I'm on my second lesson with a new guitar teacher. This is what I'm currently working on; He has me practicing the diatonic major scale using the caged shapes, (so far we've covered the E, G and A shapes), followed by the arpeggio for that position, followed by the chord. He also has me playing the major, minor and diminished triads from the third position to seventh, covering three octaves. I'm also practicing scales in patterns and thirds, etc. as well as practicing finger stretching exercises.
Jens Larsen these volumes go through the various arpeggios. The fingerings are varied exhaustively so that one can use a convenient fingering as the context demands. The intial objective is to learn each arpeggio starting from each finger (1234).
I feel like I am on the brink of the break through I've been waiting for a long long time lol. Thank you for all your lessons Jens, I finally have a good command on my arps and they are starting to flow together. Took a minute to climb that plateau but well worth it. Today I improvised a few melodies where you could hear the chord changes easily but it didn't sound like a scale or arp exercise. I've waited for that for a long time! =D lol
lately i am focusing more and more on playing what i am hearing in my mind and this is one of the most important videos for this! obviously combined with Your other more detailed videos connected to the topic! because the key word that brings melodies from the mind to the guitar is: fretboard overview! thanks Lars as always!
This seems highly related to chord inversions, which was a big change for me -- seeing a chord/arpeggio as a set of notes in any order rather than a defined shape or two is so liberating, playing-wise. Like you say, connecting them to get true understanding of it is something to really work on though -- it certainly is for me. I feel like I'm using scales more as a reference point (eg to see what other notes are available for colour in the scale...you mention this in the vid), and navigation through the neck, rather than an actual function itself now which I'm happy about. Goes without saying -- another stellar video Jens! Your mastery of the guitar is unbelievable.
Cool! That does indeed sound like the way I think, a set of notes that are more important in the scale and thinking about how they move to the next chord. 👍🙂
Decided to drop my expensive guitar lessons and just learn from your videos. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge. Love your video style. Short, well thought out, to the point and brilliantly presented.
Thank you that's a huge compliment! Though don't underestimate the feedback you can get from a teacher who is in the same room and can hear you play :)
Completely agree but I live in Nepal where there is a shortage of experienced guitar teachers. Being at an intermediate level, my technique is adequate to follow your lessons. I just needed someone to point me in the right direction and your lessons are perfect. I recently discovered you and found your videos absolutely perfect for intermediate players looking to dive into Jazz and improv. Thanks again for your time and lessons. Will be following your channel closely.
These kind of lessons are the best, the content one's are awesome too, but i like when some lessons are focused in point to you the way you got to organize the knowledge you already have!
This is very useful, Thanks Jens. I find a planned method towards a target the best way for me to learn and I’ve just started Major scales all over the neck along with arpeggios. I’ve learnt the intervals so next I’ll learn the arpeggios in reverse and skipping notes and stings using intervals. Then I’ll add the notes. It’s a long term project!!
Really great lesson, I’m working on arpeggios right now and I’m doing mostly everything you talked about in this video so it makes me feel good knowing I’m doing it a good way, I also got a few more pointers so thank you once again Jens!! :)
nice!,,i ve got a couple of idea: 1) starting the arpeggio not always rom the root in the beginning start from 3rd and 5th, than implement extension, and last but not least start from no chord tones 2) playing the arpeggio in the middle of something else so that is someway hidden (like for ex. coming from scale or cromatic approach than arpeggio and end up with something else)
Jens. Just started playing again after a 20 year break (work, kids, wife). I cannot thank you enough for this resource. What would you suggest are the three first videos I should review?
First video of yours I've watched. Thank you. I am probably not there yet, but I am searching for ways to make scales and arpeggios meaningful, and stick in my memory a little better. Any other videos any readers would like to help point me in the right direction?
Sir Jens keep up the good works, bec, yuo help the guitar enthusiast like, me pls, kindly send a major scale arpeggio, and how to put scale on drop 2 voicing
Hi Larsen great video, thanks a lot, studying here. Ah Do you have a vídeo explaining the concept of shell-voicings, Drop2 and drop 2 and 4 ? Thank you
Hey Mister Larsen. I really appreciate your videos. The only thing I really do not understand is at what time i change the position at the fretboard. Of course it depends from context, like how high I wanna play. Hope you got my question. Thanks!
For example c (just the single note). I've started my musician way with the piano: there is only one c' /c '' and so on. On the guitarfretboard are serveral points where the same note is located. For example: the c in the 8th fret is also at the 3rd fret (5th string). Im always unsure where I start (what my reason are). I think it has to to something with the surrounding? I can go much lower if i choose the c at the 3rd fret? Or are there any other reasons?
I think it works best for me to just visualize the chord shapes on the neck. I can easily find the rood of the chord and than the arpeggio's follow easily because I know the different chord shapes. Does this make sense?
Yes that makes a lot of sense, but in the long run you don't want to have a two or three step process to get to those notes. They just have to be there in your playing. Thinking of the root is already too much :)
This is from the song Princes ballad over a F#sus47Dominant I would like to suggest: E-F#(legato or hammer on) thanF# -B sliding than B-C# sliding than E-F# and the same three octave than backwards the same as up..is realy sounding Killer!!also in The song Pervey's Tango slides are commen usage of the Day, instead of bending slides are the same musical idea but in between greater intervals like 2 4 & 5ths....Have fun with this One!~!!!
Hi Jens. How about the arpeggios inversions ? To my ears the 7th chord arpeggio inversions does not sound as good as the root position. Also I found that in the tradition the root position arpeggio is much more used than the other three inversions.
Thank you so much Jens, awesome lesson! Do you have video on youtube teaching the (in your opinion) most efficient exercise to learn all the notes on the neck once and for all and in the shortest time possible (and not by deriving them from notes you already know and then counting up or down or via octaves). If not I'd love you to do a lesson on that topic. Thanks again for all your great work!
I don't have a video on that topic specifically, but my vision on it is that you learn that by knowing the notes you need. When you are playing the guitar you are playing scales and arpeggios and those are the notes you want to learn (and the groups you want to learn them in). I would recommend learning the notes of all the scales you play so that you have an overview of that. The notes of the fretboard will follow easily afterwards. I talk about it in several of these videos: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-GXIJdBWNyVQ.html Especially the first two are useful I think :)
Hi Jens how' it going ? Thanks for the vid'! I like to play guitar without pic, and I was wondering about the right hand fingering. Should I practise my arpeggios stricly alternating fingers? Thanks :)
@@JensLarsen Hmm, is it? The Dm scale has a Bb note while the C major sale has a B, right? How can both scales work? Apologise if the question sounds stupid.
Hmm but if you start playing in all the keys number of notes will go up quickly. I think with this aproach you master the c major but then it is going to be dificult to name all the notes you are playing in all the keys on the spot. Do you have any advice how to aproach it?
I just wrapped up some video courses on a different site (which will remain nameless, since we're here to promote Jens and not other teachers!) that used strictly arpeggios, and I've found myself thinking almost exclusively arpeggios + extensions instead of scales lately. Jens, do you ever think in terms of arpeggios + chord extensions for your solos? Or do you usually think in terms of chord-scale theory, with the scale overlayed on top of the arpeggio? In a sense, I guess there's no difference between playing a ii chord arpeggio with an added 9th, 11th, and major 6th and playing a dorian mode.
Actually I am curious what site, but you don't have to tell me 🙂 To me it is not one or the other. That's also why I talk about working on diatonic arpeggios in this video. If you are soloing over a Dm7 G7 Cmaj7 then it makes sense to recognize that it is 3 chords in one scale (or key in this instance). The chords are not only defined by what notes are there but also where they move in the progression, and you want to have that layer in there as well. Hence my occasional ranting on modes in jazz 😄 I guess I see the scale with the arpeggio as highlighted notes? At least that may be one description of it. I never see the arpeggio on its own. Does that help?
That makes a lot of sense! I'm curious to see how my current arpeggio-based thinking informs my future scale studies. My goal is to have as many ways to navigate a solo as possible. Since I have your permission, I'll share with the class: I purchased a course called Bebop Survival Guide with Fareed Haque on True Fire. There are three or four sample videos from the course on RU-vid. It's great for studying arpeggios and extensions, but he purposefully stays away from thinking in terms of scales and modes, I'm assuming to avoid overloading the viewer.
there is a MUCH ok aproach i was able to play what Jens played first time through (albeit very slow) and i never played arpeggios before.. Here is the method. Side note: this approach is for beginners only.. and can harm your playing but also make it alot easier to analyze major scales Here is the method. So im assuming you guys know the basic chord tones for the 1chord right? here is a brief review Ionian Dorian etc..... 71 2 2 34 5 6 6 71 2 34 34 5 6 71 71 2 34 5 5 6 71 2 2 34 so the idea is that you would memorize the arpeggios like this one chord 1357 Two chord 2461 three chord 3572 four chord 4613 five chord 5724 six chord 6135 seven chord 7246 And voila!! instantly you are able to play arpeggios without memorizing shapes, and along the way you become a better analyzer of the major scale chord tones and to point out the obvious this is just a method to be able to play the arpeggios like DFAC is obviously not 2461 its 1357 but still you can find little tricks i guess to arm yourself with more advanced knowledge like targeting the 3rd or the 5th. i guarantee anybody who tries this will be able to play arpeggios all over the neck. and again this can be harmful so make sure you find some middle ground.
That's of course up to the context you hear it in 🙂 Otherwise it would be impossible to practice a Dm7 arpeggio from lowest to highest note on the instrument.
I guess it's that - so if you're playing and you have an underlying harmonic thing going on, I've always struggled with how to switch between the two types of thinking. I can do modal but feel stuck in my thinking. Would be interested about how you erm, sort of rationalise the switch between scalar thinking and chordal thinking.
@@JensLarsen I tend to fall back on "muscle memory" when playing patterns and looking for new original ones that don't make sense to create more original lines haha
Cmaj7 C7 Cm7 Cdiminished Chalf diminished, thats 5 chords, and we should learn each 1 arpregios per chord across the fretboard. Thats only C. times 12. help 😂
Well, not if you begin to see how things fit together, then it is not that much. It is only 5000 (or 50000) if you think of them as completely unrelated things with nothing in common. You might want to consider that with other stuff you are trying to learn 🙂
@@JensLarsen When you are an expert at jazz, jazz is easy, well, ok, but that is still not a process other than practice a ton of arpeggios over and over again until you memorize them. Your website has a ton of arpeggio patterns, which again, I don't see how they are anything but references or tools for rote memorization. A method would be learn these patterns first then do this with them, then when you feel comfortable with those, do this, etc.
@@Acujeremy No, that is not how it works. What you are saying is that learning a language is like learning 5000 sentences by heart and that is all you need to be able to speak the language., What I am saying is that you want to learn 150 words and then learn to put those together to form 5000 sentences. It is about how you try to learn it.
@@JensLarsen Well after watching your video, I didn't see much in the way of teaching, but basically here are arpeggios, work on them, go the website to get more and have fun.
great content, but get rid of that repetitive pseudo-intro that you do. If people find your content interesting (I doubt that they won't) they'll subscribe anyway. It ruins the flow of the lesson when you throw that in there.
Thank you! I have actually tested that intro and it really does make a difference so I will keep doing it, sorry. You can use shift + . to speed it up so it doesn't take so long.
