Guitarists Can't Play To Changes.

I want to preface this rant with one thing. This blog isn't meant to discourage anyone or beat anyone down, but rather to point out something and perhelps help bring attention to a reoccurring issue I often see in fellow guitarists.

When guitarists, and many other musicians first learn to improvise, the first thing they learn is often the minor pentatonic scale. Guitarists especially love the minor pentatonic scale. Of course there's nothing wrong with loving that scale. It sounds great, and can be used in so many different musical contexts. The problem is that many guitarists will latch onto this scale, or perhaps the scale latches onto them, and never lets go. The even BIGGER problem however is that guitarists will spend all of their time learning licks in that particular scale, and never learn how to actually apply those licks to songs. The problem ultimately boils down to the lack of music theory being learned, but thats a topic for another blog. 

Earlier today I was jamming with a group that I'm doing some fill in's for, and the band's guitarist was showing me some of their original songs. The songs were really well wrote. They were well structured, featured interesting changes, and were even pretty catchy. The only bad things about the songs were the guitar solos. I want to make clear again, that I'm not trying to put the guy down. Hes a good guitar player, his rhythm playing was tight and his lead playing on the covers the band does (some AC/DC, and Scorpions type stuff) was really good. The dude just didn't know how to play to changes. He'd start in the right place then he wouln't move out of the box he was stuck in. When it didn't sound right he'd just try and feel out random notes (most being quite sour) until something eventually sounded right. By then he was already lost. It's not like he didn't know the songs changes, hes the one who wrote the chords. If he'd just take a little time to learn where to move that pentatonic box around then he'd be golden. I was in his spot once a while ago before I started pursuing playing live seriously. I found a group of older blues guys to jam with, and whenever my turn to solo came around I'd start in the right spot then I wouldn't go with the changes and I'd just fall apart. It took a lot of "Dude what the hell was that" from the old blues guys before I actually made myself sit down and learn how to properly improvise to changes. It wasn't even necessarily a big feat to achieve. The hardest part was actually knowing when to set the guitar down and pick up the theory book. Once you learn the general do's and don'ts to playing to changes, you open up a whole new world to yourself as a musician. If you're stuck in the great trap of the pentatonic box, then I challenge you, yes you, to challenge yourself and get out of that box!