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my friends if there's one big thing that
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pretty much all guitar players neglect
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when it comes to practicing it is also
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including some practical music theory
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topics while they're working on their
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skills I know I know music theory is
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scary it's not a term that gets guitar
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players excited but if you're only
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working on technical exercises in your
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practice routine you will not become a
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better guitar player overall because all
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you really learn is how to play those
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exercises a little bit faster every
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single day you're not becoming better at
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understanding how music actually works
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and how to use this beautiful instrument
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and the techniques that you're learning
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so if there are no practical music
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theory Concepts in your daily practice
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routine you're absolutely wasting your
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time when you're practicing and that is
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not what I want for you so I wanted to
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make this very special video at the end
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of the year because I shared so many
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cool music theory Concepts on the
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channel in 2024 and I know that you the
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awesome person that's watching this
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video is very very busy so I can
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guarantee that you missed a lot of what
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I'm about to say so let's finally add
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some insanely helpful Theory Concepts to
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your daily practice routine right now
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here's the first amazing trick I want to
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show you
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today so that sounds pretty cool and
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quite trippy right so the way that I
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recommend diving into the world of
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syncopation it's first starting out with
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A continuous pattern of 16th notes in
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our example and always muting or
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blocking the downstrokes with your
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fretting hand so generating that notes
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and of course on the
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upstrokes you have the notes of the
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scale in our case the D fren major or D
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Spanish frian scale so the way this
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exercise is constructed you have one
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pattern where you're consistently
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picking and you're always playing a dead
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note for the
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downstrokes and the scale note for the
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upstrokes but in the second half of the
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exercise you're only playing those
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syncopated
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upstrokes and that's where things get
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really tricky because instinctively and
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from experience you will want to
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play those single notes in the scale
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with downstrokes and on the beat so by
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splitting the exercise into two halves
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first working on the 16th noes and then
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those isolated syncopated 16th noes that
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will teach your hand and brain to stay
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locked into that 16th node grid so that
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it doesn't feel so awkward to randomly
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play some upstrokes that are not in time
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you will always feel that downstroke
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that comes before the upstroke even if
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you're not playing it and that's why
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this way of working with syncopation is
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the best way in my opinion this exercise
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will get you awesome results with your
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time in right away and if you're a rock
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or metal guitar player I want to show
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you the first big benefit right away
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let's move to the second rhythmic pillar
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I like to call offbeat riffing this next
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exercise is based on the same concept as
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the first one but it might remind you of
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a lot of songs right away so it's a very
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practical exercise check it
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[Music]
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out all right so I think we have all
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heard a rift that sounds like this at
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some point
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[Music]
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and once again with the first half of
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the rift those P muted downstrokes with
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the low open E string make it really
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clear that those land on the beat those
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are kind of the rhythmic Center but as
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you will see when you practice this
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exercise where it gets really trippy is
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when you remove those downstrokes and
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you only play the upstroke cuz if you
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hear and play the rift this way the
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rhythm of the drums seems to turn around
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and you perceive the snare hits as being
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on the beat and not offbeat so even
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though it looks easy just play those
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[Music]
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upstrokes is actually quite hard and an
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excellent timing exercise when you're
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playing the second half of the exercise
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please pay close attention to those
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upstrokes you want them to hit the snare
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of this uptempo drum part but also keep
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counting quad notes in your head the
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drum track is not turning around
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rhythmically you are playing on the
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offbeats even if your brain might not
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understand it right away which is
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perfectly fine that's why this is such
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an awesome exercise for rock and metal
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guitar riffing by the way if you're
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still feeling a bit lost when it comes
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to music theory meaning you don't really
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see the notes across the neck and the
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most important arpeggios and scales in
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all positions you don't know how to
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write or read music correctly you're
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almost 100% self-taught and no one ever
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explained guitar theory in a way to you
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that actually makes sense I have the
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perfect solution for you because I made
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detailed step-by-step music theory
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courses for my online guitar Academy on
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patreon these courses are especially
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designed for players that never studied
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Theory and that come from a self-taught
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background just like me me when I
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started out with these courses you will
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not learn any overly complicated Theory
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Concepts that you will never need in a
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practical way you will only learn what
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you absolutely have to know as a guitar
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player no confusing terms no boring
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lessons just the most helpful Theory
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stuff everything you need to know in one
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place so if you finally want to know
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what you're doing on the instrument and
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you're sick of playing the same old
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boring stuff over and over again all the
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time this is the solution you've been
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looking for all this time just click the
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link down below let's get started right
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away now here's the next exercise I want
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to show
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[Music]
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[Applause]
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you now outside of jazz fusion and maybe
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Blues as well of course you don't really
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hear seventh that much so this would be
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a minor 7th in interval and at the end
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you could hear a Major Seventh
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interval they are quite dissonant as you
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can hear and you can mostly find them in
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the aply called seventh chords that give
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you Jazzy or bluy kind of sound compared
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to the quote unquote regular minor and
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major chords but today we're not really
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talking about chords we want to see how
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those intervals sound like when we work
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with them within the scale so once again
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here are the notes of the G minor scale
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but this this time we're counting up
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seven notes so for the first note for G
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if I want my seventh interval I'm
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counting up G A B flat C D E flat F so
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this is my seventh interval and that's a
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minor 7th to the first two notes of the
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exercise already really interesting then
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for a I'm counting up a B flat C D E
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flat F and
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G so another minor 7th interval so the
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exercise so
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far and then for B flat I'm counting up
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seven notes again so B flat C D E flat F
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G and a so this time I have a major 7th
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interval so minor
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7th minor
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7th major 7th and for the full exercise
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that I showed you I just moved this
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pattern through the entire scale to me
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that sounds really cool already because
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you don't hear seven in rock and metal
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that much especially not in Guitar LS so
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to give you an idea once again of how
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this could sound like not in an exercise
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context but in a more practical context
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let's check out the next exercise I
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prepared for
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[Music]
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you all right so as you could hopefully
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see and here this is really really
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interesting when it comes to improvising
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and writing guitar solos we are already
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very far away from just playing linear
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guitars so descending or ascending in a
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scale and the lick like the one I just
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played for you sounds much more
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complicated than it actually is it has
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that really cool Fusion like Advanced
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sound because I'm skipping between
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strings once again and I'm basing this
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on
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Seventh so that's the first half of this
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exercise or lick where I'm just playing
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the sevens in the scale followed by a
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simple scale
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line so at the end I do think a little
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bit more linear in the scale but this
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little chunk of alone is super
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interesting for
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me on one hand I think the string
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skipping aspect is super interesting you
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don't hear that that much in this
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context most of the
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time you have like a scale phrase on the
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G string and just one note on a higher
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string and you would call that a string
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skipping lick which is technically
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accurate but constantly skipping between
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the notes of intervals is super
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interesting to me and it sounds much
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much more advanced I'd say and the
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second
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half is based on sevens once again and
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with this li My main focus was showing
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you that you don't always of course have
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to play the lower note first followed by
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the interval approach that you're going
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for it can also sound really really cool
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Once you turn that around and you play
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the higher note of the desired interval
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first so starting with the seventh and
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then playing the original scale note
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that you're thinking away
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[Music]
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from and for the last exercise I have
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another really cool and very practical
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trick for you I think this is going to
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be really interesting for all the
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shredders out there there check out how
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cool that
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sounds all right so this is the only
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lick that's not in the T minor scale
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this one is based around the G harmonic
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minor scale and what I want to talk
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about here real quick is that it's very
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very important to familiarize yourself
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with the characteristic notes in each
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scale because when most players tend to
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learn new scales and sounds let's say
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you never really heard about the
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harmonic minor scale or you never really
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practiced it they go for this very
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common approach of
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course so playing it from the lowest Noe
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and ascending and then descending
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learning the one scale box they will
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memorize for the rest of their life
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maybe they remember that the starting
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note is the root note so when they want
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to play the a harmonic minor scale
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instead of the G harmonic minor scale
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they just move it up two Frets or when
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they want to play the E harmonic minor
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scale they move it up here to e on the
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12 fret but sadly a lot of players don't
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memorize or learn about the most
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important notes in the scales so which
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note do you actually have to Accent to
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bring out the sound of the harmonic
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minus scale if you watched some of my
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videos already you know that it's one of
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my favorite scales ever and I talk about
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it quite a lot it's the seventh note in
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the scale that gives you that awesome
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harmonic minor
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sound that's also the only different
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note that you have when you compare it
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to the G minor scale so when we check
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out the G harmonic minor scale and the G
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minor scale right here considered it's
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just the seventh note that's different
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here and with this last exercise and
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lick I just wanted to show you a
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practical use of this information why is
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it so important even with a basic shred
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li like this that's very formulaic I can
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choose that important note in the scale
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and I can Circle it and really accent it
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to really bring out the sound of the
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harmonic minor scale so I'm
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[Music]
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playing really really cool lick and you
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can clearly hear that I'm accenting this
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note really hard all of the other notes
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are kind of muted a bit
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and then another really big accent right
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here and this is the exact same note
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it's just one octave lower
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so I'm accenting FP right
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here and F sharp down here as
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[Music]
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well really really cool and then I'm
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focusing on this very important kind of
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dissonant note but I'm resolving it to
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the root note to G
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[Music]
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just like that so here's the entire lck
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for
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you so on top of the intervalic licks
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and tricks we talked about in this video
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please also don't forget to study which
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notes are important to accent in the
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scale that you're currently practicing
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trust me it makes all the difference
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when you're improvising and writing
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guitar solos because you will be able to
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really bring out the color and sound of
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the scale that you're working with my
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friend make sure to download the full
00:11:57
brand new guitar scale practice pack
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package that I made for my patrons on
00:12:29
and which notes you want to avoid
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although they're technically correct so
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if you enjoyed this video just a little
00:12:34
bit you will love this special package
00:12:35
that I put together for you get it right
00:12:37
now with the link down below
