This is the first in a series on funky rhythm playing. This is in no way all there is to funk guitar. But if you've never tackled the style before you should, after covering these lessons, be able to pick up most funk stuff that you hear and play it. Funk guitar influence is so widespread that you can hear it in artists from Vai or the Peppers to James Brown, or from rock to pop, and blues or even jazz on occasion. In this lesson I've played the example slowly, then faster, then faster so you can hear it. This lick is based on the E9 chord (which is an E7 with an ...

In this lesson we deal with single and double note rhythms. It's important to understand that when playing the single notes on the recording I'm actually hitting all or most of the strings. Sometimes it's just the bottom four. You don't hear them because my left hand is muting the strings other than the one note being played. There are pauses occasionally but your right arm should keep moving up and down with the alternate strum pattern, just make sure you miss the strings at these moments. To practice this method try missing the strings when you see the mute...

This is the natural continuation to Part 1 because we now introduce chord sliding to the funk rhythm. In the notation tab you'll notice that there's a whole chord to slide and not just one or two notes. Start by strumming down on the Eb9, slide it up one fret to the E9. While you are sliding the chord 'up stroke' your picking hand but don't pluck the strings. It's a silent up stroke as denoted by the brackets (U). As before, the U means up and the D means down and the X means mute the chord as you pluck the strings by releasing the pressure on the fretboard. ...

This lesson includes some ideas to use with the rhythms that we've covered so far. This rhythm is different from the others but you could mix and match them all together. There are all kinds of extensions we can add at the end of every bar or phrase. Here are 4 "tags" you could use. Again, learn them then make them your own. Even if you come up with something quite different whilst not learning this lick properly is fine, as long you're enjoying it and making music that's all that counts. D = down stoke, U = up stroke, X = mute

Knowing sixes on the acoustic can open up a whole world of acoustic playing. Sixes (6ths) refers to the seperation of these notes. Counting from one note to the next, in order if you like. For example, if D is 1 then B is 6 (D-1, E-2, F#-3, G-4, A-5, B-6). If we use E as 1 then C becomes 6, if F# as 1 then D is 6. If this doesn't make sense then don't worry because what's really important is learning the shapes and making music. Learn the shapes then start adding bass notes to them. Open strings are a cinch but, as you need a C note or G note you'll have to...

Here we have a combination of what we've been working on, but in a different key. The main chord shape is different also. It's based around part of the A7. Play the three notes on the D, G and B strings but let them ring on as you hammer the C# note. (the first example). The whole thing is pretty much up and down alternate picking pattern except where you see a slide on hammer on. Just learn it slowly and as always make it your own. Take it somewhere that's you. To learn just how far you can go with funk playing, get around guitartricks.com and learn as many cho...

Constructing and knowing chords like Emaj9 or G7sus4 (or worse) may seem like rocket science to the uninitiated but in actual fact it's not that hard at all. Do you know some basic scales? Can you add up? Well apart from some other minor details you're ready to start contructing some impressive chords. We'll be skipping some basics at first in order to keep it real simple (chord names, major & minor 3rds, etc.). But if you hang in there we'll get to those later. We'll start with the C Major scale - C D E F G A B. Now, imagine that these guys run a race and ...

Here's a quick rock lick that I thought I would share. It involves a series of chromatic notes to make blues and rock licks more interesting. Try moving it up and down the fretboard. I have played it in the key of A but I also demonstrate the lick going from A to E then D and back to A. If you use a clean sound it could be a good jazz or blues lick, too. It's up to you if would like to pick each note or use pull offs and hammer ons. Have fun.

This is a chicken picking lick in E. Not much to tell really, just a fun lick to mess with. Starts with an E shape then moves down to a D and A before wrapping it up on an E. I've found that muted notes sound great in country, gives it that chicken pickin' sound. This lick wouldn't sound as good if all the notes were picked cleanly and the mutes were left out.

OK, so this is not just for rock players. The sound ex is quite 'rocky' so the title seemed appropriate. Most players know how to play a diminished arpeggio. But how well do they know the diminished scale? Here are some ideas that might help you integrate this great scale into your playing. A Diminshed chord is a type of 7th chord broken down this way: 1, flat 3 (or minor third), flat 5, double flat 7. This explains the name "Diminished". The scale itself has an interesting pattern to it, starting from the root note - Root, whole tone, semi, whole, semi, whole, ...

In this next part we'll be looking at a D minor chord and how notes can be added to it from the C scale. Hopefully part 1 made some sense and you're ready to move on. If you haven't looked at part 1, I strongly suggest you do before checking out part 2. Previously we had the notes in the C scale ( C D E F G A B ) run a race with C coming first. Now imagine, if you would, another race is run with all of the same notes but this time D comes 1st. Here's the results of that one: D is 1st, E came 2nd, followed by F in 3rd, G is 4th, A is 5th, B is 6th, and now C is 7th...

... and now Number 4 - The F chord. By now you should be getting the hang of numbering the notes in a scale so that they relate directly to the chord you're playing. For this reason I won't give too much explanation here except where needed. All the same notes from the scale of C Major will in be use and we'll be numbering them so that F is number one. Remember the triad system - 1st, 3rd, 5th. I'll let you look at the notes below to figure this one out, or you could just look at the notation tab - either way's good. F-1st, G-2nd, A-3rd, B-4th, C-5th, D-6th ...

My favourite - G in the "Key of C". This is where the Mixolydian occurs, where major funk & country & rock, etc. do business. There's just something about the sound of this position that works really well. Anyway, let's get into it. G is now number 1, & using all the notes from the C Major scale we have this: G-1st, A-2nd, B-3rd, C-4th, D-5th, E-6th, F-7th. Again, memorize the chords and try playing them with the other chords that we've covered so far. The only things that's important so far is knowing these basic shapes and being aware that when we add a n...

This is one of the absolute essentials if you want to know the guitar properly. Knowing how to solo around chords (instead of just scales) makes it easier on you and it also makes it sound more interesting. Playing 4 notes at a time, 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th, and then moving on to the next chord. We're going to play the arppegios to these chords without moving position, in other words, in 2nd position: 1st finger on the 2nd fret, 2nd finger on the 3rd fret, 3rd finger on the 4th fret and the 4th finger on the 5th fret. Practice the exercise in one fluid movement like...

The concept of open string licks is to have two or more notes ring at the same time. This gives a totally different sound than "one note at a time" runs. This one is typical of the type of lick that I would use to finish off the solo in "Workin' Man Blues". It covers two bars with a bendup from G to A at the end which gives me time to stomp on my pedal board. Try to let as many notes ring on as possible, attempt to let the E and B string ring throughout.

In this lesson we're looking at all of the "7" chords in C major. First, we'll play them in their open position then we'll play them as barre chords going up the neck. The first lot of chords won't be any different from how you've already played. But this time we're going to name them properly. What was "C Major with 7th" is now "C Major7" and so on. The rest of the chords are these: "C Major7", "D minor7", "E minor7", "F Major7", "G dominant7" or "G7", "A minor7", & "B minor7 flat5" (which usually looks like this: Bm7b5). On the sound file I've played the natur...

Here's a lick that visits 'Approach Note' land. Approach notes are like towns that are a nice place to visit but you wouldn't want to live there. The lick is based around a D13 and goes hard on 'flat approach' notes. Meaning, the 1,3,5,6 (13), -7 notes are used with the notes that are flat of them: i.e. D-Db, C-B, B-Bb, A-Ab, F#-F and so on. In the second lot of tab below is the lick with the 'flat approach' notes in parenthesis brackets ( ). Try playing the lick without any of these approach notes to hear what it sounds like. Pull the lick apart, study it and ma...

This lick uses ideas that I've picked up from Country over the years and kinda worked into something that I could use in almost any style (given the right sound). I guess it proves that it's handy to learn a few styles because I think this lick sounds good in country, metal or whatever. I don't play this lick the same way each time, I play bits of it and on occasions something longer than what's here. It rarely comes out the same way twice.

And now ... the A minor chord! If you've seen the first two parts in this series (and understood them) this should be real easy. We will be looking at all the notes in the C Major scale and how they can be easily added to an A minor chord. Let's take the notes in the scale and order them so that A is now numero uno ( um ... number 1). If at this point you are asking, "How can A be 1 when C was 1, then D was 1?" The short answer is, "We do it because we can", the proper answer is that we have to relate the notes to A as the root, not to C or D. The note A is now t...

This is what comes of testing a new microphone. My new Beta 57a up against my practice amp (a Peavey classic 30 (vg-88 as pre-amp)) sounded so good I decided to record something. The result is this lesson. Whenever I mess with these ideas people ask me what I'm doing. Basically it's combination of two things, knowing your arpeggios up and down the neck, and playing them in patterns and sequences with passing tones to help link the positions together. I'm just going to show the arppegios, some patterns/sequences, and some passing tones, then the rest is up to you. ...

I've been showing a lot of guys this simple idea and it's amazing how it opens up another world of playing once they realise what's in it. The idea is simple, take a stock 'A' chord (like the 'F' shape you see below but move it up the neck to the A position). Play the notes seperately then play the notes from 'Ab' in the same fashion - and join them together. Keep doing this until you find what you like and don't like, then add it to your solos. Let me explain it properly: We're in the key of 'A', let's play some notes from the 'A' chord but occassionly throw ...

Just a fun sweep picking idea. It might be an idea to practice the notes on the E, A & D strings before adding the rest in. Sounds great with some overdrive as well. All notes are picked down except where noted. Have fun.

This is a diminished lick in "A" using three basic diminished shapes to create a Robben Ford'ish feel. Can be used in Metal, Jazz, Rock, Blues, etc. (just one of those licks). Starts with a slide, the muted "F#" note is used on purpose, and there's a couple of notes to finish it off. Once you get this down try it with a blues shuffle. The second bar is the shapes by themselves. Have fun!

Not all pedal steel licks involve bends. Some pedal steel players (and fiddle players) weave in and out of chords and scales to achieve a fascinating sound: kinda Jazz meets Western. This is, of course, used a lot in Western Swing. With some experimenting you could tailor this trick to blues, rock, metal etc. You'd have to explore the options until it sounds right for you. For country, however, this lick fits right in. It's basically an E, Eb and D appeggio lick played two ways with a 16th feel. Ex. 1 is played more like a guitar while Ex. 2 has more of the...

Here's a 4 note per string pattern based around a mixolydian shape in 'A'. A lot of the gaps between the notes have been filled in with passing tones. This gives a 'Steve Morse' or 'Brett Garsed' sound to the scale. On the tab is the run with passing notes in brackets ( ). If you play the lick without any of these notes you'll have the A mixolydian mode of D major. Don't worry too much about this, let's just call it an A mixolydian or Dominant7 scale. Typically you would be comping on an A7 or A9 type chord, or even just power chords. I've included another ...

This is the first in a series on funky rhythm playing. This is in no way all there is to funk guitar. But if you've never tackled the style before you should, after covering these lessons, be able to pick up most funk stuff that you hear and play it. Funk guitar influence is so widespread that you can hear it in artists from Vai or the Peppers to James Brown, or from rock to pop, and blues or even jazz on occasion.

Jazz players use enclosures to squeeze every ounce of taste from a note. Enclosures are a type of targeting. In this tutorial, I will show you practical application of enclosures.

Constructing and knowing chords like Emaj9 or G7sus4 (or worse) may seem like rocket science to the uninitiated but in actual fact it's not that hard at all. This tutorial will show you how chords works and how to construct them.

This tutorial will show you some practical application of the diminished scale. Although some of the runs sound very "rocky", the concepts shown in this tutorial can be applied to many different styles.

Here is an exercise that requires alternate picking - up/down. Don't play all downstrokes! Apart from alternate picking you can pick the first note of each pair then hammer the second note, some creamy overdrive would make that work nicely. I've sectioned it off so you can work on it one bit at a time rather than try to take it all in at once. You could end on a D for a D major pentatonic sound or a B for a B minor - Funny that! The audio is played ascending and descending, the descending being the exact reverse. Once you have it down try using small sections ...

Here's a lick that visits 'Approach Note' land. Approach notes are like towns that are a nice place to visit but you wouldn't want to live there. The lick is based around a D13 and goes hard on 'flat approach' notes. Meaning, the 1,3,5,6 (13), -7 notes are used with the notes that are flat of them: i.e. D-Db, C-B, B-Bb, A-Ab, F#-F and so on. In the second lot of tab below is the lick with the 'flat approach' notes in parenthesis brackets ( ). Try playing the lick without any of these approach notes to hear what it sounds like. Pull the lick apart, study it and ma...

Knowing sixes on the acoustic can open up a whole world of acoustic playing. Sixes (6ths) refers to the seperation of these notes. Counting from one note to the next, in order if you like. For example, if D is 1 then B is 6 (D-1, E-2, F#-3, G-4, A-5, B-6). If we use E as 1 then C becomes 6, if F# as 1 then D is 6. If this doesn't make sense then don't worry because what's really important is learning the shapes and making music. Learn the shapes then start adding bass notes to them. Open strings are a cinch but, as you need a C note or G note you'll have to...

This is the same lick played twice with the 7th trading places between the 'Major 7' note, Db, and the 'Minor 7' note, C, (dom7/mixolydian) to create two different sounds. Each example is played up to speed then slowly. On the first row of tab are the Maj7 lick and the Dom7 lick, then in the second row are alternate ways of playing the same lick. I've put the '7' note in brackets so you can easily identify it.

This trick examines how to stay in position when soloing while the chords change around you. It's based around a B7 (mixolydian) but starts over the IV (four) chord - E7 (I've actually played an E9). I'm calling B7 the I (one) chord and E9 the IV (four) chord just to simpify things. The four notes over the B7 are D# (major 3rd), B (root or 1), A (7 of the B7), F# (5th). By playing the same idea but flattening the D# and A notes for the E9 chord we have this: D is now the 7th of the E7, G# is the major 3rd of the E7, F# is the 9 (I'm playing an E9), and B is now th...

Just a fun sweep picking idea. It might be an idea to practice the notes on the E, A & D strings before adding the rest in. Sounds great with some overdrive as well. All notes are picked down except where noted. Have fun.

Here's a 4 note per string pattern based around a mixolydian shape in 'A'. A lot of the gaps between the notes have been filled in with passing tones. This gives a 'Steve Morse' or 'Brett Garsed' sound to the scale. On the tab is the run with passing notes in brackets ( ). If you play the lick without any of these notes you'll have the A mixolydian mode of D major. Don't worry too much about this, let's just call it an A mixolydian or Dominant7 scale. Typically you would be comping on an A7 or A9 type chord, or even just power chords. I've included another ...

This lick uses ideas that I've picked up from Country over the years and kinda worked into something that I could use in almost any style (given the right sound). I guess it proves that it's handy to learn a few styles because I think this lick sounds good in country, metal or whatever. I don't play this lick the same way each time, I play bits of it and on occasions something longer than what's here. It rarely comes out the same way twice.

This is a chicken picking lick in E. Not much to tell really, just a fun lick to mess with. Starts with an E shape then moves down to a D and A before wrapping it up on an E. I've found that muted notes sound great in country, gives it that chicken pickin' sound. This lick wouldn't sound as good if all the notes were picked cleanly and the mutes were left out.

This is a picking exercise that I use after being warmed up. I adapted the technique (in mixolydian mode) from the section in the Dreggs song "Pride of the Farm" where it goes from A to D before back to G. The idea is to pick each note nice and clean regardless of speed. This type of exercise increases motor skill co-ordination so it is most important to GET IT RIGHT! Yes, I too have a tendency to want to pick things fast before actually being able to play it correctly so do as I say and not as I ... well you know the rest. The good thing about exercises like...

The concept of open string licks is to have two or more notes ring at the same time. This gives a totally different sound than "one note at a time" runs. This one is typical of the type of lick that I would use to finish off the solo in "Workin' Man Blues". It covers two bars with a bendup from G to A at the end which gives me time to stomp on my pedal board. Try to let as many notes ring on as possible, attempt to let the E and B string ring throughout.

This is one of the absolute essentials if you want to know the guitar properly. Knowing how to solo around chords (instead of just scales) makes it easier on you and it also makes it sound more interesting. Playing 4 notes at a time, 1st, 3rd, 5th and 7th, and then moving on to the next chord. We're going to play the arppegios to these chords without moving position, in other words, in 2nd position: 1st finger on the 2nd fret, 2nd finger on the 3rd fret, 3rd finger on the 4th fret and the 4th finger on the 5th fret. Practice the exercise in one fluid movement like...

This is what comes of testing a new microphone. My new Beta 57a up against my practice amp (a Peavey classic 30 (vg-88 as pre-amp)) sounded so good I decided to record something. The result is this lesson. Whenever I mess with these ideas people ask me what I'm doing. Basically it's combination of two things, knowing your arpeggios up and down the neck, and playing them in patterns and sequences with passing tones to help link the positions together. I'm just going to show the arppegios, some patterns/sequences, and some passing tones, then the rest is up to you. ...

I've been showing a lot of guys this simple idea and it's amazing how it opens up another world of playing once they realise what's in it. The idea is simple, take a stock 'A' chord (like the 'F' shape you see below but move it up the neck to the A position). Play the notes seperately then play the notes from 'Ab' in the same fashion - and join them together. Keep doing this until you find what you like and don't like, then add it to your solos. Let me explain it properly: We're in the key of 'A', let's play some notes from the 'A' chord but occassionly throw ...

Here's a quick rock lick that I thought I would share. It involves a series of chromatic notes to make blues and rock licks more interesting. Try moving it up and down the fretboard. I have played it in the key of A but I also demonstrate the lick going from A to E then D and back to A. If you use a clean sound it could be a good jazz or blues lick, too. It's up to you if would like to pick each note or use pull offs and hammer ons. Have fun.

This a D lick with a flat 5th (Ab) and minor 3rd (F) thrown in to add that jazz sound. It plays well over a D (of course) and a Dmaj7 but for an interesting effect try playing it over an Em or Em9. This is something a lot of players do, the song can be grooving in Em9 but they'll be playing/soloing around a D major. It works well in Rock, Metal, Blues and Jazz. You just have to get used to the idea and search out what works and what doesn't. Here's some more examples, Dm-C Am-G Gm-F etc. In other words, while the band is playing in Dm you solo in C, if they're...

Not all pedal steel licks involve bends. Some pedal steel players (and fiddle players) weave in and out of chords and scales to achieve a fascinating sound: kinda Jazz meets Western. This is, of course, used a lot in Western Swing. With some experimenting you could tailor this trick to blues, rock, metal etc. You'd have to explore the options until it sounds right for you. For country, however, this lick fits right in. It's basically an E, Eb and D appeggio lick played two ways with a 16th feel. Ex. 1 is played more like a guitar while Ex. 2 has more of the...

This is a pretty simple lick to get you used to the idea of rythmic pop and tap. It's not just a country trick, you could use it in almost any style. The way I've played it is in a triplet - 1 & a 2 & a etc. 1 - Start by gently popping the first notes by plucking upwards with your 2nd & 3rd fingers like you would if you were finger picking (assuming you are a pick player). If you use a thumb pick or just fingers use the 1st and 2nd finger to do this. 2 - Then release the pressure with your left hand so that the strings are muted - as you do this tap the strings ...