Thread: Guitar Showdown Anyone?

Ah. True enough. Ok.

Okay, sorry about the tone i used in that reply, i just don't want to see this particular one get put off too much.

Okay, here is the task.

Task

Create a blues piece which contains the interweaving from chords to improvisation.

The structure should be of best standard as you can, try and make it structured instead of switching when you feel, maybe 2 bars of soloing and 2 bars of chords. Its up to you, but make it structured.

You MUST make it an improvisation solo, no structured or pre-arranged solos that are practiced. Chords must relate to the solo also. You MUST also make sure to make the transition between chords and soloing as smooth as possible, if it is not, then it will most likely affect the performance of your piece. It MUST flow fluidly also.

The basic idea is for you to create a piece which sounds driven in two separate ways, it sounds like a rhythm piece as well as a solo piece.

Not sure about the deadline, but i would say the end of Saturday just to be sure, its not that hard of a task and it should be fairly easy to get down depending on how much time you have.

GO!!!

Originally Posted by Oneiro

Have you got a jack converter (1/4 inch female to mini jack) for your DI? Very simple and cheap. That's all I use, but I do DI out of my amp, which has two DI outs: a standard mike one, and a 1/4 inch stereo out, which is the one I use for PC DIing and recording.

Yeah, I'll have to pick up one of those very soon. My amp has a line out so it'd be perfect.

Originally Posted by Lucid Seeker

Create a blues piece which contains the interweaving from chords to improvisation.

I have every intention of participating this week, though reality may intervene. We shall see.

This is a GREAT challenge and should be relevant to any style of player.

Oh no.. the Blues.. (sob).. one of my most-loathed genres.. (I know I'm a philistine).. but in the spirit of the thread, I'll give it a go.

Originally Posted by Oneiro

Oh no.. the Blues.. (sob).. one of my most-loathed genres.. (I know I'm a philistine).. but in the spirit of the thread, I'll give it a go.

Don't think about this as a limiting thing. Recognize that the Blues is the basis for the vast majority of what went on to become Rock, Jazz, Pop, Funk and more.

It's easy to fall into the trap of "hearing" the blues as only something like Crosroads. Open that up... you can do all power chords with no thirds and have a total Ritchie Blackmore rip with it. You can mellow it out a bit, shift back to the six before the four and have do-wop. You can do a Imaj7 vim7 iim7 V7 and have a jazz standard. You can do im7 ivm7 vm7 and be doing a BB King minor blues rip. You can use open first-position major and suspended chords and be playing folk. You can go to an open tuning, slap a slide on your pinkie and be playing C&W.

The Blues is the foundation, man. Find something you like that is rooted in I IV V and have at it!

Oh, I can play the blues, pj, and I do appreciate all the derivations, and I will give it a go, but.. my reading of LS's rules this week would seem to disallow slide guitar (which was my first thought). Maybe I've got it wrong? If I have, I'll do a slide piece, I think.

I don't see anything about no slides.

Originally Posted by Oneiro

Oh, I can play the blues, pj, and I do appreciate all the derivations, and I will give it a go, but.. my reading of LS's rules this week would seem to disallow slide guitar (which was my first thought). Maybe I've got it wrong? If I have, I'll do a slide piece, I think.

To be honest with you, anything is fine as long as it fits the rules and does not give you an advantage above others.

I want this to be fair, and not everyone is good at slide guitar. I'd like to say no because i feel that it could potentially give you an advantage, this particular task is pointed at improving peoples skills in transitioning between chords and solo improvisation. It could be interesting, don't worry about not doing well, if it will make you feel any better, i am actually not good at transitioning between chords and soloing and i'm going to have to learn how to do it fluidly over the next few days.

But as long as it doesn't give you a BIG advantage in terms of adding and improving your performance dramitcally, then yes, you can do it. If it helps you then yeah, i want us to do our bests in this, but i don't want any unfair odds among others. But it sounds okay to me.

Does that sound alright with you?

Okay LS.. I have played loads of slide, so this week I won't play it. I'll try to go between chords and lead without using a slide. Gonna be tricky, but I'll have a bash.

I won't be partaking this week because of my damn mac breaking

I'm really pissed about this one because this was one i really wanted to do as well.

Best of luck with your entries.

You're the boss - you could postpone it and substitute something else for this week!

Thats my point though, my mac is going to be in for probably a couple of weeks, and its a week away from being sent in.

You guys go ahead and do it this week, you've probably all prepared anyways and i don't want to spoil the fun for you on my account.

Get on with it and post the submissions.

Ok - well, here's my entry:

PJ's Blues

Straight up Taylor 314CE acoustic this time. Going after that delicious TJoe sound.

can't play this week. my computer is in the shop and my bro's imac doesn't have a webcam. i'll look forward to future tries.

Originally Posted by pj

Ok - well, here's my entry:

PJ's Blues

Straight up Taylor 314CE acoustic this time. Going after that delicious TJoe sound.

Very nice pj.. beautiful tone.. it sparkles and glistens.

I'm struggling bigtime this week with my entry, but I'll have something in by the end of the day.

Thank you!

This is my favorite guitar. My family bought it for me as a college graduation present.

It is still my dream guitar. It is pre-Expression system, which means it has the Fishman Prefix pickup. Every once in a while I'll go into the "super premium" room and play a variety of Gibbies, Martins, Breedloves and other higher-end Taylors. The 314ce would still be my choice.

We've already lost Ranma and L.S. this week - I'm really disappointed about both. Hopefully we'll get more than just the two of us in here this week!

Okay.. here's my paltry effort. It has been really hard for me to adhere to LS's rules about rhythm and lead, plus the fact that I am not really a blues fan.. I'm not very happy with my effort, but it's now Saturday night over here, so I've got to get something in.

Fender Strat Plus (bridge pickup) > GK 250ML (Clean channel) > PC + echo:

http://media.putfile.com/Oneiro-12-Bar

Hardly paltry!

I'm liking it.

I sent a friend of mine who isn't part of the forum here the link to my entry... he replied, "I listened to it about a dozen times. Where's the pain? The blues isn't supposed to make me grin."

Ha.

I guess I can't play the blues.

Originally Posted by pj

Hardly paltry! I'm liking it.

Well thankyou pj..

Originally Posted by pj

I guess I can't play the blues.

You have GOTTA be kidding!

Had an idea for next week which could potentially be a good one. Since i'm missing this weeks i am pretty annoyed, but i will have my mac returned in time for next weeks task.

Heres what i propose.

I will provide a gilmour bluesy backing track, and you have to improvise over it, however, there is a catch. The solo MUST be slow with the track and you must put emotion into the solo, for example, the solo must in a sense blend with the backing track and tell a story in a way.

The benefits of this task is that we will get to see some slowed down soloing with passion instead of the usual "lets shred at 500 bpm!". This could really get us down and realize what we can do with slower soloing, i find it a LOT more expressive than fast soloing and i think it could be a cool challenge.

What do you guys think?

I like the idea, especially since that's how I play.

If you want to make it all even, you could require me to shred and force everybody else to slow it down!

Originally Posted by pj

I like the idea, especially since that's how I play.

If you want to make it all even, you could require me to shred and force everybody else to slow it down!

Haha, you may be on to something there

Lol j/k, well it should be an interesting one, i really like Pink Floyd for a start and Gilmour does some great solos, inspiring so i thought it would be cool for us to compete for the best emotive improvisation. I'll have to upload the backing track at some point, but i'll let this week run its course first.

I'd love to join in