.

Back to it.

lmao

Lol. How do you think Guthrie got Guthrie level good at improvising?

A guitarist and a composer are both musicians.

The way I look at improvising, which is not unique, is like language since music is a form of language. In English, you have 26 letters; in Western music, you have 12 pitches. When you string together a short series of pitches, a phrase, it's like a word. When you string together a series of phrases, it's like a sentence, and so on.

People can nitpick that and it's not ironclad, but the basic idea is there is a musical vocabulary for improvising like there is a language vocabulary for extemporaneous English communication. You learned to speak before you learned to read or write. You learned to speak by imitating. You spoke before you could understand what those first words even meant, and so your journey began.

In jazz, new improvisors try to take an altered dominant scale, for example, and try to make it sound like words and it comes out sounding like an infant screeching (unable to form words) because the syntax is all wrong. Instead, learning music vocabulary of the idiom you're working in by memorizing phrases will get you there far quicker than trying to take a scale and make it sound like Charlie Parker. The nice thing is with the technique you have you'll be able to progress quickly if you work efficiently.

So, with all that out of the way, to be more specific to what you played:

You're trying to do everything at once. If you want to play fast phrases that connect, you'll need to connect slow phrases very well first. I know you have them because I heard pieces of them in there, but you didn't take the time to develop them and progress the lines. Imaginereadingasentence that.iswritten;like,this.

Remedy: Use a program like Transcribe or Audacity to loop the track for each chord change. Loop just the Cmi11. The Dorian scale is C D Eb F G A Bb. That's too many notes to work with andwillmakeyourmusiclook like this. Start with 3 notes. You can start with C, D, Eb. Can you make music with those 3 notes over the same chord for 30 seconds? It's hard. But if you can't make nice phrases from 3 notes, you're mistaken if you think it will be easier to do it with all 7 notes.

When you can consistently make phrases from 3 notes, then you can add another note. Add the Bb: Bb, C, D, Eb. Now do the same thing but you've got another note. Your ear should be guiding you - there's only 3 to start with so it should be pretty easy to memorize what each one is going to sound like before it's played. Rhythm is key. When you only have a few notes to work with, rhythmic phrasing is what gets the job done.

Now add in the Fmi11. Use the same Bb, C, D, Eb notes over a loop of the Cmi11 to Fmi11 chords. Now isolate the Ab13 (what they call the D) chord only. Use the same Bb, C, D, Eb notes. Now isolate the G7#5#9 (what they call the Db) and you can stick with the same four for now. Now play the whole track just using those 4 notes and focus on the phrasing, using your ears.

Once you can do that well, you can start using other 3 and 4 note combinations of the other notes. You will have to change the A to Ab when to goes from Cm to Fm, and we'll talk about the dominant chords another time.


Trying to make scales sound like music is challenging, so use the exercise I gave above for that. That said, the lines you're probably interested in are harmonically more complex and so you don't want to reinvent the wheel for that.

Learn cool ass licks and put them into the track. Force them into your playing. Yeah, that's contrived, but so was mimicking speech when you first learned to speak. But the more you do that, the more licks you'll have and you'll start improvising within the licks, creating your own lines on the spot with your ear, and that is really what improvising is - rearranging familiar information.

Also, do you have all your intervals memorized by sound? If you can sing it, then you can hear it. Can you sing a minor 6th (4 whole steps) interval cold? If you can, then you can certainly know it when you hear it.

Excluding unison, there are 12 intervals. You should have them all memorized. If you don't, you can get EarMaster app and the basic version has all 12 intervals (and compound versions up to 3 octaves) and that will be plenty.

If you have intervals memorized by ear yet can't connect it to the board, then you need to play intervals on board. Take an interval and play it. Sing with it. This trains the mind, ear, and fingers to work as one. Sing any licks or lines you work on.

Another exercise you can do is to play a chord, say Cmi7, and sing two pitches. Find those two pitches. Keep doing it. When you can find two pitches you're singing against that chord, sing 3 pitches. Keep going until you sing a longer phrase and can find those pitches you sang without hitting wrong notes. If you hit wrong notes, find the notes that you did sing. That will start connecting what you hear in your head with where it's located on the board.

Fantastic reply, very much appreciated.

"Imaginereadingasentence that.iswritten;like,this." lold.

I will take the advice and start with using those 3 first notes in the Dorian scale over the Cmi chord. That approach does make sense because often my approach to improvisation currently is randomly playing a bunch of notes that sound in key until I find some notes I like and then trying to make little phrases in real time on the fly which, obviously, doesn't work that well.
Especially since often by the time I "find" those notes the track has moved to a different chord or progression and those notes no longer fit lol.

"You will have to change the A to Ab when to goes from Cm to Fm, and we'll talk about the dominant chords another time." It's nuances like this that I think will take me some time to become fluid with.

When you say learn "cool ass licks" like where should I begin since I'm a beginner? Should I be going back to as far as like Charlie Christian and chit back when electric guitars didn't even exist?
Or should I jump straight to trying to learn bebop licks like the Charlie Parker stuff? I actually have that Omni Book of Charlie Parker tunes in my possession but I can barely fukking read and I'm even slower towards putting that to the fretboard.

TBH my fretboard knowledge of the location of the actual notes is pretty patchy and abysmal so this will be also a good opportunity to button that chit up.

In terms of intervals the only interval I actually know is the Star Wars theme interval between the first two notes, LOL. I know that that is a Perfect Fifth. I can probably recognize a tritone too lol but that's about it.

Thanks again for all this excellent breakdown and advice, the 3 note solo idea and the interval recognition is what I'll start with. Repped.

It's never too late to go balls deep in ear training. That's a big part of what your buddy Schmoe Satriale tried to instil in his students. He had a music teacher in high school who laid the foundation. It's not just about "unlocking the fretboard" and other cliches — it's about being able to quickly understand what you're hearing.

There's a "guitar teacher reacts" video I saw a while back where the guy is completely lost trying to figure out what he was hearing @ 15:10 when he hits the vii° moving chromatically up a half step from VI and borrowing from harmonic minor before switching back to natural minor on the i. Ian Thornley in the video went to Berklee 30 years ago and has this chit down cold so he's not even thinking about what notes to play, he's hearing them and his fingers follow. The youtuber has a limited grasp of this stuff so he's taking random stabs at it until he gives up and just calls Thornley a monster player.

12:30 & 15:10



With ear training and a grasp of theory there's no mystery so you'll know what he's doing. You might not have the chops to execute what you're hearing as quickly or as cleanly as you'd like or even in real time improvising but at least you'll be on the right path.

What do you y'all think of CAGED vs/with 3NPS?

Then start with just two notes: A to Bb on the Cm, and Ab to Bb on the Fm. All you're doing is changing one note. Then add in the G. So it's G, A, Bb on the Cm, and G, Ab, Bb on the Fm. Loop Cm to Fm and play this until it's nailed. But that's after you've worked those other notes that don't change first.

I mean, if you want to be steeped in the jazz history and tradition of straight ahead jazz, yeah, but you don't have to. Just grab a phrase that appeals to you (Omni Book works and you can hear it on a recording) and apply it in your playing by forcing it everywhere you can.

By forcing, I mean intentionally put it into your improvs. Noodle, noodle, noodle, [oh here's that chord change] nail the lick, noodle, noodle, noodle. Rinse and repeat until that lick is effortless to place in there. After that, you'll probably start changing the rhythm of the lick a little or adding a note to it and then you are starting to improvise within the context of the lick.

You can also use the Bebop Bible by Les Wise. It's out of print, but the pdf is archived online. Take those G7alt lines that are a bar or two in length and do the same thing.

At that point, you'll have some licks but to get the most of the licks some theory basics help. For example, over Cm obviously the first pentatonic choice people play is Cm pentatonic. But you can take a Cm pentatonic lick and move it to the Gm pentatonic box and superimpose Gm pentatonic over a Cm chord and that sounds hipper than staying in Cm pentatonic. For example, over that Cm to Fm progression in that track, you can play Gm pentatonic over both of those chords.

The same goes for bop licks. Once a lick is mastered, it can be applied onto other chords and that changes the texture of the line and gives you more sounds from one lick. But you need to know why these pitches can work on a different chord. It's really not as intricate as you think it is for very basic theory survival topics.

Using formula numbers rather than keys is an easy place to start. For example, if you can play a major scale starting from the root, doesn't matter which key but it's important that the first note is the root note, the scale is 1 2 3 4 5 6 7. Now play the same fingering and play the 3rd pitch one fret lower (called a b3). So now the scale is 1 2 b3 4 5 6 7. Or you can raise the 5th a half step (#5) and it becomes 1 2 3 4 #5 6 7.

If you understand how that works, then you can understand how chords are constructed (say, 1 3 5 b7) and you're on your way. Shiit, you play piano, just go to the piano and play C D E F G A B and think of them as 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 and do the same thing.



Yeah, you gotta memorize all intervals. You can pick one interval and sing it ascending and descending moving up and down the neck. C up to G play and sing up a couple of times, then sing and play G down to C down a couple of times. Move it to the next fret, C#/G# and do the same thing. Keep going up the neck. After a week or two, the interval should be internalized.

Not a CAGED guy but I don't think there's a wrong answer to any of this. All that matters is that you find some kind of system (at least before it becomes automatic) that eventually allows you to hear it otherwise all you'll be doing is playing "3NPS" shapes which is just a slightly more expensive way of playing in a "box."

"Playing all over the neck" looks impressive but ultimately it's about playing in the area of the neck that gives you the sound you want in that moment. That's the key advantage over a piano where notes for a given octave only exist in one place. The guitar is like 6 keyboards stacked. That's how I look at it anyway.

If I'm hearing a twangy country lick down near the nut on the top 3 strings then that's not going to magically work 4-5 frets up on the next group of 3 strings over. I can play all the same notes but it won't sound as good. I'm a boomer bends* guy so I like building lines that take me to areas that facilitate bending the way I'm hearing it in real time. If I'm "hearing" a min 3rd bend from C# up to E I'm not going to have much luck on the B string at the 2nd fret so it's the 3rd string 6th fret all day. Next one over, wound D, is not going to cut it either.

So to me it's not just about learning where all the notes live but where they sound right in the context I'm using them and that takes practice to do effortlessly. Hopefully that makes sense.

*I reckon Tim Henson could have used a few Boomer Bends when he had his moment here.

Very talented musician who's living the dream. Reassuring this gentleman didn't get sucked into the world of EV nuthuggery.

https://vocaroo.com/130wjlpSvTEP

Still pretty pentatonic. Don't have much experience with actual fusion theory

I recommend a book called The Jazz Language by Dan Haerle. I picked it up in 2003 when I was barely into my teens, very comprehensive and gets into very abstruse territory. Very detailed on the "what scale goes with which chord/progression" stuff.


Dunno if anyone knows of Derryl Gabel, he's more of an obscure internet guitarist, but his stuff on Outside Secrets I found really helpful on how to play outside. Great player, too.

I have a bunch of books. Motivation is the problem lol

That all makes sense!

When I first learned, many moons ago, I was taught with 3NPS.

After several decades, I recently enrolled in a workshop based on CAGED and it's been a blast. I'm finding it much more intuitive to mix them together and find arpeggios when noodling.

There's a lot to unpack here, I will get back to this later today.

Dang I didn't realize Polyphia was that successful. Surprising actually.

Man you have fukking great tone. What is your full setup?

Lol you little frauding f*ggot, you already got exposed for not knowing chit about "abstruse jazz theory" and you can't even play. It's hilarious how your reputation in the misc across the boards is you being an utter frauding piece of chit.

You play circles around that f*ggot, he can't play guitar for chit.

I actually correctly identified the backdoor jazz progression, albeit with a little research/refresher, so WTF are you talking about?. I've also been saying since I first came into this thread that I don't own a guitar ATM, not that that precludes me from talking ITT. So a really weird reason for you to be angry.


Pro-tip, too: Take most fraud accusations around here with a grain of salt. People like to go "lol fraud, lol larp, lol derp" to make others angry and start arguments when they haven't actually backed their accusations up with a shred of tangible evidence.

In fact, I had to school a bunch of limpdicked Trumpers before on how you actually need to back up your accusations with tangible evidence.

You stumbled over their questions despite all your "years of studying abstruse jazz theory" and they made fun of you.

And post a video of you shredding over a jazz tune since you're so studied in "abstruse" jazz theory.

"Their" questions?

Uh, no, adimare asked me about a chord progression and I identified it as a backdoor, and that's what it was. He could have been more helpful by telling me the key it was in (since it was a variation on a theme rather than the standard progression), but still, I got it.


Dunno why you're fabricating reasons to be angry about something, but it's honestly lame and cringey. Give it a rest and get back to guitar talk, please.

Lol at you trying to pretend I'm angry. I just know you're a loser and a fraud, and that's it lmao. You couldn't even answer his questions, which you should have been able to after all your studies of "abstruse" jazz lmao.

And LOL at you sidestepping posting an actual video of you demonstrating your years of all that "studying".

I think the bigger loser would be the one who's on a bodybuilding site and his avi is the dude from Coming to America, or at least was.

Fraud accusations are tired and overused around here, so it's a broken record thing now.

Maybe just don't get pissed off and publicly squeal just because someone offers their opinion on Allan Holdsworth. People have opinions on a variety of subjects and they'll differ from yours. If that part of the real world scares you, best to stay in the safety of your basement, lol.


Anyway, later.

Just post a video of your playing.

Lmao.

I've repeatedly said I don't own a guitar ATM, so WTF are you even trying to do here? Even if I got one, I'd have to get my chops back up to speed anyway after a long layoff.

You reek to high heaven of juvenile insecurity, lol.

L M A O. Thought so.

Lmao, I like hearing opinions on Allan Holdsworth from people who can actually play guitar.

You CAN'T PLAY GUITAR. Lol.

Some exciting news for rollerball, hot off the press.



Spoiler!

LOL of course the first shot we have is Schmoe doubling down on his geriatric octagenarian "my eyes-have-been-recently-dilated" old people's sunglasses. Lol.

That being said, I wouldn't mind seeing this G3 with Vai and Johnson. I can get my snacks and drinks during the Satriale set.

I saw Vai on his Fire Garden tour a couple of months after the original G3 gigs and his tone and playing were top notch. Wish I could have seen EJ back then.