Book - Improvisation book

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Flatpicking Essentials

Improvisation (Part II) &

Advanced Technique Studies

Written by

Dan Miller & Tim May

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ii

All contents copyright

High View Publications,

2009

www.flatpick.com

800-413-8296

Flatpicking Essentials, Volume 6

Improvisation, Part II and Advanced Technique

by Dan Miller & Tim May

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Improvisation, Part II

1

Diatonic Chords and Chord Progressions 3

Creating Diatonic Triads 4

‘Temperance Reel” Exercise 9

Chord Movement and Chord Progressions 10

I, IV, V Progression: Why It Works 10

The Relative Minor 14

I - vi - IV - V Progression 16

The ii Chord 16

I - vi - ii - V Progression 17

I - ii - V - I Progression 18

“St. Anne’s Reel” Exercise 19

Note Choices For Diatonic Chords 18

Stable Melody Notes 18

Chord Tones 18

Major Pentatonic Scales 20

Modes 20

Minor Pentatonic Scales 22

Remaining Notes 22

“Nine Pound Hammer” Exercise 23

The iii Chord 24

I - vi - iii - V Progression 24

I - iii - IV - V Progression 25

The Chord Stream 25

Diatonic Triad Summary 26

Seventh Chords 27

The Dominant 7th Chord 28

I - IV - V7 - I Progression 30

Non-Diatonic Chords 31

The Flat Seven Chord 31

I - bVII - V - I Progression 31

“Salt Creek” Exercise 32

The Seventh Chord in Blues 33

12-Bar Blues Using Seventh Chords 35

Secondary Dominant Chords 36

V of the V 36

V of the IV 36

“Alabama Jubilee” Exercise 37

VI7 - II7 - V7 - I Progression 38

Conclusion 39

Advanced Flatpicking Technique

41

Introduction 41

Tension & Release 41

Alabama Jubilee 43

Skipping Strings and Advanced Crosspicking 47

Angeline the Baker 50

Hybrid Picking - Part 1 54

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Billy In The Lowground 60

Using Harmonics — Natural and Artificial 64

“Mary Had A Little Lamb” Example 65

Bury Me Beneath The Willow 66

Playing in Minor Keys 70

Cold Frosty Morning 72

Devil’s Dream 76

East Tennessee Blues 81

Forked Deer 86

Twin and Triple Guitars — Playing Harmony Parts 90

Basic Two-Part Harmony 90

“Whisky Before Breakfast” Melody 91

“Whisky Before Breakfast” - Harmony (Parallel 3rds) 92

Harmonized Scale 93

“Whisky Before Breakfast” — Double Stops 95

Harmony Variation 96

“Whisky Before Breakfast” Harmony Variation 97

Two-Part Harmony Rules of Thumb 99

“Whisky Before Breakfast” High Baritone Harmony 100

Adding a Third Part 101

“Whisky Before Breakfast” Three Part Harmony 102

Leather Britches 103

Lonesome Reuben 106

Lonesome Road Blues 110

Hybrid Picking — Part II 113

Hybrid Picking Example 114

“Lonesome Road Blues” Example 115

Midnight On The Water 118

Triplets 122

Nine Pound Hammer 124

Red Haired Boy 127

Red Wing 131

Temperance Reel 135

Wayfaring Stranger 139

Whiskey Before Breakfast 143

Conclusion and The Road Ahead 147

Appendix — Chord Progression Summary 148

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Introduction

Welcome to Volume 6 of the Flatpicking Essentials

series! This book is divided into two main sections. The first section is the second part of our study of improvisation. Although we have really been studying elements of improvisation since Volume 1 of this course, the section on improvisation that was presented in Volume 5 introduced you to a free-form improv study method that we will continue here in this volume. In the improvisation section of Volume 5 you studied how to improvise over various I, IV, V chord progressions using chord tones and scale notes. In this book, Volume 6, you will continue with the same course of study; however, the chord progressions will get more complicated. Working with the various chord progressions that we provide in this book will certainly help you develop an ability to improvise over these chords. In addition, it should also help you develop your ability to hear these chords and chord progressions when you run across them at a jam session. So, an added benefit of working with all of these new chord progressions is that you will also be developing your ear through this method.

An added feature of this Volume of the course is the inclusion of an appendix that will serve as an easy reference for all of the chord progressions that you were given in Volumes 5 and 6. We are also providing slow, medium, and fast back up tracks for all of these progressions on our Flatpicking Essentials website (go to http://www.flatpick.com/essentialsaudio. If you download all of these tracks and work with these chord progressions using the steps that were outlined on pages 55 to 76 of Volume 5, you will greatly improve your ability to improvise.

In studying the material in the improvisation section of this book you will be presented with a bunch of music theory. I know that some of you will skim over this material and not really dig into it. I know this because I’ve been playing music for 30 years and for the first 25 of them I never paid any attention to music theory because I thought it was boring and not really necessary. However, after I spent time working on projects with guys like John Carlini and John Jorgenson I realized, just by hanging around these guys and listening to them talk about music, that my music theory knowledge was severely lacking. So, I made a decision to focus on learning as much as I could about music theory and now that I know a little bit I am constantly regretting

the fact that I did not take it seriously early in my music career.

For me, having a knowledge of music theory really helps me better understand everything that I’m doing when I’m playing music. Having a better understanding of what I’m doing helps expand my choices and opens my mind up to new ideas. So, I hope you will take the time to expand your knowledge of music theory by reading the theory sections of this book and by exploring other music theory books and resources. I think that you will find it very helpful to your ability to arrange, compose, and improvise.

Advanced Technique

The second section of this book is focused on advanced flatpicking technique. We approached this topic by first having Tim May record “advanced level” improvisations for nineteen different flatpicking tunes. Tim selected the tunes, but before he went into the studio I gave him a list of techniques—like the use of triplets, natural and false harmonics, note bending, quoting, alternate tuning, syncopation, twin guitar, minor key tunes, hybrid picking, advanced crosspicking, string skipping, etc. Tim did a wonderful job incorporating all of these techniques into his improvisations and we discuss all of these techniques in detail in the pages that come before the first occurrence of a given technique. In addition to introducing new techniques in this volume, Tim also did a great job introducing you to advanced ways of employing many of the techniques that you have learned previously in this course, such as: hammer-ons, slides, pull-offs, bends, neighboring notes (toggling), tremolo (repeated notes), chromatic runs, drones, harmonic scales, folded scales, floating, crosspicking, arpeggios, note bending, runs that move up-the-neck, etc. He pulls it all together here and really takes out all the stops. If you are looking for interesting ways to spice up your bluegrass songs and fiddle tunes, you will definitely find them here in this volume. In addition to the “advanced” techniques discussed above, Tim also adds more complex timing and dynamic elements to his arrangements, as well as more complex note choices. As you will discover when you read our synopsis of each tune in the Advance Technique section, Tim makes good use of diminished, maj7th, 9th, 11th, and 13th chords and arpeggios. We will not really get into a discussion of these chords and

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arpeggios until Volume 7 of this course. However, we felt like introducing you to these chords and arpeggios here in this volume would give you a good sense of how these note choices can be useful to you, in terms of practical usage in standard flatpicking tunes.

A Word About the Audio Files

This volume has a lot of audio files. In previous volumes we always provided an audio reference for every exercise and every tune. We do the same thing here, however, we have gone a bit farther this time. For each of the chord progressions we have provided you with three different tempos so that you can find a tempo that is comfortable for you to work with. We also made each track 3 minutes long so that you could have plenty of time to work with each progression. The problem we ran into there was that in providing you with three tracks for each of 16 different progressions—each three minutes long—that resulted in two hours and fifteen minutes worth of audio just for the backup rhythm tracks.

In order to save having to put out four or five audio CDs with this book, you will find that the audio CDs that are in the book only have the medium tempo backup tracks for the chord progressions. However, the slow and fast tracks can be downloaded for free from our website at the URL mentioned on the previous page. For the tunes that we have asked you to improvise over in the improvisation section (Temperance Reel, St. Anne’s Reel, Blackberry Blossom, and Salt Creek) we have provided a medium tempo version of these songs that you can jam along with on the CD. These tracks are taken from Brad Davis’ Flatpick Jam series. If you want to play along with slower or faster tempos of these songs, you can purchase Brad’s Flatpick Jam tracks at www.flatpickingmercantile.com or download them at www.flatpickdigital.com. All of the tunes that we’ve asked you to work with in this book are on Brad’s Flatpick Jam, Volume One.

For the tunes in the Advanced Technique section of this book (those that were improvised by Tim May), we have provided you with two tempos of each tune. One is at a moderately fast tempo, and the other is slowed down. We wanted to provide you with two speeds of these tunes so that Tim could go ahead and play the tunes at a comfortable pace when he was recording, but then you could hear a slower version to help you pick out the details of what he is doing. Tim did not record the tunes at the slower tempo, they were slowed down electronically in the studio.

The way we organized the two audio CDs that come with this book is as follows:

The first CD contains all of the tracks that are associated with the improvisation section of this book. The first sixteen tracks are those that are the medium tempo tracks of all of the chord progressions as presented in the appendix. The first 5 tracks are progressions that you worked with in Volume 5. The remaining tracks are progressions that you are presented with in Volume 6. After those generic chord progressions, we then give you the progressions to the fiddle tunes that we have given you in the improvisation section of the book. We put all of these back up tracks together so that you would be able to find them easily when you are practicing your improvisation exercises. The remaining tracks on this disc present the exercises and examples that are given in the improvisation section of the book. Each exercise and example has the Disc and track printed next to it for easy reference.

The second disc that comes with this book includes all of the audio that corresponds with the material in the “Advanced Technique” section of the book. This includes all of Tim May’s improvisations (at two speeds) and all of the other examples and exercises that appear in that section.

I hope you enjoy working with all of the material in this book. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me: [email protected]. Also, if you’d like to contact Tim, you can reach him through his website: http://www.timmaymusic.net/

Have fun and keep pickin’!

Dan Miller

Acknowledgements: There are many people that helped make this book possible. First and foremost I’d like to thank my co-author Tim May. This book would not have been possible without his expertise, talent, hard work, and patience. Next I want to thank Tim May, Robert Bowlin, Wil Maring, and Adam Granger for helping me put together the guitar harmony section this course. Their ideas and suggestions were very helpful. We also need to thank Brad Davis for the material in the hybrid picking section. Finally, Tim and I would both like to thank Charlie Chadwick and Dillon Hodges for their help in the studio. Dillon played rhythm guitar for all of Tim’s solo improvisations and Charlie played bass on all of the back up tracks. Charlie also engineered all of the rhythm tracks and all of Tim’s solo tracks.

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Improvisation, Part II:

Before we move on to the next phase of our improvisation study, let’s first look back at what we have already learned in the previous volumes.

Volume 1: In volume one you learned how to design your own bass runs—including the use of leading tones—to move from one chord to another. By the end of Volume 1 you should have been able to improvise bass lines that serve to smoothly connect one chord to the next in a I, IV, V chord progression. After sufficient practice with the bass runs and fill lick examples that were provided in Volume 1, you should have developed a degree of comfort with:

1) Improvising bass runs that connect chords in a I, IV, V progression.

2) Improvising fill licks to fill in between vocal pauses while playing rhythm.

3) Ornamenting your rhythm accompaniment with embellishments such as strums, hammer-ons, pull-offs, and slides.

Whether you were aware of it or not, developing these skills in Volume 1 formed the first small step in your learning how to improvise! All of these skills will come in handy in this volume and in Volume 7, so keep working on them!

Volumes 2 and 3: In Volumes 2 and 3 you learned how to find song melodies by ear and then embellish those melodies with a variety of techniques, which included: hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, drones, scale runs, folding scales, neighboring notes, tremolo, a variety of strum patterns, and crosspicking. By the end of Volumes 2 and 3 you should have been able to find a simple song or fiddle tune melody by ear and then improvise, to some degree, on that melody by employing one or more of the above mentioned techniques. Granted, while much of the work that you did while learning the steps outlined in Volumes 2 and 3 dealt more with arranging than improvisation (since you probably were not coming up with your arrangements spontaneously in real time), remember that earlier in this course we defined improvisation as “instantaneous arrangement.” So, in building your arranging and composition skills in Volumes 2 and 3 you were also working on your ability to improvise by learning to come up with your own arrangements and variations.

Learning how to take a simple, stripped down melody and embellish it to come up with a melody-based arrangement is an important skill. As your ability to come up with variation after variation on a song’s melody improves, your ability to improvise on that melody will also improve. If you take small steps and are consistent with your practice, progress will come. Through your work with Volumes 2 and 3 you should have the tools available to you to be able to hear a song melody in your head and find it on your guitar. Once you can do that with the simple melody, you will then later be able to not only find the melody on your guitar in real time, but also fill in around the melody with interesting fills, runs, licks, and techniques that will ornament the melody in interesting and exciting ways. Learning how to play licks over chord progressions is much easier than learning how to play a tasteful melody-based solo, so that is why we started learning melody-based soloing before we discussed a more free-form approach—one that doesn’t necessarily stick as close to the melody—in Volumes 5 and 6.

Volume 4: Volume 4 was all about exploring the fingerboard and moving up the neck. In the section on using chord shapes you also learned something about arrangement and improvisation based on chord shapes and chord tones. You also studied the use of scale runs and arpeggios at various locations on the neck and practiced moving up and down the neck using open notes, floating phrases, and harmonic scales in a effort to connect various scale positions or “boxes.”

Expanding your note choices on the neck also expanded your ability to improvise. As you move around to different areas of the neck in order to find melodies and embellish those melodies you are naturally going to find new ways of expressing those melodies. As you learn how to do that in “real time” you are greatly improving your ability to improvise in ways that add interest to your solos.

Volume 5: In Volumes 2, 3, and 4, all of your study of arrangement and improvisation focused on working with the song melody. You found the melody, you simplified the melody, and then you worked to embellish the melody. In Volume 5 we asked you to do a 180 degree turn and forget about the melody so that you could

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basically learn how to play scale and chord tones over chord changes. Our logic in asking you to do this was to allow you to feel a little bit of freedom from having to play specific notes. In practicing those exercises you hopefully gained some confidence in being able to play without looking at a piece of paper or taxing your brain to remember a pre-set sequence of notes. If you’ve never experienced this sort of improvisation before, it can be very liberating. After Volume 5 was published we received emails from a lot of people telling us how much fun they were having with this section of the course because they didn’t have to worry about making “mistakes.” This is a typical letter:

“I just LOVE Volume 5—for my particular learning style, it is spot on. It is really a lot of fun to just sit and play over the G chord and the progressions—even with just 3 notes I feel like I was able to come up with some pretty good ‘stuff’. Sticking with the stages—in order—has been very helpful to me. Even on my very busy days at work I manage to get in at least 30 minutes of practicing with Vol 5 and I can tell that it is already helping—a lot of the improvement has come in the form of “confidence”—just being able to play with the pentatonic minor, blues and pentatonic major scales —and not worrying about ‘mistakes’ or if it sounds ‘good’ or not. For me, that was a major step and I think it will carry over when I play with other people.”

We loved receiving that kind of feedback because it is exactly the kind of feeling of freedom and confidence that we wanted the students working with Volume 5 to experience.

On the flip side of that, however, we have also received feedback from players who grew up playing blues and rock that have no problem at all with playing scales and patterns over chord progressions, but are having a lot of difficulty learning and sticking to a melody. This is why we have worked to present both approaches. Depending on your background and experience one approach is going to seem easier than the other. If you have spent the majority of your time in the past working with tab and memorizing someone else’s arrangement, then you should now spend time with the improvisation exercises in Volume 5. If you have spent a lot of time playing riff blues and rock, then you should spend more focused time on the steps that are outlined in Volumes 2 and 3. Eventually, the two approaches will meet somewhere in the middle and you will be able to stick close to the melody when the melodic approach is called for and then you will be able to stray farther away from it when a more non-melodic approach is appropriate.

Typically you are going to want to stay close to the melody at the beginning of a song. Later in the presentation of a song if you, or others in the band, have stated the melody clearly several times, you are going to want to stray away from it so that the overall presentation of the song doesn’t become monotonous to the listeners, or the band. As I’ve stated before, improvisational players who are the most tasteful can weave their solos around a melody in ways that still state the melody, or interesting “sub-melodies,” without straying so far away that the song becomes unrecognizable. There is a real art to this kind of soloing.

It is our belief that in order to learn how to develop tasteful improvisations the rudiments of music must be firmly ingrained into the musicians mind and muscle memory. In Volumes 2 and 3 we worked with learning how to ingrain the melody, and then embellish that melody. In Volume 5 we worked with ingraining a solid sense of the chord changes, chord tones, and the scale of the key while working with simple I, IV, V progressions. However, as you know, a lot of songs that you will encounter stray away from the I, IV, V progression and their melodies involve notes that may not lie in the scale of the key. So, here in Volume 6 we are going to continue with the ideas and practice stages that you were presented in Volume 5, but we will be adding new chords and more complex chord progressions. Now that you have built a solid foundation working with the I, IV and V chords, it is time that we add in some minor chords and some seventh chords. A Little Theory

In order to better understand common chord progressions that include chords other than the standard I, IV, and V it is going to behoove us to first study a little theory relating to how those chord progressions are formed and what scales are best used over those chords. I know...theory is not always fun, however, hopefully you have discovered from the theory that I’ve presented thus far in the course that knowing theory does help guide you when you are arranging and improvising. I’ve tried to not lay out too much theory all at once in any given section of this course, however, we are now getting into deeper water in terms of theory with the study of diatonic chords, the relative minor, seventh chords, and modes. If you’ll bear with me, I promise that understanding these things will help you in the long run. I promise!

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Diatonic Chords and Chord Progressions

In previous volumes of this course you learned that the word “diatonic” means “of the key.” If a melody is “diatonic” that means that all of the notes in that melody are notes that appear in the scale of the key. If the song is in the key of G, a diatonic melody will consist of only notes that are found in the G scale. Most simple song melodies are diatonic. As you learned in Volume 4, chords can also be diatonic.

In the harmonized scale section of Volume 4, you learned that diatonic triads are triads that are built on each scale degree of a given scale. In order to build diatonic triads on the G scale, you simply lay out each degree of the scale in sequence along a horizontal line and then stack thirds on top of each of those notes (as shown at the top of the next page). You’ll notice that some of these notes are going to be major thirds while others are going to be minor thirds, depending on the notes that are diatonic to the G scale. This concept can be confusing, so let’s explore it a little further.

What is in a Name?

Before moving on, let’s clarify how notes, scale degrees and intervals are named in music theory. For most of you, this will be a review. Musical pitches are represented using the letters of the alphabet—A through G. These letters are referred to as “the musical alphabet.” Thus, there are seven letters in the musical alphabet. Since there are more than seven tones in Western music, the notes of the musical alphabet can be altered by using a “sharp” or a “flat” symbol. A sharp symbol (#) used after a note letter name raises the pitch

of that note one half step. A flat symbol (b) used after a note name lowers that pitch one half step. By using these sharp and/or flat symbols in combination with the first seven letters of the alphabet, we can name every pitch that is common to Western music, thus naming the twelve pitches of the chromatic scale. If you’ve gotten this far in the course, this is not new information. Western music is tonal music, which means that both melodies and harmonies are typically centered upon one musical pitch. This pitch is referred to as the “tonic.” When groups of pitches are arranged around the tonic in half-step and whole-step patterns, these patterns are referred to as scales. The major scale is the pattern that forms the basis for most popular melodies. Previously in this course you studied the whole-step/ half-step formula for the major scale and a few minor scales.

Major scales can be built from any pitch in the chromatic scale by using the major scale formula. Although not as widely used, there are a number of other scales in music (minor, pentatonic, diminished, whole tone, etc) that each have their own unique whole-step/half-step formula. Each pitch in every scale can be defined by a note name from the musical alphabet, or by “scale degree.”

Scale degrees name each pitch in a major scale using a sequence of numbers. In a C scale, the C note is the first scale degree because it is the first note of the scale, D is the second, E the third, etc. Using scale degrees makes things a little easier. Since all major scales are made up of the same pattern, using scale degrees provides a universal system for naming these scales.

T

A

B

0 2 3 2 3 5 4 5 7 0 2 3

2 4 5 0 0 2 1 2 4 3 4 5 G Am Bm C D Em F#dim G G B D A CE D_B F# C E G DF# A E GB _F#A C GB D

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Lastly, lets look at how intervals are named. You will remember from earlier volumes of this course that an interval defines the distance between two notes. The first thing to know is that whenever you are naming intervals there are two parts to the name. One part of the name refers to its “quantity”, i.e. unison, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, or octave. The second part of the name is its “quality”, i.e. major, minor, diminished, perfect, or augmented.

Creating Diatonic Triads

Given the naming conventions listed above, let’s now look at how we might figure out the diatonic triads in the key of G. As stated above, the first thing to do is lay out the G scale horizontally, as shown on the bottom line of the diagram shown in the box above. To build the triads, we are going to first stack above each note of the G scale the note that is a third above that note. The note that is a third above any given note in a scale is the note that is two scale degrees away in that scale. Therefore, if you want to find the note that is a third above G on the G scale, you look at the G scale and count up two scale degrees to B. To find the note that is a third above A, count two scale degrees up the G scale from A and you find C. Continue on for each note in the G scale and you will find the notes that are indicated on the second line in the diagram shown above. For the time being we are not going to worry about whether the interval is major or minor, we are just going to find the notes.

G

Whole Step Whole Step Whole Step Whole Step Whole Step Half

Step Half _Step

G A B C D E F# D E F# G A B C B C D E F# G A G Scale: Up a Third: Up Another Third: Root Third Fifth

from each note on the middle line of the diagram above. Starting with the B note and counting up two scale degrees on the G scale we arrive at D. If you continue with this procedure along the middle line of the diagram you will find the notes that are shown on the top line. These notes are a third above the second line and a perfect fifth above the notes of the first line. Thus you have found the root, third, and fifth triads using each note of the G scale as your root. Since we have only used notes of the G scale to build these chords, all of the chords are diatonic to the key of G.

Now we are going to take a look at each of these chord triads one-by-one to determine if they are major or minor. As we discussed previously in this course, a major chord has an interval of a major third between the root and third note (four half steps) and a minor chord has an interval of a minor third (three half steps) between the root and third. An easy way to count half steps is to use the “chromatic clock” as shown at the top of the next page. Start with the root note and count the “clicks” around the chromatic clock. For instance if you start at G and count around the clock to B, you will find that B is four half steps away from G, thus the interval between G and B is major. Moving on to the triad root of A we count the clicks around the clock from A to C and find that it is only three half steps, therefore this interval is minor.

F

A

Chord Tones:

G = G, B, D

Am = A, C, E

Bm = B, D, F#

C = C, E, G

D = D, F#, A

Em = E, G, B

Chromatic

Clock

Major Third = Four Half Steps Minor Third = Three Half Steps

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Half Step

Half

Step Half Step Half Step Half

Step Half Step Half Step Half Step Half Step Half

Step Half Step Half Step

Major Chord = Major Third + Minor Third Minor Chord = Minor Third + Major Third Diminished Chord = Minor Third + Minor Third Augmented Chord = Major Third + Major Third

A

A A#/B

A

B C C#/D

A

D D#/E

A

E F F#/G

A

G G Minor Chord:

third and fifth scale degrees to determine if the triad is diminished or augmented. When you are constructing triads there are four possible triad types that you might encounter: major, minor, diminished, and augmented. These triads are defined in the chart shown above. A major triad has an interval of a major third between the root and third scale degrees and an interval of a minor third between the third and fifth scale degrees. The minor chord has just the opposite. A minor chord has an interval of a minor third between the root and third scale degrees and an interval of a major third between the third and fifth scale degrees. A diminished chord has an interval of a minor third between the root and third scale degrees and a minor third between the third and fifth scale degrees. An augmented chord has an interval of a major third between the root and third scale degrees and a major third between the third and fifth scale degrees.

If you look at the chart above you can see that I’ve constructed all of the possible triads that start with the root note of G. By counting the half steps on the chromatic scale shown at the top of the page I’ve determined what notes make up the major, minor, diminished, and augmented G chords. You’ll notice that in each case the scale degrees are the same (G, B, and D), however, the B and D notes are either natural, sharp, or flat.

In order to determine what kind of triads we have constructed on page 4, we must examine the intervals between the third and fifth scale degrees. Looking at the notes above the G on the bottom line we see a B and a D. The distance between the B note and the D note on our chromatic clock is three half steps—an interval of a minor third. Since the interval between G and B is major and the interval between B and D is minor, we know that this is a G major chord.

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T

A

B

1

3 0 0 0 2 3 0 1 2 2 0 0 2 3 4 4 2 2 0 1 0 2 3 3

2 3 2 0 0 2 0 0 0 2 2 0 2 1 2 4 2 0 0 0 2 3 G Am Bm C D Em F#dim G I ii iii IV V vi viidim I

Diatonic Chords in the Key of G

Taking a look at the next triad, we already determined that the interval between the A note and the C note was a minor third. The next interval, between the C and the E notes, is four half steps and thus a major third interval. Since the first interval is minor and the second is major, you know that this is an A minor chord. Analyzing all of the triads that are formed from each note of the G scale, you will discover the chords that are shown in the chart above. The triads built on the first, fourth, and fifth scale degrees are major triads. The triads built on the second, third, and sixth scale degrees are minor. The triad built on the seventh scale degree is diminished.

The method we have used to determine each triad type was based on counting half steps. You could have also used a derivative method to find these triad types. If you are familiar with the notes of each major scale, as shown in the chart at the bottom of page 5, then you can simply compare the notes of each triad with the notes of each major scale. For instance, if you compare the notes of the triad built on the root of G with the G major scale, you will see that the root, third, and fifth notes of the G major scale are G, B, and D and thus the triad is major. When you look at the notes of the triad that starts with the A note as the root (A, C, E) and compare that to the A major scale you will see that the first, third and fifth notes of the A major scale are A, C#, and E. The only difference here is that the third degree of our triad (C) is a half degree flat from the C# note of the A major scale, thus we know that our A chord is minor. If we jump forward and look at the F# scale, we find that in the F# major scale the notes of the 1, 3, 5 triad are F#, A#, and C#. Comparing that to the triad we built on

the F# note using the notes of the G scale (F#, A, and C), we can see that both the third scale degree and the 5th scale degree are a half step flat. This tells us that our F# traid that was built from notes of the G scale is a diminished chord.

Whether you count half steps or derive results from the major scales you will find that for every major scale the diatonic chords built from each scale degree are universally the same: I, ii, iii, IV, V, vi, viidim (or vii°). OK, so the big question in everyone’s mind now is, “How is this information useful?” Good Question! Practical Application of the Theory

In the improvisation section of Volume 5 you practiced a number of exercises where you played the notes of the G major scale against the I, IV, and V chords in the key of G. You will remember that one of the primary goals of that section of the course was to learn how to play the root note and/or other chord tones of each chord as the chords changed. Since the chord tones of the I chord, IV chord, and V chord were all in the G scale, all you had to know in order to improvise solos in the key of G were the notes of the G scale. If you were successful at matching up chord tones with chord changes, then your improvisations fit the chord progression. If you were able to keep the melody in your head and hit melody notes, or play G scale patterns that incorporated the melody notes, you were able to come up with a pretty good solo.

Now that you know that the chords Am, Bm, Em, and F#dim all consist of notes that are found in the G scale, you can apply everything you learned in Volume 5 to these chords as well! You certainly know by now that

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8

most common chord progressions in folk, bluegrass, blues, old-time, and rock music consist of the I, IV, and V chords. A little later in this course we will examine why those chords are the most common chords in roots and rock music, however, for now we will simply accept that as fact and move forward.

After the I, IV, and V chords, the two chord types that you will most likely find in the songs that you will encounter playing bluegrass and folk music are the six minor (vi) and the dominant seventh (V7). We will study seventh chords a little later, so we’ll set that dominant seventh aside for now. Let’s first look at the vi chord.

The six minor chord (vi) is very common for a couple of reasons. If you’ll look at the chord tone chart on page 5 you’ll notice that the Em chord shares two chord tones with the G chord. Since it shares two of the three chord tones with the G chord, it is very close in tonality to the tonic of the key, or key center. If you examine the Em scale, you will also notice that it shares all of the exact same notes as the G scale. It just starts on the E note instead of the G note. The six minor is also referred to as the “relative minor” and/or the Aeolian mode. We will also talk about those two concepts later. But before we talk about any more theory, let’s get away from the theoretical and practice an example in the key of G that uses a six minor (vi).

There are a lot of songs in bluegrass that are played in the key of G and include the Em chord. Just in this course alone we have run across a number of them, including “Temperance Reel,” “Cherokee Shuffle,” “Big Sciota,” “Blackberry Blossom,” and others. Tunes such as “Billy in the Lowground,” “New Camptown Races,” and “Colored Aristocracy” also include the six minor (vi) chord. In our first example we are going to take a look at “Temperance Reel.” This is a good song to work with for our purpose because there are plenty of

G A B D E G

G Major Pentatonic Scale:

E Minor Pentatonic Scale:

E G A B D E

T

A

B

1

L

L L

0 3 0 2 0 2 0 2

L L

0 3 0 3 5 3 0 3

L L L

0 2 0 2 0 2 0 3

· «

0

«

E minor Pentatonic Scale

chances to play over the Em chord. Also, because the B part of this song really lends itself to improvisation we are going to leave most of the B part open to full improvisation over the Em and D chords.

In Volume 3 you learned how to play a melody-based version of this tune. Here I want you to try and mix the melody-based approach with a freely improvised approach (a la Volume 5) by playing the melody over the G chord parts and then improvising over the Em chord in the A part. Then in the B part, improvise over the Em and D chords. In the A part of the tab you will see that I’ve kept the B note followed by the E note under the Em chord because those two notes are “stable” melody notes. Other than hitting those notes, you should freely improvise over the Em chord. In the B section you’ll see that I left the tab under the Em and D chords totally blank. So, freely improvise during that section using the chord tone technique that you learned in Volume 5.

Before you give this tune a try, one interesting thing to recognize is that the notes of the G major pentatonic scale and the notes of the E minor pentatonic scale are exactly the same (see diagram above). The only difference is that they start on the G note and the E note, respectively. If you worked with the 12-bar blues in E as I recommended in Volume 5 (Stage 16: Exploring Other Keys), you will be able to improvise over the Em chord in this song using the E minor pentatonic scale. Even if you did not work with the E minor pentatonic scale in Volume 5, but did work with the G major

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“Temperance Reel” Basic Melody Outline with “holes” for Improvisation

T

A

B

1

½

0 2

G 0 0 0 2 0 1

3 3 3 0 2

É

Em 0 2 2

6

G 0 0 0 2 0 1

3 3 3 0 2

É

Em 0 2 2

É

D G 0 2 0

10

14

0 2 2 0 2

É

D G 0 2 0 Em Em D improvise . . . . improvise . . . . improvise . . . improvise . . . .

pentatonic scale (stage 8 on page 70 of Volume 5), then you will still be familiar with the notes of this scale. When you hit the Em chord in “Temperance Reel,” just think G major pentatonic, but start on the E note and you’ll be fine. If you did not familiarize yourself with either of these scales in Volume 5, then run through the E minor pentatonic scale as shown at the bottom of the previous page before working with “Temperance Reel.”

There are many songs in the flatpicker’s fiddle tune repertoire that have a B section that lends itself

to improvisation. In tunes like “Temperance Reel,” “Blackberry Blossom,” “Lonesome Fiddle Blues,” and “Salt Creek,” to name a few, you can stay close to the melody in the A section, and then stretch out and improvise more freely in the B section. After practicing with “Temperance Reel,” try this same exercise with “Blackberry Blossom.” Practice tracks for both of these tunes, taken from Brad Davis’ Flatpick Jam series, can be found on audio Disc 1, Tracks 17 and 18, respectively.

Play Along with Audio Track 1-17

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10

Chord Movement & Chord Progressions

Before we move on to work with more song examples, I want to first talk a little bit about chord movement and chord progressions. We will dive deeper into this subject in Volume 7: Advanced Rhythm, however, in order to understand improvisation using the chord tone technique, it helps if you understand something about chords and chord movement. If you can grasp some of the underlying theory of chord progressions, you can better understand how to solo over various chord changes.

Why The I, IV, V Progression Works

You know from the material that we’ve presented in the previous volumes of this course that in any simple song that you will run across in bluegrass, folk, blues, or rock music the melody and harmony of the song revolves around the notes of a major or minor scale. At the root of the scale is the tonic, or root, note. Chord progressions are tonal and they revolve around the tonic chord. Even if you don’t know the key of a song the tone center will always reveal itself as the song resolves because it settles on the tonic chord. Not every song begins on the I chord, but almost every song ends on the root chord.

The simplest songs are those whose melody can be supported harmonically by just one chord. Some nursery rhymes and a handful of pop songs are one chord songs. Take a look at the French nursery rhyme “Frere Jacuqes” shown at the top of the next page. If you take a look at the song’s melody, you will notice that the first and last notes of every measure are notes that belong to the G chord. Any G scale notes that are not part of the G chord in this song simply serve as connecting notes. So, this melody can be completely supported harmonically by the G chord.

While there are not too many song melodies that can be supported by just one chord, there are thousands that can be supported by two or three chords. We have learned that the majority of song melodies that we will encounter in bluegrass, folk, blues, or rock music are based on the major scale. In the first section of this book—when we presented diatonic chords—you learned how to harmonize the major scale. Since most songs melodies come from the notes of the major scale, it makes sense that the majority of the chords that are used to support those melodies will come from the diatonic chords.

If you know that your primary chord choices for a given song are going to come from the list of diatonic chords and you are presented with a song melody that sounds happy and upbeat throughout, then you know that the chords that support that melody are probably going to be major chords. Remember, major chords and scales sound happy and bright while minor chords and scales sound sad and dark. Looking at the diatonic chord list, you may recognize that there are only three major chords available—the I, IV, and V chords. When we studied song melodies in Volume 3 you learned that in the resolving phrase of every song, or song section, the chord progression was most likely going to move from the V chord to the I chord. Why is that usually the case? Remember back in Volume 1, and again in Volume 5, when we worked with leading tones? You discovered that leading tones beg to resolve to the root of the scale. If you don’t believe me, play the G scale that is written below.

When you play this scale aren’t you just aching to hear that F# note resolve to the G? Similarly, if you are playing a song that is tonally centered upon G, when you play a D chord and your ear hears the F# note in that D chord, it naturally wants to hear resolution to the G chord. As we will study later in this book, the concept of tension and resolution is something that helps add interest and helps propel music. The tension and resolution between the V chord and the I chord is not great, however, it is significant enough that simple song melodies take advantage of it. The relationship between the root (tonic) and the V chord (dominant) is a strong one and thus most all two or three chords songs include the V chord. On the next page you will find a simple two chord song, “Skip To My Lou,” that demonstrates the I and the V chord relationship. Notice that in measures 1 and 2 the melody consists of all G chord tones, but in measure 3 when the melody moves to the A note as a strong stable note, it calls for the harmony to move to the D chord. Almost all two

T

A

B

1

3 0 2 3 0 2 4

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One Chord Song — “Brother John” (Frere Jacques)

T

A

B

1

G

Are you sleep ing,

0 2 0 0

Ding, ding, dong.

0

0 0 0

É

Ding, ding, dong.

0

0 0 0

- - -

-Two Chord Song — “Skip To My Lou”

T

A

-12

chord songs are going to consist of the I chord and the V chord. Since the I chord and the V chord share a note in common, there is a smooth transition between the I and the V. Chords that share a common tone are called “common tone” chords. The transition between common tone chords is relatively smooth due to the shared tone.

If the tonality of a song melody remains happy and bright throughout and the 4th or 6th notes of the scale show up as stable melody notes (in the key of G, that would be the C note or the E note), then those notes are going to call for a IV chord to provide the harmony. In the key of G, it is the C chord. [You may note that diatonically the E note also appears in the Em and Am chords and the C note in the Am chord, however, those chords give a darker tonality to the progression.] While the relationship between the I and the V chord (tonic and dominant) is the strongest, the relationship between the I and the IV chord (tonic and subdominant) is the next strongest in line.

In a two chord I-V-I progression there is a slight tension set up when the I chord moves to the V and then a resolution when the V moves back to the I. Many three chord songs follow the I-IV-V-I or the I-IV-I-V-I progression because:

1) Shared Major Tonality: These are the only three diatonic chords that have a major tonality.

2) Smooth Transition: The IV chord is a nice transition chord between the I and the V because it shares a note in common with the I chord.

3) Step Transiton: The movement from the IV chord to the V chord works well because the root of the IV chord steps up to the next note in the scale (V).

4) Resolution: The V chord wants to naturally resolve to the I chord.

Therefore, in I-VI, I-IV-V-I, or I-IV-I-V-I progressions in the key of G you have movement in the song’s harmony as shown graphically in the next column on this page.

Adding to the I, IV, V Progression

While most popular songs are written using the I, IV, V chord progression, there are times when a song composer wants to add a bit of flavor to the melody and harmony of a song he or she is writing. The first step in adding to the I, IV, V tone pallet is to use the diatonic minor chords, namely the ii, iii, vi, and vii°. In the parlance of music theory the I, IV, and V chords are called “primary” chords and the ii, iii, vi, and vii°

I - V - I

G - D - G

D

B

G

Fifth:

Third:

Root:

A

F#

D

B

G

Smooth Transition Resolution

I - IV - V - I

G - C - D - G

D

B

G

Fifth:

Third:

Root:

G

E

C

A

F#

D

B

G

Smooth

Transition TransitionStep Resolution

I - IV - I - V - I

G - C - G - D - G

D

B

G

Fifth:

Third:

Root:

G

E

C

A

F#

D

B

G

D

B

G

Smooth

Transition TransitionSmooth TransitionSmooth

Resolution

chords are called “secondary” chords. Lets go ahead and take a look at all of those secondary chords and how you might improvise over them.

An interesting thing to note is that for every major diatonic chord there is at least one minor diatonic chord that shares two of its notes. Chords that share two notes can be used as substitutes for each other because their tonal qualities are so similar. The diagram at the top of the next page shows all of the diatonic chords that share two notes in common. The information in this chart can be helpful in two ways. The first is when you are looking to spice up a given chord progression with chord substitutions. For instance, if a song melody is supported by a I-IV-V progression, but you want to add something different to give some variety to that progression, you can add a substitute chord in order to give a different texture to the harmony.

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I - vim - IV - iim - vii - V - iiim - I

G - Em - C - Am - F# - D - Bm - G

D

B

G

Fifth:

Third:

Root:

G

E

C

A

F#

D

B

G

B

G

E

C

A

C

A

F#

D

B

Substitute Chord Chart

Tim May executed this type of chord substitution on the old Flatt & Scruggs tune “Gone Home” that he recorded for the FGM Records project Flatpicking Bluegrass. Typically the chorus of that song starts on the IV chord for two bars. Tim played it that way the first time through the chorus. However, the second time he played the chorus he started on the ii chord for a bar before moving to the IV chord on the second bar. Since the IV chord and the ii chord share two notes in common, this was a logical chord substitution. In Volume 7 of this course we will take a deeper look at the theory and application of using chord substitutions in order to add texture to an existing chord progression. The second way this chart can be useful to you is when you are trying to figure out chord progressions that support a given melody line. Remember the chord ladder from Volume 2? I’ve reproduced it above for the diatonic chords. If a song is in the key of G and starts with a G chord, but then the tonality of melody

turns minor, you’ll know from this chart that the minor is most likely going to be an Em because in sharing two notes with the G chord the move to an Em tonality is very smooth. Or, it could be an Am chord that is being substituted for the C chord.

An interesting thing to note here is that the Em chord is to the right of the G chord on the chart at the top of the page and the E note is the sixth degree of the G scale. The Am note is to the right of the C chord on the chart and the A note is the sixth degree of the C scale. And, the Bm chord is the right of the D chord in the chart and the B note is the sixth degree of the D scale. The diatonic chord that is built from the sixth degree of any scale is called the “relative minor” chord and it is the fourth most common chord you will encounter in bluegrass, folk, blues, and rock songs (after the I, IV, and V chords). So, let’s take a closer look at the relative minor chord.

iii

vi

ii or IV

V or

vii

I or vi

The Diatonic Chord Ladder

Bm

Em

Am or C

D or F#

G or Em

Tension

Resolution

Chord Ladder

Chord Ladder for Key of G

Em

Am

Dm or F

G or B

C or Am

Chord Ladder for Key of C

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14

I - vi - IV - V Progression in the Key of G: The 50’s Cliche

T

A

B

1

G 3 3 3 0 0 0 3 3 0 0

Em 0 0 0 0 2 2 0 0 0 2

C 3 0 1 0 2 3 0 1 0 2

D 0 2 3 2 0 0 2 3 2 0

The Relative Minor

When song and tune writers are composing and want to insert a feeling of sadness to a tune that is in a major key they will typically first turn to the six minor (vi) chord. The six minor is referred to as the “relative minor” because all of the notes in the six minor scale all “relate” to the notes of the major key. They are, in fact, the exact same notes. The chart on the top of the previous page showed us that in the key of G the G chord and its relative minor, Em, share two notes in common. So the transition from the G chord to the Em chord is smooth, but because of the flat third note in the Em chord the tonality gets dark. In bluegrass this bright-to-dark movement occurs most famously in the Earl Scruggs tune “Foggy Mountain Breakdown.” As we discussed earlier, many bluegrass songs and fiddle tunes use the six minor chord. Pop tunes of the 1950s and early 1960s also made use of this chord, so much so that the I-vi-IV-V-I progression is known as the “50s cliche progression.” Songs like “Earth Angel,” “In the Still of the Night,” “Please Mr. Postman,” “Stay,” and many others, used this progression. Play through the progression shown above and see if it sounds familiar to you. Other popular bluegrass songs that use the six minor chord in various combinations with the I, IV, and V chord are songs like “Rocky Top,” and “Big Spike Hammer.”

Regarding improvisation and the relative minor, you discovered in our “Temperance Reel” example on page 9 that since the notes of the relative minor scale are exactly the same as the major scale you can play the notes of the major scale starting on one of the chord tones of the relative minor and you will be safe. Furthermore, if you play the minor pentatonic scale of the relative minor over that chord you will never play a “wrong” note.

In Volume 5 you learned how to start to improvise using chord tones and scale notes by following a series of practice stages and working with a rhythm track. In this volume we are going to ask that you do that exact same thing with each of the new chord progressions that we present. At the top of the page 16 you will find a simple chord progression in G that includes the Em (vi) chord. You will also find a rhythm track on the audio CD that provides a rhythm bed for this progression. In the tab I’ve simply given an example of how you might improvise over this progression using quarter notes. You’ll remember that in the stages that were presented in Volume 5 you worked with root notes, then leading tones, then quarter notes, then eighth notes, then a mixture of quarter notes and eighth notes. Then you worked with some repeating patterns, then you worked to include different tones from the chord on the first beat of each measure. For each new chord progression that we present in this section of this volume, it would behoove you to go back through all of the steps that you practiced in Volume 5 when you worked with the I, IV, V progression (pages 55-76). Not only will this exercise help you to learn how to solo over these minor chords, but it will help solidify the minor tonality in your ear. So, take the progression shown on page 16 and work through all of the same stages that you work with in Volume 5.

Once you have worked through all of the stages with this progression, try to work once again with “Temperance Reel,” and also play along with the rhythm track of “Blackberry Blossom” that we have provided on track 18 of Disc 1. Work to play a melody-based solo for section A of each of these songs, and then stretch out a bit on the B section and improvise freely over those Em chords.

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Revisiting the Circle of Fifths

Circle of Fifths

C

G

D

A

E

B

F#

C#

A

E

B

F

D

b

G

b

C

b

0

0 a

1#

2#

3#

4#

5#

6#

7#

1

2

3

4

5 ₆

7 b

b

b b b

e

b

f#

c#

g#

a

d#

e

a#

b

f

c

g

d

b b b

5ths 4ths

(Cycle of Fourths)

C

G

D

Am

Em

Bm

IV

I

V

ii

vi

iii

The more you learn about music theory, the more you will learn to refer to the “circle of fifths” to help understand and remember the theory that you have learned. Let’s briefly revisit the circle of fifths (also sometimes called the “cycle of fourths”) here so that we can point out a couple of other useful references that you can find in this chart. At right is a graphic of the circle of fifths as it was presented back in Volume 4. In addition to showing the progressive numbers of sharps and flats in any key and depicting intervals of perfect fifths moving in the clockwise direction (and perfect fourths moving in the counter-clockwise direction), most every graphic presentation of the circle of fifths will also include a presentation the relative minor chord that is associated with each root chord. In our diagram, at right, the relative minor is shown in the inner most circle.

If you want to quickly know the relative minor of G, the circle graphic shows you that it is Em (e). For C, it is Am (a), for D it is Bm (b), etc. However, this is not the most useful part of having the relative minor associations on this chart. Because, really, if you want to figure out what the relative minor of the G chord is, you can simply count six steps up the scale and you have it. The circle of fifths is more useful when you want to look at the bigger picture.

Earlier in this course we talked about how you could glance at the circle of fifths in order to quickly know what the I, IV, and V chords in any key might be. You’ll remember that for any chord that you look at on the circle the chord

to its left will be the IV chord and the chord to its right will be its V chord. Well, if we add the relative minor chords to the mix (as shown below), you may notice that in looking at a small slice of the circle of fifths you are presented with every diatonic chord, with the exception of the vii°. We’ve studied the diatonic chords in the key of G (as shown below), but what if you want to quickly find the diatonic chords in the key of E? A quick glance at the circle of fifths will tell you that they are E, F#m, G#m, A, B, C#m, and D#°!

Book - Improvisation book

Flatpicking Essentials

Improvisation (Part II) &

Advanced Technique Studies

Written by

Dan Miller & Tim May

All contents copyright

2009

www.flatpick.com

800-413-8296

Flatpicking Essentials, Volume 6

Improvisation, Part II and Advanced Technique

by Dan Miller & Tim May

Welcome to the PDF-based version of Flatpicking Essentials Volume 6. All

pages of this book are presented in Adobe Acrobat Portable Document File

(.PDF) format and are printable on your computer printer.

For best results, you will need to have the latest version of Adobe Acrobat Reader

software installed on your personal computer. You may need to visit the Adobe

website (www.adobe.com) to download the latest version of this free software.

The line items in the Table of Contents on the next page are hot-linked to the

pages in this book. To access a particular item, simply click on the title in the

Table of Contents.

www.flatpickdigital.com

Table of Contents

Improvisation, Part II

1

Advanced Flatpicking Technique

41

Introduction

Improvisation, Part II:

Diatonic Chords and Chord Progressions

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T

A

B

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Notes in the G Scale and Diatonic Chord Tones

A

A

A

A

A



A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

A

Chord Tones:

G = G, B, D