The 4 Note Soloing Challenge Video Lesson
This lesson is an extract taken from my brand new book Soloing School: Beginner Lead Guitar Method. Make sure you watch the YouTube video before playing the following examples. The A Minor backing track below will provide a fun way to practice the 4 note soloing method.
The principle behind this challenge is simple: Pick a scale shape you know well, and restrict yourself to playing only four notes from that scale.
Example 1 – A Minor Pentatonic Notes
Here is the A Minor Pentatonic shape in full.
Example one gives you the notes within the A Minor Pentatonic scale (A C D E G) to create your solo from. The notes you are allowed to use for this solo are the 5th and 7th frets of the ‘D’ and ‘G’ strings.
At first, the possibilities seem incredibly limited when dealing with just these four notes, but by applying bends, hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides and vibrato, the number of melodic options are vast.
Example 2 – Full Solo
Learn and study the solo I have created here before attempting to create your own solo using this four-note system. Steal as many licks as you can from this solo, and from all the earlier chapters based around the A Minor Pentatonic scale too.
Example 3 – How To Apply This Technique
Once you have completed example 16a and feel comfortable creating your own solos using the four notes, you can apply this same strategy to any four notes from any scale shape.
For starters create a solo over backing track one using just these four notes from the highest part of the A Minor Pentatonic scale.
After you have completed the four note challenges with the A Minor Pentatonic scale, apply this idea to any other scale shapes you already know.
If you have created your own solo using this four-note soloing strategy, record a video of yourself playing and post it as a comment underneath the YouTube video featured at the start of this chapter.
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