david6strings
Member
This one is for those willing to share their own exercises or things in order to study specific subjects.
I have problems playing subtitutes in a musical way, i just cant hear the lines in my head, neither can see the fingerings easily. anyway i have maked an exercise for myself, what do you think, is it something good to work on?
Quintricacy
Member
I have been working on chromatic harmony/chord substitution for the last 6 months and it does take a while to get it in your ear. What I do think is very beneficial is to listen to a lot of John Coltrane specifically from around the time he released Coltrane's Sound and Coltrane Plays the Blues. There is so much information in there and it's worth transcribing even 8 bars of his solos just to see where he's coming from.
Matt
Member
maybe i'm the odd one out but i never really try to do 'exercises' (although i'm not at the level of working on chromatic harmony). i try to record myself playing a lot and just try to work on developing ideas, feel, and tone. transcription itself, i suppose, is an exericse - i'll extract licks and what not i enjoy and just play them any time the situation is appropriate.
JorgeRubiales
Member
@david, I think you would be better trying to hear the general sound of the chords first, to use them as an anchor for what you'll play. An exercise that comes to mind is to play half note chords, the first is the original and the second is the substitute. Maybe singing the root of the original in whole notes too while playing this exercise can help you to hear them better. I'm not near that level, but I'm good at designing exercises hehe.
@Quintricacy very true. I've always liked Peter Bernstein, and while his lines seem simple, once I transcribed him on a blues I was astonished. My brain somehow sensed a kind of complexity, and I didn't understood until I wrote it down and saw a lot of wide intervals that aren't apparent when he's playing. I bet the same is true with Trane, Bird, and all the greats.
One exercise I do to play the changes is to force myself to play for example half notes using only chord tones over II-V-I, or III-VI-II-V-I, in every key. Once I'm comfortable in a certain key, I use quarter notes, etc. This is useful to learn new songs too.
mrzzajjazz
Member
This is an exercise I came up with a few days ago, and was actually derived from a warmup exercise playing a G-major scale in thirds. So I tried to keep the third movement going while I shifted between G-major and D altered. As well as it gets your thinkingprocess going, I find it also to be a great alternatepicking exercise.
Just wrote down a couple of lines here so you can get the idea, check it out here:
http://www.4shared.com/document/jYlQ7htZ/G-major_D_altered_exercise.html
-mrzzajjazz
Floatingbridge
Member
I have been making little licks ( with less consideration for their actual harmonic implications and more for their visual shapes { maybe little triangles or diamonds at first } or just for how they feel to do in the hands) that are made of a few notes ; maybe 5 or 4 or 9 whatever. Afterwards , i look at the notes and take out any redundancies( regardless of register ). Then , if its fewer than 12 ( which it usually is since they are quick little bursts of inspired urges ) i look to see which of the 12 tones was left out and try to incorporate them in a way that compliments the first part and completes it all into one big 12 tone lick. I play the lick for it's own thing and decide if it has any application - like if it could be a cool way to arrive at some chord tone... This layer is kind of not that interesting because i am kind of tired of collecting little licks.
At this point i will write the line out with no time just twelve big whole notes or stemless heads and that just becomes a row. I can put this throu the loop station and do it intime ( ...or not) and use it as a way to work on something without sleepwalking through it's changes. For examples:
Practicing major triads on a specific string set only and voiceleading ( moving the least distances possible ) and find the inversions and make the changes. Practice arpeggi and see their position stuff come to the surface with this restriction . Practice motifs- taking a little thing uphill or downhill (... Or staying in one place ) and making the changes . Alternate the qualities- not all major triads , make a little game. Take it backwards or harmonize everyother or any set distance within the row and see what you get.
mrzzajjazz
Member
btw I'm working on a full transcription of this... a lot of chord- and harmonic info here!
add4
Member
one thing I did lately was listen to some of adam roger's comping rhythms.
I wrote the rhythm he played while coming behind chris potter for 24 bars or something like that. without consideration for the chords.
Then i rewrote every bar, with a classification by number of 'hits' by bar.
This gives me little rhythmic cells of one bar. I then started practice each one of these cells by comping on a tune using exclusively one cell, then a combination of two of them, then learned one more, etc etc. working on having them all in my fingers at the moment.
I guess then i should do variations on them, rhythmic displacement, inversions, removing some 'hits' etc etc.. but i have so many things i want to practice..
Matt
Member
these are great exercises. @floatingbridge it's amazing how adaptable those lines become. i wrote two and immediately was able to use them in a tune i wrote. crazy!
Floatingbridge
Member
Im glad you are finding it fun or useful.
silverwater
Member
Great thread and some great ideas!
1. I'll second Floatingbridge's mention of taking motifs and practicing them through changes. Because of the guitar's visual nature, I think motives is one of the few areas guitarists have an advantage over horn players, but yet it seems like horn players tend to use them more. I like to find some little lick on 2 adjacent strings and move that around a set of changes like All The Things or Solar, or a blues. Also this can be a good time to work in playing 3 on 4, or 5 on 3, etc.
2. Doing the above, but with 4ths, inverted 4ths, and triads.
3. This is an exercise I came up with for interval training. It's hard to explain, but bear with me: Pick two intervals. Play the first interval, then move the distance of the second interval, and play the first starting there. (Ok maybe just better to go to guitartabcreator.com)
For example, this would be M3 & P4:
E|-----5-----5--------------------------------------------------
B|--6-----6--------5-----5--------------------------------------
G|--------------5-----5--------4-----4--------------------------
D|--------------------------5-----5--------4-----4--------------
A|--------------------------------------5-----5--------4-----4--
E|--------------------------------------------------5-----5-----
This would be M6 & M3:
E|-----5-----5--------------------------------------
B|-----------------6-----6--------------------------
G|--5-----5--------------------6-----6--------------
D|--------------6-----6--------------------7-----7--
A|--------------------------7-----7-----------------
E|--------------------------------------8-----8-----
Go back up, practice downward intervals, etc. etc. etc.
4. I call it "Lick Inversion"....it's just taking a lick and starting on a different note, but it's amazing what you can discover melodically. Shaun Baxter calls it "Lick Rotation" and can explain it much better:
http://www.slideshare.net/edgararruda/part-3-the-lick-rotation-method
5. All Hammer ons and pulloffs:
E|--------------------------
B|--------------------------
G|--5--7--8--6--7--5--6--8--
D|--------------------------
A|--------------------------
E|--------------------------
silverwater
Member
Oh and Mrzzajjazz, I'd love to check out that transcription if/when possible, even just a chorus or two. I'm sure others would also!
david6strings
Member
one thing i do is to play the same lick changing the last 4 eights of the last bar before the resolution tone in the beat 1. is another thing to not play the same again and again and i think you gain control in terms of subdivision of the beat. check it.
i have uploaded too a sequence over lazy bird changes. i'm happy that you are sharing your exercises and thoughts, don't take the secrets to your grave lol
Quintricacy
Member
I came up with this thing about a year ago I like to call Telephonic Patterns. Basically using phone numbers as a way of creating patterns. For example lets take a phone number of 7 digits like 6254327 (just made that up of the top of my head not my actual phone number!) Each number becomes an interval so if you're in C ionian it is A-D-G-F-E-D-B. Each interval can change according to the mode you want to use so if you were using say C aeolian it would be Ab-D-G-F-Eb-D-Bb. So you flatten or sharpen each interval in accordance with what ever mode you are playing in. I then had the problem of having phone numbers with a 0 in them. But thanks to the game Scrabble I figured it out. In scrabble you have one blank square that you can use as any letter in the alphabet so I decided that 0 can be any interval that doesn't already exist in the phone number you're using e.g if the number was 4250398 the 0 could be 1,6 or 7. Then you can invert the patterns. The most fun ones are ones that have big jumps in them mainly because they're not very guitaristic!
jorgemg1984
Member
Not exactly an exercise but have discovered something that really helped my playing a lot - playing a tune without any background. Melody solo and melody again, everything a capella. Forces you to keep good time, not overplay, telling a story in your solo, be harmonically clear, hearing the changes in your head, memorize the form / changes etc... Recording an analyzing is also crucial!
geetarted
Member
On a purely technical level, this one is great for legato playing.
E|--------------------------------------------|
B|--------------------------------------------|
G|-------------4-h5-h7-s9-p7-p5-----------|
D|----4-h5-h7--------------------h9-p7-p5-(slide to 4th fret to repeat)
A|--------------------------------------------|
E|--------------------------------------------|
Picking only the starting 4th fret notes in the sequence, possibly the 9th fret on the d string. This can be moved into any string set or scale choice.
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