I would go down to the crossroads, but I can't even find them.

February 5, 2007 11:44 AM

How can I become a better guitar player?

I made it my New Year's resolution (turning 40 this year) to become a more complete guitar player, and start putting myself out there to try to learn some blues standards, and learn to improvise parts over them, but I'm running into a wall.

I'll explain:

I have been playing electric guitar for, yikes, 30 years now. I have been in bands since I was 14, all the way through high school, college, the 90s, and even as recently as three years ago. I have been told that I am an excellent rhythm guitar player, and creative song/hook/part writer.

I have a fairly well-defined style: kind of jagged, very punk/new wavey. Sort of Robert Quine meets Steve Jones. My time is good, and I can pick up songs parts, and stylize them and make them my own with little time to prepare, but... I cannot solo.

I can do the standard blues box at given position on the fretboard, but I freeze up when I have to go up or down the neck, and invariably it ends up sounding like shit. I loose my place in the beat, and hit the wrong note, and end up wishing I had just stuck to my groove. And, when I stay in the one position (pentatonic minor scale, 5th fret for a solo in A), I end up doing the same old trills/double string bending stuff that I learned when I was 12.

It's starting to get really embarrassing for a player of my experience can suck so hard at something that kids in the guitar store seem to do so effortlessly, but I'm not sure where to go. Are there books that can help? Approaches I need to consider? I have some old books with all the modes in them, but for blues, I kind of know what the positions are... I just can't be creative within them.

Can this old dog learn some new (or really old) tricks?

posted by Flem Snopes to society & culture (18 comments total)

Sorry... I blew the category tag.
posted by Flem Snopes at 11:46 AM on February 5, 2007

Well, for one PRACTICE PRACTICE PRACTICE.... (obviously blatant, I know).....

What I would do is record some songs on a boom-box, either some rhythm guitar or some bass lines, and then just play leads over the top as you play the tape back.... Steve Jones and Johnny Thunders are really good to play along with as well....

Look up some blues scales online that show all the notes for the entire neck, not just the one box.... for instance, the minor penatonic in E (blues scale) I can see six boxes for it in my mind.... try composing a basic solo and practicing the solo in each box.....

Arlen Roth had some great books back in the day, as well, that really helped me get started.....

As a side note, some kid a few weeks ago was laughing at me as I was trying out an old Gibson Junior at the guitar store.... he said my playing was "so eighties..." meh....

Just practice, it'll come to you eventually.... I had a hard time "feeking it" too when I started to learn how to play lead.....

And I still use my "back-up plan" once in awhile when I start blowing the lead..... just play a bunch of notes fast ala Greg Ginn and end with a huge slide down the neck and/or whammy dump...... ;)
posted by peewinkle at 12:00 PM on February 5, 2007

< feeling it>
posted by peewinkle at 12:01 PM on February 5, 2007

A good piece of equipment to get for exactly this purpose is the Boss RC-20 loop station. It allows you to record, re-record, and layer your guitar. It's an easy way to get a rhythm going behind you while you attempt to solo. It also spares you the embarrassment of doing it in front of your bandmates while you are still progressing.

In addition they can make for great fun while playing live. Best of luck to you!
posted by nsillik at 12:24 PM on February 5, 2007

I'm currently taking lessons in jazz guitar, which of course involves much improvisation work. So far I'm not really all that good at it yet, but I have learnt some tips to help with improving better; this applies mostly to jazz though.

First, it helps immensely to have some theory in your head when you need to improvise. You probably know the chords of the song you're going to solo over, and theory helps you know what notes will sound good with which chord. Use those chord notes as anchors, and always play from one chord note to another, because you know for sure those notes will be the 'right' ones. And of course, break this rule from time to time to add a bit of dissonance for interest.

The pentatonic scale tends to help you follow the above rule pretty easily, because most of the notes in the scale occur in the common chords of the key you're playing in. However it gets boring, so using a major or minor scale gives you more notes to play around with. Again you'll need some theory to choose the right scale for the passage you need to solo over.

Finally, and most important of all, for any of the above to work you have to know where each note is on the fretboard. Example: Locate all the F#s on the fretboard, immediately. The inverse is also necessary: everytime you play some note on the guitar, you should know what note it is. This is the part I find most difficult, because I tend to get "lost" when improving and forget what notes I'm playing. There's a useful flash app that can help with training this aspect.

The basic idea here is to understand why certain notes sound good and others don't, to know what these notes are for various parts of a song, and to find these notes on the fretboard. Most people tend to instinctively know what notes to play, but theory can only help you sharpen your natural instincts.
posted by destrius at 12:32 PM on February 5, 2007 [1 favorite]

Have a look at Guitar Principles which focus on not what you play but how you play.

Zen Guitar is a good read which makes you look at the guitar in a different way.

Think about taking up the Alexander Technique which allow you to relax whilst playing. Good luck....and yes, practice every day!
posted by oh pollo! at 12:33 PM on February 5, 2007

The most important thing a guy told me when I was learning jazz piano:

Play every song in every key, every single time you practice.
posted by koeselitz at 12:41 PM on February 5, 2007

Jazz chords. They just make your fingers do unnatural things, and then it becomes natural. Gets you so fast. Also shred.
posted by DenOfSizer at 12:47 PM on February 5, 2007

If you aren't familiar with them, learn all the 3 note-per-string scales. The A one is a convenient way to go up the neck in a minor scale.

Start at A (5th fret on the low E string) and play A, B, C, then go to the next string and do D, E, F, and so on, 3 notes following the scale, you'll make your way up the neck and have a lot of notes to work with. If you start at C you get a major scale, and you can of course move it up and down the neck as needed to play major and minor scales in different keys.
posted by Space Coyote at 12:57 PM on February 5, 2007

I would highly recommend this blog about learning to play jazz which as you know is all about improvisation. This guy has detailed spot-on ideas about how to improve your playing, and he breaks it down to small bits so you can really see where you went wrong and how to fix it. He is an amateur player with a consistent and focus on improving, improving. I've linked to his improvisation suggestions page. And it's not a bunch of technical jazz theory stuff, in fact, as he points out, it's all about your ear and the instrument, not theory. The fact that he plays trumpet is irrelevant.
posted by Listener at 1:14 PM on February 5, 2007

I feel your pain Flem.

One recommendation I would have is stop listening to blues for awhile. Listen only to country and/or alt-country. Listen to some of the stuff that the Nashville players are playing. People like Brent Mason (a complete monster), Albert Lee and Redd Volkaert come immediately to mind. Most of the stuff they play is major scales but it's in the note placement where they just make my jaw drop.

Example: For our band, I had to learn the guitar break in an Alan Jackson song (his remake of "Summertime Blues"). When you hear it, you say to yourself "no fucking way I'll learn that." But then I used this transcribing software, slowed it down, and practiced it til' my fingers hurt and now I can do a passable version of it live. Some people may say that that isn't really learning music but what it did was force me to see the fretboard differently and it sure as hell expanded my vocabulary when soloing. That's just one example but there are many.

The key for me was getting out of the rut, namely playing blues jams and being stuck in that box. After awhile, it just becomes more about who can bend and hold the longest, ala Buddy Guy or who can make the most pained expressions during a SRV solo.

Don't get me wrong; I can still throw down when it calls for it but listening to country and learning some of the tricks of the trade took me in a whole new direction. And I use country as my example; for you it could be jazz, avant garde, etc. but the point is to stop doing what you're doing for awhile.
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 1:47 PM on February 5, 2007

Sounds pretty straightforward to me; stop playing in one position. There are only 5 positions of the pentatonic scale. Start by learning them all in every key. Then move to diatonic scales, which you can begin by looking at as simply filling in the cracks of the pentatonic scakes.
posted by ludwig_van at 1:58 PM on February 5, 2007

Love the Guitar Grimorie, myself.
posted by Ironmouth at 1:59 PM on February 5, 2007

I second KevinSkomsvold's suggestion of trying a new style - though I like bluegrass. Has an emphasis on soloing, but also on being a background player. Makes you work on your right hand also. A little boring with the chords, though, at first. I think working in another style for a while gives you a different perspective on your music, which can help differentiate yourself from everyone else as well as kickstart the creativity a little.
posted by ctmf at 3:57 PM on February 5, 2007

I second the Boss RC-20 loop station. I got one several years ago and have been using it in my solo and duo gigs ever since. It has made me a much better guitarist. It's very simple to use. The day I got it I gave myself an extra 15 minutes to set up and get used to it and I was looping like a pro immediately. I rely on it so much now that I bought a second one in case the other goes out on me on a gig. It's completely run with your feet.
posted by wsg at 5:21 PM on February 5, 2007

play leads over the radio... Turn in on loud and just solo around over it. Practice anytime, with tons of songs, and it forces you to improv cause it is always a new song.

oh if you hit a bad note, Bend it, Bend it till it is relevant to the music. I swear that Hendrix did this, hitting some off notes, but bending them into something that worked before people could tell. After all in most scales, theres a good note half a step after each bad one.
posted by magikker at 5:36 PM on February 5, 2007

Indeed magikker; I had a jazz teacher who used to say "Remember, help is always a half step away!"
posted by ludwig_van at 5:39 PM on February 5, 2007

Thanks again all, making slow but steady progress on some of the above. Incidentally, I picked up the March 2007 issue of Guitar World. It had a couple videos in it with Alex Skolnick and a couple of other metal guys I'd never heard of discussing this very thing: identifying patters and taking melodies up the neck. Metal isn't really my thing, but KevinSkomsvold is right in that you really have to pull yourself out of your comfort zone to make some improvements.

OT: a shirtless Eddie Van Halen is on the cover the GW issue. He's only about 45 years old, isn't he? Man, he looks like hell.
posted by Flem Snopes at 6:57 AM on February 9, 2007