« | Home | »

Learn Guitar Online – The Best Kept Guitar Secret and how Voice Leading can benefit You

By Mike Hayes | January 20, 2010

Do you listen to top guitar players and wonder how they get
that beautiful, seamless, logical sounding guitar style? You
know the Mark Knopfler, John Fogerty, Keith Richards type of
sound … they all have it and by now you have probably tried
everything from different brands of guitars and amps, changing
from round wound to flat wound strings; valve amps to transistor
amps and back again but nothings seems to work!

Some dedicated guitar players even go so far as to buy signature
series guitars as played by their heroes … but to no avail; so
I think you will agree it fair to say that the secret to their
playing is not in their equipment rather it’s how they are able
to weave their musical ideas together and the way they can
transfer the sounds they are hearing in their head onto the
guitar fretboard.

Where do we start?

Voice leading is the key!

Voice leading … sounds like something to do with singing
lessons doesn’t it? Actually voice leading is a musical process,
a craft that all good musical arrangers use, you hear the result
of good voice leading everywhere you hear good music.

The Eagles use it for their backing vocal arrangements and guitar
parts, the best classical music has it, the Rolling Stones use it
to create maximum impact in their guitar parts, you will hear it
in the best jazz, bluegrass and country music recordings.

Many guitar players have no idea they are doing it, they simply
keep searching looking for a particular sound until they find
it… no doubt you have hear the phrase “I don’t know what I want
… but I’ll know it when I hear it”.

What if there was a way to create powerful music without having
to spend countless hours thrashing around in the dark hoping to
stumble upon that magical ’sound’ you were looking for. The good
news is there are many ways to get great musically correct chord
progressions, here’s just one of the secrets …

Voice leading

Step 1. select a chord progression that you want to strengthen.

I’ll use this basic progression in D

D /// | G /// | D /// | A /// | D /// ||

Step 2. Identify the notes contained in each chord.

D = D-F#-A

G = G-B-D

A = A-C#-E

Step 3. Select a string grid

A string grid is a set of three strings i.e.,

string grid 1 = strings 1,2 & 3

string grid 2 = strings 2,3 & 4

string grid 1 = strings 3,4 & 5 etc

Step 4. Decide on a starting point on the string grid you have
selected.

I’m using this particular D chord on grid 1

D
—5—–
—7—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—–

Step 5. Identify the note sequence under your chosen chord.

In the chord shape above my notes sequence is:

A = first string, fifth fret

F# = second string, seventh fret

D = third string, seventh fret

The notes can be in any order provided they are in the same grid,
and that you use exclusively the notes in the chord.

Step 6. decide on the most logical transition from one chord to
the next by (a) looking for common notes; (b) moving each note to
the next alphabetically correct note.

You can’t always find a common note but that’s what you look for
first.

Back to my original progression

D /// | G /// | D /// | A /// | D /// ||

Same progression with notes in each chord identified by [ ]

D /// | G /// | …
[D,F#,A][G,B,D]

To connect the D chord to the G chord using correct voice leading
principals I look first for a common note which in this instance
is the note ‘D’, it’s common to both the D chord and the G chord.

Now I have my starting point for the G chord, common note D,
third string, seventh fret

D
—5—–
—7—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—–

G (common note D, third string, seventh fret)
—x—–
—x—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—–

Step 7. look for semitones that move alphabetically to correct
notes in the next chord.

A Semitone is the distance from one fret to the next when moving
in a linear fashion e.g., the note F on the first string, first
fret to F# first string, second fret is a semitone.

The F# in the D chord would move nicely to the G note of the G
chord, like this:

D
—5—–
—7—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—–

G (semitone movement F# to note G, second string, eight fret)
—x—–
—8—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—–

Now that I have two notes of the G chord accounted for the only
thing left to do is move the remaining A note (in the D chord) to
the next alphabetically correct note which of course would be the
note B in the G chord.

Like this …

D
—5—–
—7—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—-

G
—7—–
—8—–
—7—–
—x—–
—x—–
—x—–

Review:[D chord]=>[G chord]

string 1 __A =>____B____

string 2 __F# =>___G____

string 3 __D =>____D____

string 4 __X____________

string 5 __X____________

string 6 __X____________

It looks complicated but try it a couple of times and you will
find it’s a breeze, the difference is instead of blindly
searching for a great sounding chord progression we are musically
designing or engineering the movement of the notes (or voices) in
each chord shape away from the guitar.

Notice how easy the shapes are to play, they require the
minimum of finger movement and result in the maximum musical
power.

Time to try your new voice leading techniques on the guitar.

And now I’d like to invite you to get free access to my “How To Remember 1,000 Songs” eCourse. You can download the course for free at: http://www.guitarcoaching.com

You’ll learn about hit song templates, easy chords, simple scales, red hot rhythms, and successful practice strategies in text, audio and video.

From Mike Hayes – The Guitar Coaching Guy & the Express Guitar
System

Topics: Beginner Guitar Lesson, Guitar Chords, Guitar Fretboard | No Comments »

Comments

You must be logged in to post a comment.