I’ve been trying to improve the way that I incorporate the various modes into my lead improvisation. This is can be an arduous task but I thought I would share I few tools that have assisted me no end.
First of all there is the pandora px4 from korg toneworks. It has a few useful tools, apart from being a great little effects box. Here are some useful features of note:
- You can record up to 30 seconds of track and then slow it down in order to learn and master some amazingly fast lead solos and riffs.
- Secondly, there is an effect on the box called c major. You can change the key, but c is the default. (It also has one called E minor for minor scales, and yes you can change the key for that as well.) Note: it is imperative that your guitar is in concert pitch for this and that your intonation is relatively good – the pandora can help you with this as well. So what does this do? Well it will sound awesome and create a very nice sound as long as you are playing notes in the correct scale. Slip out of the scale and it will sound a bit naff.
- It has built in drum and backing tracks, some of which actually change key for you to jam over.
- You can jam along with any mp3 or cd player via an aux in
Secondly, I’ve mentioned it before but ChordBook has some nice free online tools for tuning your guitar as well as searching for chord shapes and scales, not to mention a pretty good little forum AND some excellent jam tracks
Thirdly (and last for now), check out this neat little utility for printing your own little maps of the fretboard. It works an absolute treat. I’ve personally been printing to pdf with primoPDF to save paper. But you don’t have to print them at all if you don’t need to.
I’m not particularly into listening to jazz, but to be able to play some nice jazz guitar is a worthwhile endeavour as I believe it can assist a musician in almost any style. Mastering the different modes and learning when to use them is the main hurdle. And part of this is learning the fretbord properly, or at least recognising the patterns that are present. The next thing is to practice playing and improvising over various different chord progressions until it becomes completely natural and you almost don’t have to think about it. You should ultimately be able to concentrate on what sounds great and injecting your feeling into what you play without having to think about the patterns.
Anyway, forgive me if I’m rambling on. I hope you find these tools (especially the free ones!) useful.
The Guitar Master
Tags: fretboard, links, tools, tuning
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