Quake3World

Used to play constantly few years back, but once work/school started, and I got cable internet my guitars have been collecting dust. Picked up a friends guitar few nights ago and looks like I'm addicted again...finally :icon25: .

One thing I never got into was learning scales and all the other so called technical things about this instrument. I have always been impressed how some people can just pick up a guitar and rip out a solo just off the top of their head while someone else was just throwing around some power chords.

I know we've had this discussion already, been a while....but I have a question: To be able to just bust out a solo while someone else is playing rhythm, are those just certain scales the person knows that lets him do that? I've always had a decent ear for music, so if I learn the scales...over time could I achieve this as well?

tia.

Oh yes, also...I remember (I think it was) Canis posting some tunes he was playing a while back. A few others in the past have as well, so anyone know what all I need to record some music onto my pc?

I can do it without conciously trying to stick to certain scales. I'm sure it's a heavy influence on it though. After playing for some time, I just know what a certain note on a certain fret will sound like before I hit it. But yeah, scales are invaluable if you want to be serious about IMO. They aren't absolutely necessary to play of the cuff, but I would highly recommend learning them. Also you need to know what scales sound good with certain keys. The more you know, the more flexablitly you'll have in playing.

yea this taht an the other.

but really tho just play from your heart.

let the rythem in your mind, or in the air be your inspireation
.
or so i feel

Scales are important when you are playing over a rythm so it sounds good

Look for Marty Freidmans video on guitar soloing

plained wrote:yea this taht an the other.

but really tho just play from your heart.

let the rythem in your mind, or in the air be your inspireation
.
or so i feel

You should always play from your heart, but musical knowledge can be a great tool to make it easier and better.

Some people are inherently good at finding the appropriate scales over rhythms to get the sound they want, and some people have to learn scales to be able to play over rhythm.

But even if you're the former type, it is a very good idea to learn scales and keys. Why re-invent the wheel, and miss out on other important things you'll probably learn along the way?

Learn the major scale. You have to know what key everything else is, and you can solo over it easily. Then after that you will have to (eventually) deal with key changes and passing notes and chromatics and so on :icon14:

http://www.zentao.com/guitar/ is a good place to start, teaches you the basics of theory. The forum there also has a theory section if you want to know about extremely complicated stuff :icon14:

Deji wrote:Learn the major scale. You have to know what key everything else is, and you can solo over it easily. Then after that you will have to (eventually) deal with key changes and passing notes and chromatics and so on :icon14:

http://www.zentao.com/guitar/ is a good place to start, teaches you the basics of theory. The forum there also has a theory section if you want to know about extremely complicated stuff :icon14:

Nice. I'm bookmarking that sucker. :icon14:

I've also found the minor pentatonic to be an easy one to play over rhythms and improvise on. It sounds good with a lot of chord progressions, and you've heard it used a million times in blues and rock songs.

R00k wrote:I've also found the minor pentatonic to be an easy one to play over rhythms and improvise on. It sounds good with a lot of chord progressions, and you've heard it used a million times in blues and rock songs.

I've used it quite a bit.

Knowing scales helps in the age old 'you know what the hell you are doing and not just doing it' thing
When someone asks you how you just played that, don't say oh i don't know i just play it....say something like oh i started with e major scale then moved into an arpeggio and then finished it with a c dorian bit

it just makes you a better player

That site's got some good info Deji, thanks for the link. :icon14:

scourge34 wrote:

R00k wrote:I've also found the minor pentatonic to be an easy one to play over rhythms and improvise on. It sounds good with a lot of chord progressions, and you've heard it used a million times in blues and rock songs.

I've used it quite a bit.

i too ave been around that town a time r two

As Rook said, learn the minor pentatonic (blues) scale. I'd recommend knowing your modes, maj/min scales, and recognize the difference in chord color in chords such as half diminished, fully diminished, major, minor, etc.

*Bangs Head*

edit: Thanks for all the advice btw. :icon30:

Big Kahuna Burger wrote:As Rook said, learn the minor pentatonic (blues) scale. I'd recommend knowing your modes, maj/min scales, and recognize the difference in chord color in chords such as half diminished, fully diminished, major, minor, etc.

I suggest skipping modes for now. They confuse almost every beginner and they are rarely explained well enough on online sites (hence all the misconceptions like 'do I use C ionian or D dorian mode here?')

Deji wrote:

Big Kahuna Burger wrote:As Rook said, learn the minor pentatonic (blues) scale. I'd recommend knowing your modes, maj/min scales, and recognize the difference in chord color in chords such as half diminished, fully diminished, major, minor, etc.

I suggest skipping modes for now. They confuse almost every beginner and they are rarely explained well enough on online sites (hence all the misconceptions like 'do I use C ionian or D dorian mode here?')

That's true.

Remember to learn scales not just 1-8 then 8-1 (althought thats a great way and really the only way to start). You want to learn them all over the guitar, up and down the neck. This takes a looong time to learn well, obviously. Good luck :icon14:

Learning the different modal fingerings is useful if you realize that they all fit together up and down the neck, so you can play all over the fretboard; but yeah, most of the theory is crap and you should just play in whatever mode sounds right.

Geebs wrote:Learning the different modal fingerings is useful if you realize that they all fit together up and down the neck, so you can play all over the fretboard; but yeah, most of the theory is crap and you should just play in whatever mode sounds right.

* Correction: you can't play in modes if the music isn't modal. Which it isn't quite a lot of the time.

For instance: a typical I-IV-V progression in the key of C major. If you choose C Lydian, you'll have one wrong note. What you have to understand that in these terms, it's better to talk about different keys, not modes - as with a progression like this, it will sound HEAVILY key based and modal terms don't really apply. You can call it C lydian, you can call it the key of G major or you can call it 'Bob', it doesn't change the content here.

Modal terms can be used to analyze music, but they're not improvisational tools in their own right.

(edit) for clarification: as soon as we start talking about any kind of progressions, we lose the modal quality. The chords in modal music aren't used in any sort of progression, but rather just for the sake of their sound and are repeated for a long time. The lines between modal and key-based music are, of course, blurry.

Erm, C major is a mode. But I was pointing out that the different fingerings are very useful to learn 'cos if you stick them togehter up the fretboard, you stay in the same key/mode but can play all over the neck. Otherwise, you get stuck playing those silly 3-octave fingerings. Most guitar courses don't point this out properly.

Geebs wrote:Erm, C major is a mode. But I was pointing out that the different fingerings are very useful to learn 'cos if you stick them togehter up the fretboard, you stay in the same key/mode but can play all over the neck. Otherwise, you get stuck playing those silly 3-octave fingerings. Most guitar courses don't point this out properly.

C major is a key, which just happens to coincide with C ionian. From a theoretical point of view, it's very important to tell the difference between modes, scales and keys.

Yeah, but I don't really give a flying fuck about that

Geebs wrote:Yeah, but I don't really give a flying fuck about that

Which is perfectly fine - as long as you're not misleading others that is

I think you're wrong