Advanced Guitar lessons!

Hey everyone! So today, I’m going to be teaching some advanced guitar lessons that is going to take you to the next level. 

Before we get started, let’s have our moment of silence. 

At this time, I would like all of us to take a moment of silence and pray to God to help us to become the person that he wants us to become. Take a minimum of 5 minutes and pray for this. 

Now back to the show

Advanced Guitar lessons: Knowing your scales

So the first thing that you should absolutely know as a guitarist are your scales. 

Often, us as guitarists are called to solo over a chord progression with other instruments. And you might be wondering, “German, how do all of those guitarists know what note to play at the right time?”

I’m going to explain soloing and improvising in a minute, however, it’s important to note that knowing your scales are going to help you to decide what notes to play in a key.

Say for example if The Chord progression is A, F#m, D, and E, I automatically know that, that’s the key of A.

So what happens is that once we learn our scales, we know what notes fit exactly in that chord progression. 

Let me explain it like this. 

The notes in the Key of A major are A, B, C#, D, E,F#, G#, and back to A for the octave. 

If I know my scales, I will be able to play every single A,B,C#, D,E,F#,G# that there is on the guitar. 

And if you ever see that chord progression that I mentioned above, you will know that the A major scale will fit perfectly with the chord progression that you have given me.

So I automatically know what notes to play all over the guitar. 

Now I know what you’re thinking, “German, that’s great news, however, How do I know what key I’m supposed to play in? And also how am I supposed to memorize where every Note is on the guitar?”

So to those two questions, let’s talk about that. 

The first question is how do I know what key I’m supposed to play in right?

Alright. It’s really simple, DO NOT OVERCOMPLICATE IT.

Let’s start with the key of C.

If you see No sharps or flats in the Key signature, then that means it’s the key of C major. 

And that means that the notes in the Key of C are A, B, C, D, E, F, G. Like I said, no sharps or flats. 

Now let’s move on to the key of G.

The key of G has One Sharp, F#.

So the notes in the key of G are A, B, C, D, E, F#, G.

The key of D has 2 sharps, F# and C#

So the key would be: A, B, C#, D, E, F#, G

And it keeps going in an order that was determined by the music theorists back in the day. I’m not going to describe why this order is this way because that would just confuse everyone, but here is the order that these sharps fall in place. 

The first sharp to go would be F#, Second would be C#, third would be G#, fourth D#, fifth A#, 6th would be E#, and 7th would be B#.

*** So that would mean that there are a total of 7 Sharp Keys. I know that sounds a little tricky, but I’ll explain it.  

If you want a chart that will tell you what are the sharps and their keys, here it is: 

C major: 0 sharps, 0 flats

G major: 1 Sharp, F# (Remember, whenever you start a key, the proper way to annotate that is to start with the root note, which is almost always going to be found in the name of the key. In the key of G major the root note would be G. so the notes would be annotated as G, A, B, C, D, E, F#, G)

D major: 2 sharps, F# and C#

A major: 3 sharps, F#, C#, and G#

E major: 4 Sharps, F#, C#, G#, and D#

B major: 5 Sharps, F#, C#, G#, D#, and A#

*F# Major: 6 Sharps F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, and E#

*C# Major: 7 sharps, F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, E#, and B#

Note the two keys that I have mentioned with a star. Those two keys are called F-sharp Major and C-sharp Major respectively. 

Don’t worry about why they’re called that just yet, I don’t want to confuse you if you’re not already confused just yet! Haha! 

A good way to remember all of the sharps is to remember this Fresh, Clothes, Get, Dirty, After, Eating, Breakfast!

F#, C#, G#, D#, A#, E#, and B#

Let’s talk about the flat keys

They follow another pattern. And the pattern would be BEADGCF

And the flat keys would be F major has a B flat, B-flat Major would be B-flat and E-flat, E-flat Major would be B, E, and A flat. A Flat major would be B, E, A, and D Flat. D flat major would be B, E, A, D, G Flat.  G flat major would be B, E, A, D, G, C flat. C flat major would be B, E, A, D, G, C, F flat. And C flat major would be B, E, A, D, G, C, and F flat.

So a total of 7 flat keys! 

Now, how do you memorize every single note and play it in pattern so efficiently? 

Well there’s two ways to do this, both of them you have to do EVENTUALLY. However there’s a cheating way to do it and that’s the way that I’m going to teach you right now. 

So you could literally memorize every note on the guitar, and people do that as professionals. 

However, in order to solo and get good at soloing, you have to understand that the scales on the guitar are moveable.

What does moveable mean?

It means that the same pattern that I play for the A major scale, is the same pattern for the G major scale except it’s located in different places on the fretboard. 

So to boil it down for you, if you know one pattern, you know them all. And it’s also the same for almost every other key or chord or pattern that you could possibly think of. 

Do me a favor.

Right now, Google specifically G major scale on guitar, you’ll notice a pattern on a fretboard as an image. Then Google, A major scale pattern on the guitar. You will notice that the patterns are copycat twins except the A major scale is located 2 frets up. 

So that’s the cheating way to do it! 

You will eventually as advanced guitarists need to learn the entire fretboard because it will help to do advanced things on the guitar. 

But when you’re first starting out soloing, it’s not that crucial. 

Soloing

A good solo will have the crowd roaring for your name. It will make people feel and dance and just have a great impact on the crowd. 

Now remember, that music is rhythmic. Therefore, you have to be in time in order to sound good as a soloist. 

The way that you make great solos is by writing out your solos. 

If you plan your solo ahead of time, you will create better solos. 

Now there are some other aspects to soloing that you probably want to use. 

It’s not just playing the scales back and forth in a monotonous manner. 

No, you have to make it exciting! 

As guitarists we have a wide array of tools in our own hands that can make a solo exciting!

Slides, hammer ons, pull-offs, tremolo, sweep picking, raking, palm muting, elongating the notes, shortening the notes, staccato, pinch harmonics, chords, arpeggios, etc. etc. there are a wide array of tools that you can do that will make your solo sound exciting. 

Now there are some general rules to soloing.

1. Keep it simple. (It’s more important to sound musical than it is to sound fast. You use fast speeds to show raw aggression or energy. So most of the time it’s best to keep it slow and phrasy)
2. Start low and end high, this creates a dynamic that is impactful!
3. Repetition is key. Repeat phrases so they get stuck in your head. 
4. Learn a whole bunch of licks. Remember how I said that patterns are moveable? Well, licks are patterns that you can use for your own benefit, so learn a whole bunch of licks that sound cool to you. 
5. Practice, practice, practice. 
6. Start high and end low. This is another theory that people like to use and is also impactful because it creates a dynamic. The point is to change in the solo while you move through your phrases. 
7. Practice your phrases and transitions. The better your phrases, the more impactful your song. 

Improvising

Improvising is exactly that, soloing except that you make it up on the spot. 

Now, it goes without say that soloing and improvising are very similar. However, improvising needs practicing making things up on the spot. 

Use the same scales and techniques as in soloing, except just use it wherever you see fit while you’re in a jam session.

The way you practice making things up on the spot, is by using your scales and just playing the things that you made up on the spot. 

So say for example if I were to practice improvising, I would just practice soloing on the guitar, I would not write it down, I would just start playing the guitar and improvising in TIME.

That means using a metronome or a backing track to help me keep beat. 

In conclusion

I could teach you guys a million things on the guitar, but It would really be up to you to practice it. So, what I gave you guys today is gold, trust me, it’s gold. Ask questions if you don’t understand, I would be happy to help you.

Broadcast

I sure hope that I have been an inspiration and a hope to you all. Please remember to pray, read your bible, go to church, and love God above all else. Like, comment, share, subscribe, and  I will see you all next time. 

If you want to go to heaven, then believe in Jesus and you will go to heaven. (John 3:16)

Thank you all for listening in on this blog post. 

German Gonzalez, signing out!