Soloing | Improv Archives - Page 2 of 9

3 Cool Blues Guitar Licks for Soloing (50CBLI)

February 10, 2017 By Klaus Crow 1 Comment

Today I’ll show you 3 cool blues licks from the 50CoolBluesLicksImprovisation Course. (See below this post for more info).

Blues licks are an essential part of learning to solo and improvise on your guitar. They are small parts/fragments of an entire solo. You can see them as the beautiful words that spice up your story line, bringing drama, elegance, juice, soul, and excitement to your soloing. You can incorporate licks into your solos, copy them, learn from them, rip them apart, and rebuild them to create your own.

Building a vocabulary of licks expands your musical ideas and insight, and gives you greater flexibility in your soloing and improvisation.

Know that blues licks are not just for blues music. They are used widely in rock, country, jazz, pop and many other styles of music. They are beneficial to your playing in every way.

So let’s get started.

Enjoy!

If you want to learn more cool blues licks, how to create your own, connect licks together, learn to solo and improvise all over the neck, and dive into the scale shapes, tricks and tools to really master the Pentatonic / Blues Scale inside out, check out:

The 50CoolBluesLicksImprovisation Course

Get Your Soloing and Improvisation Skills to the Next Step!

What Scales to Play over a Song in a Major Key

November 11, 2016 By Klaus Crow 7 Comments

There are so many songs and so many scales. So what scales do you need to solo and improvise over a song in a major key? And what chords can you find in a major key?

First, when a song is in a major key, it means it’s based on a major scale. The song usually conveys a bright, happy or cheerful mood. There are seven chords that you can derive from that major scale. We’ll look into that in a few seconds.

To be able to improvise over a major key you also need a major type scale. The two most commonly used scales are the major scale and the major pentatonic scale.
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The Brilliant Benefits of The Blues Scale

August 4, 2016 By Klaus Crow 6 Comments

The pentatonic scale is a great scale to start out with when you’re learning to play lead guitar. But once you got that under your belt you can quickly move on to the blues scale. Even for guitar players who have kept their chops limited to the pentatonic scale for years, it will be enlightening to see how the blues scale can help out.

Although the blues scale doesn’t look that different from the pentatonic scale, the benefits are tremendous and can have a great impact on your soloing and creative expansion.

Let’s take a look at some of the reasons that make the blues scale such an important and valuable scale. We’ll show you how to play the pentatonic scale and the blues scale in different positions. And further we’ll explain how it can benefit, grow and open up your playing.
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10 Best Tools to Figure Out Guitar Songs and Solos

June 30, 2016 By Klaus Crow 19 Comments

Being able to transcribe a song or guitar solo is a great skill that anyone can learn. One of the things that is really helpful developing and applying this skill, is to have some good solid tools that make this process as effortless as possible.

Back when I was 15 I had a cassette recorder with a slow down function, so I could figure out the notes of a guitar solo. The only problem was the slow down function also lowered the pitch when you’d slow down the song.

So when I had to deal with a fast blazing solo I set the pitch exactly an octave lower than the original key so I could transcribe the solo by ear. The downside was that some notes were so low they became undefinable and I couldn’t tell what notes they were playing anymore. :)

The tools we have today are something I could only have dreamed of back then. I’m not complaining, because I learned a lot from those limitations, but I also enjoy the benefits of the technology today. And oh, what makes it transcribing fun and easy!

Working out a song by ear is an important skill that is often overlooked. It takes your guitar playing to a higher level and gives you a deeper understanding and insight in many aspects of guitar playing. So, try to develop the skill of transcribing and use the appropriate tools to improve your skill and take it to the next step.

I created a list with the best tools that make the process of transcribing and learning a song or solo going as smooth as possible. These tools will help both guitar players who can already transcribe and guitar players who can you use some extra help.

Enjoy!

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