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Tips and tricks for six strings
Steve Morse shares in Guitar Player magazine his tips on how to improve one’s playing skills:
You might think that master guitarist Steve Morse never gets in a rut with his playing. But guess what? He’s just like the rest of us in that regard. However, being that he’s Steve Morse, he’s figured out some ways to dig himself out of any kind of hole he finds himself in.
“I’ve found that changing my perspective always helps me,” Morse says. “One way I do that is by imposing limits on myself. We tend to gravitate toward choices that are easy on the guitar, and because of that we wind up playing a certain way.
“Let’s say you’re playing too many box patterns,” he suggests. “What you can do is say to yourself, ‘I’m only going to solo on the D and G strings.’ To make an octave phrase, you’re going to have to move your left hand. By doing that, you’ll play in a more linear manner. It’s a cool trick.”
He laughs. “It sounds counterintuitive,” he admits, “but by taking away options you’ve opened yourself up to playing in a way you never would before.”
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Yo,
Good article, & thanks for the tips & guidance Steve ! Very much appreciated.
And without sounding like an “A”-hole, probably the most important aspect was overlooked imo, & that’s aural-training, where-by one should spend at least a 1/2-hour everyday listening to pre-recorded chords & intervals, at the least within the diatonic Major scale…Simply play chords, & nominate their quality, being either Major, minor or Dominant-7th…And added to that, is interval identification, where you play a root-note, followed by one-of-the-12 remaining intervals, & then identify what it is. Playing music is about listening & identifying what’s going on, so confident recognition of what you play, is a primary in getting you to the top-of-the-mountain.
Technique & learning the fret-board kind-of come second, since you have to have the sounds / music-in-your head first & foremost, so you “know” the mountain you’re trying to climb…
Music memory is everything.
Playing the above recommendation with a friend or student is even better than something pre-recorded, since you both help each other & learn at the same time, & can then jam-out afterwards. Plus the order of things played is spontaneous, & changeable every-time. And as you get better & better over-time with your chord & interval recognition, your playing improves dramatically, & you’ll start to hear “target notes” in your head mid-solo, so your solos become many varied, spontaneous & far-more interesting, for you, your band-mates & audience alike.
Peace !
June 25th, 2023 at 05:05Someone correct me if I’m mistaken, but I thought I read an article somewhere that Ritchie plays/ solos in a “linear manner”.
June 25th, 2023 at 11:30@2…I guess that “linear” is open for interpretation…
Generally, RB’s solos are “linear” in the sense that they follow note-after-note in sequence of a predetermined scale…It’s the general way most people go about things.
That said, the 5-note pentatonic-scale is also the most popular, but its make-up is a combined set of varied interval-steps, that have alternating note intervals following one another. The notes played are 1,2, 3,5 & 6. It sounds very expressive because of the varied note interval step sequence.
A good example of someone who does not follow “linear” playing, are the country-players ( though RB does at times use the country-licks as in Anyone’s Daughter ), & one of the best single-note Jazz guitarists John Scofield, plays “everything possible”…
This is a good example of what I mean, as JS plays the blues…Inflections of non-linear playing are throughout, especially past the 4-minute mark. Good music, though maybe not the best example. But a blues-tune makes for good comparison, & it’s unlikely RB could play like this. Check-out the chords played yo !
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7bOAeMd6Zw
Peace !
June 26th, 2023 at 00:38Rick #2, you’re probably right, but what does that say? Of the four guitarists that DP has had, at least three (and probably all four) are among the best in the world, so naturally they would know some of the same tricks.
June 26th, 2023 at 01:20Yo,
At the end-of-the-day, it’s all about how much imagination you can throw into the music. Regardless of the instrument played, everyone has the same 12-notes to work with. The more these notes become your friends & part of you, the more ways you can use them to express through your imagination, & on to your instrument.
RB certainly has his identity defined by his note choices, the way he expresses them, & works with them in the tunes he plays. Strong classical inflections nicely blended back with & into the blues. A very technical & emotional player when on fire.
SM has probably a wider musical vocabulary, especially with picking & note selection, & definitely has maintained a more imaginative mind imo. And he structured his solos to suit, whilst following his own unique methods. eg. Often he starts a solo with the tunes melodic phrase / hook for a few bars, then almost always follows with the fast speed-picked section, & then backs-it-all up with some chordal-riffing leading back into the next section of the song. And he always adds the pick-harmonics along the way too. A lot of players follow a method / solo structure similar to this, but there’s only one SM.
TB was very unique…He liked & played the “other notes” where possible, & had his own growing unique style. He was still developing his persona imo, & then sadly left us all-to-soon. What he may have lacked in his developing technique, he made-up for with melody & note choices. I miss TB.
JS is a well rounded & accomplished musician. He has all skills at his finger-tips, & can take the music wherever he chooses, such is his command over the instrument & musical knowledge. His home still lays with the blues, though he could probably make a bed anywhere he wanted lol ! A great player.
Simon from what I’ve seen has all of the above. He knows his way around the fret-board & has played things / melody I haven’t ever heard yet played on a guitar. This means he’s got a great musical imagination. Time will show us what he can put down on record. A really good player, & a great fit for DP imo.
Peace !
June 26th, 2023 at 13:13I’m not sure, lieber Gregster, whether Steve meant “linear playing” in the way you you described it; I believe he meant playing up and down the neck to reach notes rather than staying in one position/fret area and moving from string to string which a lot of players call “box playing”. For better description, I’ll refer to the two styles as AOTN (all over the neck) and box playing.
Ritchie is AOTN all the way, Rick’s observation is right. It’s together with his excellent pick control, the scalloped neck vibrato and his choice of uncommon various scales (which he often combines fluidly) one of the core features of his playing, and back in the 70ies he was one of the best doing it. Satriani, Morse and McBride are AOTN as well, Bolin was a box player which is why Ritchie’s lines did not come natural to him. Ritchie, who is no shrinking violet, was always well aware of his AOTN abilities. Jimmy Page for example, while not just strictly a box player, didn’t have them to the extent Ritchie has and had (Ritchie’s AOTN ability is to my ears undiminished to this day, everything else has suffered a little/become rusty after decades of playing with BN).
Judas Priest in the old KK Downing/Glenn Tirton line-up were a great case study: KK on the left channel was strictly box, Glenn on the right channel was masterful at AOTN. When KK played a solo, he’d play it in one position only or climb up 12 frets (for some drama and some sliding noises he so much liked) to mirror that same position one octave higher, when Glenn played a solo, even a simple one, his fretting fingers would be a flurry up and down the neck. When KK was once asked what he admired about Tipton’s playing he said: “His general fret board dexterity. I wish I could do that and I have tried.” Answering the same question, Tipton said about KK that he respected the latter’s gift “to say it all with just a few notes in the exact right places”. That is why they were such a good team.
The experienced eye can recognize an AOTN player before the first note – they generally wear their guitars higher than box players, think Ritchie, Tipton or Malmsteen. If you have your guitar slung low Keith Richards- or Billy Gibbons-style, AOTN is not really comfortable and you tend to be a box player. But there are exceptions, Angus Young is an ardent box player and wears his SG high (but I cannot come up with a single AOTN player who wears his guitar slung really low).
June 26th, 2023 at 14:34@6…Thanks Uwe…I did interpret “linear” as being a note sequence as opposed to how one managed their way around a fret-board.
As one develops their skills, both box & along-the-length-of-the-fret-board knowledge become part of your playing. Box playing is a primary imo, simply because you can play all 12-keys from the one position, with only a slide down one fret, or up one fret in position needed. This is possible because all the 5-types of primary finger patterns can be accessed. This also means no open strings are used, everything remains fretted when learning.
Using the length of the neck allows you to focus on say a couple of strings natural sound as your preferred choice, & opens the door to finger-tapping.
So how does one achieve these abilities ??? You simply get to know the all the names of the notes on the fret-board, by naming them on all strings following the cycle of 4th’s & 5th’s. ( eg find C on all six / four strings, followed by F,Bb,Eb,Ab,Db,B,E,A,D,& G ). Your ears will tell you you’ve found the same note on the next string(s), & over time, it all becomes second nature. Work within the first 12-frets length-wise when doing this. Everything’s hard at first.
I’d suggest that because all the classic rock/blues-licks are a minor-pentatonic scale, played from a box-position, is why so many players favor / use it.
Peace !
June 27th, 2023 at 00:47