What Are You Working On Right Now?

[Stone]

Ever since I watched Bernth (guitarist/teacher extraordinaire on YT) inform that the proper pick grip for playing fast is laid across the 2nd bone of your first finger, then clamped onto with your thumb (I trust his teachings), I've been gradually moving mine down. I couldn't do it all at once since it felt unnatural at first.

As I worked it towards the 1st knuckle, I started developing a very-unwanted callous on the side of the tip of my 1st finger. PITA! I'd even go so far as to cut some of it off with fingernail clippers. Yep- a callous from my pick! I play a lot.

But I'm happy now that I'm comfortable with it where he said to place it, no more callous, and it has improved my picking.

Bernth is simply amazing !!

 

[JasonE]

I started paying with some guys 3 weeks ago. They want to build a list and play some gigs. These guys are all 10+ years older than me. I am learning songs that are a little before my time. I have heard many of them but never tried to play them. The interesting thing is that I am finding some parts of the songs that have me thinking about how they used the notes in the key and the chords to create the songs. I am actually seeing a few new ways of execution from what I have typically played.

I am not sure I want to stick with these guys for a long time but I am trying to find some bright spots in the situation. I am not really into most of the songs. I know these guys are going to struggle with gigs. They have trouble moving around the smaller amount of equipment we are using for practice. I figure as long as I am getting something out of it and we are not a group that is full of drama I will go along for the ride for a while. I have been doing this long enough that I have already heard a few things come out of them that I know ends up being an issue down the road so I know this is not going to be a long lived thing.

 

[TSJMajesty]

I started paying with some guys 3 weeks ago. They want to build a list and play some gigs. These guys are all 10+ years older than me. I am learning songs that are a little before my time. I have heard many of them but never tried to play them. The interesting thing is that I am finding some parts of the songs that have me thinking about how they used the notes in the key and the chords to create the songs. I am actually seeing a few new ways of execution from what I have typically played.

What are some of the songs? And I'm curious as to what you mean about the keys/chords.

 

[metropolis_4]

Oof, speaking of stretches I’m working on Chet Atkins version of Mister Sandman and those opening arpeggios are brutal. They have to be perfectly clean too


———4—2———————5—4
——5———5—————7——7
—6—————6———7———7
7———————7—9————9
——————————————
——————————————

 

[JasonE]

What are some of the songs? And I'm curious as to what you mean about the keys/chords.

My comment was more around finding that some old Stones songs were not real complex and how they really stuck to major pentatonic scales in some of them. There are some Beatles songs in the list as well. I found some of the chord changes interesting how they made some quicker chord changes and used several 7th chords in those quicker chord changes. I also found it interesting how much of what I call over playing is in these old stones songs. Dead Flowers is one I would say has a good bit of over playing in it under the vocals. I guess this song was very popular in it's day though, from what they told me.

In the end the fit with these guys and songs just isn't working for me so I sent an email today letting them know that I won't be back. They have issues that they don't even realize are going to be big issues as they try to get out and gig. I tried to enlighten them and they think they know better so I hope they learn sooner than later that they need to do the things I was telling them.

 

[Jazz Padd]

Working on a solo guitar set for an event at a regional venue, consisting of 3 instrumental pieces:

1) Tired of Waiting for You. The 1960s Kinks song, for which I worked up a 10 minute solo guitar version inspired by Bill Frisell's quartet version on his 2014 album Guitar in the Space Age. (10mn)

2) Beatles Suite. Five songs I adapted for solo guitar, including Yesterday, Free as a Bird (inspired by Adrian Belew's version of Lennon's 1977 demo), Blackbird, Lucy in the Sky, and In My Life. (20mn)

3) Killer Joe. A solo guitar arrangement of the Benny Golson jazz standard. (perhaps about 10mn)

The first two I've played at events over the years. I only do these sets for fun, maybe 2-3 times a year, and each time I'm booked for a solo performance, I draw upon my previous performances to put together a set, to which I then also try to add a new song. This time, the new song is Killer Joe.

I've been playing Killer Joe for years in various combo settings at local jam sessions, sometimes including horns, bass, keyboards and drums. I use my archtop straight to an amp for playing jazz.

For these solo guitar sets, I often use a solid body with a pedal board. The feel and playing is often quite different, and since I'm not a full-time musician, it takes me some time to acclimate back and forth between different instruments and in different settings, to develop a solo guitar arrangement.

When playing Killer Joe in a combo, there's of course other instruments to hold down the groove. But for solo guitar, at least in my limited experience, that can be difficult, so I'm trying to integrate live looping for some parts. I'm also using the opportunity to try some pedals I don't use at jams.

In working to come up with an arrangement that'll suit the solo set, I tried a few permutations of live playing and looping. I don't like using pre-recorded loops (or backing tracks) for these sets, so it's a bit of a challenge to get everything together, and I spent the past couple of weeks struggling with it.

Then I had a breakthrough. When I do these solo sets, I'm not trying to cover the song; rather I see it as an impression. I feel it needs to have the melody recognizable, and there should be a general sense of the harmony and the structure of the tune, but there can be a lot of flexibility. I couldn't get a transition from the solid groove part of the A section to the flowing harmonies of the B section, for which the bass and drums drop out. I decided that, instead of using the groove and the melody right at the start, I can ease into the groove for a bit, get the loop going, maybe do some sparse single note ad-lib over it, and then state the melody. For the B section, I'll play something looser, hinting at the ascending melody and harmony from the original, but freeing myself from that by going into an ambient kind of thing. And, after that, instead of going back to the groove, I'll do a short loop based on the A section vamp, and do some ad-lib over that using a POG2 for a different texture, then wrap that up with another statement of the melody but in this new, altered setting. And once that has run its course, instead of going back to the original groove and melody that I started with, I can segue to some kind of outro. It's still Killer Joe, the melody is intact, but I've made the song my own, like an impression. With that idea behind me, I feel comfortable with the arrangement and can rehearse it.

Sometimes trying to arrange a song is like cracking open a nut. Of course, you can bludgeon the nut to crack the shell, but that puts the focus on the shell, and might obscure, or even destroy the fruit. I recalled watching my mother-in-law preparing walnuts for us. There are three layers, a thick outer skin, a shell, and the tasty fruit inside. With a clear strategy and a skilled hand developed thru practice, she can get to the fruit quickly. There's an idea behind that procedure, and it's almost as if she gets into a groove. Maybe it's similar to arranging a song; the melody is the fruit within, it's what makes a song what it is, it's a goal with a procedure to reach it, but it needs to be lovingly attended.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

Working on this Locrian lick that I wrote right now - maybe someone else might have a little fun with it. Play over Ab half diminished -

View attachment 49499

Would make for a lovely E7 line too.

 

[DrewJD82]

Oof, speaking of stretches I’m working on Chet Atkins version of Mister Sandman and those opening arpeggios are brutal. They have to be perfectly clean too


———4—2———————5—4
——5———5—————7——7
—6—————6———7———7
7———————7—9————9
——————————————
——————————————

I’ve actually secretly been working on this when I’m not recording because I want to get some Travis picking skills and that version of it is one of my all-time favorite pieces of guitar music. That stretch is definitely a good one!

It boggles my mind that I can play fairly intricate guitar parts while singing over the top of them, I can play drums and sing while playing, but ask me to hold a bass line while playing a melody on top with one hand and I just bomb immediately. I really want to develop this in the next couple years.

 

[metropolis_4]

I’ve actually secretly been working on this when I’m not recording because I want to get some Travis picking skills and that version of it is one of my all-time favorite pieces of guitar music. That stretch is definitely a good one!

It boggles my mind that I can play fairly intricate guitar parts while singing over the top of them, I can play drums and sing while playing, but ask me to hold a bass line while playing a melody on top with one hand and I just bomb immediately. I really want to develop this in the next couple years.

It’s one of my favorites too. I know what you mean, that style is such a totally different way of approaching the guitar it’s like learning a new instrument.

It always amazes me how clean and consistent Chet was.

One of my other favorites to work on when I’m building up these chops is Merle Travis version of Cannonball Rag. Usually about half his speed, haha. It blows my mind when I realize he’s only using his thumb and index finger!

 

[DrewJD82]

They have issues that they don't even realize are going to be big issues as they try to get out and gig. I tried to enlighten them and they think they know better so I hope they learn sooner than later that they need to do the things I was telling them.

I’ve been dealing with this lately in my band as well and the pushback I’m getting is rather confusing as the singer/guitarist went from “Dude, I’ve been following you in every band you’ve been in since we last met, whatever advice or help you have for us being a tighter band we’re going to take it”, to “You need to learn your parts, are you even playing in key? You’re screwing me all up” to “We have bandcamp, we don’t need any of that crap. You need to focus on learning the songs” when I offered to setup and run the band’s social media accounts.

I have 1 song I need to write my parts for. The reason it’s taking me so long is because before I even play a note on these recordings I’m mixing I’ve had to edit all his fucking tracks so I’m not embarrassed to have my name associated with them. This dude has sang in one band previously, for about 2 months. That’s his level of band experience. He’s played 3 shows and has never once booked a gig or has any idea about networking with other bands, he’s never even been on FB to understand why a band should have a FB page. The drummer is quite chill overall, there’s only one time he’s said something stupid and I may have took it wrong due to the singer pissing me off 5 minutes before.

My reaction to it all, though, has been good….for me at least. Every comment I hear just makes me want to lay down the sickest parts I can, I’m ensuring that when/if I eventually quit that they won’t find anyone else who is going to pull that stuff off.
After the last comment on Monday that perturbed me, I bought a subscription to Moises and took the demos they made before I joined and split everything into stems, deleted all the guitars and bass and started re-recording them so they can hear what they’d sound like when the effort is put in to get what you’re going for.

There’s several of their songs that I thought were going for a punk vibe due to the guitar parts, what I found later is that he believes he’s playing something entirely different than what’s actually on the demos. Take this intro riff, for example- he’s claiming he’s playing a palm muted triplet pattern like-

4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4
4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4

(We’re in drop C#) but I’m not hearing a single palm muted triplet anywhere in that intro. At best there’s a rest between strumming he may have used his palm to mute the strings in.



“It’s like a Lamb Of God riff”

I’m going to bang out the 7 songs from the demo from before I joined as I finish up the last song we recorded together and give them everything at the same time while saying “This is what your band can sound like, but if you keep taking pot shots at me this all goes bye bye”

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

I’ve been dealing with this lately in my band as well and the pushback I’m getting is rather confusing as the singer/guitarist went from “Dude, I’ve been following you in every band you’ve been in since we last met, whatever advice or help you have for us being a tighter band we’re going to take it”, to “You need to learn your parts, are you even playing in key? You’re screwing me all up” to “We have bandcamp, we don’t need any of that crap. You need to focus on learning the songs” when I offered to setup and run the band’s social media accounts.

I have 1 song I need to write my parts for. The reason it’s taking me so long is because before I even play a note on these recordings I’m mixing I’ve had to edit all his fucking tracks so I’m not embarrassed to have my name associated with them. This dude has sang in one band previously, for about 2 months. That’s his level of band experience. He’s played 3 shows and has never once booked a gig or has any idea about networking with other bands, he’s never even been on FB to understand why a band should have a FB page. The drummer is quite chill overall, there’s only one time he’s said something stupid and I may have took it wrong due to the singer pissing me off 5 minutes before.

My reaction to it all, though, has been good….for me at least. Every comment I hear just makes me want to lay down the sickest parts I can, I’m ensuring that when/if I eventually quit that they won’t find anyone else who is going to pull that stuff off.
After the last comment on Monday that perturbed me, I bought a subscription to Moises and took the demos they made before I joined and split everything into stems, deleted all the guitars and bass and started re-recording them so they can hear what they’d sound like when the effort is put in to get what you’re going for.

There’s several of their songs that I thought were going for a punk vibe due to the guitar parts, what I found later is that he believes he’s playing something entirely different than what’s actually on the demos. Take this intro riff, for example- he’s claiming he’s playing a palm muted triplet pattern like-

4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4
4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4

(We’re in drop C#) but I’m not hearing a single palm muted triplet anywhere in that intro. At best there’s a rest between strumming he may have used his palm to mute the strings in.



“It’s like a Lamb Of God riff”

I’m going to bang out the 7 songs from the demo from before I joined as I finish up the last song we recorded together and give them everything at the same time while saying “This is what your band can sound like, but if you keep taking pot shots at me this all goes bye bye”

Not triplets…

And people wonder why the only thing I do for the love of music is instrumental stuff.

 

[DrewJD82]

Not triplets…

And people wonder why the only thing I do for the love of music is instrumental stuff.

I’m exercising my ability to give grace.

 

[Mikael Dez]

I’ve been dealing with this lately in my band as well and the pushback I’m getting is rather confusing as the singer/guitarist went from “Dude, I’ve been following you in every band you’ve been in since we last met, whatever advice or help you have for us being a tighter band we’re going to take it”, to “You need to learn your parts, are you even playing in key? You’re screwing me all up” to “We have bandcamp, we don’t need any of that crap. You need to focus on learning the songs” when I offered to setup and run the band’s social media accounts.

I have 1 song I need to write my parts for. The reason it’s taking me so long is because before I even play a note on these recordings I’m mixing I’ve had to edit all his fucking tracks so I’m not embarrassed to have my name associated with them. This dude has sang in one band previously, for about 2 months. That’s his level of band experience. He’s played 3 shows and has never once booked a gig or has any idea about networking with other bands, he’s never even been on FB to understand why a band should have a FB page. The drummer is quite chill overall, there’s only one time he’s said something stupid and I may have took it wrong due to the singer pissing me off 5 minutes before.

My reaction to it all, though, has been good….for me at least. Every comment I hear just makes me want to lay down the sickest parts I can, I’m ensuring that when/if I eventually quit that they won’t find anyone else who is going to pull that stuff off.
After the last comment on Monday that perturbed me, I bought a subscription to Moises and took the demos they made before I joined and split everything into stems, deleted all the guitars and bass and started re-recording them so they can hear what they’d sound like when the effort is put in to get what you’re going for.

There’s several of their songs that I thought were going for a punk vibe due to the guitar parts, what I found later is that he believes he’s playing something entirely different than what’s actually on the demos. Take this intro riff, for example- he’s claiming he’s playing a palm muted triplet pattern like-

4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4
4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4

(We’re in drop C#) but I’m not hearing a single palm muted triplet anywhere in that intro. At best there’s a rest between strumming he may have used his palm to mute the strings in.



“It’s like a Lamb Of God riff”

I’m going to bang out the 7 songs from the demo from before I joined as I finish up the last song we recorded together and give them everything at the same time while saying “This is what your band can sound like, but if you keep taking pot shots at me this all goes bye bye”

Ooof with those “triplets” haha

 

[JasonE]

I’ve been dealing with this lately in my band as well and the pushback I’m getting is rather confusing as the singer/guitarist went from “Dude, I’ve been following you in every band you’ve been in since we last met, whatever advice or help you have for us being a tighter band we’re going to take it”, to “You need to learn your parts, are you even playing in key? You’re screwing me all up” to “We have bandcamp, we don’t need any of that crap. You need to focus on learning the songs” when I offered to setup and run the band’s social media accounts.

I have 1 song I need to write my parts for. The reason it’s taking me so long is because before I even play a note on these recordings I’m mixing I’ve had to edit all his fucking tracks so I’m not embarrassed to have my name associated with them. This dude has sang in one band previously, for about 2 months. That’s his level of band experience. He’s played 3 shows and has never once booked a gig or has any idea about networking with other bands, he’s never even been on FB to understand why a band should have a FB page. The drummer is quite chill overall, there’s only one time he’s said something stupid and I may have took it wrong due to the singer pissing me off 5 minutes before.

My reaction to it all, though, has been good….for me at least. Every comment I hear just makes me want to lay down the sickest parts I can, I’m ensuring that when/if I eventually quit that they won’t find anyone else who is going to pull that stuff off.
After the last comment on Monday that perturbed me, I bought a subscription to Moises and took the demos they made before I joined and split everything into stems, deleted all the guitars and bass and started re-recording them so they can hear what they’d sound like when the effort is put in to get what you’re going for.

There’s several of their songs that I thought were going for a punk vibe due to the guitar parts, what I found later is that he believes he’s playing something entirely different than what’s actually on the demos. Take this intro riff, for example- he’s claiming he’s playing a palm muted triplet pattern like-

4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4
4-4-4—4-4-4—4—4-4-4

(We’re in drop C#) but I’m not hearing a single palm muted triplet anywhere in that intro. At best there’s a rest between strumming he may have used his palm to mute the strings in.



“It’s like a Lamb Of God riff”

I’m going to bang out the 7 songs from the demo from before I joined as I finish up the last song we recorded together and give them everything at the same time while saying “This is what your band can sound like, but if you keep taking pot shots at me this all goes bye bye”

I wish you much luck. These situations can really take some patience and overlooking to get through them and get people to understand. Us musicians can be some difficult SOBs to work with. The longer I do this and the older I get the less tolerant I seem to be to people being stupid and thinking they know everything. I just cut the ties and let them go learn at their own pace. I quit giving free band lessons.

 

[DrewJD82]

I wish you much luck. These situations can really take some patience and overlooking to get through them and get people to understand. Us musicians can be some difficult SOBs to work with. The longer I do this and the older I get the less tolerant I seem to be to people being stupid and thinking they know everything. I just cut the ties and let them go learn at their own pace. I quit giving free band lessons.

It's mostly a good time, I know that message probably makes it sound like a shitshow, but outside of the specific things referenced, everyone has been really great to be around and while the music isn't completely up my alley, I do get quite a bit of freedom to just go nuts. And I get to play loud.

We had a great practice today, as long as things keep up with that we'll be good. I played a couple rough mixes of the songs I'm mixing and they're stoked with everything, I was worried I was going to get armchaired to death with that but they seem fine leaving up to me entirely.

 

[Jazz Padd]

This is an extension of post #846, in which I wrote about a solo guitar set I'm performing soon. Two of the pieces, Tired of Waiting for You (Ray Davies) and a Beatles Suite (Yesterday, Free as a Bird, Blackbird, Lucy in the Sky, In My Life) I've performed in solo sets before. But the third tune, Killer Joe, I've only done in a combo setting, minimally with a drummer and bassist. In the earlier post, I mentioned the difficulty in moving from the groove section to the easy going B section. With that as an assumption, I tried using a looper to get the groove part going. But it sounds forced. And I also came across a couple of videos where people are using a looper for the A section, but it comes out sounding more like funk and rock than a more laid back vibe in the original Benny Golson 1960 cut.

So, rather than emphasizing the contrast between the A and B sections, I smoothed them out. I'm now using the looper only for the ad-lib vamp section later in the arrangement. For both the A and B sections, I'm more or less playing it chord melody style. There are some players out there who have masterfully rendered the tune that way, including walking bass, chord stabs, the melody and ad-lib. It's truly a wonder to behold, but also far beyond what I'm capable of doing. So I developed a poor man's chord melody on the A section before moving into the B section with a similar feel, then back to A and into the ad-lib, for which I'll be using a variant on the A section. I noticed on one Golson record, they didn't stick to the AABA format common to jazz, and actually used AAABA. So I take some liberties on the repetitions and it's now slipping into a nice, chord melody-ish kind of a thing.

For the ad-lib section, I'm looping a four bar vamp based on the C7-Bb7 vamp of the original, but changed the feel more into a lilt and away from a groove, and changed the voicings of the chords. For C7 I'm using 6G 4E 3G (number is the string, letter is the note), and for the Bb7 I'm using 6Ab 4F and 3G, then back to the C7 shape as above, but the second time of the Bb7 I use 6F 5Bb 4D. Once the loop is set, I use a hybrid mode from the chord tones of both chords, giving me C D E F G Ab Bb and C. That mode goes by several names depending where one looks, including the Aeolian Dominant or the "Hindu Scale." I suppose it doesn't matter to me, but I also noticed that for some outside playing I can use a C whole tone scale, which replaces F and G with an F#/Gb, and which actually sounds interesting if judicially used, and also sets up using C6/9#11 as the ending chord.

After the ad-lib section, I can either go back to the AAABA variants as above, or, depending how I feel, moving further away from the tune into something more ambient like. Same for the intro, I am using an approach that I've seen others use (Bill Frisell comes to mind) in which they start by hinting at the tonality of the coming tune through playing rubato harmonics, which I find comfortable to use.

So with a rubato hinting intro, an extended variation on the AABA form in a sort of a chord melody style, an ad-lib section based on the A section, and a possible ambient concluding AA section that keeps the main form of C7-Bb7 but uses theme and variation on the melody, and then moves away from the main tune, rather than back into it. All that brings the timing into my target of around 10mn.

Beside a looper, I am planning to use an EHX SMMH in a setting that resembles reverb, and a DOD Rubberneck in the rubato/ambient sections. In addition to arranging the tunes in terms or notes and chords, I'm planning to integrate several pedals. But that's another story and this has already gotten quite verbose so I'll stop. Thanks for reading and wishing you all the best in what you're working on!

 

[TSJMajesty]

I've been working on my speed, using, among other things, this lick at the very end of The Shadow Man Incident.

It's on a std-tuned 7-string, and played @ 96 bpm, which is about 20 bpm faster than where I have it. Strict alt-picked, start on downstroke.

But I noticed when I played the last note on each string, I was pausing ever so slightly, like I was almost reaching my pick back a little too much, in anticipation of sort of, slamming that final downstroke with enough force to carry the momentum of the pick across the space btw strings, to clear the adjacent string, in prep for the next upstroke. Kinda like reaching your arm back just before throwing a ball.

And it was messing up my timing.

So I slowed it back down, and started to focus on not only keeping my picking even, but also keeping the upstroke on the 2nd-to-last note on each string, ending as close to the top-side of the string as possible, so the next downstroke wouldn't need to be any longer in physical length, than any other pick motion.

I remember watching a video where the guy was claiming in order to be able to pick really fast, you need to pick the string as if the pick is "glued to the string." Iow, with super-short pick strokes.

But after really thinking about that logic, it means you'd need to greatly increase your pick speed to get to the next string. Because if you're using these really teeny motions, then suddenly you need a longer motion to traverse the distance from one string to the next, in order to keep the timing accurate, you'd have to suddenly speed up the pick motion to get to the next string.

My thinking is, you want to keep every motion the same length (as much as humanly possible), so the pick speed stays as consistent as it can, to make the string changes as easy as possible.

So I slowed things back down with this in mind, and it actually made an improvement in how I was playing it, once I sped things back up to my max speed.

I'll probably never be able to play this run at tempo, articulating each note accurately. But I do think I can get it to the point where it sounds fine. If I can get my fretting fingers to keep up!

 

[Mikael Dez]

Decided to learn Trivium’s “A Gunshot to the Head of Trepidation” and it’s taken me all weekend to finally get the first riff to 100% speed - it’s the 9 open palm mutes going directly into a chord that fucked me up. I had to slow that shit down to 80% and build my way up they wrote that shit when Matt was 19, wtf

 

[Mikael Dez]

Got the first few riffs down and they weren't bad except one part of the first riff that I had to work on. THIS though is fuckin me up, I can play it clean at 60%, this song may defeat me but I won't go down without a fight lol

 

[TSJMajesty]

Got the first few riffs down and they weren't bad except one part of the first riff that I had to work on. THIS though is fuckin me up, I can play it clean at 60%, this song may defeat me but I won't go down without a fight lol

View attachment 51329