Hey! Welcome to video #10 of the Lead Guitar Quick-Start Series. In this lesson I’m going
to teach you a solo that incorporates everything that we’ve learned up to this point. We’re
going to keep it pretty simple. We’re just going to use the three scales that we’ve been
working with – the major scale, the major pentatonic scale, and the minor pentatonic
scale. If you’re just jumping into the series on this video, I’d really recommend that
you go back to the first lesson and start from there because we’re going to be learning
every single aspect we’ve learned about music, techniques, scales, all that stuff
to play through this solo. So the three scale shapes that we’ve learned,
the major scale – G major, the major pentatonic scale, the G major pentatonic scale in this case
and the minor pentatonic scale, which is going to be an E minor pentatonic scale
in this case. We learned a G minor pentatonic scale, but we’re going to be moving that
exact same shape up to where our index finger is starting on an E note, so this becomes
an E minor pentatonic scale. If you need to work on that in this position, now is a good
time to do that. So I have a new jam track for you that you can
play this solo over. It’s basically a 24-bar phrase that you’re going to be playing this
solo. The first 16 bars are just a G major chord, then you’re going to have 2 bars
of E minor, 2 more bars of G major, 2 bars of E minor, and you’re going to finish off,
measures 23 and 24 are just a G major again. So right now I’d recommend you just pull up
this jam track and listen to it just so you can get a feel for what this jam track sounds
like. The jam track, the 24 bars are repeated 4 times throughout this jam track, that way
you can kind of loop it and work on a solo over and over again. Here is what the solo
sounds like by itself. This is where you’re going to be learning. Once I play it for you,
we’ll break down each little lick and each phrase so you can learn the thing step-by-step
So let’s take this solo and break it down
just one phrase at a time. You’re going to start off with a major scale lick and your
third finger is going to be on the fourth fret of the G string. What we’re going to
do is bend that note up a half-step, so 1, 2, 3, 4. That’s the counting on it, so
1, 2, 3, 4, come back to the second fret of that same string, the G string with your index
finger, 1, 2, then for the 3 and 4 of that measure come to the fifth fret of the D string
with your pinky and then you’re going to kind of roll your pinky over to the fifth
fret of the A string and hold that out for 6 beats, 1 full measure, so 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2
and then you’re going to rest for beats 3 and 4. So that whole first little phrase is
kind of our repeating theme that I was talking about in the last lesson. So here it is all together.
That’s like the first phrase of our solo. The next phrase starts out with the same bend,
so 1, 2, 3, 4, but from there you’re going to go up to the fifth fret of that same G
string with your pinky for 1, 2 then 3 and 4 you’re going to go with your middle finger
on the third fret of the B string and then hit that note again for 6 beats, 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2
then rest for beats 3 and 4. That’s the second phrase of our solo. So it will sound like this.
And those two phrases together make up kind of the
first sentence of our solo, so here’s what it sounds like.
So that’s the first sentence. The next sentence of our solo starts off with that exact same reoccurring theme that the last sentence did. This one.
That’s the first phrase of the second sentence. The next phrase starts off kind of the same
but we end up with this sentence with a little pentatonic run, so we’re going to start
off kind of the same way, but from there we’re going to just walk up the G major pentatonic
scale starting with our first finger on the second fret of the G string, then the fourth
fret with your third finger. Go over to the next string, G string, with your middle finger,
fifth fret with your pinky, and then you’re going to end on this G root note to finish
off of that phrase and that sentence. So that last phrase of that sentence, then the pentatonic run
So let me play the whole second sentence of this solo for you.
And one thing you’re going to want to do is on the longer note, so you’re going to
want to make sure to put some vibrato on those just to give it a little more expression.
Those whole first two sentences together of this solo, let me play them for you so you’ll
get an idea of where this is kind of going.
So far in this jam track we’ve been playing over a G major chord the entire time. That’s why we’ve been using a G major scale and
a G major pentatonic scale, but the next two measures are going to switch to an E minor
chord, so we’re going to adjust our playing to use an E minor pentatonic scale. That way
it just fits the whole sound better. So what we’re going to do, I told you earlier, we’re
going to use our G minor pentatonic skill shape and move it up to where our root note
is on an E up here on the twelfth fret of the low E string. So the lick and measure 17
is basically just walking up an E minor pentatonic scale which is perfect because we’re playing
over an E minor chord. What we’re going to do is pick the first note of that scale,
hammer-on to the fifteenth fret, go over to the next string, pick, hammer-on; next string,
pick, hammer-on. And then you’re going to go to this note on the twelfth fret of the
G string and then come back to the E root note right here on the fourteenth fret of
the D string and that’s the whole kind of first little phrase of this sentence, so.
Don't forget to put some vibrato in on that long note.
That lick covers and measures 17 and 18, which are two measures of E minor. After that we have
two measures of G and all we’re going to do to kind of adjust our playing to play over
the changes is grab this G note right here on the twelfth fret of the G string. It’s
an octave higher than the open G string, so you’re going to play that for a whole note,
1, 2, 3, 4, then another whole note, 1, 2, 3, 4 and that will take care of measures 19
and 20. Measures 21 and 22 go back to an E minor chord, so we’re going to adjust our
playing to use our E minor pentatonic scale again. What we’re going to do is basically
repeat this lick we just did on the first E minor chord, but it’s going to be an octave
higher. We’re going to start on the fourteenth fret, this E root note right here on the fourteenth
fret of the D string and play up just like we did. And so just walk up that scale from that
E root note. When you get to the highest note, come back to the E root note right there on
the twelfth fret of the high E string and that’s your long note for that phrase.
Measures 23 and 24 move back to a G major chord. What we’re going to do is switch
back to a G major scale but instead of playing it down here, we’re basically just going
to move that up one octave to this G note right here on the fifteenth fret. This is
going to be kind of our reference scale shape, still G major scale but it’s one octave
higher than we play down here. The lick is really easy. You’re just going to put your
pinky on the seventeenth fret right here, bend it up a whole step, let it back down
and then just play this G root note right here on the fifteenth fret with your middle
finger and just hold that out. So 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4. So this is a pretty simple solo
but the cool thing about it is it literally applies everything that we’ve talked about
in this series so far. So once you get this down and you have it learned, pull up the jam track
and try to play this solo over the jam track. Once you do that experiment with these scales
over the jam track and just remember for the first 16 bars, you’re going to be playing
a G major or G major pentatonic scale and then for the next 2 bars you can switch to
an E minor pentatonic, switch back to a G major for 2 more bars, back to an E minor
for 2 bars and then the last 2 bars are going to go back to a G for you.
Don’t forget to use all the tips we learned in the last lesson like phrasing, building
your solos dynamically, all those types of things. Try to emphasize the root notes, for
example G root notes when you’re playing over a G major chord and emphasize the E root
notes in the E minor pentatonic scale when you’re playing over the E minor chord.
So I’m going to give you an example right now just of what you can do with all the things
we’ve learned if you really work hard at it on a consistent basis. Here you go.
So if you have any questions related to soloing or this solo that I wrote off for you, you
can leave them here and I’ll try to answer you as best I can. Also you can email me
nate@guitarsystem.com. See you.