The Guitar Diaries #8

Last week's lesson was a bit of a mixed bag:

1. Started off by reviewing the "Mr PC" tune and happily it was sounding better -- I was managing to get my "swing" on :-)

2. Introduced some new ideas for comping using chord shapes based on stacking intervals of diatonic fourths (instead of the thirds that comprise regular triads and seventh chords). We went through shapes involving 3 and 4 notes, all starting on the fifth string. 

One interesting thing is that when you start on minor or half-diminished tones (i.e. A, B, D, E when in the key of C Major), you get a stack of four perfect fourths. Thus, instead of a dissonant or melancoly sound, you get a more neutral, open sound.

For the major seventh tones (C,F) --- as well as the dominant seventh (G), if you include 4 tones --- you stumble on a tritone at some point in the "stack" of fourths. Of course you have to, since two perfect fourths on top of each other make a minor 7 interval -- so if you want a major seventh, one of them has to be an augmented fourth. For the dominant seventh, the tritone is the interval from minor 7 to major 3rd (8va).

These shapes seem to have quite versatile applications in comping. As an example, in the tune Mr PC (which is becoming something of a workhorse) we looked at playing the root C and D fourth stacks instead of Cm7, and the Fm7 and Gm7 stacks in place of Fm7.

3. Arpeggio shapes: introduced a bunch of root 5 and root 6 seventh arpeggio shapes. These were more-or-less familiar but I wasn't "fluent" in them, so I've been practising them during the week.

4. "Yesterday" (by The Beatles) chord melody piece. He gave me the sheet music but I haven't had a chance to start working on it. It sounds a fair bit more challenging than the "twinkle twinkle little star" one that we did a few weeks back, so it should be fun.