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The Guitar Chord Solo – Playing A Chord Melody

A chord melody or guitar chord solo is a method guitarists use to bring out the musical possibilities of a tune by interpreting it as a series of chords rather than single notes. Or, putting it another way, you play the chords AND the melody simultaneously. You will find the guitar chord solo – a group setting or unaccompanied – used quite a lot in jazz guitar music.

In rock-oriented music we are used to hearing a guitar solo played by one guitar, the bass notes by another, and the rhythm by a third guitar. Using the chord melody approach, the guitar player makes use of all three elements of a piece of music to produce a different way of interpreting the melody by making use of musical effects of the guitar chord. Solos played this way often have the ability to draw the listener’s attention into the music.

What do we need to enable us to play a guitar chord solo? We can make our chord melody by taking a piece of sheet music, tab or a fake book that gives us the basic melody and the chords. Of course, you will need to be beyond the raw beginner stage to make any progress on a guitar chord solo, because your facility for changing chords needs to be established in your body.

Once you have chosen your piece of music to transform into a guitar chord solo, try playing the melody as chords with the melody note on the highest string. This way you can simply strum the chord from bass notes to treble and see how the melody sounds and feels on the guitar. If playing the piece as a chord solo feels too awkward, you will need to think about changing keys.

An alternative approach to arranging your own chord solo is to make use of some of the collections of chord melody arrangements on the market. Some of these anthologies are for either fingerpicking or flatpicking only, but some include both.

There is quite a good book by Mel Bay called Mel Bay Jazz Guitar Standards And Chord Melody Solos. This book has a CD with all the guitar chord solos recorded and they are written in music notation as well as tab.

If you decide to learn to play guitar chord solos you might need a friend or teacher to help you with left hand fingering or the use of your right hand fingers for fingerpicking arrangements. Whichever course you take you will find that learning to play chord melody arrangements quite rewarding.

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