Sequence of Learning Forms

Spalo

I've decided to not to learn the forms in the sequence given in the book.

I'm going to learn the Major forms first (which I'm doing) then I'm going to ignore the Minor forms for now and start on the 7th forms.

Having the Major and 7ths under my belt I'll be able to try and incorporate them in some 'proper' (or slightly modified tunes). After all, my aim is to be able to solo over songs not learn forms.

'Lady be Good' and the Hot Club version of 'I've Got Rythmn' can be played just using Majors and 7ths, or even a standard Blues sequence. There must be loads more. i just want to get the feel that I'm playing, or trying to play music, not just doing exercises.

What do you think? Any other simple song suggestions?

Sp

Lango-Django

Yeah, great minds think alike! That's exactly what I've been doing too.

A couple of tunes I like to jam over are "L-O-V-E" ("L is for the way you look at me...") and "I Can't Give You Anything But Love"... you can use Givone's ii7-V7 fingerings from the book if you like... or it seems to work fine for practise purposes to just ignore the ii chord and work on your V7 forms.

Another tune like this that I like to practise over is "Mack the Knife"; OK, it does have a diminished chord but what the hey, I think most cats who play in this style are cool with that!

For that one, I've created a backing track that starts in G and then goes up chromatically through all the keys to arrive back in G again six minutes later.

Since it involves no infringement whatsoever on Givone's copyright, I'm going to attach my rhythm tracks for all three of those tunes, and I hope you'll find 'em useful.

Will

PS And everybody else--- whether you're a badge-wearing, secret-decoder-enabled GGG member or not--- you are invited to please share your useful rhythm tracks too...

spud

yes, why not start just with major and V7.
thats already lots to get through. it really is.

i think its good to apply as much as you can on songs even if it means going at a really slow tempo.
these are good songs that cover a lot of fundamental territory:
-start applying as much as you can to relatively standard jam session tunes (because lets face it, to play with others is the aim of the game, not to do excersises at home alone):
cant give you
coquette
minor swing
blues minor
les yeux noir
all of me
in these songs you will find lots of standard chord changes that you need to learn asap.

i think that you will also need to learn some licks or concepts for the standard progressions that change quicky. givone doesnt give enough ammunition for these changes that are in many songs and are often one bar per chord:
-christoph (i dont know the name in english- the progression at the end of cant give you, all of me, it had to be you, djangos tiger etc)
-rhythm changes
-djangology (same as night and day, all the things you are etc)

i like stepahne wrembel and denis chang's playbacks- great sound

Passacaglia

OK, count me in. I have gotten a lot from the materials I have, but call it a peripatetic itch, impatience, or what you will, I'm hopeful of a way in that is different from what I've been doing thus far. Ordered the text just now, will look forward to working with it.

anthon_74

Hey I just saw this thread... I've been doing the exact same thing! I skipped the minors and went straight to the Majors and sevenths. I've been trying it over Sweet Georgia brown because of all the sustained 7th chords, but I would love alternate suggestions and will look at the ones here.

Also, I thought of making a play along like this and wondered what people would think - So you play 4 bars of C major, then 4 of G major, then 4 of D major, and so on down the circle of 5ths. Then another play along just using dominant 7th chords, again down the circle of 5ths, and last playing the relative miner chords .

Do you think that would be helpful for memorizing the neck?

Anthony

spud

instead of creating your own chord sequences , i would recommend applying what you learn to actual songs as quick as you can.
so if you've learnt majors and dominants (i assume you mean the dominant in a major context because in givone's book there are also dominants in a minor context) you can use the major forms over its relative minor (eg use C maj over A min) and it will sound ok.
so then you can pretty much begin working on any song because you've got something for maj,min and dominant and yes its a good way to begin familiarising yourself with the neck.

sooner or later you are going to need those minor forms too because i think using the maj for a minor substition is going to sound a little drab after a while .

but i cant emphasize this enough- use the repetoire songs ,even if you go really slowly or only work on sections.

anthon_74

Yeah I was thinking the same thing after trying it out last night. Kill 2 birds with one stone. I only just got the book about a week ago though so I'm still just getting into it.

spud

in fact, thinking about it, why not just learn 2 of the major forms, 2 of the minor, 2 dominant in a major context and 2 dominant in a minor context?

or even just learn 1 of each beacuse they are long phrases, and as soon as you start applying them to songs you'll see how you need to adjust them.

i think that will give you a bigger range of sounds and that way you wont be substituting all the time.

anthon_74

on the same wavelength as that, here is my plan - I want to pick one form, let's say, the E shape form, and learn the major,dominant 7, and minor phrases that correspond, and then do a play along using only that one form and it's corresponding phrases.

This means, of course, a lot of jumping around the fretboard, but I find it helps (me) memorize the form's phrases, and where they lie on the fretboard, a lot better. It also makes me have less to think about.

Then, you move on to another form. then another, and so on.

I did this before with basic arpeggios and I found it to be helpful in getting an arpeggio (or phrase) from "I know it" , to "I can use it in a solo" a lot quicker than doing play alongs using different forms together.

Then Maybe the next step is to try and do an entire play along without leaving a specific zone on the fretboard... Hopefully I get to that exercise before Django in June...

Passacaglia

anthon_74 wrote:

on the same wavelength as that, here is my plan - I want to pick one form, let's say, the E shape form, and learn the major,dominant 7, and minor phrases that correspond, and then do a play along using only that one form and it's corresponding phrases.

This means, of course, a lot of jumping around the fretboard, but I find it helps (me) memorize the form's phrases, and where they lie on the fretboard, a lot better. It also makes me have less to think about.

Then, you move on to another form. then another, and so on.

I did this before with basic arpeggios and I found it to be helpful in getting an arpeggio (or phrase) from "I know it" , to "I can use it in a solo" a lot quicker than doing play alongs using different forms together.

Then Maybe the next step is to try and do an entire play along without leaving a specific zone on the fretboard... Hopefully I get to that exercise before Django in June...

Now that I've gotten into the book just a bit, what you're saying (and what Spud is saying) makes a lot of sense to me, too, Anthon. Basically, previous to the book, I was just working one form of M, m, V7 from Gonzalo's stuff on DC online. It clicked, and I just applied them to a bunch of songs as a matter of daily practice (I still do, along with Michael's 6th string and "odd string" arpeggios from his book, and a couple of Tim Robinson's excellent arp workouts).

With Givone, I figured I'd just start from the beginning and work through, in order - meaning, I have all 5 Major forms memorized, and the enchainement of pg. 21 is part of my daily work.

I realize now, though, that perhaps that's not the best way in...based on past experience, I think I like your approach, 1 form in each of M, m, and dominants approaching M and m. Yep, it's not staying in the proximate real estate, but it's applicable right away to tunes, and it seems using up the fingerboard in this way is really useful. (For whatever reason, I find form 5 my "stickiest" transposing to other keys, with E, C and A easiest - probably because I spent some time with Stephane Wrembel's book).

Anyway, I guess I'm concluding that your notion makes a lot of sense, for me - might be far more useful to work one form, say, E, in majors, mineurs, dominants, etc., than to stay in one fretboard area, and different forms. Cheers for the thoughts, fellas.

Lango-Django

on the same wavelength as that, here is my plan - I want to pick one form, let's say, the E shape form, and learn the major,dominant 7, and minor phrases that correspond, and then do a play along using only that one form and it's corresponding phrases.

OK, let's say for the sake of ease that we're working in the key of G a/k/a "the people's key".

So, just to clarify, do you plan to use the form 4 "E shape" fingering to learn the G major, D7, Em and its "minor-style" dominant B7?

OR

Do you plan use the form 4 "E shape" fingering to learn the G major, D7, G minor, and its "minor-style" dominant D7?

For me, the latter choice seems more logical...

Will