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12 Ways to Keep You Focused at Practicing Guitar

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May 14, 2019 by Klaus Crow

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A lot of guitar players tend to practice less or quit practicing altogether once they get older and gain more responsibility in life.

They still play guitar (the stuff they already know) but have given up practicing to improve. There’s a huge difference.

This is unfortunate because there are so many great things to learn that many guitar players aren’t even aware of.

It would open up their way of thinking and renew their approach to guitar playing by adding valuable knowledge, developing different skills and expanding their vocabulary.

Although I teach guitar and write about guitar playing, I also sometimes have difficulty keeping up a regular practice schedule to improve my guitar skills. Guitar playing is a major part of enjoying the good life but not the only part.

Besides the busyness of commitments and obligations in daily life, I also like to keep up with my other hobbies such as spending quality time with my wife and three kids, drinking cappuccino in the backyard, running, yoga, meditation, reading and enjoying good wines to name a few.

And as much as these things are of great importance, practicing guitar may not be harmed by all of these wonderful life luxuries. To keep a safe and secure place for regular practice I make sure I follow the guidelines below.

If you also feel like your active lifestyle is keeping you from practicing then here are the keys to get you back on track.

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Combining Pentatonics to Play Mixolydian

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May 14, 2019 by Klaus Crow

Today I introduce to you George Ramsay, Co-founder and Guitar Teacher at Bold Music Lessons. George sheds light on combining pentatonics to play mixolydian.

A great example of how get the most out of your pentatonic scales. Learn and reap the benefits!

HERE’S GEORGE

You can’t really talk about soloing on the guitar without understanding pentatonic scales. Normal, or “full” major or minor scales have seven different notes, while pentatonic scales have only 5 notes (hence “pent”).

Klaus has written extensively on this as well as the CAGED system, so I’ll let you read through some of his postings for more info on playing these scales.

Today we will look at creating the Mixolydian scale by combining some major pentatonic with its parallel minor pentatonic.

Mixolydian is used extensively when improvising over the 12 bar blues, other I-IV-V chord progressions, and more generally chord progressions featuring dominant seventh chords.

What the heck is Mixolydian?

Mixolydian is a mode, and modes are really just types of scales, much like major and minor (in fact, major is called the Ionian mode and minor is called Aeolian). Perhaps the simplest way to understand modes is to look at a major scale. Let’s look at C major, where our notes are C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C.

Playing a major scale (in this case C major) but not starting or ending on C, creates our different modes. For example, the second mode, called Dorian (in this case D Dorian) would look like this: D-E-F-G-A-B-C. Similarly, the fifth mode, called Mixolydian, would have G-A-B-C-D-E-F as its notes. Notice that each of these modes consist of the same seven notes! We are just starting and ending in different places. These are modes.Continue Reading

Ruthless Minor Pentatonic Scales Over 3 Octaves

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May 14, 2019 by Klaus Crow

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The standard minor pentatonic scale is normally played over 2 octaves and stays within one position.

If you have been playing and improvising with the minor pentatonic scale for some time it’s likely that you want to break out of that one position and expand your reach on the fretboard.

You can use the minor pentatonic scale over 3 octaves for this purpose. It wil give you much more freedom and flexibility.

When you play “the pentatonic scale over 3 octaves” it means you actually play 3 pentatonic scales, one after another. Each pentatonic scale consisting of 5 notes per octave.

In the first example (the E minor pentatonic) you start on the E note, which is your root note (open low E-string). You play the first 5 notes of the scale and then arrive on the 6th note to land on the octave (7th fret A-string), which of course is also an E note. Then you play the next pentatonic scale starting from that 6th note, play the 5 notes of the pentatonic scale and arrive on the 11th note (9th fret G-string) to land on your second octave. Continue on the 11th note, play 5 notes up the scale and arrive on the 16th note for your 3rd octave.

So you can play each example as one long hell of a scale across the entire neck or treat them as 3 separate scales.

The numbers next to the notes on the staff above the tablature indicate the finger placement of your left hand (assuming you play right-handed). 1 = index finger, 2 = middle finger, 3 = ring finger, 4 = pinky.

The first example, the “E minor pentatonic over 3 octaves” is commonly used to take the standard pentatonic scale to the next step. It’s also the most comfortable and easiest one to play. The other two (A minor and G minor) are a little bit more challenging but definitely worth the effort. Practice pays off!

Tip: Each scale can be played in different keys by moving the entire scale up or down the fretboard. If you want to move “the E minor pentatonic” up a half step to the key of F you need to move up the entire scale 1 fret higher. So the first 4 notes on the 6th string: “0 3 5 7” now become “1 4 6 8”. Moving every note of that scale up a half step (1 fret) and you’re playing F minor pentatonic. If you move up the scale a whole step (2 frets) you’re playing F# minor pentatonic and so on.

Assignments:
– Play each 3 octave scale ascending and descending.
– Memorize how to play each 3 octave scale.
– Play the scales with a metronome. Start slow and gradually build up speed.
– Play the scales in different keys.
– Play the 3 smaller pentatonic scales that make up the big “3 octave scale” separately, from root to octave, ascending and descending.

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8 Reasons Why Learning The Blues is So Important

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March 28, 2021 by Klaus Crow

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My oldest brother introduced me to the music of Stevie Ray Vaughan, Eric Clapton and The Rolling Stones when I was about 8 or 9 years old. I was hooked instantly. I soon took up the guitar and started taking lessons.

Although I was happy in the beginning playing and singing songs by Bob Dylan, John Mellencamp, The Beatles and Springsteen, what I really wanted was to learn those beautiful bluesy solos that came from Stevie’s fingers and strings. It took another couple of years before I found the right teacher to teach me those skills. The blues has always been a major influence on my playing ever since.

Whatever you’re playing, whether it’s country, folk, alternative, rock, pop music or jazz it’s always great to combine these and other styles with blues elements or to lean on your blues vocabulary and skills whenever you need it.

There’s also something about the pentatonic / blues scale that no other scale has in store. It’s that raw, crying, heart aching, but also earthy, soulful, honest sound that really comes alive through playing the blues.

Now if that hasn’t convinced you to pick up your guitar and dive into the world of blues, you might want to know what reasons are so important that you do so.

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