In this video, I’m going to show you how to have a ton of fun along the neck by doing something that covers a number of practice concepts while providing the added bonus of developing your scales and your keys to a much higher level.

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ONE FRET-POSITION LEARNING:
The effect of only sitting within one key, scale (or mode) won't address the quick thinking in your playing that will come from when we work at changing which key and scale is being played - and doing that, "on the fly."

This lesson's exercise will teach you how to strengthen areas that are weak for you when it comes to moving a scale or mode to another region of the fret-board.  With a step by step attack plan, you are going to be able to improve your ability to switch keys, scales and modes once and for all.

This lesson will help you with a very common problem that’s generally caused by doing too much in position playing on the guitar fingerboard. No matter if that’s from learning licks in one playing position, or studying scales and arpeggios within one, or if it’s from learning how to play a favorite song, we tend to learn ideas on the guitar in one position using one scale, one key or with one mode. 

By applying a key signature exercise along the fingerboard, we can train ourselves to shift ideas that we’re performing along and across the neck - changing key and changing scales all in one go. 

This exercise will not only help with getting better at scales and keys, but it will also help with thinking faster on your feet and when we shift along the neck while playing like this, it’s an incredibly satisfying and fun feeling when done perfectly in time. 

BACKING RIFF:
Let’s get things going today by learning a backing riff, then we’ll jump into learning a melodic idea and then we’ll move them both along the neck and have some fun with this... 

Example 1): Backing Riff Idea
Here's a a basic 3-chord riff. It’s a fairly typical sounding riff that you’ve probably heard before… Here it is…

SCALE and KEY PATTERN:
The above riff is in the key of “A Minor.” It’s easy to understand that because the first chord is “A Minor,” and the last chord is “A Minor.” So, this tells us that to understand how to play over the riff we need to become a little familiar with the notes inside of an “A Minor Scale.” 

Below is a pattern for “A Minor” that focuses on the region of the fret-board where we were playing our riff…

Example 2): “A Minor” scale in the central region of the neck… 

Coming up next, I’m going to teach you how to create a melodic statement using that “A Minor” Scale, and then we’ll move the scale along the neck. First into “G Minor” and then along through other keys as well. 

But before that – I have a short promotional message for you about my “Handouts Collection” eBook offer… 

GUITAR LICK - SPRINGBOARD LICK:
Once you become familiar with the general layout of the scale that matches the key of your guitar riff, all you’ll need to do is record the riff on a looper pedal (or you can just record it on your phone), and then play it back while building a melodic idea over it by using the correct scale. 

I’m going to help make all of this a little bit easier for you by giving you a melody to work on so that you can have something to perform right away and it’ll get you going with this idea a lil’ faster. 

SHIFTING IDEAS TO NEW POSITIONS:
Now that you have a backing riff and a melodic idea, you can start getting into the real fun part of this exercise. We’re going to practice playing the first melody in “A Minor,” down a whole step into the key of “G Minor.” 

Of course before we play down into “G Minor,” let’s quickly become familiar with how the riff will move, and how the melody will move as well… 

Example 4): Riff and Melodic example (Key of “G Minor”)

Scale region of the neck in “G Minor.” 

Melodic idea moved over to, “G Minor.” 

Perform the riff and lick (A and G Minor), back to back smoothly in time.

CONCLUSION:
This exercise can be moved all along and across the entire guitar fret-board through a number of different keys. 

You can start with this melody I’ve shown here to get you going, (it’ll make the whole experience of getting started with this easier in the beginning). But over time… (and as you get better with the exercise), move it through several keys. 

It’s an excellent exercise and it’s one that you’ll have fun with because you’ll very quickly discover how to build both a sense of scale association and you’ll develop more control over the guitar neck. 

At the same time you’ll learn how to manage all the changes to keys and scales that happen as you move this exercise across the fingerboard.

 
In this episode of my "Play This Riff" series I will continue with another "easy to play riff workout," that is designed to push your stylistic boundaries to the limits in just a couple of minutes every day.

By using this lessons fun to play Latin Style Riff exercise you'll hit all of the right performance areas in just the right way. Plus, you'll learn just how much more effective that you can be during all of your guitar workouts.

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PLAY THIS RIFF
The “Play this Riff” series continues and this time were hitting an easy to work through, (but also very cool sounding), Latin guitar style riff that’s only one measure long. 

You’re going to love this one, because this riff is super catchy and that makes it perfect for anyone who needs to step up their ability for developing a better sense of groove, a better sense of timing and also it’s a really great riff for improving right and left hand coordination, (especially if you want to get better with your finger-picking). 

But, the best part about this riff is that you can play it on either an Acoustic guitar or on an Electric guitar – makes no difference. So, let’s get things started by introducing the general idea of this riff to you – right now…

Example 1). General Riff

“The Latin Feel” of this riff certainly makes it catchy sounding and it’s overall “in-position” set up on the neck makes maintaining a well-established fret hand position on the neck rather easy. Work slowly through the riff to learn what you need to know about the note layouts for this riff.

Once the riff’s notes and the playing positions are memorized, start taking a closer look at the plucking hand.

When we create modifications to any riff composed in any style, the modifications will often alter one of two primary areas of playing. They can change up the note layout of the riff, or change the riffs rhythm structure. 

In my first modification, we’re going to alter the note layout. With this change, we’ll establish two fret-board positions by altering our overall note set-up. Here’s how this change sounds.

Example 2). Modification no. 1 - Position Shift

The “two-position” set up on this version of our riff makes it a little more challenging to perform (due to a fret-hand position shift). 

Once you learn the change I’ve made and the riff’s notes are memorized, you’ll want to also double check what to do with your plucking hand as well.

CREATING FURTHER MODIFICATIONS:
If we create other modifications to the riffs rhythm structure the cool thing that happens is we end up with a new sense of dynamic feel from the riff, (because the stress points and the accents end up getting changed). 

In my last example, we’re going to alter the note duration. We’ll still stay in the same fret-board position with a few changes to the notes themselves, but the main difference will be the rhythmic feel. Here’s the final change to the riff.

The note set up on this version of the riff isn’t all that difficult to perform because we are back to staying within a position. But, here’s what you need to know about my modification on this one; the sixteenth-note rests create a very broken feel from the overall note structure.

And, just like before, once the notes are memorized, you’ll want to also confirm what’s happening with your plucking hand.

A lot of a guitar players fear about music theory lies in the term itself "Music Theory." Those two words will often start to invoke mild terror in the body of many a guitar player. 

In fact, most guitar players out there refer to music theory as being confusing and too complicated to learn, so they push it away for another day.But, that ends up turning into months and years of neglect for this subject.

Good news, it doesn't need to be like that. Regardless of why you haven't studied theory, the fear of music theory is not about the challenge of learning it. 

The fear is often based more on because the student does not have a comfortable path to learning music theory in the first place.

A NEW WAY TO PLAY:
Do you just grab your guitar and play notes, or licks, or chords without ever thinking about even the slightest bit of theory with respect as to what it is that you’re actually playing? 

I know that I used to do that many years ago! And, I know from teaching experience that far too many Beginner and Intermediate guitar players will also do that. 

But, what if you could learn a simple idea that would give you a ton of information about what it is you’re playing? And, at the same time, what if that idea was so easy to understand that anybody could do it.

I know you’re probably curious as to what this idea is, so here’s the thing. All this has to do with is simply learning the order of the notes used in whatever it is that you’re playing. 

This is amazing to know how to do, because it will tell you; the name of the scale, the key that you’re in, and the Major or Minor harmony of what it is that you’re playing. 

So, let’s spend the next 8 – 10 min. learning exactly how this works, so that you can do this before the next time that you play anything on the guitar.

A lot of guitar players would easily learn how to play this 3-chord riff, but they’d never know the chord names, or the key that it’s in. And, that’s a real shame, because learning this information is really easy to do. 

Let me show you the method of how you could learn this using those chords that I just jammed on…

Example 2): Get the note names together
If you know the notes on your guitar neck, this first step will be super-fast to get through, (but even if you don’t, there’s a great website for getting your notes together on guitar, just go to, “GuitarScientist.com/generator.” 

That website will show you all the notes and allow you to trace out (and diagram), everything that you’re playing.

Let’s begin with the first chord of our jam. 

It looks like this…

What we’re after is to view those notes in 3rd’s so that they travel in a sequence that gives us notes in a 3-step order. 

All you need is a few seconds to figure that out with these notes, and when we do it, we end up with a 3rd’s order of; “G, B, D.” Telling us that we have a “G” chord! (Major) 

Example 3): Get the next chords note names together…
Now, let’s do that again, but with the next chord, in the progression. 

The next chord in the progression looks like this:

On the fingerboard the notes lay out as follows...

 That chord has three notes and they can be seen as; 

Again, we want to have those notes established in a direct order of 3rd’s so that they travel in a sequence that gives us the letter name distance over the notes in a 3-step order. 

All you need is a few seconds to accomplish that, and when we do it, we end up with a 3rd’s order of; “C, E, G.” Telling us that we have a “C” chord! 

You can see how easy it is to do the ordering, and how simple that it is to discover the name of any chord in any song that you’re playing! 

Coming up next, I’m going to cover how to get the key of a melody, and how to discover the scale being used. But first - here’s a short promotional message about my “Hand-outs Collection” eBook offer!

Example 4): Learning the Scale and Key of a Melody…
Next I have a simple melody line that can be played over the chords that we had just spent some time learning about in our last example... Here's how that line melody goes...

CREATING A "MELODY MAP"
If we take any melody or guitar solo and we plot the notes out on the fingerboard, we get a quick overview of the notes that are in use, and this easy and simple step will tell us something very important. 

It shows us the solos’ roadmap and that roadmap will lead us to the solos key, and what scale is being used. 

Here’s what the roadmap for that solo I just showed (above), looks like on the neck… 

Example 5). Solo Roadmap on the Neck: 

The solo functions between the 5th fret region off of a “G note” up to as high as the 2nd string 10th fret note of “A.” In between, we have a scale box shape giving us the notes of “E, A, B, D and G.”

After we discount any repeating notes, we end up with a grand total of five tones and that means we have a Pentatonic scale. 

Once we look back at the solo (shown above), and we take notice that the starting note (which is a “G,” and, the ending note (also a “G,”), we can come to the conclusion here, that we have a key of “G” solo, and it uses the, “G Pentatonic Scale.” 

Now that you know about this simple theory trick why wouldn’t you do this before you; study, play through, practice or memorize anything going forward from here on out? 

Knowing this stuff only takes a few minutes of very simple work, and if you do it the breakdown will tell you a ton of information about what you’re playing, thus making you a far more skilled guitar player along a with MUCH better musician.