GENERAL playinG tips

all of the recorded examples in this lesson are based on playing different inversions of the same parental triad (a) while travelling laterally along the length of the guitar neck. Within the transcription, some pick-stroke indications are given to reflect where I used sweep picking on the recording; however, where 16th-notes are used, you may prefer to use alternate picking instead. also, if following the pick-strokes recommended in the transcription, although some examples are shown starting with an upstroke, it’s often more natural to start most musical phrases with a down-stroke. So, if you play the first note using a down-stroke, that’s okay: it shouldn’t make much difference once you’re past that initial note; just play as written from that point onwards. Furthermore, most of the musical examples start from CaGed shape #1 of a Mixolydian, but you should also try to create ideas that both ascend and descend from each of the other CaGed shapes too. In the backing track, a bridge part was inserted just to mix things up (to make it less monotonous). The chord-names may look a bit scary [Gmaj7 (no 5th)/e5 F#m7 (no 5th)/e5, dmaj7 (no 5th)/e5 and C#m7 (no 5th)/e5]; however, every note of each of these four bridge chords are to be found within a Mixolydian, so you’ll be able to continue to play a Mixolydian throughout. Finally, all of the examples have been‘trimmed off’with a bluesy ending, just to give you an idea of how the two approaches (triads and blues-rock) can be forged together.