A while ago, I wrote two lessons on the theory behind the lydian mode. (Hopefully you’ve already worked through those lessons). Because it’s essential to put all the theory you learn into practice, I thought it would be a good idea to show you some licks that use the lydian mode. To do this, I’ve created the following four guitar lessons for you to work through…
- Rock Guitar Lick 19: Lydian Legato Lick #1 (This is the lesson you’re reading now).
- Rock Guitar Lick 20: Lydian Legato Lick #2
- Rock Guitar Lick 21: Lydian Tapping Lick #1
- Rock Guitar Lick 22: Lydian Tapping Lick #2
If you diligently work through all four lessons, you’ll be off to a great start in building your lydian soloing vocabulary. So let’s get started with the first lick now…
The First Lick
In this guitar lesson we’re going to look at a new guitar lick designed to help you to improve your legato technique, and also expand your lydian mode soloing vocabulary.
Before we look at the lick, it’s probably a good idea to quickly review the notes of the scale that it uses…
A Lydian: Scale Degrees and Note Names
Please make sure that you memorise this table now. Once you’ve done this, then you’re ready to get started with the lick…
Rock Guitar Lick 19: Lydian Legato Lick #1
This lick uses an eight note melodic pattern that repeats three times, and has a nice cascading sound to it. To help you see the melodic pattern more clearly, here’s the same lick with boxes drawn around each repetition of the pattern…
Although I pick the first note of the lick with a downstroke, notice how I slide into each new repetition of the melodic pattern. Sliding into these notes removes the accents that would occur if the notes were picked, and makes the lick sound more flowing. Of course, if you prefer the sound of picking the first note of each repetition of the pattern, then you’re welcome to do that. 🙂
With the exception of the last two notes, all of the lick is meant to be played using sixteenth note timing. So when you start playing the lick to a metronome, be sure that you play four evenly-spaced notes per metronome click. It’s quite easy to rush when playing licks that use a lot of legato technique, so do your best to make the sixteenth notes as even as possible.
Have fun!
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