Jazz Lines

How do jazz guitarists make their solos sound like jazz? They outline the chords and decorate them with chromatic notes. This chapter teaches you to play jazz lines over the ii-V-I in C major, all in fifth position so you can focus on sound instead of shifts.

First you learn arpeggios over the ii-V-I, so your lines spell out Dm7, G7 and Cmaj7 even without a rhythm guitar. Chromatic approach notes add the slippery tension of bebop, and enclosures surround a target note from above and below so it lands with purpose. Then you put it all together in your first bebop line, using the bebop dominant scale, and finish with three original ii-V-I licks, including a flat-nine lick and a long four-bar line.

Each tab plays in your browser with a swing feel, a click and a tempo ladder, and every lesson ends with a checkpoint. By the end you'll hear the changes in your own playing, land chord tones on the beat and have a handful of bebop vocabulary to build your jazz improvisation on.