How I got better at GUITAR SOLOS (Patreon)

Guitar solos will never die….the perfect lead ignites our souls with desire and changes our lives forever. This is an opportunity to tell YOUR story to the world. Bleed your passion and bend reality to your will. I was always drawn to lead guitar players like John Petrucci, Steve Vai, Paul Gilbert, David Gilmour and Randy Rhoads. These lead lords aroused my imagination and made me think anything was possible. An accomplished lead player can communicate things beyond the scope of language. A universal power resides in his fingertips, giving form to the intangible. To achieve unlimited freedom, a soloist must train consistently, have vision and execute a structured plan of attack to reach his goals. One must master the mind with mediation techniques, sleep well, eat well and exercise the body. When each parameter comes into alignment, powerful transformation will occur FAST!

🛑 The Problem

Contrary to popular opinion, playing with your hardwood isn’t easy. When I first picked up the guitar, nothing but useless cacophony plagued my ears when I tried to rip a lead. Why couldn’t I blaze through scales effortlessly and make the babes weep tears of joy?  My fingers hurt just trying to push down the strings much less try to play an epic solo! In this post we’ll go through the process of how to improve your solos and start shredding on level 666!!

🛑 Get Excited

It‘s important to get excited about what you’re doing. The emotional energy needed to make progress isn’t something you can ignore. While you’re at work, or going about your day, start to fantasize about fingering the g string. Day dream about the sounds you want to make. Imagine yourself executing the perfect solo, having immaculate control over each soulful tone produced. Recently, I’ve been taking a pop song and writing my own lead overtop to practIce my soloing skills. Pop songs typically have simple structures that are perfect for musical experimentation. This allows you to work on your  improvisation and composition skills all at once! Lady Gaga’s Poker Face will be our chosen Guinea pig to experiment with.

🛑 The Circle Of 5ths

Step one is to determine the key you’re soloing in. This is done by using the circle of 5ths. The circle of 5ths is a visual diagram of all 12 musical keys. It’s basically a blueprint for how to sound good. Here’s how you figure out what key a song is in. First, Hum the tonic pitch and find that note on guitar. The tonic pitch is the note you could end the song on. It’s like home base and feels resolved when you play it. Next, play a major and minor scale on that note to see which one sounds better. It should be pretty obvious which scale is correct. Poker Face is in the key of G# minor, which contains 5 sharps. Don’t be scared, This one of my favorite keys! It just takes a little getting used to if you’ve never used it before. Bands like Rush and Dream Theater use this key in tracks like Limelight and The Count Of Tuscany

🛑 Learn The Chords

Once the key signature is determined, you need to have a fretboard navigation system in place so you can finger the g string on level 69. Unfortunately, the guitar isn’t as to understand as the piano. You're likely to get lost, unless you have a system to work things out. The first step in this process may not be intuitive for lead lords...Learn the CHORDS. It’s actually an understanding of the harmony that makes a good soloist. A good solo builds on what‘s already there. If you’re unaware of what the rest of the band is doing, you‘re going to be talking past one another. The chord Progression in poker face is G#m-E-B-F#. In order to tell a story with your solo, you must reference and develop the main characters represented by each harmonic event. Each one of these chords has a unique personality waiting to be explored. I find it extremely powerful to conceive of each chord as a modal identity. G#m is Aeolian, E is Lydian, B is Ionian and F# is Mixolydian. Aeolian is melancholic and sad, Lydian is nostalgic and bright, Ionian is Optimistic and uplifting, Mixolydian feels like a party and creates momentum back to the beginning. Make a point to emphasize these specific emotions during each chord change.

🛑 Follow The Chords

You may have heard the phrase, “follow the chords” before. So how does one “follow the chords?” A good soloist knows how to target chord tones and amplify the synergy between melody and harmony. For example, a G#m chord contains The notes G#-B and D#. During your solo, play these tones in your licks during the G#m chord and things will automatically sound good. Use this strategy for each chord in the progression. Memorize the notes in each chord change until they’re tattooed on your soul. G#m is G#-B-D#, E is E-G#-B, B is B-D#-F# and F# is F#-A#-C#. You don’t want to be thinking during your solo. There simply isn’t enough time. Instead, rely on your training and instincts to guide you. I can’t possibly stress just how important this aspect of soloing is. You’re basically just stumbling around in the dark hoping for a happy accident without knowledge of how to outline chords.

🛑 There’s More Than Just Pentatonic

Despite what Metallica may say, there’s more than just the pentatonic scale. Each scale has a special story to tell, with unique flavor and emotion. Scales play a huge role in your soloing capacity. Being able to deploy the right one at the right time is a superpower. When I started improvising ideas for poker face, I played each mode within the key of G# Minor across my hardwood. G# Aeolian, A# Locrian, B Ionian, C# Dorian, D# Phrygian, E Lydian and F# Mixolydian. Now you have every position underneath your fingertips. This is so important because each zone of the guitar offers unique possibilities to express yourself.

🛑 Technical Tantrums

Make your solos more interesting by incorporating different techniques. In the Poker Face solo, I’m using sweep picking, legato, speed picking, rasgueado strumming, hybrid picking and more to create a sense of ACTION. A good solo is like a film that has twists and turns, putting you on the edge of your seat in anticipation of what might happen next. The last thing you want is to bore the audience with predictable licks and boring ideas.

🛑 Rhythm Is KING

Rhythm is another way you can elevate your lead lines. Bands like Polyphia are massively popular in large part because of the rhythmic nature of the music. The Latin influence allows complex lines to groove and possibly even inspire thots of dancing. Practice using different subdivisions of the beat to grab the listeners attention. Quarter notes, 8ths, triplets, 16th notes. Don’t even worry about your fretting hand and think of the guitar as a percussive object. Spank it with your picking hand and smack into the strings without trying to be too precise. The more strings you hit, the bigger the percussive sound will be. In poker face, I’m getting pretty crazy with the rhythms. In addition to all the common subdivisions, You’ll find quintuplets, sextuplets, septuplets and even 32nd notes. It’s important to make a connection with these rhythms in your gut and and your brain. Try slowing the metronome down to 50 bpm and see you can play each one.

🛑 Practice Strategy

Learning something complicated like a guitar solo is a daunting task. Imagine you’re a Jedi Knight who’s training for his biggest challenge, the ultimate showdown between good and evil. You must summon every ounce of your skill to face this challenge. Use the SHRED METHOD to guide you. Science, Ritual, Education and Discipline. The secret is to use the C WORD “chunking” to make things easy. Chunking is when you divide larger segments into manageable chunks. One bar, or even one beat at a time. Don’t feel stupid, this is how all the pros do things. We’re not machines yet, we need time to process and assimilate musical movements into our muscle memory. Another absolute GAME CHANGER is guitar pro. This is the program I used to tab the poker face solo. It’s also the most powerful practice tool I’m aware of. You can play along at any speed and customize your practice session using any metric imaginable. Various tunings, adding other instruments, or changing keys. Isolating your part and really focusing on where you’re currently at and where you’d like to go. Getting better isn’t something that happens by accident, you must fight against the law of entropy and have a plan to transform chaos into structure. Now, it’s time to rip some leads. Score the full tabs for my Poker Face solo below. Good luck!