Gus - Phrygian Dominant "10 lessons in 1" SI Lesson

Gus

Introduction

Welcome

Hello, GMC - My name is Gustavo Costa. So it is Gus C ( not a Gus G yet )

I also added a silly welcome video (Main video comes later in the post) : Welcome.avi ( 16.86MB )

I live in Aalborg, Denmark, where I am studying mobile communication. I was born and lived almost all my life in Brasília, capital of Brazil. Really good city but it was good to move. It is such a good experience to live abroad for some period. I am 26 years old and played acoustic since I was 8. But I stopped several times, I was lazy to practice and played basically chords.
3 years ago me and some close friends decided to form a band (named Rotação 355) and then I started learning electric guitar and lead. Currently, I am playing acoustic style with one band and electric with another.

I just love music. Not only hearing and playing, but also dancing. About rock I like pretty much every genre, from ballads to metal. My favorite guitarists are Jimmy Page, Slash, Kirk Hammett and Augusto Licks (brazilian guitarist of the golden era of Engenheiros do Hawaii). But there are so many more (Joe Satriani, Gus G, David Gilmour, Mark Knopfler, ... )

Still, I will give you one example of song from each, to make you understand one kind of song I just love: songs that build up emotions all the way to the top. From slow clean melodies to shredding at bulky distortion: Stairway to Heaven, November Rain , Fade to Black, O exército de um Homem Só (Parte 1) . That's also I believe the best construction for a solo: use full speed only in the climax.

That said, I hope you like the dynamics of feeling of this lesson, and can learn something

I try to give advices about execution, as well as insight on how I composed that. I believe it can be useful indepedently of the level you play. I classificated each part according to level. Remember also that even beginners can play advanced stuff, if you start practicing slowly. Off course advanced students are encouraged to play all of it until full speed

The Lesson

One video worths more than 1000 words, so just put it through your best sound system and hopefully you enjoy :
Main.avi ( 25.33MB )

If that's too big for your download, check the version in my YouTube channel:

Years ago I learned the intro of "Come out and Play", from The Offspring. The sound is so amazing. It is exotic and at the same time cativating. Kind of "egyptian" or "middle-eastern".
But at that time I did not know anyhthing about scales. When I started learning major and minor scales I realized it did not fit any of them. Then, I learned the harmonic minor and I though my quest was over. When learning modes, I didn't revise the concept, but finally in GMC I came accross the modes of harmonic minor, and amongst them the phyrigian dominant scale. Well, that definetely is it: that exotic/cativating sound comes from Phrygian Dominant mode. I was instantly passioned for this scale.

This lesson starts with a Dm pentatonic feel. It has lots of slow and fast parts, building up until full blast usage of D Phrygian Dominant.
But don't be afraid of fast parts! Just learn it slowly.
The bass line on backing track is just D, which gives full room to change the modes.

Each part of this lesson has an aspect I am highlighting on the explanation and that's the way I am naming the section. So, if for example you liked the frenzy pick tapping you may want to check part 07 directly. Actually, as this part is a little bit trickier I did a 101 video. The class is a little long (cause I like detailed explanations ), but if it's too much for you try at least checking the sessions you are more interested into and/or according to your level:

01 - Vibrato
02 - Bending
03 - Pentatonic licks
04 - Changing the mode
05 - Fast pull off
06 - Wild Pinky(little finger)
07 - Pick tapping mixed with normal legato
08 - Staccato
09 - Bridge
10 - Tremolo picking

Here are the scales used in the lesson, (reused and adapted with Muris/Kris permission):

D minor pentatonic
D F G A C

The "aliens" notes here are 2 notes that don't belong to D minor pentatonic but I am using occaionally: G# and Eb. Though I called them "Aliens", they are not choosen by chance. The first one is the blues note. And the minor pentatonic added of blues note is the blues scale. The other one is the main characteristic of Phrygian mode.

D dominant phrygian (in the diagram there are some repetitions. I just included the notes used in the lesson).
D Eb F# G A Bb C

Here are the full tabs for the lesson. You can see the notation on the text file:
PhrygianDominant.gp5 ( 6.56K )
Phrygiandominant.txt ( 14.64K )

I did not include all the tabs in the explanation, otherwise it would make it hard to read. One important thing to notice about tabs: they are tabbed to normal E tuning, but my guitar was actually on Eb tuning in the video. I hope this does not become a problem to learn from the lesson. I apologize for the confusion, but who owns guitar with floating bridge knows we don't want to change the tuning every day...

Part 01 - Vibrato

Part 01 - Vibrato: 01vibrato.avi ( 4.42MB )

Hey, ending long notes in vibrato gives more expression to your playing. Actually, within time you become addicted to use vibrato on every long note ending phrases.
Vibrato, in electric guitar is basically about moving your fretting finger a little bit up and down in appropriate tempo. In classical guitar technique you do it also sideways (which I also use sometimes, specially after finishing a slide).
In the bending note there is a small vibrato just to keep the sustain a little bit more, and in the other note there is quite a wide vibrato that combined with delay and reverberation accentuates the note without being boring.

E||---------------------|---------------------|---------------------------|--------------------|
B||--13b----------------|---L~----------------|--13br------10--13~--------|---L----------------|
G||---------------------|---------------------|---------------------------|--------------------|
D||---------------------|---------------------|---------------------------|--------------------|
A||---------------------|---------------------|---------------------------|--------------------|
E||---------------------|---------------------|---------------------------|--------------------|

Part 02 - Bending

Part 02 - Bending: 02bends.avi ( 7.95MB )

First part already has a bend, but in this part it is on spotlight.
Bending is a technique that actually removes one of the limitations of guitars. Guitars are well-tempered instruments, and as such they are "more suited" to some (standard) specific sounds. But, while bending you actually can reach any frequency (pitch) you want, within guitar range.
In other words, while bending what you should trust the most is your ears. You are probably going to see tabs of Jimmy Page, Slash or any of your favorite guitarists doing 1/4 and 3/4 tone bends. That means they just followed their ear at that point doing "non-standard" notes
The main bend here is exploring one interesting situation: In the combined first/second pentatonic box, in 3rd string (G) you can reach 3 interesting notes while bending: the 4th, the blues note(augmented 4th) and the 5th.
What I am doing here is starting in the 4th, going to the blues note 2 times. The blues note gives an nice feeling of unfinished things (try it yourself). And then I go to the 5th (one of the most recognizable intervals by human hearing). All of that bending.

E-------------------------------|---------------------|
B--13--10-----------------------|---------------------|
G----------12--10--12brbrb------|---L--------L--------|
D-------------------------------|---------------------|
A-------------------------------|---------------------|
E-------------------------------|---------------------|

There are 3 things I took quite a while to learn about bending that can make your life easier  : 1) The thumb should be on the top of fretboard providing strong turning point so that hand and arm work on the bend (not only your fingers)
2) Using more than one finger to the bend will add you more strength to do it.
3) When bending upwards, to stop the string just above from ringing you can use your index finger on it. Here I have my index on 4th string, and middle and ring fingers are bending the 3rd string.

The last phrase of this part is what I would call a spoiler. It adds the minor 2nd to the pentatonic. The minor 2nd characterizes the phrygian mode, so it is giving an idea to the listener: phrygian is coming!

|-----------------------------|--------------------|
|-----------------------------|--------------------|
|--12--10---------------------|--------------------|
|----------13--12~---L--------|---L----------------|
|-----------------------------|--------------------|
|-----------------------------|--------------------|

Part 03 - Pentatonic licks

Part 03 - Pentatonic licks: 03pentatonicLicks.avi ( 9.34MB )

Licks are very short but effective phrases, that you can practice over and over so that they become automatic. Then you simply pull them out of your musical quiver during your solos. First pentatonic box is really great for that.
Both licks here are very simple, but effectively starts speeding things up.
The first one uses three notes, with a pull off.

E-------------------------------
B--13p--10------10--13p--10-----
G-----------12---------------12-
D-------------------------------
A-------------------------------
E-------------------------------

The second one is a matching bend. That is, the bend goes until reaching the other note being played, giving a fast repetition feel, with just two notes.

E---------------------------------------|
B--10-------10-------10-------10--------|
G------12b------12b------12b------12br--|
D---------------------------------------|
A---------------------------------------|
E---------------------------------------|

Again, this section finishes with the phrygian spoiler phrase.

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