Phrasing

SMM-270 · Space, shape and sentences

Pat Metheny once observed that if a line is rhythmically strong, it almost doesn't matter what notes you play. That having been said, remember that a phrase is like a musical sentence; it can be on the short side (one bar or less), or longer (as many as four bars). All Blues Soloing for Jazz Guitar, p.13

The scale apps show you which notes you can play. This page is about how to say something with them. Every quote here comes from the books on the RAID and was checked against the page.

1 · Breathe

Guitar players are notorious for playing with no break in the sound, and beginning players are especially guilty of this. Vocalists can't do this, because they must stop to breathe. Naturally, vocal solos are broken up into small phrases of three or four seconds of music. The Everything Rock & Blues Guitar Book, p.36

Use space, don't fill it. While constant motion can be effective on occasion, it is frequently resorted to because of a lack of melodic ideas. All Blues Soloing for Jazz Guitar, p.90

As a great teacher of mine once said, "Rests are the windows of music." Let the light shine in! The Everything Rock & Blues Guitar Book, p.36

2 · Sing it

While it's convenient to think of the pentatonic scales as "boxes," boxes don't make any music—notes do. So how can you think "outside the box"? Start singing everything you play. The Everything Rock & Blues Guitar Book, p.35

To make a solo more singable, practice singing the melody, then "sing" it on the guitar with guitaristic phrasing nuances like bends, slides, vibrato, etc. This way you'll stay melodic and sound "guitar-ish" at the same time. Rock Guitar Secrets, p.175

3 · The cliché cell

Improvising Rock Guitar's demo track gives each cliché the same six bars: state it, rest, say it again with a tail, land on the root, then rest for two bars. The rests are part of the exercise. The book's advice for starting out:

At first just play the cliches against the background. It is not necessary at this time to try to make music. Just play the cliches to hear how they sound against a background. When you begin to feel fairly comfortable with the cliches, then try building phrases around them… Improvising Rock Guitar, p.47

Tempo 80

Ready

Pick a pattern and press Start. One count-in bar, then the cycle loops.

4 · Give the solo a shape

A solo should have shape, logic. It can gradually build to a climax, ending in an upper register, conclude with chord or octave phrases á la Wes Montgomery, or have several intervening peaks. Try to initiate a solo with a strong, distinctive statement. All Blues Soloing for Jazz Guitar, p.90

Improvising Rock Guitar walks through a full solo and points out the moves as they happen:

Open with familiar material. Clichés at the start are "a particularly good thing to do at the start of a solo, when the sound of familiar material helps to orient the listener." Later "you can trip into less chartered territory, and still stand a good chance of the listener being with you, since you both started together." p.52
Same notes, different meaning. "You can make the same notes sound entirely different by the different ways you choose to play them": slide, bend or fret. p.55
Pick the string for the tone. High strings give "a thin, treble quality", while "the same lick played on the lower strings has a richer, mellower sound." p.59
Bend with purpose. "It is not necessarily a good idea to bend notes indiscriminately. Dramatic effects usually result from a contrast between the plain and the dynamic." p.75
Go high for the climax. Playing high on the neck lends "an urgency and a sense of climax to the music." p.68
Repeat to build. "As the solo draws to a close, the use of repetition helps to whip up peak excitement." p.86

5 · Make a lick yours

If a lick is played literally every time, you are not necessarily improvising. However, if you are able to spontaneously vary a lick at will—either subtly or radically—then you are satisfying one of the requirements of effective improvisation. All Blues Soloing for Jazz Guitar, p.44

A lick has very little value if you can only play it literally. But once you are able to transfer it to new positions, registers, and keys, as well as manipulate it in various ways, then you're on the path to true fluency. All Blues Soloing for Jazz Guitar, p.57

Improvisation means to me the spontaneous reorganization of known material. Licks, phrases, sounds, etc. that you've played or practiced are spontaneously mixed together to form something new. Rock Guitar Secrets, p.178

The same book's threading drill: "Take 10 licks in the same formation and work on moving from one to the next over a medium tempo one-chord vamp… Feel free to leave space" (p.61). The Lick Library and the Jam Engine's drone give you both halves of that.

6 · Three kinds of solo

Rock Guitar Secrets (pp.174–178) sorts solos into three types, each with its own job:

Pop song solo"It's far more important to play 'for' the song. This often means playing less notes, but placing and phrasing them optimally." The listener should be able to sing it.

Hard rock soloWorked-out "killer licks" plus improvisation: "learn as many licks as possible, practice your technique and then try to combine the licks with improvised material."

Extended improvisationLooser form. "The soloist uses dynamics, motifs, licks and spontaneous ideas to build up intensity." How to practise it? "Start with jamming a lot!"

For the Brothers Mac, the pop song solo is the one most songs will ask for.

7 · Playing with someone else

"When your solo follows that of another person, imitate their last phrase (or some aspect of it)." All Blues Soloing, p.90
"When you're alone, you can practice trading fours (or any other number of measures) by setting up an accompaniment." The trainer's Trading fours pattern does exactly that. All Blues Soloing, p.90
"Jam at every opportunity (and make some opportunities yourself)." And: "If it's difficult for you to find people to jam with, then jam with a tape recorder." Improvising Rock Guitar, p.91

Practice

Cliché cell, one cliché per night. Run it for five minutes. Keep every rest silent, even when your hands want to fill it.
Breath test: improvise over the drone, but stop playing after every three or four seconds. Count the gap.
Sing a phrase during a rest bar, then play it in the next bar. Wrong notes are fine. You're training the connection.
Take one lick and play it four ways: higher, lower, starting on a different beat, and with a different ending.
Trading fours with Ian: one of you plays four bars, the other answers by borrowing something from the last phrase.

Sources · All Blues Soloing for Jazz Guitar (Jim Ferguson) · The Everything Rock & Blues Guitar Book (Schonbrun) · Improvising Rock Guitar (Green Note) · Rock Guitar Secrets (Peter Fischer). Page numbers are the books' printed pages.