To top it all, the beautiful Hofner Committee guitar inlaid with Mother of Pearl fretboard markers, which I bought in the 1960’s in London’s West End music shops enclave, suffered the indignity of a broken neck when I inadvertently left it on the double bed in our caravan while travelling! It was damaged beyond economical repair and today would have been worth a great deal as a collectors item if I still had it.
Oh me Oh my ! I was young and ignorant of music then and had no idea what I was denying myself for the future ! They would have been something I could share with you as well as them likely to have been worth a packet of money today ! The pages used were half A4 in size and I used to wonder at how those in the band could see them to read them when actually playing. 1940’s -1950’s band sheets I once had which included this and many of the old hits complete with guitar chords etc. I regret abandoning to the rubbish bin, all the old original London U.K. Great Job Dirk, with this now legendary song. Here is the backing track for this lesson: Here are the notes of the E harmonic minor scale:Īnd here is a common position of the E harmonic minor scale: Play A harmonic minor over E7 (goes to Am7).Play E harmonic minor over B7 (goes to Em7).There are two dominant chords like this in the chord changes of Autumn Leaves, B7 and E7: The most common scale of choice to play over dominant 7 chords that go to a minor chord is the harmonic minor scale. To bring variety to your solos and sound interesting to your listeners, you’re going to need some other scales as well. Here is a common fingering for the E minor blues scale (the blue note is colored… blue!): The minor blues scale is almost the same as the minor pentatonic scale but has one more note, called a blue note (#4 or b5). If the major scale is new to you, start with this position:Īnother scale that you can use over the entire chord changes of Autumn Leaves is the E minor blues scale. Here are the notes of the G major scale mapped on the entire fretboard: That’s why you will learn to combine the G major scale with other scales. You can get away with playing over the entire chord changes of Autumn Leaves with just one scale, the G major scale (aka G Ionian mode), although there’s a great chance you’ll sound boring after a while. There are other scale options besides the ones on this page, but in this lesson, we’ll stick to the basics. In this section, we will have a look at the basic guitar scales needed to solo over Autumn Leaves. Jazz guitar scales are an important tool for improvisation and essential learning for every jazz guitar player. Study it over the backing track, incorporate licks and ideas from the solo into your own playing, and dig into one of the most famous jazz tunes in the repertoire. Have fun learning this Autumn Leaves melody and solo. Even if you are excited to dive into the solo, take the time to learn the melody, it builds a strong foundation of the form and tune in your ears and fingers that will make soloing easier over these changes.
Learning the melody is an important part of studying any jazz standard. Next, you will learn a guitar solo over the chords of Autumn Leaves, and the scales needed to play that solo. In this lesson, you will learn to play the melody of Autumn Leaves, combined with chords to fill up the gaps. While other instruments, such as sax, trumpet, and vocals, often play the melody on a gig, you never know when you’ll be called up to play the head in or out of a tune. Because of this, having a strong hold on the melody and improvising is essential learning. Autumn Leaves is one of the most popular jazz standards on record and is a must-know tune for any jazz guitarist.