Here you go!

What are modes? Everyone knows there are major keys and minor keys, and that songs in a major key tend to sound cheery while songs in a minor key tend to sound melancholy. That’s such a gross simplification that I hesitate to even put it that way, but you get the idea. Anyway, I like to think of modes as “flavors” of major and minor keys. Instead of thinking of a song being in a minor key, I would think of it being in a Dorian minor, or an Aeolian minor, etc.

When you know the mode of a song, you generally know which individual notes will work (say, in a solo), which chords will work (for the sake of composition), and the overall feel of the song. For example, if someone says we’re about to play a bluegrass song in G, I pretty much know that we’ll be in the Ionian mode. Or if a Latin song is in a minor key, it’s probably a Dorian minor.

Here’s how modes work. Let’s take the C major scale which of course is made up of the notes C, D, E, F, G, A, and B. Now if you start on one note and play the others in succession, you get a different mode for each note that you start on. Here they are:

The only modes which are commonly used are Ionian, Dorian, Mixolydian, and Aeolian, so don’t worry about the other three for now. And by the way, the Ionian mode is equivalent to what most would just call the “major scale”.

It really doesn’t matter what order you play the notes in or where you start. What makes a mode a mode is the set of notes used with a particular chord. For example, any time the notes of the C major scale are used over a D Min chord, you have a D Dorian mode.

Given a chord progression, how do you know which mode a song uses?

If the song is in a minor key then it will use either Dorian or Aeolian. If the IV chord of the chord progression is a major then it’s Dorian and if the IV chord is minor it’s Aeolian. So if an Em song has an A Major chord, then it’s probably E Dorian. If it’s an Em song with an Am chord, then it’s probably Aeolian.

If it’s a major key, then it will most likely use Ionian or Mixolydian. To narrow it down beyond that, you should probably use the melody as a cue. A melody that uses the major 7 (one note below the tonic) would be Ionian. A melody that uses the dominant 7 (two notes below the tonic) would be Mixolydian.

Here are some examples of the common modes and which styles of music you might find them in. I’m speaking broadly here. There are tons of exceptions.

Ionian
* Classical music in a major key
* Nursery rhymes in a major key
* Bluegrass music in a major key
* Old jazz (pre-fusion) in a major key

Mixolydian
* Rock music in a major key
* Blues music in a major key*

Dorian
* Latin music in a minor key
* Old jazz (pre-fusion) in a minor key

Aeolian
* Classical music in a minor key
* Some rock music in a minor key

* Blues songs usually change modes as the chords change.

And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that the theme song to The Simpsons by Danny Elfman uses the Lydian mode.

The list of modes above is not anywhere close to complete. It includes the seven modes of the diatonic scale, but there are other scales such as the Harmonic Minor and the Melodic Minor which spawn their own systems of modes. And for all 21 of these modes, there are individual tweaks you can make resulting in hundreds of others. However, almost all of these are purely academic or antiquated.

Guitarists should learn to play modes as scales over two octaves in varying positions. The positions and fingerings of the scales is worth a whole other article but for starters try learning the four common modes in the key of A in position IV or V and the key of C in position II or III. Then, pick out some songs in each mode to practice soloing over. Here are some recommendations:

Ionian – Blackberry Blossom (bluegrass classic)

Mixolydian – Dark Star (Grateful Dead)

Dorian – So What? (Miles Davis)

Aeolian – Stairway to Heaven (Led Zeppelin)

Happy picking,
— John

As expected, learning a new style feels like starting over. The technique, the rhythm, and the feel are all different. One of the most basic strokes, the golpa, where the index finger strums downward while the middle finger taps body, I find almost impossible to execute. Yet in a sense the music is very simple. Almost all of the songs are in either E or Am, and the chords tend to move between the two with occasional diversions to G and F. Interestingly, the single-note “melodies” are mostly in E lydian (which has a minor 3rd) but are then usually followed immediately by an E major, thus mixing up the minor and major 3rds, which I’ve been a big fan of for many years (mostly in acid jazz).

What’s interesting about the rhythm is that in Flamenco, a quintuplet is not just an academic curiosity, it’s a prominent part of the music, usually in the form of a rasgueado. I found a great description of the mechanics behind the rasgueado here.

Anyway, I’ll probably be updating the blog more now that I’m learning new stuff. Stay tuned!

In the end I figured it made sense to get a Santa Cruz since, you know, I live in Santa Cruz. So I walked into Sylvan music ready to buy. I’ve never bought a guitar this expensive before, and the prices I saw on the Internet were quite a bit lower than the sticker price in the store. While I would never buy a guitar like this off the Internet and I don’t expect my local guitar shop to meet those kinds of prices, I wondered if they could come down a little. When I asked if they could come down a bit, a funny thing happened. The salesperson gave me a deadpan “No” and a look that just seemed to dare me not to buy it. Extra strings? Strap? Picks? Nope, I guess he wanted to make this decision very easy for me.

So, I walked out of the store and across town to the Martin dealer, Union Grove Music. I asked the same question about coming down in price, and instead of dismissing it out of hand, the salesperson entered into an interesting dialog with me. He told me about how this guitar isn’t made any more, and Martin’s equivalent replacement costs $5K, so I’m getting a good deal with the sticker price. I told him about the prices people were buying them for when they were available (thanks Harmony Central!) and eventually we found a middle ground: he knocked $300 off the price. He also told me everything I could ever want to know about the Martin company and their guitars.

So, I’m the proud owner of a Martin HD28-LSV and I have no regrets. It’s a battleship of a guitar (hey, where do you think the dreadnought gets its name?) and takes some extra effort to play, but the sheer power is enough to make it fun– strumming a G chord hits you in the chest like the tailpipe of a Harley Davidson. And now I know what they mean by the “Martin Mystique”. The tone is warm and single notes have subtle complexities that make it great for lead as well as rhythm.

When I came home I plugged in the mic and immediately wrote and recorded two songs with it:

It Took a While and Squish. Both of them are for my wife Jenny.

The truth is, up until now that “transcription” has been in my head and I had never recorded the song or written down how to play it on guitar. Well this weekend I got around to doing both.

Here’s a recording of the song: Sunset Road

And here’s the transcription in PDF format. The transcription is pretty much just the basic shell of the song so you can get an idea of what the chord fingerings are like, but it’s meant to be expanded upon as you can hear in the recording.

So it’s no wonder that I’m cursed to this day with a weak left-hand pinky. I eventually branched out beyond Texas blues and became interested in jazz, classical, and Brazilian music. To play the licks of Wes Montgomery, Joe Pass, and their ilk without all four fingers being in good shape is nearly impossible. In the 20 years that I’ve been cursing my damn pinky, it’s learned to behave a lot better but recently I decided to focus on this weak link and see if I could devise some exercises to strengthen the pinky.

And actually before I get into the exercises, there’s the matter of position. As I mentioned, I come from a blues heritage and in blues the thumb rests on the top of the guitar to provide maximum leverage for all those string pulls. However in this position the hand is always at an angle and the pinky is farther away from the neck than the rest of the fingers, so it’s at an extreme disadvantage. If you’re playing the type of music that requires a lot of pinky work, you’ll probably want to bring the thumb down so it’s pretty much right in the vertical center of the neck and all four fingers are equidistant from the neck. I’ve only ever seen one guitarist that can play effortless chromatic pinky runs in the blues position, and that’s Mitch Watkins. But he’s a god and I’m a mortal so I have to do it like mortals do. Also, I’ve found that while practicing, resting the guitar on my left knee instead of the right provides for more accuracy and speed.

OK now for some exercises.

For starters, there’s the good ol’ C scale

You start in position II (2 frets up from the nut) and play the C scale, shifting in the middle. I’ve been warming up with this for years and years, and I don’t think it’s doing all that much good. I modified it so that it has more chromatic notes (from E to G) and added an extra workout at the top where the ring and pinky fingers have to play after one another, since that seems to be the hardest thing to do:

C scale + Chromatics

I worked this into my practice regimen and thought I might be improving my pinky strength, but I realized that this was only happening by virtue of the modification I added. And if playing the chromatics was all that was happening, why not ditch the easy part and just play this:

Mosquito

(I call it “Mosquito” because it’s so annoying for everyone around me.)

It’s just a simple pattern starting with the pinky and going down to the index finger, then back up, on each string. About 10 minutes of this, and I would feel a nice burn in my “pinky muscle” (that muscle on the inside of your hand, below the pinky).

After doing this for a week or so, I became more accurate but noticed that the hardest part was when I shifted strings. When the ring finger plays a note on the 1st string and the pinky has to play on the 2nd string, it’s extra awkward and take a little more muscle. And so my next modification:

Mosquito w/ Skip

It’s the same pattern, but I skip a string each time. Hey, that’s pretty hard.

But wait, if playing the ring against the pinky and shifting strings is key to strengthening the pinky, then why not ditch the rest of it. Along those lines I came up with this:

Pinky Rolls

Holy cow, this is torture. Not only do you have to skip strings, but after the skip the pinky has to roll back up to the next string, and that’s a killer. At first, the notes I played were completely sloppy and my pinky muscle burned out after only one trip up and down the strings. That’s a good thing! I think I found the perfect pinky exercise. The pattern is still pretty simple and in guitar tab it looks like:

After a few weeks of this, I can play it much faster although still a bit sloppy:

Pinky Rolls

But more importantly, it takes a long time before my pinky muscle gets tired. And when I’m playing lead, I’m definitely finding myself able to pull off more difficult licks thanks to my new and improved pinky.

Killer Warmup to the Rescue

This warmup exercise is just the key. Almost every note is two strings away from the last and a five fret stretch is required at one point, so it really stretches out your fingers and loosens the fretting finger muscles. Picking can be challenging here since every note must be picked and again, almost each one is at least two strings away from the last.

It sounds like this:

Slow

Fast

I’ve found that running through this warmup once or twice before playing really helps my accuracy and comfort level. And, while it’s no Bach, it follows a standard I/IV/V chord progression that’s interesting to listen to and watch.

If you’re a beginner and find this kind of picking to be difficult, use your metronome and slow it waaaaaay down— say, 1/4th notes at 80bpm or so. Be sure to alternate your picking for each note. Try to practice a few times a week and make your way up the metronome. Once you can play 1/16th notes at 96bpm, you’ve arrived!

Here’s the written music (click for full size):

If I recall, this came about because I was practicing the picking pattern in House of the Rising Sun and got bored of playing the same thing over and over. I started playing E, B, E7, A, Am, E, F# and a whole new song developed.

The tempo and meter changes are typical of my writing style. Sometimes I hear a melody in my head that matches the mood of the song, but not necessarily the tempo or time signature. So what? If it sounds good to my ears, I go with it… unless I’m writing for a full funk/rock/pop band, in which case it really ticks off the people trying to dance. The looks on their faces as they try to cope with 4/4 -> 13/8 -> 11/8 -> 12/8 (transposed triplets) is almost worth it.

1. Jimi Hendrix

What can I say? For me, it all started with Jimi. When I was 13 years old my friend Shane brought a Hendrix album over and played Hey Joe. I was hooked. I forced my dad to show me Purple Haze and I practiced non-stop until I got it. At one point in my sophomore years I began to laugh Jimi off as a sloppy blues player who played the same 10 licks over and over, but then later I came to appreciate his music on a new level as I do today. The more you know, the less you know, I guess.

2. Eric Johnson

I grew up in Austin, TX where 90% of the male population plays guitar, and in Austin, Eric Johnson is a legend. Before any of his studio releases came out (before Tones), my dad had somehow heard of him and took me to a guitar clinic at Lightning, Music, and Sound. I sat five feet away from Eric in a room full of only 20 guitarists or so and heard things that I’d never heard before. Later when Tones came out I learned every song on the album note for note. In fact, people would make fun of my high school band for playing Zap over and over. (We won the senior talent show, so nya!).

3. Wes Montgomery

The first time I heard Wes Montgomery (playing Airegin by Sonny Rollins) was a real lightbulb moment for me. I had been playing nothing but blues and rock for 3 or 4 years and all of a sudden there were all these beautiful mysterious notes going by at the speed of light, and this kicked off my love for jazz. Soon after I enrolled in guitar school and learned all about modes and II-V-Is. Well, quite not all about them :-)

4. Stevie Ray Vaughan

Eric Johnson was a legend in Austin, but Stevie is the legend. When I was in high school me and my friend Ian Moore (a well known guitarist himself) would do nothing but go to Antone’s and try to learn SRV licks. One thing I really appreciate in a guitarist (any musician, really) is rhythm. SRV has some seriously amazing rhythm.

5. Jimmy Herring

Somehow this guy has managed to stay under the radar, but I really think he’s one of the best playing out today. He has this amazing style of soloing where he’ll go out into atonal never never land and then winds his way back in, usually ending up at some blistering blues lick. He plays with jam bands such as Project Z, Aquarium Rescue Unit, and Jazz is Dead. Check out his website, and if he happens to play in your town, check him out.

6. Al DiMeola

I have an Al DiMeola instructional guitar video where Al says

You should really never pull off or hammer on your notes. Picking every note is the more correct way to play.

What a bozo! But, the man can pick, and he writes some interesting music. I’ve also learned quite a bit about rhythm from him.

7. Mitch Watkins

Here’s another guitarist that you may not have heard from. He’s also from Austin, but even in Austin not all that well known. However IMHO he’s one of the best in the world. He can play pretty melodies on acoustic and amazingly fast runs on electric all in the same song and make it fit. His album Strings With Wings is one of my all time favorite guitar albums. Sadly, this is a very difficult album to find. Amazon does have some available used. (Unfortunately, I can’t recommend the Bob Schneider collaboration that’s on iTunes.)

8. Trey Anastasio

When me and my friend/roommate/drummer Brooks Gray drove across the country visiting with friends and playing our newly recorded Zzyzywuzsky album (more on that name another time), one of them commented that we sounded a lot like the band Phish, whom I had never heard of. She put on Picture of Nectar and here was this band that had crystallized so many ideas I had been having about music up to that point. Mixing styles, making humor with music, playing music for music’s sake basically. I stopped liking Phish shortly after their next album, but I learned a lot from Trey.

9. Fareed Haque

Fareed Haque plays with the band Garaj Mahal, who you should check out right now. Seriously, stop reading this and go listen to some of their stuff. ……Pretty awesome, huh?! Fareed is just a master of all things guitar. (In fact, he’s a guitar professor at the Northern Illinois University.) He has this textbook perfect technique and plays very unusual patterns, rhythms, and scales, often drawing from Indian modes and scales.

10. Bela Fleck

Huh? He plays banjo, not guitar. I know, I know, but I’ve learned as much from him as any other guitar player. I once transcribed “Sunset Road” for guitar and it’s one of my favorite pieces to play on steel string. I like to study his multi-string picking patterns, which are evidently pretty effortless on banjo (since he plays them at 100 mph) and try to recreate them on guitar using cross picking techniques.

11. John Scalo, Sr.
A.K.A. Dad— An incredible guitar player (as well as piano) and a patient teacher, I was incredibly lucky to grow up with a full-time live-in guitar tutor. I could quickly learn any song I wanted, from Stairway to Heaven to Funeral March of the Marionette, at any time thanks to my dad. Thanks dad!

What do you think? Who would you list? Feel free to chime in.