Modal Playing

Meathook

I just wanted to declare my love for the Mixolydian and Phrygian... lol

Seriously though, I've spent most of my time when practicing scales just running up and down the neck playing solo to a metronome w/o any thought at all put into the actual modal sounds that each degree makes. Unless you include Aeolian, but that's only because I play a lot of metal in G/Em and before today, I never really looked at it as a mode. I always looked at it as G major.

So here are two tracks for comping ideas. One is a straight A drone so you can choose several different modes, (for instance play in \"D\" for Mixolydian sounds) but the other is a E->F->E \"march\" type riff. This works extremely well for using Phrygian ideas. Just pretend you're in the key of \"C\" but think of E as the tonal center and blaze away. A harmonic minor is also very strong for that one.

These are both at 88 bpm because that's about as fast as I feel comfortable experimenting with 16th note trips. I made these in my looping program if anyone is interested I can post faster or slower versions.

http://www.polytyrant.com/music/Scales/ModalExercises/JazzCompA.mp3

http://www.polytyrant.com/music/Scales/ModalExercises/PhrygianE-88bpm.mp3

Try this lick over the Phrygian jam track. Then move everything up a whole step and play it over the A comp. It becomes a Mixolyidian lick with a real fusion sound. Except I think it sounds better to stop on the major third of the tonal center somewhere instead of the fifth when playing it in Mixolydian. It's a picking pattern I came up with when I was trying to figure out Senor Mouse. Of course pick every note if you can, and those little arrows up top are accent marks. It sounds best when you really lay into the first note of each pair of trips.

partch

For Now Ionian because I play in a Worship Band & everything is major. So that is my most known mode. In Time I shall master all modes & modal playing switching modes with the progresion etc.. for now I'm pretty basic

Meathook

You might like the Mixolydian then too!

Just flat the seventh of a diatonic major and play it over a major chord. Lovely color. ALMOST a minor sound, it's more of a dominant I suppose with the flat seventh if I remember my theory correctly, but if people start looking at you funny, just work your way back to the major third every once in a while! lol I think it has a very reverent sound to it so you may be able to get away with it more often than not.
but it's got sooo much character. You can stop on so many of the notes in that scale imo. Well basically everything but the second degree sound good as a whole note to me.

Meathook

Updated first post with some really monotonous comp tracks. While they will never become hits, they're decent enough for practicing tonal ideas.

partch

Hey Jim this is good stuff!! 8) I'll have to play around with this stuff. Thanks bro All Yeah by the way I played around with Mixolydian during one of our songs that was Bb & then comes up 1/2 step to C for the final verse & Chorus. I liked how it sounded 8) I played it in the E form position 6th fret 3 notes per string 2 octive pattern Were I would normally play the Major Ionian Mode. BUT Targeted the 5th scale degree as the Tonal center & kept all fingering the same so I supose that flatened the 7th deg like you said to do. Anyhow the neat thing about playing this in that position it was very eazy to get back to 1deg very eazy when things felt like they should resolve Thanks for these Ideas Jim this stuff is great!! 8)

Meathook

Yeah very cool partch. That's how I would have done it too. I don't even know any of the \"CAGED\" patterns I only ever learned the 3 note per string patterns. And strangely enough, ever since I started playing guitar pattern five has always been my favorite, though I'm not so sure because of sound, only because it has a REALLY easy to remember shape lol. Mixo is such a great sound to me though now that I know how to get it. (over one chord songs anyway lol)

Hope you can find a use for the tracks :rockon: I'm almost ready to start messing around with the ideas over some changes I'll keep you posted

Tal Rules

Great post M.H.

I tend to look at modal playing, pretty much the way this link describes it..
http://guitarsecrets.com/phrygian.htm
pretty much the interval relationships established by playing the C major scale starting at the 7 possible starting points of C major..

When you explore harmonic minor, whole tone, diinishes scales, you start delving off into areas not covered by the greek modes...

I use a lot of Dorian type licks, in jazz playing..

Meathook

GREAT SITE!

I'm going to see if I can't come up with some better tunes today. :rockon:

thehootman

Harmonic minor rocks!! However the larger intervals between notes make it harder to shred with harmonic minor (ie 16th triplets @ 120bpm) whereas aeolian has a nice layout of the prospective notes, as does phrygian etc.

0Dannyboy

Right on MH great post. checked out your Myspace today...dig that gitfiddle!

Meathook

Yeah Harmonic minor off the fourth degree of a Phrygian scale owns. Trip sixteens at 120? That's monster man. I never was that fast. 110 maybe. I could do straight sixttenths at 140-150 before I quit ten fifteen years ago, but that was in straight runs and not really being able to switch directions at will or put in anything to break up runs.
Major Pentatonic scales and dominant seventh arpeggios go great in Mixo as well. I'm having SO much fun coming up with ideas for sounds. Some of em aren't too bad so I'm gonna keep em to myself hehe
But I'm working on a new project that may get me some $$ and it's related so I'll have to be careful what I post here for a while.

ODB thanks man! Yeah I love that baby. Especially after I let Jeremy at Roseville Guitar Works have a go at it. Anyone in the Greater Sacramento area need a guitar set up, take it that guy. I took mine to another guy who didn't do it right, and I figured, \"everybody has a bad day\" but when I took it back they charged me, and still didn't have it right and blamed it on the strings lol... Well Jeremy has my guitar so in tune, I can play multiple octaves anywhere on the neck and they are absolutely in tune. And the action and relief are perfect. BTW I saw your studio pix in the \"look what I got thread\" and I have to say, I contemplated suicide momentarily... lol What a setup man! It's just gonna take time for me to get back into the swing of things and collect up enough junk to make me look serious. ><

I just got a Berklee workshop DVD today with Rick Peckham; \"Jazz Guitar Modal Voicings.\" So far it's not what I expected, but I\"m only ten minutes in and I have another 47 to go... And even though it may not be what I was expecting, I can see that I am going to learn some cool stuff from it. I think he's mostly going to concentrate on Dorian ideas. I don't particularly like that sound, but hey, since Dorian is a minor mode, I can probably move a lot of those ideas over to Phrygian. I know a lot of the stuff I'm working out for Mixo does NOT translate well to minor modes or anything outside of dominant chords even if I make adjustments to stay in key.

Maybe we should do a sticky thread with DVD reviews because I've gotten a couple of stinkers lately. You get a couple duds and it makes you less likely to buy instructional DVDs. But I've also gotten some real gems. Anyone want to get together and help me come up with a review schema?
It's nice to be able to look inside a book and be able to tell if it's going to cover what you want. But since you can't return DVDs after they're open, it's tougher to make decisions. At least it is for me. I'm on a LOW budget and it stings when I spend fifteen to thirty bucks on garbage :ROCKON:

Dobb

WOW :shock:


JUICY Thread!!!!



8) Great stuff Meathook, This really helped to make modes more useful to me. I memorised the modes and practiced the scales, but never really USED them...but I've had an epiphony...Thanks Guys!!!! 8)

Peace,
Dobb.

Meathook

wow man... that is just awesome to hear! That just really brings it home for me. :ROCKON:

I've got a mellow funk I-IV-I-V-IV-I in twelve bars that is a good next step once you get the hang of the patterns because then you can work on transposing in real time. Work the same mode for each chord change which is harder than it sounds, (in this case, the key will be D for the I,G for the IV, and A for the V. At least to follow each chord with a Mixolyidain sound) and even try to stay in the same position during the turn around and work all three chords w/o moving away from the position you happen to be in when the V comes up. When the Mixo starts to sound like crud, play A minor pentatonic. And then all of a sudden it sounds fresh again! Which brings up another idea which is to play C major pentatonic. The same exact notes, but looking at them from different tonal centers makes them sound like different scales. Also see if you can come up with two or three other pentatonic scales that fit diatonically into each chord. Now you're really gonna get fusion! That's damn hard to keep track of. At lest for me it is lol... Again, not a Grammy winner, but hey, it's all about working things out. Working out when to play tonally comes more naturally than playing modally to me so these tunes are purposefully monotonous!

And I'm just posting as I progress. I'm not trying to be an authority, just trying to share what works for me...


http://www.polytyrant.com/music/Scales/ModalExercises/mellowfunkfusion.mp3

Ok, don't really pay any attention to the actual picking patterns here, these are still WIP, but check out the shapes and where they're played. I'm trying to work out seventh arpeggios for each degree of a dom7 chord. Lots of fun really lol...




Peace, Love, and Good Happiness Stuff,

judoka227

\"Peace, Love, and Good Happiness Stuff\"

Did you write this song for all your friends? When you grow up are you gonna be FAMOUS (drum hit!) rock'n roll guitar player?

Great Vai reference... nice post material too. Keep it goin'.

Meathook

lol. I absolutely love the way that kid says that, and it's one of my favorite phrases. :ROCKON:

Thanks judoka227. I encourage everybody else to post anything related they use as well.

I'm still working on the becoming a famous rock and roll guitarist bit, but that's all part of the fun of it. ><

Got hooked up with some heavy progressive guys last night. Singer and drummer at least anyway. Singer sound pretty damn good. TOOL type stuff. As long as they don't expect me to detune my guit we should have some fun haha

thehootman

\Meathook\ wrote:

Yeah Harmonic minor off the fourth degree of a Phrygian scale owns. Trip sixteens at 120? That's monster man. I never was that fast. 110 maybe. I could do straight sixttenths at 140-150 before I quit ten fifteen years ago, but that was in straight runs and not really being able to switch directions at will or put in anything to break up runs.

Thnx! I spent way too many hours getting that goin 8)

But i have the technique, but i am working on the phrasing (its not that good at the moment)