r/jazzguitar

the keys, guitar, and horns all are just so tasteful, i get the licks are a lot of cbromatisism and arpeggios, but how can i follow the chords and play like that?

Hello everyone,

I’m looking for help identifying an instrumental track I recorded from an Italian radio station back in 1988 or 1989. The song is a blend of 80s smooth jazz, Italo disco, soul, and funk. I have tried several music recognition apps, but unfortunately, none of them have been able to identify it.

Does anyone recognize this piece or have any leads? I would truly appreciate any help you can provide!   

here's the link: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/u4ewhb8xfcgle6kjmrg2o/instru-80-s-long-version.mp3?rlkey=nqol5wpxswt1kulwzgeypmnq3&st=z5q9f0de&dl=0

Hey, relatively a beginner here. Let's say you start working on a new tune - ATTYA. There's plenty of possibilities of voicings you can choose to learn the harmony - shell voicings, drop 2, drop 3, inverted chords, easier campfire style voicings (hello CAGED).

How to choose between all these options?

​It seems to me that the initial choice of voicings will strongly define your progress and understanding of the fretboard in terms of the ability to see scales, arpeggios, and substitutions. Also, if I practice the tune in all 12 keys - a weak voicing choice can make practice less insightful and unnecessarily complicated.

​I can play ATTYA using voicings for strings 1–4 which gives me the desired chord melody, but also figured how to play comping using voicings with the root on strings 5 and 6 only. And it took me a while to realize, that chord melody comes to you better, if you're able to comp the standard first - but it all folds into a good voicing choice again.

Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated.

TLDR: any tips with this style of picking? Especially the variations outside of economy picking.

Hi.

I’ve recently gained a bit of interest in the picking style of Cecil Alexander (inspired from George Benson’s technique) recently, mainly due to the appeal of how fast people using this technique can play. I’ve always rested my pinky/ring finger below the string and held the pick in a traditional way and have always felt like I’m not great with speed and accuracy. I’m usually an alternative picking player to, with on beats getting a down stroke and off beats getting an up stroke.

I decided to check out Cecil’s master class and learnt the technique to be quite complicated, with a mixture of economy picking technique with a lot of rule breaking + the hand angling and pick holding. Overall I am liking this way of picking however.

I’ve watched the video and tried out the exercises he’s got written out however, still a bit confused as to how I would apply the technique outside of the written licks.

I know my scales and arpeggios quite well using the Berklee/William Leavitt position (7 positions) and when trying to play these scales and arpeggios with the technique, I find I’m really questioning where I should be doing up strokes vs down strokes e.g. arpeggios descending that have only 1 strong on a string. It seem like the rules with the picking weren’t very strict, but since I’m quite new to this way of picking, I feel like I’m not applying it correctly without more stricter sort of rules.

Anyway. Here’s some questions I have:

• descending arpeggios with 1 note on a string (as well as 1 note on a string consecutively) - up stroke or down stroke?
• when would you play an up stroke on a string with one note instead of a down stroke (Cecil does this sometimes for maybe speed reasons but not always)
• do you still apply this picking technique when not playing fast?

Would love to hear everyone’s opinions about this style of picking! Also let me know if anyone’s tried out Dan Wilson’s right hand mastering course.

I'm hunting the source of a track used in a commercial which was then turned into a meme. Let me explain, a man in a polo shirt says something along the lines of "look what he can do", there is then a shot of a very poor quality CGI pink gorilla playing a CGI guitar. The audio over the gorilla is an absolutely burning segment of a guitar solo over a rhythm changes.

Any ideas what the source might be? I've not been able to relocate the meme video sadly.

I played the base and now I am taking the electric jazz guitar…

I am not satisfied with the amount of noise that the tip of my fingers make on the strings, especially the e and b strings

I would like to know how do you experience folks deal with that? Is there a way to reduce that noise or is it unavailable?

Well, this has been a frustrating project and sure could be wrong, but I've come up with a possible way to enhance your skills to a point where those "Zen" moments aren't just here and there, but are burned into your play. It worked for me but it was an accident. I think it's pretty well known that to be an improviser you need to not think when you are playing. My research has given my the idea the way to get there is to put solo jazz guitar into your practice routine or switch to it for awhile. Took me a couple of years and the logic is improvising with no other players is much more difficult than any other type of jazz improv on guitar. I have found many great players who agree with this theory and I'll see if they mind being mentioned. It's frustrating to watch all these players almost there and if this can get them over the hump, that would be great. Bill Conners, the late guitarist who played in Chick's first "Return to Forever Band" took several years off to study what I have described because as I have read, wanted to be a complete player. If anyone can add names to my list it will make it easier to sell, not for money, for the gratification of helping all that have choose the road of Jazz.

Hi, I wanted to start playing jazz with my guitar… Quite some time ago my guitar teacher was teaching me some scales to use for example on a 2-5-1, the fact is that he was too fast and took sole important things for granted. Now, it’s been a while that I don’t practice my guitar “jazz” exercises and I don’t know where to start again, I don’t remember that much. Where can I start improvising/ accompanying with guitar? I know some things so I don’t want to start from really really basic concepts. Thank you