Solo guitar

[S.Carter]

I've based my solo guitar style on pick&fingers technique. I developed it while I was teaching at Berklee. I posted my solo piece "Baba Ghanosh" on this site, as an example.

Over the years many students have asked me about pick&fingers (p&f) technique, and this is a great chance to dig into it.

To me, the melody of a tune is important. When I play p&f style, my RH pinky has to play the melody, and the melody has to sing out. There are some considerations.

First, it's important that you learn to bring out the melody note
*somehow*. I was fortunate in having Bill Leavitt (Chairman of the Berklee Gutiar dept.) as my boss and good friend. He showed me how to accellerate the pick to bring out the top note. So, most important, I had the *sound* and conception in my head.

When I tried to do the same with the pinky, I had problems.

My steps toward a solution:
First. I make sure the RH is angled so that the flesh of the finger
hits the string first, and the nail hits as the finger leaves the
string. Then I worked on the angle, changing the hand position until
the tone was good. Lots of flesh for warmth and body, a little nail
for harmonics (overtones). Remember that overtones actually affect the
way you hear the fundamental, and therefor the lower overtones. Then,
since I could not make the pinky louder, I made the other fingers
softer. Balance is everything.

Steve

[szulc]

I am confused by your discussion of accelerating the pick to bring out the top note. You say this right after you said that you use your RH pinky for the melody.
What do you mean accelerate the pick anyway?
Hit the note faster or harder?

[S.Carter]

To clarify about accelerating the pick:

Before I played p&f style, I played chord-melody with the pick. Later I applied the concept of "balancing the chord" to p&f style.

Bill Leavitt's explanation was something like the following.
You want to hit the top note the hardest. Suppose you have a Cma7 chord on strings 5,4,3,2,1 (3rd fret), and you want the E on the second string to be the melody. Think of hitting the 5th string softly, then increasing the pressure (moving the pick faster as you cross the strings). 4th string a little louder, 3rd a little louder, then 2nd loudest. The problem is that you've build up momentum and you end up sounding the first string.

Now think of the first string as a "pick stop" (like a backstop in baseball). You should hit the second string hard enought that you see the first string bend a little as it stops the pick. Just the right amount of pressure and you get the melody note nice and clear.

But what if the first string has the melody note? Then you imagine another string past the first string, and you aim for that as an imaginary pick stop.

When I moved to p&f, I simply practiced making each note the loudest. On that Cma7 chord, the right hand, from the low note up, is pick-2,3,4, that is, pinky on second string. So (I'll use caps to indicate volume:) C-g-b-e, c-G-b-e, c-g-B-e, c-g-b-E. The pinky needed extra practice, but by doing it this way, I could hear what needed to be done.

Hope that makes it clearer.

[Guni]

Hi Steve,

I'm glad that this topic pops up as it is a great extension to the Chord Solo thread.

I don't know if you remember but when I took your classes at Berklee I was pretty much against using p&f for that kind of style. I did try this technique for quite some time but using just the fingers seemed to sound so much better (probably due to my classical background).

Well, ... until one day I came up with an idea that combined single lines with chords and a separate bass line. In order to play this idea I needed to have another look at this technique.

The biggest problem I encountered was the weakness of my right hand pinky. I mean over the years all other fingers underwent some serious workouts. With the pinky I started at zero. I undusted some of the classical etudes I was working on years ago and reworked them with this new technique. This actually worked pretty well.

How did you go about getting the necessary strength? Any special exercises you can recommend?

Thanks,

Guni

[S.Carter]

Hi Guni,
Yes, I remember your insistence on fingers. I don't know which of us was more stubborn at the time.

I don't think of the pinky as being weak and needing strengthening. I think of it as a matter of developing flexibility and coordination. Once again, for me, the secret is not to make the pinky note louder, but to make the other notes softer.

However, I did some exercises.

Here's one:

[S.Carter]

Gunharth asked about exercises to strengthen the right-hand pinky. I've made a soundfile with an exercise that eventually became an intro to a tune.

The vamp uses Ebmaj7 and Bbm7, in the VIIth position.
There are two pedal tones, on string 6 and string 1.

Right hand: the pick plays strings 6 and 5, finger 2 plays string 4, finger 3 plays string 3, pinky plays strings 2 and 1. So that Bb pedal tone on the 1st string is played by the pinky. The goal is to get it to ring out like a vibraphone note.

Also, the melody is played mostly with the pinky, so the vamp was good preparation for getting those hight notes to ring.


The soundfile is taken from my solo CD, Act One. The tune is Didni, but Antonio Carlos Jobim.

Since the soundfile is too big to attach to a forum message, I put it on my website: www.frogstoryrecords.com.

I used the vamp as an intro to the Jobim tune, Dindi. These days I play the tune slower, which I think captures the mood better.

Steve

[S.Carter]

Another pick-and-finger exercise.



Steve

[S.Carter]

Keys can be important for solo guitar.

Eb is one of my favorite keys for solo pieces. Melodies in that key lay generally high on the second string or on the first string. I remember that one of the first chord-melodies I learned was "Dindi" (which I've since recorded on two CDs) - in Eb. The tune made quite an impression on me the first time I played it. I was working with a small group with a singer. Then I did not play it for a while. A few years later, a student came by my office at Berklee and said, "Do you have a leadsheet to Dindi." I said no, but come back in about 20 minutes. I wrote up a lead sheet from memory. That reminded me how much I liked the tune, and I started on a chord-melody solo.

Other tunes I do in Eb:
Moonlight in Vermont (medley with Misty)
God Bless the Child
Watch What Happens

[Guni]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for all of your input. I am just working on a chord solo and was thinking if you could share your experience with approaching such a thing. Ok, first step is that you know the tune well. Now, do you work some parts out on paper or do you just work with the guitar in your hands or or both?

Also, when arranging a tune for live performance how do you structure a song and due to what criteria. I mean how much is actually improvised and how much is prepared?

I gotta call yesterday for a solo guitar gig. The guy is asking me to play for about 2 hours. I never did that before but of course I said 'yep sure':D Man this will be a new experience - not having a band to back me up is a new challenge and I gotta work on that tune-wise and mentally.

Guni

[S.Carter]

Originally posted by Guni
[B]Hi Steve,

I am just working on a chord solo and was thinking if you could share your experience with approaching such a thing. Ok, first step is that you know the tune well. Now, do you work some parts out on paper or do you just work with the guitar in your hands or or both?


Just the guitar in my hands, but if I come up with something I might forget, I notate it.


Also, when arranging a tune for live performance how do you structure a song and due to what criteria. I mean how much is actually improvised and how much is prepared?


I work out the head and improvise the rest. Sometimes I'll work out some interesting chord voicings, maybe over a bass line (like the middle of my solo on "Skating in Central Park" on my CD).

Depending on the setting, I plan on playing at least one improvised chorus. If it's early in the night, maybe a cocktail hour, when people want to (subconsiously mostly) hear tunes they recognize, I limit it to one chorus. Once I've won them over, or feel I can stretch out, I do more. I try not to do more that one full chorus of single lines, and rarely even that. I punctuate with chords in my improv.

Sometimes I'll have a plan for several choruses: 1 - hea;, 2 -chord-melody improv staying close to the melody; 3 - single line with lots of chords; 4 - single line through both A sections, 3-note chords on bridge, 4-note chords on last A; 5 - head.


I gotta call yesterday for a solo guitar gig. The guy is asking me to play for about 2 hours. I never did that before but of course I said 'yep sure':D Man this will be a new experience - not having a band to back me up is a new challenge and I gotta work on that tune-wise and mentally.


Two hours is a lot. Over the years, I worked up to four hours, but even now two hours is a lot. Most solo gigs are background music, and people notice when it stops, so you pretty much have to play non-stop. Sometimes instead of putting a clear ending on a tune, I'll vamp and noodle and work my way into another tune.

You really need to work up -- if you have time between now and the gig -- to 2 hours.

Good luck with the gig!

Steve

[Bongo Boy]

Originally posted by Guni
I gotta call yesterday for a solo guitar gig. The guy is asking me to play for about 2 hours

Can you elaborate? I don't understand what this means--"solo" and "two hours" seem self-contradictory. What's going on during the two hour period. Remember, I'm still an idiot--very little hope of the situation improving, either.

[S.Carter]

Originally posted by Bongo Boy


Can you elaborate? I don't understand what this means--"solo" and "two hours" seem self-contradictory. What's going on during the two hour period. Remember, I'm still an idiot--very little hope of the situation improving, either.

"Solo" in this case, simply means unaccompanied. Just guitar, playing -- as much as possible -- chords, melody and bass line.
Some players' recordings you could listen to as examples:
Tuck Anress
Joe Pass
Martin Taylor
Johnny Smith
George van Epps

If you listen to the sound samples on my web site, those are examples of what I'd play on a "solo" gig. In fact, several tunes on my "Act One" CD were recorded live at a solo gig.

Steve

[S.Carter]

Why solo guitar?

A lot of people ask me that. At this point in my career almost all my gigs are solo. Just me and my guitar.

I've played with groups for many years. Everything from quartets and quintets to big bands. I've enjoyed it and learned a lot.

About 5 years ago I decided to focus on solo guitar. I still do gigs with duos or trios occassionally. But when I do a duo with a sax, the sound is nice an full during the sax solo, because I play bass lines and chords, but when it comes to my single-line solo, the bottom drops out. There's no way I can make my lines sound as full and rich as a tenor. On a solo gig it's different. I play bass and chords on the head (melody), and can then "set up" the single line solo section, by gradually or abruptly changing the texture.

I'm still learning to leave space. I'm always afraid that long single-line improvs will sound empty or lose the listener. But I'm learning that is not the case. I'm learning to stretch out more.

One approach I'm taking is to start a tune with single-line improv. My favorite tune for this is "Black Orpheus". I improvise a chorus of single-line, mostly rubato, then go into a vamp, then into the head. Seems to work.

Steve

[S.Carter]

I see from the "Views" stat on the Forums list that a lot of people view this thread -- over 700 views so far! Yet few post to it.

I did get a question by email about solo guitar. I decided to post the answer as part of my Player's Journal on my website,
http://www.frogstoryrecords.com, rather than reply here, partly because my reply is too long to make a useful thread entry.

As time goes on, I'll be adding to my Player's Journal, so you might want to check it out every few days. Since my main thing these days is solo guitar, it will mainly deal with that, though I'll probably rample on a bit about music in general.

If I have brief observations, or answers to questions, I'll post them in this forum thread.

Steve