Learning long solos

Teetonetal

I've never really spent much time learning solos, I've always tended to play enouogh to get the basic style, shape, learn a few interesting runs etc. Also my reading ability is pretty good, so give me a proper Note/Tab of say the solo to Mr Brownstone by guns n roses and after a couple of goes I can simply read it.

For my own stuff I've tended to build solos into a finished article over time, so it's never been an issue.

now I'm presented with an interesting covers band opportunity and they want note for note solos. Sweet Child o mine is one of the songs, it's a pretty long solo. I can play it no problem, but learning it.... 

Any tips?

Danny1969

First thing to do is get the solo in your head. Listen to it in the car, on the train or whatever. Break it down into chunks. The first solo on SCOM is memorable to me because it's actually melodic, if you can whistle it you can remember it. The second one is more freehand but there's still bits I can whistle so break it down into chunks and remember which chunk comes next. 

It can take many many gigs to nail long solo's really convincingly, I've been honing stuff like Hotel California, Time and Comfortably Numb for years. I hear these songs on the radio and I notice something I'm not doing then I try to remember to do it. 

I know there's a school of thought that says don't bother but I actually get a kick out of copying stuff as exactly as possible. 

stickyfiddle

What he said! ^^

If you can't sing it without a backing track and without a guitar you don't properly know it. Get that sorted and the rest gets a lot easier.

Teetonetal

stickyfiddle said:

What he said! ^^

If you can't sing it without a backing track and without a guitar you don't properly know it. Get that sorted and the rest gets a lot easier.

That's true. But lots of solos are not exactly melodic. Just shapes being blitzed up and down the board.

I do wonder if there is a lazyness level you need to cross to nail this stuff. I've never really cared for learning solos note for note, doing a job on them has always been good enough. To thoroughly learn something is probably the sort of long term project I've always shirked for the more fun and immediate route of improvising based on set ideas.

Probably the wrong guitarist for this job, but I'm going to see if I can make headway

robinbowes

Some solos must be played note-for-note, as they're an established part of the song. Others are more free-hand, and can be improvised.

A good example is Comfortably Numb. Even DG plays the first solo note-for-note, but improvises more on the second solo.

Listen to songs played live - often, the solo on record is merely a snapshot and the original artist plays it different every night.

R.

Teetonetal

robinbowes said:

Some solos must be played note-for-note, as they're an established part of the song. Others are more free-hand, and can be improvised.

A good example is Comfortably Numb. Even DG plays the first solo note-for-note, but improvises more on the second solo.

Listen to songs played live - often, the solo on record is merely a snapshot and the original artist plays it different every night.

R.

Which I always found odd for that song as the 2nd one is much better than the first IMO.

I have also often wondered if lots of solos are improvised live purely because said player actually cant work out what they did... also lots of solos are mish mash takes of many attempts (I think DG used to do this, he'd record a bunch of solos then piece together one solo from the bits he liked?)

Still, doesn't help me out as this band want note for note solos on some songs...

Gassage

As a Floydhead, I've done a lot of this.

Often a long solo is marked by a mix of improv and key phrases.

So, if you take CNumb as everyone knows it, David pretty much always plays the first 12 bars of the outro as per the recording.

He then has, say around 10 or 15 'key phrases' that are a couple of bars long and tend to be used ad hoc.

So, my approach is to nail the bits played by rote, then learn a load of key phrases which allude to the ones he uses.

I think a degree of artistic licence with a solo THIS long is also allowable, as long as you sort of pay homage to those key phrases.

Another couple I've done exactly like this- Free Bird, December (All About Eve) and Fingers of Love (Crowded House).

If you want the idiot's guide to every CNumb phrase ever, here' the famous Oslo gig, where DG spent all day getting shitfaced with David Crosby, walked on stage and just said fuck it...and the results, as you can hear, are utterly astonishing

stratman3142

I did a dep on New Years Eve and had to learn Sweet Child Of Mine. I learned the first couple of solos more or less note for note, which aren't that long. Even then, I went off on a slight accidental tangent on the second solo .

I just played something broadly similar for the final (E harmonic minor) solo. Although I did go to some trouble to nail the ascending lick.
I think the important thing is to capture the main parts that people expect to hear. I'm not sure that Slash would play it exactly the same every time.

Note: we didn't tune down a semitone, which is why I refer to it being in E harmonic minor at the end.

Vaiai

I do covers band too and with a lot of them I do note for note, but usually it's just the "key" parts or bit's everyone knows that are important - bear in mind the band or even singer may be listening for certain sections to know when to come back in.

Note for note is only important if you are in a tribute band - otherwise - what percentage of the crowd will know if you play it identical or not in a pub/club!

Gassage

Vaiai said:

I do covers band too and with a lot of them I do note for note, but usually it's just the "key" parts or bit's everyone knows that are important - bear in mind the band or even singer may be listening for certain sections to know when to come back in.

Note for note is only important if you are in a tribute band - otherwise - what percentage of the crowd will know if you play it identical or not in a pub/club!

Two of my best mates in music are Dave Fowler and Steve McElroy from The Aussie Floyd Show (Dave's rig was at least 50% mine at one point- certainly his P1, P2, MXR Dyna (1976) and his 1970 JBL Speakered Twin, and Steve owns my Dynacord CLS222 and my Motion Sound Rotary Speakers.)

They tell horror stories of Floyd anoraks (not me) who sit with notebooks in the Audience and if one single note is varied, SMac says you can see them get their pencils out, make a note and then bombard the website the following day.

I will admit, SMac has employed me to ear-test a show on 2 occasions, and the only thing we disagreed on was SOYCD, as SMac uses two compressors, as per the album version, and I prefer the PULSE version.

Teetonetal

Gassage said:

Vaiai said:

I do covers band too and with a lot of them I do note for note, but usually it's just the "key" parts or bit's everyone knows that are important - bear in mind the band or even singer may be listening for certain sections to know when to come back in.

Note for note is only important if you are in a tribute band - otherwise - what percentage of the crowd will know if you play it identical or not in a pub/club!

Two of my best mates in music are Dave Fowler and Steve McElroy from The Aussie Floyd Show (Dave's rig was at least 50% mine at one point- certainly his P1, P2, MXR Dyna (1976) and his 1970 JBL Speakered Twin, and Steve owns my Dynacord CLS222 and my Motion Sound Rotary Speakers.)

They tell horror stories of Floyd anoraks (not me) who sit with notebooks in the Audience and if one single note is varied, SMac says you can see them get their pencils out, make a note and then bombard the website the following day.

I will admit, SMac has employed me to ear-test a show on 2 occasions, and the only thing we disagreed on was SOYCD, as SMac uses two compressors, as per the album version, and I prefer the PULSE version.

I couldn't cope with that. 

Being stuck so rigidly to someone else' playing - it's like being an artist but only alowed to use someone else paint mixes and only being able to do paint by numbers.  

Gassage

@teetonetal

Part of the reason is the segue to the videos. Only 3 tracks are totally free styled- CNumb being one.

Gassage

Wrong thread.

hotpickups

I must admit when I've seen a band advertise with that song in their set it turns me off straight away. Only because I haven't heard a band that's done it well enough yet IMO. 

However, learning note for note solos I used to do in one of my past bands, I agree with the above statements and that is to break it down in chunks and segments and to get them right or as best you can. However, in a pub gig situation it's more about the vibe than the actual note for notes rendition IMO. I'd ignore the scrutiny of some of the audience as the pubs I've played in aren't paying the correct amount for stadium virtuosity LOL

ESBlonde

+1 @hotpickups, I do like to get close to the solo and if it's Hotel California that everyone and his dad knows, then you'd better nail it or they think you can't play guitar. similarly with Sultans of Swing etc.

Otherwise tribute bands should sound like the people they are selling themselves as, that's why your audience is there surely?

Long solos I break down into the constituent phrases and learn each one before tacking the next one or two onto that, gradually building the length and speed as I go Having got it down I might then 'cheat' or rephrase a couple of notes to make it smoother for my hands without it sounding different to average Joe. But the original part is my starting point. If people wanted to hear me they can come see me play originals, but you know what, there's no money for me in that.

I like it when I'm given the task to learn something in a new style, it opens new horizons in my playing which I might never have tackled. Go from Nile Rodgers to Peter Frampton, Mark Knophler to Eric Clapton, Unknown Latin rhythm player to George Benson.
I've just been tasked with an accurate version of Street Life, now there is more than one guitar part in places so it will be a fudge, the trick is to make it not sound like one and disappear into the mix where appropriate.

thomasross20

I'd like to think our band does a good SCOM. 

I learn solos 95% note for note. Or I should say, 95% of songs I learn note for note. Sometimes you've just got life to live and other things to do and those fast passages don't need to be done 100% bang on (unless it's a G N' R song!!)

close2u

As already advised, learn in chunks. Try not to go back to the beginning every time you set about learning a new chunk. This may be useful for you:

meltedbuzzbox

Teetonetal said:

robinbowes said:

Some solos must be played note-for-note, as they're an established part of the song. Others are more free-hand, and can be improvised.

A good example is Comfortably Numb. Even DG plays the first solo note-for-note, but improvises more on the second solo.

Listen to songs played live - often, the solo on record is merely a snapshot and the original artist plays it different every night.

R.

Which I always found odd for that song as the 2nd one is much better than the first IMO.

I have also often wondered if lots of solos are improvised live purely because said player actually cant work out what they did... also lots of solos are mish mash takes of many attempts (I think DG used to do this, he'd record a bunch of solos then piece together one solo from the bits he liked?)

Still, doesn't help me out as this band want note for note solos on some songs...

if you want to play the songs and do the gig with this band I think you just have to suck it up and get to learning. 

hotpickups

Gassage said:

As a Floydhead, I've done a lot of this.

Often a long solo is marked by a mix of improv and key phrases.

So, if you take CNumb as everyone knows it, David pretty much always plays the first 12 bars of the outro as per the recording.

He then has, say around 10 or 15 'key phrases' that are a couple of bars long and tend to be used ad hoc.

So, my approach is to nail the bits played by rote, then learn a load of key phrases which allude to the ones he uses.

I think a degree of artistic licence with a solo THIS long is also allowable, as long as you sort of pay homage to those key phrases.

Another couple I've done exactly like this- Free Bird, December (All About Eve) and Fingers of Love (Crowded House).

If you want the idiot's guide to every CNumb phrase ever, here' the famous Oslo gig, where DG spent all day getting shitfaced with David Crosby, walked on stage and just said fuck it...and the results, as you can hear, are utterly astonishing

I can't help thinking that that is an old wives tale. Getting shit faced before a gig is never going to make anyone play as awesome as DG.... even DG himself. 

Grunfeld

Teetonetal said:

now I'm presented with an interesting covers band opportunity and they want note for note solos. Sweet Child o mine is one of the songs, it's a pretty long solo. I can play it no problem, but learning it.... 

Any tips?

Yep, playing is usually not the issue for me either and likewise I like to learn note for note solos -- at least to begin with.

The quickest way and best way, for me, by far is to load the mp3 into a program called Transcribe! which will display the song as a wave on the screen.  Then map the song with section markers and bar markers -- which you can do as fast as you listen through the song.  Once the song is mapped you can then SEE how many bars the section is and you can learn it bar by bar or whatever way you want.  It's so much easier to see you've got say 24 bars to learn, and two of them are buggers but the rest are okay.

You can also slow things down and repeat difficult bars, etc.  E.g. the tricky two bar lick in Sweet Child O Mine.


Looks like this:  (and the +1 is to bring SCOM from flat tuning into standard -- i.e. changing key, and adjusting for random tunings, Jimi I'm looking at you, is simple).

stratman3142

@Grunfeld
Yes I use a broadly similar (but not quite so detailed) approach with Transcribe! for audio files. I tend to use Transcribe! instead of Reaper (which can also do something similar), because the Transcribe! interface seems ideally tailored to this purpose.

With Youtube video clips I sometimes download them using the Video DowloadHelper addin for Firefox. Then I drag the downloaded video file into Reaper. This allows slowed down video/audio with the option of preserving the pitch.