Starting this topic now that I’ve reached Grade 4, the point at which I passed all the skills and musical knowledge I accumulated playing guitar back in my teens. Everything I post here charts new skills and progress. The first follow-ups will include attempts at motif development to backing tracks using different keys and musical styles.
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The following video was originally posted to AVOYP back in August.
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I posted the following video earlier this week. I should point out that the backing track is an original composition that I spent a couple of months practicing and refining (mostly by simplifying it). I also recorded multiple attempts to improvise over that track and grew increasingly frustrated with my lack of musical imagination. As much as I liked the flow of the backing track as a rock shuffle, I could not come up with melodic ideas that raised it to another level. I finally gave up trying to come up with something better and focused on making the improvisation as mistake-free as possible for someone as klutzy as I am. Who knows, maybe something better will come to me after I break away from this for awhile?
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Enjoy your improv journey Jim. You’re going well.
Whats the chord progression in this C Major jam?
Cheers, Shane
Thanks! The intro riff (which I imagined as a chorus, but can’t come up with a lyric melody or words for) is Gsus4 - G - Dm - F - Gsus4 - G - Dm - C all using mostly inverted triads on strings 2-4 except for the C triad on strings 3-5. The extended bridge starts with inverted triads F - Em - Dm - C - Am (hammer-on to the root A note) - Dm -Em - F - Em - Dm - C then shifts to single pick strings on chords Am - Dm7 - Em7 - F to (the imagined) verse, a repeated cycle of picked strings in C - G - Am - Dm7. The entire composition then repeats, except that the 2nd verse’s picked chords are C - Cmaj7/B - Am7 - G. After that there is a very abbreviated chorus and bridge to a final repeated pattern of Dm - C triads and then Am - G - Dm - C9/D. I’m not sure about the name of that last chord. It’s just a barre across strings 2-5. I got the notation from https://www.scales-chords.com.
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I enjoyed that. Thanks for posting.
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Interesting progression; ‘falling’ harmony with some hanging resolution. Bit like a reverse twist on the ii-V-I; then falling chords in the bridge as well…
Thanks! I never knew ii-Vi-I was a common chord progression. I may try switching things around a bit to see if that progression works better in the verse or bridge sections!
I assume you meant ii-V-I, which is what I said.
It’s very common in jazz, but you can incorporate it well into the Blues, which is my wheelhouse.
It can work well within any chord progression; you can ‘tonicize’ any target chord, and play the ii-V leading into it. The voice leading provides the magic.
Cheers, Shane.