Chords for Dweezil Zappa on Varying Pentatonic Riffs | Reverb Tips and Tricks
Tempo:
79.725 bpm
Chords used:
E
Am
Em
A
Bb
Tuning:Standard Tuning (EADGBE)Capo:+0fret
Start Jamming...
[E]
If you play guitar, you most likely got into it because you heard a pentatonic lick.
You know, any kind of
[Cm] Any little thing that has [A]
that kind of sound to it
just automatically sounds good to people who like guitar.
You know, you put that little extra flat five
[D] [A] [Eb] One of the things that people run into that becomes a problem
when they're trying to expand on their possibilities or ways of using pentatonics
is that the right hand and the left hand sometimes don't cooperate with each other.
And pentatonics usually work out to be two notes per string,
and that complicates the right hand quite a bit.
You have to really work hard on your picking technique
if you want to play lightning-fast pentatonic riffs two notes per string.
So there's other ways to do it,
and I can show you a couple of simple ways to at least get your left [Am] hand thinking about it differently,
and the right hand will follow after a little bit of adjustment.
Let's take just A minor pentatonic in this position,
starting on the A string at the 12th fret.
If we look at it as two notes per [E] string
So you've got that little pattern right there.
If you were to practice that and try to get your speed up on that
You [Bb] can see, like, once you get past there, it's going to start getting a lot harder
because there's a lot of quick motion that has to happen.
And when the pick is working in that confined space,
for a lot of people, it's totally unnatural.
But if you want to look at it a different way,
instead of [Am] playing these [E] same notes as two notes per string,
except the last one I did three notes, as you can see,
but what we're going to do is we're going to [Am] do three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes.
[Am] And so what that gives you, if you break it down,
you have three notes, three notes, and three notes.
Even there [Em] is a cool lick.
[Eb] So you could [Am] hammer on, you could pick [E] one, hammer, hammer,
pick, [Am] hammer, hammer, pick, hammer, hammer.
That's a lick in and of itself.
We left out two notes in there, but check it out.
If you start to get it to where you really can see this shape
and get it under your fingers,
you can work out a picking technique that's the sweet picking technique
that Frank Gambale and other people are really great at.
So you have a downstroke, upstroke, and then [Em] down, down, down.
So [A] it's one, two, [E] three on one string.
The downstroke of this third note continues to the next string.
So down, down, and then continues again to the next.
So it's almost like a chord shape here.
You can either ring them out or have them individually ring,
and you kind of like mute the string with the fleshy part of your finger
as you're making the pass.
So [Am] right there, it's down, [E] up, down, down, down.
[D]
[E] Right?
The next thing that would [Bb] happen is you would continue from there.
It would be an upstroke, down, [Em] down, down, up, down.
So down, [Gm] up, down, down, down, [E] up, down, down, down, up, down.
There's not much going on.
Your right hand is just kind of on [Em] autopilot.
You can do [Am] it with other things too.
Like check out if you do it like this.
Downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, and then the pick again.
Or you [A] can have two fingers.
So like downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, fingers.
That's a different sound.
It's much more mellow.
But see, this gives you all this variety of how dynamically you want to attack the [Em] string.
[A] [Bb] So that's what's kind of [Ab] cool about it is that you can really start [Am] to incorporate the [D] tone of your fingers.
And [Am] even another good exercise is to just try to do it only with your left hand.
[Bb] Try to get [E] that cleanly across the strings.
Like right there, [Am] [A]
[Em]
[Eb] it just maps [E] out very easily.
And once you know what it is, it's like the right hand can synchronize with the left hand
because you automatically know this little sequence.
[Em]
If you play guitar, you most likely got into it because you heard a pentatonic lick.
You know, any kind of
[Cm] Any little thing that has [A]
that kind of sound to it
just automatically sounds good to people who like guitar.
You know, you put that little extra flat five
[D] [A] [Eb] One of the things that people run into that becomes a problem
when they're trying to expand on their possibilities or ways of using pentatonics
is that the right hand and the left hand sometimes don't cooperate with each other.
And pentatonics usually work out to be two notes per string,
and that complicates the right hand quite a bit.
You have to really work hard on your picking technique
if you want to play lightning-fast pentatonic riffs two notes per string.
So there's other ways to do it,
and I can show you a couple of simple ways to at least get your left [Am] hand thinking about it differently,
and the right hand will follow after a little bit of adjustment.
Let's take just A minor pentatonic in this position,
starting on the A string at the 12th fret.
If we look at it as two notes per [E] string
So you've got that little pattern right there.
If you were to practice that and try to get your speed up on that
You [Bb] can see, like, once you get past there, it's going to start getting a lot harder
because there's a lot of quick motion that has to happen.
And when the pick is working in that confined space,
for a lot of people, it's totally unnatural.
But if you want to look at it a different way,
instead of [Am] playing these [E] same notes as two notes per string,
except the last one I did three notes, as you can see,
but what we're going to do is we're going to [Am] do three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes.
[Am] And so what that gives you, if you break it down,
you have three notes, three notes, and three notes.
Even there [Em] is a cool lick.
[Eb] So you could [Am] hammer on, you could pick [E] one, hammer, hammer,
pick, [Am] hammer, hammer, pick, hammer, hammer.
That's a lick in and of itself.
We left out two notes in there, but check it out.
If you start to get it to where you really can see this shape
and get it under your fingers,
you can work out a picking technique that's the sweet picking technique
that Frank Gambale and other people are really great at.
So you have a downstroke, upstroke, and then [Em] down, down, down.
So [A] it's one, two, [E] three on one string.
The downstroke of this third note continues to the next string.
So down, down, and then continues again to the next.
So it's almost like a chord shape here.
You can either ring them out or have them individually ring,
and you kind of like mute the string with the fleshy part of your finger
as you're making the pass.
So [Am] right there, it's down, [E] up, down, down, down.
[D]
[E] Right?
The next thing that would [Bb] happen is you would continue from there.
It would be an upstroke, down, [Em] down, down, up, down.
So down, [Gm] up, down, down, down, [E] up, down, down, down, up, down.
There's not much going on.
Your right hand is just kind of on [Em] autopilot.
You can do [Am] it with other things too.
Like check out if you do it like this.
Downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, and then the pick again.
Or you [A] can have two fingers.
So like downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, fingers.
That's a different sound.
It's much more mellow.
But see, this gives you all this variety of how dynamically you want to attack the [Em] string.
[A] [Bb] So that's what's kind of [Ab] cool about it is that you can really start [Am] to incorporate the [D] tone of your fingers.
And [Am] even another good exercise is to just try to do it only with your left hand.
[Bb] Try to get [E] that cleanly across the strings.
Like right there, [Am] [A]
[Em]
[Eb] it just maps [E] out very easily.
And once you know what it is, it's like the right hand can synchronize with the left hand
because you automatically know this little sequence.
[Em]
Key:
E
Am
Em
A
Bb
E
Am
Em
_ _ _ _ [E] _ _ _
If you play guitar, you most likely got into it because you heard a pentatonic lick.
You know, any kind of_
_ _ [Cm] Any little thing that has _ [A]
that kind of sound to it
just automatically sounds good to people who like guitar.
You know, you put that little extra flat five_
_ _ [D] _ [A] [Eb] One of the things that people run into that becomes a problem
when they're trying to expand on their possibilities or ways of using pentatonics
is that the right hand and the left hand sometimes don't cooperate with each other.
And pentatonics usually work out to be two notes per string,
and that complicates the right hand quite a bit.
You have to really work hard on your picking technique
if you want to play lightning-fast pentatonic riffs two notes per string.
So there's other ways to do it,
and I can show you a couple of simple ways to at least get your left [Am] hand thinking about it differently,
and the right hand will follow after a little bit of adjustment.
Let's take just A minor pentatonic in this position,
starting on the A string at the 12th fret.
If we look at it as two notes per [E] string_ _ _ _
So you've got that little pattern right there.
_ If you were to practice that and try to get your speed up on that_ _
You [Bb] can see, like, once you get past there, it's going to start getting a lot harder
because there's a lot of quick motion that has to happen.
And when the pick is working in that confined space,
for a lot of people, it's totally unnatural.
But if you want to look at it a different way,
instead of [Am] playing these [E] same notes _ _ _ _ as two notes per string,
except the last one I did three notes, as you can see,
but what we're going to do is we're going to [Am] do three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes.
[Am] And so what that gives you, if you break it down,
you have three notes, three notes, and three notes.
Even there [Em] is a cool lick. _ _
[Eb] So you could [Am] hammer on, you could pick [E] one, hammer, hammer,
pick, [Am] hammer, hammer, pick, hammer, hammer.
That's a lick in and of itself.
We left out two notes in there, but check it out.
If you start to get it to where you really can see this shape
and get it under your fingers,
you can work out a picking technique that's the sweet picking technique
that Frank Gambale and other people are really great at.
So you have a downstroke, upstroke, and then [Em] down, down, down.
So [A] it's one, two, [E] three on one string.
The downstroke of this third note continues to the next string.
So down, down, and then continues again to the next.
So it's almost like a chord shape here.
You can either ring them out or have them individually ring,
and you kind of like mute the string with the fleshy part of your finger
as you're making the pass.
So [Am] right there, it's down, [E] up, down, down, down.
[D] _ _ _ _
_ [E] _ Right?
The next thing that would [Bb] happen is you would continue from there.
It would be an upstroke, down, [Em] down, down, up, down.
So _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ down, [Gm] up, down, down, down, [E] up, down, down, down, up, down.
There's not much going on.
Your right hand is just kind of on [Em] autopilot.
_ _ You can do [Am] it with other things too.
Like check out if you do it like this.
_ Downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, _ and then the pick again.
Or you [A] can have two fingers.
So like downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, fingers. _ _ _ _ _
That's a different sound.
_ _ _ _ It's much more mellow.
But see, this gives you all this variety of how dynamically you want to attack the [Em] string. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [A] _ [Bb] So that's what's kind of [Ab] cool about it is that you can really start [Am] to incorporate the [D] tone of your fingers.
And [Am] even another good exercise is to just try to do it only with your left hand. _ _
_ [Bb] _ Try to get [E] that cleanly across the strings.
Like right there, [Am] _ _ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _
[Em] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Eb] it just maps [E] out very easily.
And once you know what it is, it's like the right hand can synchronize with the left hand
because you automatically know this little sequence.
_ _ _ [Em] _ _ _
If you play guitar, you most likely got into it because you heard a pentatonic lick.
You know, any kind of_
_ _ [Cm] Any little thing that has _ [A]
that kind of sound to it
just automatically sounds good to people who like guitar.
You know, you put that little extra flat five_
_ _ [D] _ [A] [Eb] One of the things that people run into that becomes a problem
when they're trying to expand on their possibilities or ways of using pentatonics
is that the right hand and the left hand sometimes don't cooperate with each other.
And pentatonics usually work out to be two notes per string,
and that complicates the right hand quite a bit.
You have to really work hard on your picking technique
if you want to play lightning-fast pentatonic riffs two notes per string.
So there's other ways to do it,
and I can show you a couple of simple ways to at least get your left [Am] hand thinking about it differently,
and the right hand will follow after a little bit of adjustment.
Let's take just A minor pentatonic in this position,
starting on the A string at the 12th fret.
If we look at it as two notes per [E] string_ _ _ _
So you've got that little pattern right there.
_ If you were to practice that and try to get your speed up on that_ _
You [Bb] can see, like, once you get past there, it's going to start getting a lot harder
because there's a lot of quick motion that has to happen.
And when the pick is working in that confined space,
for a lot of people, it's totally unnatural.
But if you want to look at it a different way,
instead of [Am] playing these [E] same notes _ _ _ _ as two notes per string,
except the last one I did three notes, as you can see,
but what we're going to do is we're going to [Am] do three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes,
[E] then one note,
then three notes.
[Am] And so what that gives you, if you break it down,
you have three notes, three notes, and three notes.
Even there [Em] is a cool lick. _ _
[Eb] So you could [Am] hammer on, you could pick [E] one, hammer, hammer,
pick, [Am] hammer, hammer, pick, hammer, hammer.
That's a lick in and of itself.
We left out two notes in there, but check it out.
If you start to get it to where you really can see this shape
and get it under your fingers,
you can work out a picking technique that's the sweet picking technique
that Frank Gambale and other people are really great at.
So you have a downstroke, upstroke, and then [Em] down, down, down.
So [A] it's one, two, [E] three on one string.
The downstroke of this third note continues to the next string.
So down, down, and then continues again to the next.
So it's almost like a chord shape here.
You can either ring them out or have them individually ring,
and you kind of like mute the string with the fleshy part of your finger
as you're making the pass.
So [Am] right there, it's down, [E] up, down, down, down.
[D] _ _ _ _
_ [E] _ Right?
The next thing that would [Bb] happen is you would continue from there.
It would be an upstroke, down, [Em] down, down, up, down.
So _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ down, [Gm] up, down, down, down, [E] up, down, down, down, up, down.
There's not much going on.
Your right hand is just kind of on [Em] autopilot.
_ _ You can do [Am] it with other things too.
Like check out if you do it like this.
_ Downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, _ and then the pick again.
Or you [A] can have two fingers.
So like downstroke, [E] hammer, hammer, finger, fingers. _ _ _ _ _
That's a different sound.
_ _ _ _ It's much more mellow.
But see, this gives you all this variety of how dynamically you want to attack the [Em] string. _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ [A] _ [Bb] So that's what's kind of [Ab] cool about it is that you can really start [Am] to incorporate the [D] tone of your fingers.
And [Am] even another good exercise is to just try to do it only with your left hand. _ _
_ [Bb] _ Try to get [E] that cleanly across the strings.
Like right there, [Am] _ _ _ _ _ _ [A] _ _
[Em] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Eb] it just maps [E] out very easily.
And once you know what it is, it's like the right hand can synchronize with the left hand
because you automatically know this little sequence.
_ _ _ [Em] _ _ _