Is scale practice just technique or is there more to it? 🙂

Oh, my god! That Em pentatonic over the Cmaj7 trick just changed my life. I have so many beautiful Cmaj7 songs! Thank you!!

Thank you for this awesome offering. I really appreciate you taking time to film and post this.

Thanks Jens! The more I learn, the more I realize there is to learn.

What I love about your content is that you obviously draw directly from your experience, but you have reflected and structured that for us. Great video Jens.

Jens, I've bee playing guitar since 18 years, and yesterday i decided to watch this video. I was playing accordion in my childhood. So, practicing 7th chords by playing thirds up and down gave me a feeling that i've never studied the neck by this way - which is incredible, I would incorporate it in my daily routine and I'm sure I'll know this sequences after a week of practice without even thinking "what the heck is coming after G D B... Eh. What... F, or what, ah u.. ok. It's A, clear as mud" . Especially it is hard for me when playing from up to down, but i think it's a matter of time. Thank you for an inspiration and giving a fresh breath to my exercises on guitar and music at all. God bless you.

Jens I’m just getting into jazz guitar after 20 years of playing rock and metal. I really enjoy your lessons, you are a great teacher and I feel like I’m learning a lot from this channel. I find the jazz voicings so much more interesting than what I’ve been playing all this time. I still love rock and metal but I’m starting a new phase in my guitar journey and you are my go to guy for helping figure out how to play jazz. You are proficient at explaining the techniques to make it sound jazzy. I watch one of your videos every day, trying to learn as much as I can. Thank you for these videos they are very helpful! Cheers!

Thanks Jens I learned more in 15 minutes watching your video than years of unfocused practice:)

Wow what an awesome lesson. I've been noddling around the major scale patterns for sometime in a pretty aimless manner. I can join them all up seamlessly but not actually sure what I've achieved. This has given me a lot more to think about and will hopefully lead to something more musical once I add the arpeggios and some phrasing into the mix. Many thanks again.

Jens again coming from a metal hard rock guitar player background scales were always going to be the staple of my practice regimen... but watching your videos has opened my mind to sit back and look and think about why certain things fit with certain things thank you so much keep doing what you're doing I always find something good to learn in each of your videos

I like your videos so much! My jazz guitar teacher in one of the few lessons threw there the idea of 3 pentatonics that fit over a major scale, and it sat there without an explanation. Now I'm at peace

Jens you should talk one day about a pedalboard setup for jazz guitarists. What do you consider must have effects pedals for jazz?

Thanks Jens I needed this !!! Mindless practice of running scale patterns is great for muscle memory but THAT IS ALL , THIS WAS A HUGE HELP !! MUCH APPRECIATED

Thanks for a great video! You’ve confirmed what I started reaching for at the end of last year - that knowing your chord structures and intervals from wherever you are on the guitar makes a lot more sense than just memorising the ‘5 patterns’ that a lot of books and systems go on about, without being clear about the ‘why’.

You always start your videos with something that I already know, then quickly go to something on the edge of my knowledge. You always leave me with something new and things for me to practice. That reminds me of a quote, "We only learn what we already partly know." I love your guitar. My guitars are either too big and heavy, are not cut-aways, and/or the necks without truss rods are warped.

Discoverd your channel recently. the quality of this video is superb so many ideas. the key concept of making the scale musical is so overlooked I was struggling to find a way to practice this effectively. Thank you for sharing all these tips (I stopped at half video as I already have homeworks for months to come :D ). I think the other side of it is making the scale a tool available at hand (so that you can indeed focus on musicality) for me practicing scale vertically, horizonally and dianagolly with various excercise is also key get fluent and make it easier to apply musically later (not learning the box but learning notes and intervals)

Indeed there is more than technique in practicing scales, and we can definitely use harmonic knowledge to spice up daily scale/arpeggio routine and make it more close to actual impro.

man your videos made me pick up my guitar after sitting in dust for years and start learning jazz.i started from nothing and now i'm practicing solid 5-6 hours a day. I know it's not enough to become a professional jazz guitarist but it's better than nothing. thanks jens..you are a wonderful specimen..

My new year's resolution was to get back to basics with the guitar, learn the fingerboard properly and get a system together for connecting my scales, chords and arpeggios efficiently. I was looking for ideas online, and found this video. It's the first one of yours I've watched, Jens, and I'm an instant fan! There's SO much great stuff inside this 15 minutes. You cover a lot of the ideas I've been trying to think through, but you make them so clear and straightforward...and your whole approach is down-to-earth and inspiring. On top of the "basics" about diatonic relationships, etc, there's so much extra in here - enough to work on for months, maybe years. The material about finding and analysing quartal triads and pentatonics inside the major scale is just gold. Thanks, Jens. I'd better get working..,.

Playing the major scale and modes with intervals is a good practice :)

I like to turn around the idea of pentatonics in a major scale. If 3 pentatonic scales are inside a major scale, then 3 major scales contain the same pentatonic. For example: I write a basic vamp using only the notes of D minor pentatonic. I then have 3 major scales that will fit over that vamp: C, F, Bb. I'll loop the vamp and experiment how each scale works against it. F Lydian Dominant will also work in this example.

Jens, that was a great lesson on how to look at practicing major scales at a deeper level. You are a boss 😎. Much appreciated lesson! 👍

always wanted to play jazz, you make it easy, thank you so much, your great

Excellent, I don't play jazz, I come from playing the Indian Sarode, but these lessons are just so instructive.

Great advice. I have found David Wallimann’s Guitar Infusion Videos to be a great way to learn basic theory and how to apply it to playing guitar. Yes, practice, arpeggios and learn the fretboard. A foundation in theory is desirable. It will assist in ear training and technique. Fingers and ears. Practice well.

It gives me enormous pleasure to watch one of Jens's videos and not learn anything at all. I usually pause, rewind, review a few times, and take a lot of notes, but not on this one. I'll enjoy the feeling until I watch the next one of Jens's videos, but for now I feel pleasantly smug.

It's great! Thanks a lot!! From Brazil!!!

Fantastic Lesson (4- years late). Cheers from SpoCanada.

Great video lesson!!! Really reminded me of also using the minor pentatonic on the 3rd of the root!!!🙏🙏🙏🤘🤘🤘

This is awesome Jens. All of your stuff recently has been excellent.

I figured out this 1,3,5,7,2,4,6,8,3579,46810,etc by ear, on my own. I was so delighted with this exercise, I have , and do , drill it up and down the fret board. It really has opened up my ear. I’m now ready to learn this in a minor voice. Do you think I should proceed as such and go on to augmented and diminished voices? I’m trying everything I can to learn jazz music. I’m a self taught player and grew up listening to Clapton, Beck, Page, and Hendrix( my hero). Now I want to sound like Kenny Burrell, but the going is tough. I’ve been a Patreon member with you for several months/years now. I play daily but struggle to shift to more Jazz vocabulary in my improv. I’m sure you’ve heard this story before. Any ideas or suggestions are welcome. You do such a great job. A natural pedagogue. 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻✌🏻😎

You are speaking directly to me with this type of lesson...will have to dedicate a notebook to your channel content, it seems. Thanks, man.

Excellent information. Many thanks.

Great lesson Jens! Again a lesson that shows the importance of the fundamentals! I love these lessons! There is so much information: your excellent videos, other YT videos, books, forums etc. but vids like these show that if you really know your fundamentals (diatonic theory, notes on the neck etc, arps in these scales, pentatonic scales) you can play a lot of music (blues, country, pop, rock, R&B) and also a lot of jazz! The 80/20 principle at work :P.

Thanks Jen , the quartal three note chords are awesome sounding ...I tried to add some quartal chords in my playing but didn't have how to construct them now I see them in my major harmony ...🎸🎶🎶✌

i feel like learning. thank you.

Great Lesson Jens, so much to extract from the major scale!

Thanks for your videos Jens. I play Sax, but at least 90% of what you say is useful for me. The only things I don't use are when you talk about positions on the fret etc. But everything else is great! Thank you.

You're the best guitarrist ever!

Thank you very much Jen that was very useful.God bless you.

never knew music was this tough...

This is a killer lesson!

Tnx lars you are light in a dark world of learning music theory

These are all great ideas. What I found to be very important in scale practice is working on aural association of a scale with the matching chord (or chords). So I alternate scales with chords. I play ,say, a drop 3 Maj7 chord and play the matching, say, major bebop scale. I do that with different rhythmic variations (chord at the & of 4 then scale from 7th descending to 1). So I am practicing many things: - Playing scale while connecting different chord tones (not just always starting on 1 ending an octave higher). - Practicing different voicings of drop 2 and drop 3 chord, depending on which position I am playing the scale. - Most importantly training my ear to associate chords and scales. Ideally, one should be able to just hear a chord and play the chord scale anywhere on the fretboard completely by ear, without thinking positions, keys and what not. - I am also developing my time this way because you have to know where the beat one is when you're freely alternating chords and scales.

This is a really informative lesson! Thank You again! Excellent Work!

Many YT guitar sites for many masters but this one rules them.

Thank you for this video! Very insightful!!!

Thank you so much for this inspiring video mr. Larsen

Very informative Jens! Great video like always.

just hit a gold mine thanks man!

Hey from India Jens. Your channel has really helped me on really understanding jazz and improving both my knowledge and technique on guitar. I was wondering if you could break down how to figure out jazz chords by ear. Iv got a real book, but I also want to be able to create those charts myself. Thanks a lot for your videos once again.

Thanks for this video JL. I am starting to re-learn guitar and i think your videos will be of great help. Subscribed.

You have great teaching style mate.

Hi Jens, you have a huge number of great videos in your channel. Is there a kind of roadmap to the videos so we can study your videos in order from beginner, intermediate and advance?

I recently picked up an interesting and, for me, new way of practising scales from another KZfaqr, Ross Cambell. Rather than just practising scales up and down on their own use the circle of fourths/fifths. Ascend using Cmajor then descend using the next key, Gmajor and repeat around the entire twelve major keys in logical positions up the fingerboard. This approach can be used for not just the two minor keys as well but also triads and arpeggios and other scales. It helps me a lot in getting past the usual guitar keys (up to four sharps and four flats) and in mentally thinking about the notes I'm playing as I'm not reading anything at all from a chart or staff, just my own knowledge that, say B major has five sharps and what they are and then play the scale. It also helps in the logical movement of music so I guess for jazz playing the II, V, I scales in sequence would also be quite helpful. Anyway, just another way of looking at scales rather than just stand-alone keys which we know is not how music tends to work out. There's movement from one key to another in most pieces and it tends to follow logical patterns.

im pretty sure you had talked about all this stuff before (because I know all of that, and basically all I know, I learned from you xd), but it's nice to have it all in one video. as always.. thank you for your efforts and constancy.

Great videos.

Serious Question Jens Can you point me to one of your videos on: A. Quartal Arpeggios; B. Upper Structure Triads? Thanks!

Jens, you are the best! Great video!

Hi Jens, could you tell us how to use the phrygian chords, for example: C, E, Gb, B, or in the short version : C, Gb, B. This chord is awesome to be used, is know sometimes as Cmaj7 (b5) chord. Please tell us how to use it . Thank you in advance.

Thanks Jens. Tight, pragmatic. Inspiring. Hard to do with scales! :-)

Sometimes ..... my brain just melts and I think I'll never get there!!

Great lesson! Thank you

the patterns that you show at the end from 9:50 < triad cascading around the modes > are really cool i really love them they remind me some Joe Diorio kind of sound ...it would be great if you could develop them in a video maybe there is already something somewhere in your channel about this // m@n you are a great player N very humble which a great quality IMO

My teacher always said, "if you think you're a good player, then let's see you solo in major".

Learned this scale till i memorized it, now to practice it the right way

Excellent lesson.

Very interesting! Like to see how you set up the Ibanez

the content of this video renders all my attempts of correctly playing a major scale useless. at least now I know how much I don't know on this subject. Thanks again!

Thanks Jens ♥

Do you have a video on learning the diatonic arpeggios at all the different positions with the 3nps method within the c major scale you used in the video as example ?

Great video, good information.

Hi Jens: Love your videos. Much of each goes over my head though. Could you suggest a sequence to start with? So I can more systematically work through them? Or could you suggest a theory book that would augment your videos well? Thanks!

Wonderful, Jens. Thank you. Your videos have opened my eyes to so many things! Er du Nordmann?

I try to take it one chord at a time, diatonic intervals are very consistent... my fretboard knowledge consists of triads and 4 part chord inversions, pentatonics and diatonic scales as well... but I'm always thinking of the next interval rather than the whole fretboard.

First starting jazz lesson new students

Hi, I found your lesson so useful, but as a beginner, I donno what to start first. Can you line up your essential lesson for beginner? thank you

I am appreciative of you. This simplifies so much-thank you!

great video, thanks

Loved the video! These scale practice tips have helped me a lot, but there's something that I struggle with a lot and that is arpeggios. I really haven't figured out a good way to practice or learn arpeggios that allows me to relate them to a corresponding scale. Is there any advise you can give me?

music is a painful but rewarding addiction.

Don't forget to play in C sharp and B and all other keys, I should do this too, I get passed off with A and E on guitar although I love E for that bluesy sound and some open string action, ultimately I want to be able to feel each note of chromatic scale although key of the music can restrict you unless you are a jazz guy and play outside a lot.

Such a great moment @ 11.03 :-)

Great video - just a bit of constructive feedback in the way you edit some of your videos..... in 6.08 you talk about an important concept but at same time add a separate window with you playing stuff - quite distracting and not sure what it really achieves - This happens in several other videos (sometimes it’s a live concert etc....) and I find myself having to rewind a few times to fully understand what you’re saying

So, in the end, when you improvise on top of a chord, do you think on the actual note names (C,D,E,F...) or do you relate them to the key root with numbers (1,2,3,4...) instead? I guess the first approach is better for knowing the actual notes all over the fretboard, but the second approach allows developing patterns that work for any key easily. I am trying to learn the fretboard using the second approach, but another problem I see now is that the numbering relative to the key root may be misleading when thinking about the role of the notes on top of other chords of the key other than the I, as your example on quartal appergios shows at 11:27. How do you "read/think" the notes while improvising? Thank you for sharing all this great content!

watching some videos is like eating popcorn and I really enjoy that but YOUR videos are like eating steak and I love them BUT it takes more time to digest steak as opposed to popcorn. If you ever come to the US I would sure like to know just in case I might have the opportunity to meet you.

Great

Great vid. Do you think you should always be aware of notes while playing? I've got this habit now where I'm always thinking of the interval (eg seeing a G as a 5th in C major, not really even heeding the fact it's a G note) instead. Should I really force myself to think of both? I've been trying to follow this approach for a while now, as I do neglect notes in my playing, but it's so hard to improvise while thinking of notes. Same with chords, I would really have to think about what the notes of F major 7 are. Then there's the whole "shape" thing, which again detracts from thinking of a note but just a pattern...in a way the confluence of "shapes" and the idea of scales has probably hampered my playing more than help it.

Hi again,your videos are very informative,do you have one dedicated to Quartal harmony,its fingering,and diatonic scale,and is E,A,D the Quartal extension for a C major?double thanx.

merçi beaucoup

Hi Jens. It’s been a while. So how do I explain to someone how to do all of this in a way that is comprehensive rather than a mindless repetitive exercise that doesn’t help us. Everyone is a different kind of student so... got any helpful information for that you’re interested in sharing. Thanks always!

When I'm learning the scale on all fretboard, should I call names of notes and know them and do that in all keys? Or that isn't necessary?

Jens, I’m new to your postings and enjoying the material. I do have some ideas about your quartal arpeggios section. Do you have an email to contact you directly?

Is it common to practice the scale for the triads of all the interval of a key. Ive been doing this for a while

Hi Jens, you're videos especially this one are very informative and meaty! I have a couple of questions: I am an intermediate guitar player who has been playing for five years, and am primarily a rock n roll guitarist. My inspiration to take up the guitar was Stevie Ray Vaughn. I play Beatles, Stones, AC/DC that kind of music. I want to get into jazz. Can you recommend any books and/or videos intro so that I can get into Jazz. I saw Joe Pass playing Blues Juice and I love it. I have to build a foundation. I only follow guitar tabs. Can you help please? Thank you.

I use 2 fingers to play it

I am just starting to play Jazz and i m having a problem with appegios. Can you do a video on that appegio exercise

Hi Jens, thanks for these great videos, very inspirational. I just wanted to hear what your reasoning is behind the way in which you play a two octave C Major scale by sort of sliding from 2nd Position to some quite wide leaps in the fingers by the upper second octave. Might it be better to start in 2nd Position and then change to the 5th Position for the second octave as there would be no need to stretch fingers at any point by doing this? Any thoughts you may have would be very welcome.

What is the Ibanez guitar you're using? What pick thickness do you use? I have trouble with control unless i drag my little finger of picking hand on the guitar top; i notice you pick both with little finger up on KZfaq and down when performing on stage. Any suggestions to help me get a little faster to keep up 😕 i practice using the"Modern Jazz Guitar Concepts." Thank you Frank

Jens this is a very late comment, but the only part of the video I didn't understand is when you stacked a Em triad on top of a Gmaj7 chord. I understand that the E is a relative minor to the G major, but how would you go about doing this with other chords contained within a G major scale?