EXPRESSIVE SOLOING WITH PAUL GILBERT

In this exclusive video lesson, the legendary Paul Gilbert treats you to a37-minute overview on transferring vocal phrases to the guitar, with Jon Bishop as your guide.

- Jon Bishop

Paul Gilbert exploded onto the 1980s rock scene with his exciting brand of speedy and highly technical soloing. He has been part of two great rock bands, Mr Big (soon to tour again) and Racer X, but has also maintained a fabulous solo career.

In this article Paul sets out to explain the goal of the lesson, which is to adapt vocal phrases for use on the guitar, in order to play with expression. We have notated the seven live performances so you can study the fingerings and try these ideas out yourself.

A strong melody is of course the obvious starting point and provides a launch pad for other lead phrases and soloing variations. Paul encourages you to test out melodies by singing them. He stresses there are many great phrases that aren't singable too, but for this feature it's all about the vocal phrasing. As Paul performs the melody he taps his foot to create a strong relationship with the pulse.

The scale of choice for the first example is E Mixolydian (E-F#-G#-A-B-C#-D) which sounds great over an E7 chord. To get the Mixolydian sound in your head Paul says thinks of it more as the E Minor Pentatonic with a raised 3rd. Indeed: Minor 3rd notes (G) can be bent slightly sharp within a Mixolydian framework. Paul adds expression to the melody with the inclusion of long and short notes. This provides contrast and breathes life into the phrases. He chooses the long and short notes on the fly, simply calling it a 'feel thing'.

Once the pitches, rhythm and duration of each note is decided it's time to add a variety of articulations including, string bends, finger vibrato, finger slides and raking of the pick (fake sweeps), which adds attack to the notes. All of this articulation is necessary to provide the kind of emotion and feel that Paul wants us to inject into the solos.