Breaking chords apart - opening up the fretboard.

Hello Steemit!

I get asked many times how I break down my chordal approach in the instrument and how I break away from conventional chord shapes. Some months ago I did some lessons covering this aspect under the name of ''The Chord Library''.

I have a very ''piano-like'' chord approach on the guitar , trying to visualize how each individual note relates
to the chord that is being played at the moment and by using ''Drop voicings'' as a starting point for shapes then move the voices around , like a combined set of melodies. This approach is mainly inspired by guitar player Eric Johnson.

Once you have the main shapes under your fingers , you can start improvising melodies and connecting the notes in a single-line manner . This is why I say my improvisation is chord and harmony based rather than scale based .. 90% of the time I'm thinking chords and movements and how to connect them. A pentatonic ''scale'' in my mind is just a 4-note chord with 1 tension added , this way I can ''bring together'' chord and melody playing under the same roof and make my thought process a little easier when improvising.

This is just a quick improvisation connecting Cmaj7 and Ebmaj7.

These are the lessons:

https://steemit.com/music/@pechichemena/guitar-tutorial-the-improv-toolbox-lesson-4-chord-library-the-maj7-drop2-chord-family

https://steemit.com/music/@pechichemena/guitar-tutorial-the-improv-toolbox-lesson-4-chord-library-part2-the-drop-3-family-from-maj7-to-dominant7

https://steemit.com/music/@pechichemena/guitar-tutorial-the-improv-toolbox-extra-lesson-piano-style-voicings-for-guitar

Thanks for reading and listening!

Pechiche Mena

My video is at DLive