Image by Charlie Antonio via Flickr
I know that I need to show up with a solid game plan, so we don't waste time standing around and looking at each other and saying "okay, what do we do now?". I am actually going to go so far as putting a few bullet points on a note card so we can have a clear agenda. Hopefully, I can get the other guys to buy into my game plan.
First off, I actually want to avoid writing songs during practice until we become tight as a band. Everyone already has some material they have already been working on anyway, so we can spend some time teaching each other those songs and riffs. Also, I eventually want to agree on a practice time where we can get together for at least 2 hours every week. I also want to see if everyone is one the same page with our goals. Personally, my ultimate goal is to quit my day job and tour.
If I can't get everyone on the same page, I will just have to keep my involvement limited to occasional casual jam sessions, so I can allocate my time and resources elsewhere. I hope that is not the case, but I am not going to try to push my dreams on other people who don't really share the same goals. In the meantime, I am just continuing my practice routine by myself at home.
As of tonight, I am starting a program of drilling with scales, modes, and arpeggios. Right now, I have a guitar exercise book that uses 25 different scales and 25 arpeggios. This includes 5 major scale positions, and 5 each of natural minor, melodic minor ascending form, melodic minor descending form, and harmonic minor. The arpeggios include 5 patterns each of major, minor, dominant seventh, minor seventh, and major seventh chords. I realize that this is only the tip of the iceberg in a sense, but this should give me plenty to work on for a while. I want to memorize and become fluent with all of these pasterns, and then practice applying them in various real life situations, so they all eventually come naturally to me.
I have definitely been getting into a rut when it comes to composing lead guitar melodies, and I think these exercises will help alleviate this problem. My goal is to break the monotony caused by only knowing a couple scale positions, and not really knowing how to effectively apply my knowledge of most of the scales I do know. I will let you know how this goes.
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