Printable Version of Topic

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Nov 24 2011, 09:03 PM

To all GMCers! Let's practice together on video chats!


I'm starting this topic for my future video chat program. Video chats are being held every Sunday 16.00 GMT time (11.00 EST, 12.00 EDT)

During these chats we will have topics that will be reserved for the first hour (or 30 mins) of the chat. In the second hour will be dedicated to practice with backing tracks! I will make up a small course designed to help you achieve more precise playing, get yourself familiar with:

1. Pentatonic scale
2. Blues scale/blues improvising
3. Diatonic scale
4. Chords,
5. Arpeggios
6. Improvising in general

For November, we have one important thing to work on, and that is Pentatonic scale. Our first stop towards better playing. I will provide you with backing track day before the chat, and all the necessary material. Stay tuned!

Here's the plan for this part of the course:

- Session 1: Pentatonic scale, boxes 4 & 5, connecting them with slides (Sunday 26th of November)
- Session 2: Pentatonic scale, boxes 1 & 2, connecting them with slides (Sunday 3rd of December)
- Session 3: Pentatonic scale, box 3, and connecting all positions with slides (Sunday 10th of December)

After pentatonic scale, we will move to blues improvising course, that can be found on the separate topic.

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Nov 27 2011, 12:22 PM

Today we have a first practicing video chat, and the goal is to get ourselves familiar with pentatonic scale notes. This is the most important thing, the thing that people are usually neglecting when practicing this pattern. Usually we learn the pattern, but names of the notes somehow go unnoticed.

Let's fix this with some fun exercises that go up & down the pentatonic scale, and see how we can do various exercises on top of this scale, and still stay in context of a harmonic background. We will play along side with the backings, and start from low tempos, so be sure to hop in!

The overall pattern that we will work on is this one, most of you know it as A minor pentatonic scale, although by the end of the chat, I think most of you will have another opinion about it

http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

We will go step by step, using the CAGED format, splitting this scale into five positions on the neck for easier learning:



Here are all 5 backing tracks that you can use for this course. What we will do over backing tracks is this:

1. Play the backing
2. Use the pentatonic pattern
3. Find the root note of a chord within this pattern (i.e. over C major chord, find C notes within the pattern)
4. Play pattern up & down, while making a stop on each root note
5. Increase speed gradually, always making sure you remember these roots and where they are, specially C and A notes!
6. Apply same method for sliding connection licks during the course


C major
http://soundcloud.com/ivanmilenkovicmusic/c

E minor
http://soundcloud.com/ivanmilenkovicmusic/Em

G major
http://soundcloud.com/ivanmilenkovicmusic/c

Posted by: JaxN4 Nov 27 2011, 04:15 PM

This is a great idea Ivan, very usefull.... such a shame, its just out of reach for me. Time zone differences....



I will have to wait for the replay

All the best mate

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Nov 27 2011, 04:18 PM

Ah, sorry to hear that mate, I'll put a log on in the evening.

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Nov 27 2011, 09:10 PM

Thank you guys for coming to today's session, I hope you had some fun with pentatonic scale positions, and I'm guessing you tightened up those fingers a bit too

Here's today's log:


We covered two pentatonic positions of the A minor pentatonic scale:

Position 4:
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Position 5:
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

We went up and down on the position along side with the backing tracks. We also worked on two sliding licks that can help us connect these two positions together. You can also see the chords that were used on top of these licks, relative to the starting and ending note of the licks:

What is important is that we covered 5 chords with these patterns: Am, C, Dm, Em, G. While going up & down the pattern, we made stops on each chord's root note. So when practicing these patterns, play a backing track (i.e. C major), and while playing the pattern, stop on every C note along the way. This will get yourself familiar and comfortable of finding/using that note later on when playing.

Lick 1 (Am)
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Lick 2 (Em)
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Backing tracks for this course are included in the post #2

Posted by: Sinisa Cekic Nov 27 2011, 10:43 PM

Perfect concept mate !

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Dec 4 2011, 02:35 PM

Ready for the next session? (Sunday 4th of December 2011)

We cover two more pentatonic scale positions with the backing tracks (on top of C, Dm, Em, G and Am chords).

Position 1:
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Position 2:
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Let's put these patterns into context, and tighten them up a bit as well. Here are some of the things we we will work on today:

- starting from low tempos
- starting and ending on a root note/making a stop on a root note of the chord along the way
- increasing speed gradually
- covering position connections with slides

Have your guitars ready and let's start at 16.00 GMT time (11.00 EST, 12.00 EDT) !

Backing tracks for this course are included in the post #2

Posted by: JPBluestring Dec 6 2011, 03:47 AM

I have seen so many guitar teachers who pretend to teach guitar while showing only the basics of a few songs without really knowing the real stuff behind what they do, especially with scales and modes. The sessions you prepared Ivan are so well thought and just show how much you know. Your phrasing is always impressive and crisp. But most of all is you ability to explain and simplify in such an easy way the things that are getting complex as we are progressing in our journey to learn guitar. Learning from a real master is not only motivating but inspiring. Thank you honestly for all the genuine effort you put behind your teaching. Thanks man you rock! You're the Blues,..man!

JPBluestring

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Dec 8 2011, 10:31 PM

Thank you very much man, it means a lot! I'll try to have this course interesting, fun and instructional at the same time. I hope you will like it. Thanks again, it means a lot to read this.

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Dec 11 2011, 12:16 PM

Ready for the next session? (Sunday 11th of December 2011)

For today's (final) pentatonic session, we go through the last position that we have left - position 3 of the Am pentatonic scale. We will practice this position up and down following the root notes of the chords playing in the background.

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/687/41709881.jpg/

For the second part of the chat, we will try to connect different positions together, but again with using the notes in context, not just playing randomly. These sliding connections are extremely important as they provide foundation for moving horizontally across the neck, and "breaking out of the box". Here are the essential 4 slide connections we will go through:

Example 1:
http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Example 2:

http://www.guitarmasterclass.net/scalegenerator

Example 3:

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/846/81491654.jpg/

Example 4:

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/405/94077529.jpg/

Have your guitars ready and let's start at 16.00 GMT time (11.00 EST, 12.00 EDT) !

Backing tracks for this course are included in the post #2

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Dec 11 2011, 08:56 PM

I'm finalizing backing tracks for this pentatonic part of the course, but want to make them enjoyable for listening. Stay tuned for them until tomorrow evening!

Backing tracks that will be included are with chords:

- C major
- D minor
- E minor
- G major
- A minor

This will cover the chords/notes of the pentatonic scale we worked on!

Posted by: Ivan Milenkovic Dec 14 2011, 01:09 PM

Backing tracks for this course are included in the post #2