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Posts Tagged ‘modes’

App Review: Modal Buddy

Posted in buying gear, effect pedals, Effects, GAS, gear, gear reviews, guitar, guitar gear, overdrive, pedals, tagged , , on December 11, 2014| Leave a Comment »

4.75 Tone Bones - Almost perfect but not quite

 NineBuzz Software: Modal BuddySummary: Whether you’re a rank beginner who wants to learn about modes or a seasoned player looking for a quick refresher and reference tool, Modal Buddy provides a fresh, easy-to-understand reference that demystifies much of the hub-bub behind modes.Pros: Made for the iPhone, but easily viewable on the iPad (which is what I have the app on). Clear, step-by-step method of introducing modes. Touches on the fundamental theory behind modes, but doesn’t get bogged down in all the intricacies. Also has great backing tracks to practice.

Cons: My only nit with product is that it would be helpful to have examples of all the modes so users can hear what all the modes sound like. I suppose it’s easy enough to just discover that while playing against one of the backing tracks. But it would be a nice touch to hear an example to know what to expect.

Price: $4.99

Tone Bone Rating: 4.75 ~ As simple and straight-forward as this app is, over the months that I’ve had it, I’ve returned to it several times to brush up. I’m definitely not an academic as far as playing guitar is concerned, and Modal Buddy is a great way to both learn and practice the fundamentals of modes without having to do a deep-dive into theory.

UPDATE: The app is made for the iPhone, but I run Modal Buddy on my iPad. According to Ron at NineBuzz, Modal Buddy does include example solos of all the modes. So please base my rating on running the app on an iPad.

For the better part of my performing career, I’ve played solos purely by feel. And in the past, I’ve done some leads where I ask myself, “Where the hell did I pull that out from?” What I didn’t know at those times was that unconsciously, I was applying a mode over the chord progression. But being as busy as I have been over the last several years, I didn’t – or perhaps couldn’t – take the time to investigate and analyze what I had done.

But a couple of years ago during the holiday season, I was coming up with a more contemporary arrangement of the carol, “Do You See What I See.” In the middle of tooling around with the arrangement, which I recorded so that my church band could get a feel for the arrangement, I started playing a lead that really intrigued me. I figured it was a mode, so I stopped what I was doing, then went to YouTube to find some instructional videos and possibly find out about what I was playing.

The very first video I found pretty much changed everything for me with respect to improvisation. This was by Rob “Chappers” Chapman, and I often return to it to review modes (plus Chappers is pretty funny). From that video, I realized that I was playing an F Lydian mode over a C-Bb chord progression, which gave it this really cool sustained feel. From that point on, I started investigating and learning about modes in earnest.

But to be totally honest, once you figure out how modes work; especially from such clear explanations such as those that Chappers gives, they’re really not all that mystical. But as with anything, you have to practice, and especially for someone like me who has never really taken an academic approach to music, what you need are good references. This is where Modal Buddy has become a extremely handy for me.

I took the advice of Joe Satriani in a video he did on modes and learned just a couple of modes at first; specifically, Dorian and Lyrdian. I don’t recall Joe specifically mentioning these on the video, but those were the two that made sense to me to start out with; especially Dorian because it was so easy to get to – at least for me – from a tonic, and I could easily combine it with minor pentatonic in the relative major for a minor chord progression. For me, that was totally cool to discover because for a chord progression in Am as the root chord, I could do a G Dorian, then switch to the minor pentatonic in C if I got lost, and believe me, I got lost a lot at first. 🙂 But I still use that combination just because it sounds great to me!

Sorry for the minor detour, but with respect to Modal Buddy, having a reference for the modes (it focuses on the key of G), has been invaluable for me because as opposed to going into all the deep theory (especially interval spelling, which I hate), Modal Buddy presents a mode in such a way that it’s easy to just pick up.

Granted, my only nit is that Modal Buddy only provides an example lead for the Dorian mode, and I’d like to be able to hear all of them. But with the practice tool, you can play the G scale yourself over the backing tracks. Come to think of it, that’s probably what the intent was in the first place: Rather than provide audio examples, they make you practice. Oh well… 🙂 And here’s an important point about modes that the practice tool gives you: You learn to hear what a mode sounds like given a particular chord sequence. To me, being able to hear the mode is far more important than having the intellectual knowledge of it. When you can hear a mode, you can play it. That doesn’t necessarily apply when you just learn the theory.

Now some people who get the app may say, “There’s really not much to it.” But that’s the beauty of Modal Buddy. It gives you a quick reference on modes and doesn’t bog you down in the deep theory. If you want that, you can read a book, or go on YouTube for that stuff. For me, having the most important fundamentals of modes available to me is a lot more important than having an academic understanding. After all, I gig 3-4 times a week, and I just don’t have the time to spend studying.

Modal Buddy is by no means the do-all and end-all to modes. But as the name implies, it’s a great companion app to have around when you need to quickly brush up.

ROCK ON!

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Can Modes Be THIS Easy?

Posted in Guitars, tagged , on December 19, 2012| 1 Comment »

I keep on running across some great instructional videos at random times. Today, I was actually looking for videos on “the Big Muff” fuzz – specifically on an original Sovtek Red Army Overdrive, which was essentially a Big Muff. I found several videos, but in the sidebar, I saw a video entitled, “Learn Modes in 15 Minutes.” I’ve shared Vinnie Moore’s series on modes from the 80’s. But these two videos show modes in an even easier way; completely simplifying Pitch Axis Theory. Check ’em out.

The dude doing the videos is actually kickin’ guitar player. Damn! Check out all his videos! There’s some pretty tasty stuff to learn!

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A VERY Cool Tool

Posted in announcements, guitar, guitar theory, guitarists, Guitars, jam, jam track, Music, music theory, musicians, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on June 21, 2009| 1 Comment »

Jam Center

Wow! Amazing what taking a few days off can do! I spent last weekend in Las Vegas deflating from the rigors of everyday life, and when I came back, made a conscious effort to play as little guitar or writing as possible. Sometimes you just need to take a break. But I’m back now, refreshed, restored, and fully recovered.

So yesterday, not feeling like writing any music – actually not feeling very creative at all – I just picked up my guitar and started noodling. Within a few minutes, I wanted to play to something, so I did a search on “jam tracks” and the first search result was a link to a place called Jam Center. Intrigued, I clicked the link and was taken to the site.

There really wasn’t much there; just a navigation bar on the left that listed “Jam Machine Keys.” I clicked the Key of A, the page reloaded and the following “machine” appeared on the page:

jamcenter_player

Cool, I thought, this looks really promising. I clicked on “COOL” and was rewarded with a nicely produced jam track. I slung my guitar and started playing… Two hours later, I still hadn’t gone through all the keys and all the jam tracks, I was enjoying myself so much!

Yeah, there are lots of different sites offering jam tracks out there, but what I like about this particular site is that instead of just playing MP3s in another tab or window that eventually end, the jam tracks are arranged in a loop, and not only that, many of the jam tracks have two different “feels” to them. Usually, the first part of a track will have a mellower feel, then jumping into the second half of the track, the feel gets more intense. Having this type of variation makes you play differently. So not only can you practice your technique, you can practice changing your tones and attack. What I found very useful with having two different feels to a track was it allowed me to practice switching pedals and pickup selections. How cool is that!

One thing I forgot to mention was that when you click on a style on the machine, text appears on the machine suggesting the type of scale to play like “A Harmonic Minor” or “E Blues.” It’s a small thing yes, but it’s cool to have a starting place. For instance, in one of the tracks, the suggestion came up with “A Mixolydian.” I’ve never been that much into modes and such, even though I’ve studied them, but as an interesting and added value, the site has some great graphic examples of the different modes.

I looked up “A Mixolydian” and was greeted with the pattern, and started playing the pattern over the jam track. That was really cool; a way to immediately use a mode over a piece of music, as opposed to having to intellectualize. What that sparked was using different modes starting with different tonics or root notes over the different keys. Some didn’t work at all, but it sure helped me understand how modes can open up a whole different world when jamming.

Anyway, check this site out. It’s a great tool!

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Epiphany in Modal Scale Theory

Posted in guitar instruction, guitar theory, Guitars, improvisation, inspiration, instruction, learn guitar, modes, music theory, scales, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on January 5, 2009| 16 Comments »

modesfig2

Note: This isn’t going to be an instructional piece… just a sharing piece… mostly…

I’ve been playing guitar for over 35 years, but it hasn’t been until the last couple of years – actually the last few months – that I’ve really started focusing on scales and modal theory. Chord theory I had down cold, but I really didn’t focus on the scales part of the equation. I figured that if I could get some lead patterns and tricks down, I’d be in pretty good shape; and for awhile, that worked just fine.

But then I realized that in many of my recordings, I was using the same patterns and tricks, albeit in different keys and in different combinations, but the same stuff nonetheless. This prompted me to rethink how I approached playing solos, so I started out by learning major and minor scale patterns. I got a couple of books to help me along, and I proceeded to practice them.

But in the back of my mind was this idea of modes. I’d heard them bandied about for years, and pretty much ignored them partially out of the thought that as a rhythm player, they weren’t too important; though that really masked an innate fear that modes were WAY beyond my ability to grasp. But during this past weekend’s study/practice session, I realized that modes are not difficult at all! The names of the modes just scared the livin’ crap out of me! 🙂

Think about it: The mode names are all in Greek: Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, and Locrian. From my previous life as a bio-sciences major, terminology in Greek or Latin would evoke feelings of anxiety similar to, “Oh shit! More frickin’ terms to memorize just to regurgitate later on.” 🙂 Such was the case when faced with modes.

I now feel a little foolish about my anxiety with modes. Once you understand what they represent, they’re totally easy to play!

Here’s my explanation in a nutshell, just in case you too have the same anxiety about modes as I did:

  1. Modes are simply starting points within the scale of a particular key.
  2. For instance, if you’re playing in the key of C and want to play in the Mixolydian mode, you’d start and end on the 5th degree of the C scale which is G.
  3. Now don’t get confused here: You don’t play a G scale. You merely start at G, and play the notes of the C scale, so: G A B C D E F G

So what’s the big deal? Lots of players don’t give a whit about this stuff. For me as a teacher, this stuff is pretty important. But from a player’s standpoint, it gives you a much deeper understanding of the fretboard, and also, playing in a mode gives you a different tonal center to play from, which actually has an effect on how a solo sounds and feels.

I found that a great example of this is to play the Lydian mode. The Lydian mode starts on the 4th degree of a scale. Going back to the C scale, this means that the Lydian will be F. If you’re familiar with chord theory, a chord with an added 4th is notated as Csus4. The sound of this particular chord connotes a feeling that the chord must be resolved – it’s not something you’d finish with; you’d typically use a “sus4” chord before either the major root chord or minor root chord. In our case of a C chord, we’d do something like: Csus4 – C. In playing in the Lydian mode, you’ll evoke a sense that you have to resolve your scale somehow. After all, starting and ending on the 4th creates a feeling that your phrase is unfinished. The point of all this is that where you start will have a huge effect on the general coloring of what you’re playing.

Note that this discussion only brushes the surface of modal theory. For a much deeper discussion, check out Guitar Noise or this excellent article that I found on Modes of the Major Scale.

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