Grab the free lesson pack for this lesson (includes intro solo tab). Lesson Transcript: In this lesson, I’m going to show you step by step how to turn simple triads into melodic guitar solos. One of the hardest things about learning guitar is taking things you know and actually using them musically. So with this […]

In the last lesson, we harmonized the G major scale in first position to understand the chords and intervals contained within the scale. This type of exercise is great because it reinforces four essential skills at once: scale position identity, interval recognition, root note awareness, and diatonic harmony. In this lesson, we’re going to do the same with the G minor scale.

I always enjoy exercises that are more encompassing than just learning a single skill. In this lesson, we’re going to harmonize the G major scale in first position to understand the chords and intervals of the key as a single system. This reinforces four essential skills at once: scale position identity, interval recognition, root note awareness, and diatonic harmony.

If you’re familiar with the CAGED system, then you know it’s a way to use open chord shapes to map out guitar chords all over the fretboard. But the system goes far beyond just chords to incorporate arpeggios, pentatonic scales, and diatonic scales. In this lesson we’re going to look at an exercise that that […]

Broken chords are absolutely fundamental to playing the guitar. They’re utilized in so many songs, it’s essential to hone your skills in this area, particularly your picking skills. So in this lesson we’re going to look at what broken chords are and dive into a few exercises to get your fundamentals up to speed. Let’s […]

I love to work from arpeggios when improvising and creating musical lines. It’s so easy to create a melody with them and they can be easily expanded upon with scales. In this lesson we’re going to work through a simple musical exercise for applying arpeggios and scales to the guitar.

Perhaps my favorite way to learn the pentatonic scale up the fretboard is through the use of repeating patterns. In this lesson we’ll take a look at the repeating patterns concept and how we can apply to the pentatonic scale to create a fun and effective exercise for learning the pentatonic scale.

As its name suggests, the 12-bar blues is a chord progression that spans twelve bars. It consists of a signature structure, but also features several common variations. In this lesson we’ll cover the basics of the 12 bar blues, how it’s structured, and some variations to get you strumming the blues.

Mixolydian, along with Dorian, is one of my favorite modes to improvise over. It’s rather straightforward and gives you room to experiment and intermix several approaches. In this lesson we’re going to take a look at a three simple options for improvising a guitar solo in the Mixolydian mode.