How to Arrange 7th Arpeggios for Single Escape

Harmony & Theory
#1

Typical advice for learning a Jazz Standard tends to be to play the arpeggios one after another in 8th notes in one position and change to the nearest note of the next arpeggio as the chord changes. This doesn’t work neatly with single escape so I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions or ideas?

At the moment I’m thinking of either using the gypsy double down approach or to just skip over this step entirely and start trying to build musical phrases. Anyone know George Benson’s approach? Obviously he’s not just playing arpeggios up and down but is there any easily applicable trick or movement shifting he’s using to accommodate his technique? :slight_smile:

#2

the easiest ones to do it are the 2 string variety which are similar to pentatonic scales.
this is where you take the root and start below and add the seventh then play root move to the next string then play the third and 5th. then you can repeat the figure on next set of strings and so on. Works for major minor half dim and dim and #5 #4 etc just replace some of the notes. I have done this for awhile now and its cool. Kind of gives you a break from pentatonic licks. for jazz depending on chord sequence you could do it with leading tones etc just as long as your notes on a single string are even. Other wise for more than two strings single escape you’d need to use sweeping mixed with single escape motion which has been done alot as well.

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#3

That’s a good idea, sounds especially useful when descending as like you said you can add some sweeps in to make ascending lines flow nicely. I’m sure there has to be some great position shifting ideas people like George Benson, Cecil Alexander and Dan Wilson use with their USX form but I haven’t worked it out yet!

#4

That’s an awesome idea! Slightly off topic but possibly related is this cool twist on pentatonic by Rick Graham

The first minute and 30-ish seconds I was like “OMG everyone knows this why are you telling us about it???” then he gets to his point, which is a very cool “new” way to think of pentatonic scales. So that might help with idea you mentioned here:

Just use that Rick approach and grab the color of the chord. Doesn’t have only be chord tones either and that could help by sneaking in cool passing tones, neighbor tones (enclosures) or altered scale degrees that are very idiomatic of the genre.

A more stock approach, that checks your “single escape” requirement (hey, you didn’t say it had to be pure alternate picking :wink: ) is something like this for the opening bars of Autumn leaves.

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That’s all in the Yngwie system as well as gypsy jazz regarding the picking.

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#5

dont just conform to some preset rules like you will be punished if you think of how to break them yet still remain inside them. because there are loop holes who’s to say you couldn’t do a half rest stroke down stroke to a pull off or hammer on to switch strings to a down stroke? and do double ups its faster lol. we can have a race and i can show you! :rofl:

to me the whole reason for the double down thing i think is sort of a curse of the gypsy jazz guitar. the way the arm has to bend and flex while trying to do rhythm guitar and pick lines. they just opt to keep the wrist the same as when strumming, so it is why they just double down and the rest stroke helps with tracking. it helps immensly with speed on the musically ascended side so just do the opposite during the descend if you want to or learn to do half rest strokes you play the way you want. don’t take me wrong this double down can definitely be a very powerful tool in your arsenal when you need it. same could be said about double ups, swybrid, 3 finger economy picado etc etc.

also specific players or schools of players in the gypsy jazz realm will play things (arpeggios, lines, fragments) in specific pockets, positions,and areas on the neck.

christiaan van hemert has abunch of nuggets littered around his videos. here is a major 7th shape, i have seen others as well, but i am quickly trying to show you stuff from the gypsy jazz realm.

i know this isn’t a 7th but its another chord the minor 6th and he shows two different positions from different schools of players. The first is dutch style, and the second shape is around, 5:55 talks about french style shape. Which is similar to the Yngwie descended harmonic minor shape concept 4 notes, switch string 3 notes, switch string, except its just using this slanted pocket area on the neck to do the arpeggio.

#6

Yeah this has been my general thinking, was hoping someone would of found a way to neatly stick to the typical beginner Jazz approach but thought that might be a bit hopeful, feel like Jazz guitarists are making it very hard on themselves trying to alternate pick through all these arpeggios!

I don’t know what a half rest stroke is :thinking: More generally I don’t use any rest strokes in my picking, though I feel like I could learn too relatively easily if I wanted to properly go down the Gypsy Jazz route :slight_smile:

That’s interesting, I know some of the guys can get it going really smoothly but I think I’m right in saying that they will ascend in one way and descend another to avoid it if possible?

#7

I dig what he is saying. It is a great way to get new sounds with almost little fus on the mechanics side of things cause if you can do pentatonic stuff you can just change the notes as long as the concept is still the same. I dabble in this a bit to tweak it for like harmonic minor and mixolydian by just raising the third of the minor pentatonic etc. I think Marty Friedman has some exotic scales that would work with same principal as well.

#8

Just depends on the players some are religiously single escape always switching strings to a down stroke, and some might break the rules.

#9

You should check Peter Farrell’s youtube channel if you haven’t. He was a student of George.

Here’s a pretty neat lesson on stretching the simple minor pentatonic shape to fit over a variety of chords:

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#10

I would say it can only strengthen your usx if you are naturally usx to learn the rest stroke and double down stuff. doesn’t matter if you are usx style dart thrower (i dont know which is which on usx and dsx so if this is suppose to be reverse dart thrower forgive me :sweat_smile:) or turning a key in a door knob motion (i have seen both styles of gypsy jazz pickers), both can benefit from incorporating the rest stroke. from my time using and developing it i can say it took my picking to new heights, mainly consistency which can greatly reduce time learning new phrases. you can learn phrasing so fast it will shock you, and so quickly you won’t even have time to really say how did my fingers fret all of that i just don’t get it! taking a detour down this path can shed light on uncovering the fretboard in new ways that you might have never been shown. plus i might even add that you could be preventing your ears from permanent damage if you listen to heavy metal at full volume on max daily by switching to gypsy jazz. :rofl:

if you are into the real tasty stuff, i would say if you are gonna take the detour start with gypsy bossa’s they sound soo good. elena’s bossa & bossa dorado are two that are just make me want to live in that sound forever! left another great one out for sephora is another amazing gypsy bossa. those should keep you busy for at least half a year or more.

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#11

One-way or two-way economy are the “best” approaches because they’re not really one approach: they include both alternate picking and sweeping. So an economy player could do pure alternate when it suits them, or alternate + sweep. Good two-way economy players switch between these as it suits.

Among players we’ve interviewd, Oz Noy, Jimmy Bruno, and Wim Den Herder are great examples of two-way economy players who are just as likely do a pure alternate line as a line including sweeping. Frank Gambale, while famous for two-way sweeping, is really more of a DSX economy player (DSX alternate + upstroke sweeping) when he gets into it. All these interviews are good sources of examples to check out.

To get started, here’s a lesson on doing this with DSX economy, including both positional pure alternate examples as well as ones with sweeping:

For through-the-changes stuff in USX economy (i.e. downstroke sweeping), this is a pretty textbook example of how this would work:

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#12

This guy (Tomato-something) has not one but 3 lessons about it for DSX players… for USX just start on an up or change the patterns :slight_smile:

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#13

Incredible resources and some killer playing, thank you both!

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#14

Those CtC guys (Troy and Tommo) are some seriously sick players. The fact that they sound that clean when isolated is pretty humbling. Glad I’m just a hobbyist, otherwise I’d feel awfully inferior lol!

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