Piano

First day of starting new piano course. Doing ok!

P I A N O

Still playing guitar. Bought a piano course today.

G u I t a r

Spent a controversial amount of time this weekend practicing guitar. Band practice this weekend went well; I get to sing Bruce Channel’s “Hey Baby.” Using a different strategy for soloing that uses:

1. Considering using some modes to the pentatonic shapes.

2. Instead of shifting shapes each time the chords of a song change, I found it easier to play (and sound better) by changing the pentatonic shapes less frequently.

3. Interesting playing a corresponding scale that is the minor (if the song calls for a major) or major (if the song calls for a minor) of the given chord. 

Oh yea …. and still may sign up for piano lessons (on-line). 🤷‍♀️ 

Blah

Made a recording of “All the Things You Are,” chord melody style and then added a solo. Listened back to it, and decided the solo just wasn’t what I wanted to sound like. So I deleted the solo. What was left, the chord melody, wasn’t so great, but it was ok.

Again, it’s just a reminder that I have to actually rehearse the solos … work on them … not at the point where I can solo on the fly. Difficult changing pentatonic patterns quickly within the constraints of the chords.

Had a little dental work. Yesterday I lost a filling from eating candy. And I’m still dealing with a loose top tooth. Long story short: got the filling work, but putting the front tooth repair on hold due to $.

Nice Saturday

Was up about 5:45 AM with the dogs. Picked up guitar than and practiced chord melody song. Back to sleep then went to band practice. Good practice there today. I’m singing that old great song “Hey Baby,” and also “Heartbreak Hotel.” Also did done work on the CCR song “Down on the Corner.” Spent some time after that working up the chord melody song: “All the Things You Are.” Almost done it. It’s taking some work!! Still haunted by a wish to play piano, but the side of me that hesitates is still winning.

Another

Another good practice day. Went over scales (a little), but spent more time relearning chord melody to “All the Things You Are.”

Good Practice

Good practice day. Not a lot of quantity time, but put some good time in. Back to my notes to relearn “All the Things You Are” chord melody style. Sounding good. Went over some scale stuff too. 

Blues

Played a little bluesy stuff, but not really a lot. A cool book arrived yesterday: “The Complete Book of Electric Blues Guitar,” by Dave Rubin. Read the first chapter on T-Bone Walker, and listening to him while I type this.

Guitar … piano

Practiced the five pentatonic scale patterns as well as the five pentatonic blues scale patterns. Also started learning a blues arpeggio for dominant major chords. 

Made a decision today to stop the piano lessons. Sounds maybe a little weird that although I like the sound of the piano, I hate practicing piano. I like practicing guitar, though. It probably makes sense to quit piano, when it’s looked from the perspective of what I’m best at (guitar). I’m more familiar with the guitar. So that explains some of the decision. 

I can always go back to piano if I want.

I’m enjoying the learning of guitar scales. However, I’m thinking that I should start playing them more in the context of songs.

Guitar / Piano / visit

Weekend over. Played more guitar today. Borrowing son’s Stratocaster and amp; he’s borrowing my soprano saxophone. Youngest daughter visited too. 

Did a little more piano stuff today 

Jesus Christ Superstar

Got up early Saturday morning with the dogs, then practiced guitar this morning until it was time for Church music practice with the Church band. Got home and practiced some more. Nice this weekend having youngest daughter, son, and son’s girlfriend over. Went to see Jesus Christ Superstar with son and son’s girlfriend. It was quite cool. Saw the guitarist and keyboard player, and that was interesting. 

Pentatonic Blues Scales

Keeping on working on them !!!!!

Pentatonic Blues Scales

Haven’t posted here in a little while, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been practicing! Continue to try to burn those pentatonic blues pattens into my hands. At this point I’m up to four out of five, but that doesn’t mean that I’ve mastered those four 🤓. 

I go back and forth still about whether I should continue with the piano.  

Regular

Regular day of practice. Still trying to burn in my mind shapes 2 and 3 of the Blues Pentatonic Scale. I got shape 1. Practiced piano too. First day of practicing piano using the new method. Playing C scale with both hands. Not looking forward to going to dentist tomorrow. Having teeth cleaned, and trouble with a false tooth. 

Blues

Trying to learn the blues scale on guitar; I am getting close to it; working on the first three patterns. Started the new piano course. I’m at the very beginner part of the program now. 

Guitar / Piano

Learned how to turn pentatonic shapes 1 and 2 into the blues scale. Played piano at Mass tonight and I’m glad I did it; it went well. Joined a new online piano lesson site….

G u I t a r p I a n o

Not too thrilled with my guitar playing today. Finding it will take practice practice practice to sound like I want to. Just a tiny bit away from starting piano again.

Marathon

It’s a marathon and not a sprint. Yep. That’s where I am regarding music learning. Practiced some soloing tonight in a jazz standard, and it wasn’t particularly fun… Difficult! The right notes in the pentatonic patterns, but translating them in real time to my fingers is different game. The trick too is to not just play the patterns, but to make m u s i c out of those patterns. Needless to say, I wasn’t too satisfied with what I recorded tonight trying to solo. The key is to not get too judgmental! 

Phygerian

Had some fun today playing this mode to a backing track of using two chords. Need some clarification though.

My old school

Guitar

Practiced soloing a bit tonight to “The Way You Look Tonight.” Went ok. Takes practice. Continue to read the Jimi Hendrix biography, and I’m enjoying it. It’s so cool how he loved his guitar. Reminds me of when I was a kid reading some of Hunter Davies book about the Beatles, how I think it was George Harrison who would practice guitar until his fingers were feeling the results. 

My first school that I attended from 1968 to 1976. Amazing… hard to believe that I was in school in the 1960’s.

Epiphone

Used to have this Epiphone 335-Pro. Liked what I think was its coil splitting capabilities:

Found

Found a link to my past music:

https://www.reverbnation.com/shortwaveradioband

Assignment

Recorded what might be the final assessment in my guitar course. My practicing for it sounded better than my actual performance! My playing needs polish, 

From tonight’s recording:

Back at it

Back to practicing some guitar today. Tried a little of the blues scale, worked on improvising to a different jazz standard, and played a little to the guitar course’s jam along stuff. Reading a biography of Jimi Hendrix, and really liking it. 

So Cool

One gigantic eye opening musical learning experience for me was learning that major bar chord. I remember I was using a Bad Co. music book and played some bar chords to their song “Can’t Get Enough.”

Well here I am in 2024 and I had another experience like that. 

I

Learned

How

To 

Solo

So cool. 

Fabulous

Very very happy with my guitar playing these last few days. Soloing all over the place on “All of Me,” first just me playing to a canned background, and then this morning with band. Being able to solo like this is nothing short of

A

Dream

Fulfilled 

🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸🎸

“All Of Me”

Ok, so I made my first recording tonight of me using the Pentatonic Course stuff to solo. Not perfect, but ok for a first go through.

P e n t a t o n I c

Working it on a real chord progression today. Going to take work to get it to sound right. 

Two More

Had group meeting with others regarding the soloing course. Looks like we have two more group meetings to go. This course is good stuff.

Circa 2002

Dud Snowstorm

Was supposed to get some snow, but this morning it looked like we hardly did. Visited youngest daughter today for her 22nd birthday. 

Entered my guitar playing into the course’s site. Learned from it that I could do better knowing the pentatonic shapes.

Wife videotaped me for it. Here’s a still from it:

Guitar Fun

Today’s practice was interesting. Played some of this week’s course work, BUT… then it went somewhere cool. Was getting into playing other stuff, and it felt good to just Play Guitar. 

Morning Practice

Went over soloing over a progression consisting of A major and D major. Progressing in that I found a cool motif, and stretching out from just two patterns. 

Pentatonic Homework

Played a bit to a backing track that was this week’s assignment. Started slow, but then got into it. It’s using two pentatonic scales for their respective chords. Adding to the two scales, I stretched it sometime to other positions. Pleased that I found a cool little melody in there 👍 

It’s going to take some homework to make the scales sound melodic when I use them in a song. 

Ok

Ok day of guitar practice. Not a lot, though. 

Not a Great Guitar Day

Had tooth worked on this morning…

Tried playing pentatonic stuff to a song and was underwhelmed. 

Super Bowl Sunday

Chiefs vs 49ers

Good guitar day. Had our group meeting this morning that went well. It’s a good boost. Asked if teacher can show how to “tap.” For the first time, I actually tapped. Won’t make it a habit 😂 

Good practice today extending some patterns into the secondary ones.

Nice Saturday

Visited a good friend who lives about two hours away. We’ve been getting together with each other every month or two; we alternate whose place we visit. He has a cool “man cave.” He has a number of guitars - a Godin, Gibson Les Paul, Ibanez. Cool hearing him play jazz chords out of the Mickey Baker book. 

Came home and practiced my pentatonic stuff. Starting to try to use the scale over actual songs. Tomorrow will be meeting with the guitar course folks over Zoom. 

Recording this week’s assignment

Pentatonic

No real practice today, but I did record me playing over a jam track supplied in my pentatonic course. It was a challenge! This week, we were to play lead guitar over a two chord jam: G major and D major; the patterns assigned were very close to each other, and this made complicated things! Good workout. But I’m realizing that by focusing on what I’ve been emphasizing (memorizing roots), I leave out focusing on the other course material - 

Pentatonic Application

I think I’ve made significant progress in my endeavor to get some basics of the pentatonic scale into my brain. Today I did not practice a lot, but I tried to apply that scale to improvising on songs. Went ok, but needs work. 

Practice practice practice

Making progress, too.

More Pentatonic Familiarity

Trying (still) to internalize those pentatonic roots for major and minor chords. Getting there! It’s actually a fun challenge,

Chords & Roots

More practice today getting those six important scales down. I can get them, but it takes TIME for me to figure out how to put them on the correct frets.

In other news, looks like a dentist visit in inevitable.

Chords and Roots

As always, a good meeting with the Pentatonic People today. Heard the group leader talk about chord shapes and thought that there ARE chord shapes that can help me remember the scales. Took that idea and ran with it today in practice, and I’m finding it helpful! 

Recording the latest assignment in the course I’m taking:

Guitar & Church

Practicing the guitar big time; I see the potential of the Pentatonic Scale, so I keep working on it. Big Time. 

Played guitar in Catholic Mass tonight. Even received the Sacraments of Penance and the Eucharist. 

Rest in Peace Carl Weathers

Pounding those shapes in my brain. Really think at this point it’s just a matter of time. These are just patterns, though, and the goal is to make music out of them. 

On a sad note… sad to hear of the passing of Carl Weathers (aka Apollo Creed in the Rocky movies). Most of the Rocky movies are special to me, especially the first one. So inspirational. 

Rest in Peace, Carl Weathers 

#BePeace

Learning

Ok so I was going to use my memorization of roots in order to remember the applicable pentatonic shape. (Let’s call that Plan A). But that wasn’t working. So I was then going to use the instructor’s method of remembering scales by their chord shapes. But that wasn’t working. I liked, though, how with his method, it greatly organizes things by simplifying choices. (Let’s call that Plan B). But what is working?

What is helpful is mixing the “best of” both plans. I’ll use the ‘finding root method’ instead of using chord shapes. BUT, I’ll use how Plan B organizes things. And it’s working! Plan C to the rescue!

REGROUP!!!!!

I don’t think my memorization method is a good idea for me. I can remember the roots, but transferring that knowledge from a lead sheet to my guitar is more time consuming than I want it to be; it will take too long for me to see, let’s say an “Eb” on a lead sheet and then find the correct pattern that goes with it. So I think I’m going to try it the teacher’s way: memorize the 6 chords that are associated with whatever patterns. This method might yield quicker results. 

Played guitar today with the scales. Tried a little of extending the pentatonic shape by getting out of just one box. 

Really liking the course, and I’m blessed to have found it. 

Pentatonic saxophone

Didn’t play guitar today, but continued to review those scales in my head. Going well. Saw an advertisement today for a saxophone learning method, and it was a little tempting.

My “Go To” guitar

Clicked!

All those attempts to learn the roots to the minor and major scales in five pentatonic shapes paid off today. It is definitely becoming easier and that’s a great thing. With the guitar in hand, I thought of a key and looked to where the minor and major roots were in each shape. And it went well! I can see that it will take time to play the scales on the fly if I’m presented with a lead sheet, but it’s good that some good progress was seen today!

It’s Difficult!

It’s really tough for me trying to memorize those minor and major pentatonic notes in the five shapes. Frustrating. Had meeting with the guitar group and instructor today. Told them how difficult it is for me to memorize this stuff; instructor suggested that NO, don’t do it that way because it’s too much. Of course I choose the tougher road. It’s the two big NFL playoff games today; watched the first one and tried throughout it to work on the memorization. It’s difficult for me! 

Minor & Major Pentatonic

Hard day’s work on trying to get those pentatonic scales down. I think I may have 6/10 (kind of) down… Difficult to use them in context, but then again, it would be best to see this pentatonic stuff as a “work in progress…”

Major Major Major Major Major

Continue to work on getting those 5 major pentatonic scale roots internalized. 

Major Pentatonic

Ordered, and received today, a blank music book that only has guitar grids. Thinking it would be good to use that to help internalize those pentatonic scales. Started with the major pentatonic shapes and I’m very pleased with the progress I made today.

A little practice

Getting ready for my journey into memorizing the root notes of minor and major pentatonic scales. Did practice a little today with major pentatonic shape 2 with backing tracks. It’d be nice if I could play at a faster speed. 

Pentatonic Plan

Had group guitar lesson today with the teacher and the other guys in the group. Looks like I need to do some hard work to get where I want to go. Planning of making a list:

May be wrong about this, but:

Out of the five shapes, each one has scales within them. I think each has two ways to play the major scale and two ways to play the minor scale. 

So each shape has 4 within it. 

So 40 to remember? Wow… we’ll see. Still have to check all this and work it out better.

EDIT January 24, 2024: Thank goodness I was wrong; it’s NOT 40 to remember!!!!!!! I started today (1/24/24) working on this and it looks like there’s only TEN to remember!!!!!

Moving On With the Soloing Course

Frustrating doing the process of recording for the course. I’m not the best computer technician, and I find it difficult to manage pushing buttons, trying to get the laptop to behave, dealing with guitar cord stuff, wires, etc. But I made a recording nonetheless that was ok. 

Finding that trying to get ahead of myself in the course is not a good thing (trying to apply what I learned so far to soloing over “Misty.”). 

Keeping with the pace of the course is advised (for me, anyway).

Mellow and Productive

Did some learning of shape 2 of the pentatonic scale. Didn’t cram a lot of learning in today… mostly just shape 2. Trying to ingrain the major and minor starting points in that shape.

Pentatonic Scales

Big Guitar Day

Made my first two videos for the guitar course. One is using the minor pentatonic scale over a mostly static background track; the other is doing the same over using a major pentatonic scale. (I consider it an achievement that I was actually was able to video myself and upload the videos to the guitar course site)!

Also played around with the scales trying to get the knack of roots. Played around using the scales to the first two measures of “Over the Rainbow.” Didn’t really like the way it sounded; but on repeated tried it sounded good. Conclusion is that just learning the pentatonic scales isn’t enough for me. Also have to really ingrain them in my brain and practice a lot of integrating them.

Here’s a pic from a video:

Scaled back

A bit of scaled back guitar practice today. Tried to figure out how to submit videos for my guitar course. Had trouble with it, but I think I got it, mostly. Hate to spend time learning that stuff, but it’s good. Practiced a little improvising with the A minor and A major backing tracks. It’s tricky! 

Pentatonic Scale(s)

Trying to memorize root notes of major and minor pentatonic scales. Played along to a backing track consisting of either an Am chord or an A major chord. Good well, but still need practice.

Pentatonic Scale(s)

Worked hard today trying to get accustomed to where the locations of the the roots are in the minor and major pentatonic scales. Want to keep working hard on this. 

Here’s the book that I’m using; getting a head start on the Pentatonic Course by using this book, (I originally posted about this book in my entry on this blog for July 30, 2019).

Pentatonic Scale

Felt like I got a lot accomplished today. Completed learning the pentatonic scale in various places around the neck. Using the Pentatonic book which has been very valuable. Learning them by looking at the root is a deal changer, as is learning how to mix the patterns (as opposed to learning five distinct isolated box shapes) as well as emphasizing the notes on the higher strings. 

Finding it refreshing to improvise using just one thing (the pentatonic scale) rather than trying to learn complicated systems of soloing using different scales. 

Taking place tomorrow is our first Zoom group meeting which is run by the Pentatonic Scale course leader.

Pentatonic Scale

Having a successful time integrating Boxes 1, 2, and 5 of the minor pentatonic scale. Liking it and feeling confidence. Sounds like I know what I’m doing 😂 

Pentatonic Scale

Had a good talk with the individual who is in charge of the guitar course that I’m taking. Getting into the pentatonic scale, using Lee Nichols’ book: “Pentatonic Scale Fluency.” It’s elegant, to the point, and written clearly.