Belief - John Mayer

The album Continuum by John Mayer is a modern classic. From a guitar playing perspective there’s tonnes to be learned from it. I’d like to pay attention to the guitar solo in Belief though (starting at 2:26).

This is a great example of an effective 8 bar solo. I often have students who are working on soloing/improvising send me 3 minutes of them playing over a backing track. Meanwhile John Mayer is writing killer 8 bar solos.

I often use this solo as an example to students of how to phrase. Look at how John opens this solo: Root note played with loads of attitude. Also pay attention to how he builds and structures this solo. It’s all Dm Blues Scale stuff FYI.

In coming weeks I’ll be doing a whole lesson on this solo with video, backing track & TAB. Check back for it.

Sunday's Uncle - New Gary Burton Quartet

This is some of the last music released by world renowned Vibraphonist Gary Burton and my absolute favourite of his.
His new quartet featured Antonio Sanchez and Julian Late and it was here that I fell in love with Julian’s playing. The album Guided Tour probably features my favourite of Julian’s playing.

This tune is great and this is a fantastic performance of it featuring great solos from Julian, Gary and Antonio.

Check it out:

Beirut by Steps Ahead

This tune by Steps Ahead is a really interesting one. The melody uses an interplay between the minor and major 3rds over a static Dm7 chord.

This was a common feature of Michael Brecker’s playing and Mike Stern took this idea and ran with it in a lot of his heads (Chromazone, Link & others).

Michael Brecker’s solo on this is so, so good. Such a clinic in phrasing.

It’s also interesting to note that because there’s so much time spent on a static Dm7 chord, the scale choices are a lot less restrictive than they might be if it were a functional II chord for example.

Check it out and comment with any questions or observations etc

Cheers, James.

Altered Lick Using 3rds.

Following on from yesterday’s lesson, here is another II-V-I idea this time using 3rds. It’s a little more complicated than yesterdays, but only a little.

On beat 4 before each chord change I use an enclosure. This is a scale tone above and then a chromatic note below my target note. I then play up a 3rd, down a 3rd, up a 3rd using the appropriate scale for the chord before playing the next enclosure and moving on to the next scale etc.

The result is a lot of structured chromaticism and tension resulting from the enclosures and the use of the altered scale over G7.

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Thanks so much, James.

Altered Lick Using 7ths

I’ve recently been studying with the great Mike Stern. He advised to me to write licks using concepts that I’m trying to work on with a view to helping them ‘sink in’ to my playing more quickly.

So I thought I’d share them with you guys.

This is a II-V-I lick using 7ths. I start off playing 7ths through the D Dorian scale, then move to the nearest interval in the G altered scale and continue playing 7ths before resolving to playing a line using the C Major scale.

The motif I’m using in whilst playing 7ths is going up a 7th, down a 7th, up a 7th.

In the video and TAB/notation I’ve demonstrated the lick both in position and laterally across the neck.

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Thanks so much, James.