Originally published July 27, 2024
This lesson goes beyond the "one scale per chord" method from Part 1 and explores two additional methods for chord tone soloing: a relative-positioning method that leverages the Nashville number system and an absolute-positioning method using cowboy chords and triad shapes.
This is a challenging lesson to master, but it's worth understanding the approach even if you can't yet find chord tones quickly enough to target them in real time. Understanding the process will motivate you to practice the fundamentals that you'll need to do this, and the end result is worth it. For what it's worth, the "Nashville number" approach described here completely transformed my playing.
This is as hard as this stuff gets, so if you're struggling, don't despair. Let me know what areas you're having trouble with and I'll help you bridge the gaps with future lessons. I'll also be sharing future lessons that use this methodology to explain what's going on in iconic solos, so it's worth making the effort to understand the approach now.
What follows is the written lesson — the full contents of the PDF handout, so you can read it here or download it above.
In Part 1, we practiced playing a different pentatonic scale over each chord of the “Little Wing” progression. In this follow-up lesson, we’ll practice visualizing one common pentatonic scale while targeting tones from each chord. This is a good explanation of what Hendrix played in the first part of his solo, and it’s a great approach to have in your toolkit. After we’ve covered the basics and practiced this approach, we’ll talk about what Hendrix did in the second part of his solo, and I’ll describe how I like to approach this chord progression.
This lesson gets very challenging very quickly, but even if you can’t perform the later exercises in real time with a backing track, be sure to read and understand the process behind the method. Seeing the big picture clearly will help motivate you to practice the basic skills (like quickly finding triads) that you’ll need to do this fluently. Like everything in life, if you have the right framework, it will get easier the more you work at it.
Many classic solos can be efficiently described as combining one baseline pentatonic scale with chord tone targets (which are sometimes outside the scale). For example, Jimmy Page’s “Stairway to Heaven” solo consists of the Am pentatonic scale plus some F-note targets played over an F major triad. Both iconic solos in “Hotel California” (played by Don Felder and Joe Walsh respectively) consist of the Bm pentatonic scale with added chord tone targets.
As for “Little Wing,” Jimi Hendrix’s opening solo phrases are based on the Em pentatonic scale. Hendrix targets chord tones throughout, most noticeably when he plays a C over the Am chord, which is not in the scale.
The Em pentatonic scale is a great choice for “Little Wing” because most of the chords in the progression come from the key of E minor. Hendrix plays most of his solo in the 12th position, using the familiar Form 1 of the minor pentatonic scale. Finding chord tones there is relatively easy because you can leverage your knowledge of cowboy chords.
The chart on the next page shows each of the seven chords in the chord progression, both as an open-position cowboy chord and overlaid on the Form 1 Em pentatonic scale at the 12th fret.
Exercise 1: Over a “Little Wing” backing track, practice creating phrases using the Em pentatonic scale in the 12th-fret Form 1 box. Use your knowledge of open-position chords to emphasize notes from each chord in the progression. Practice emphasizing the chord tones that are not found in the pentatonic scale.
There are five pentatonic positions, and we’ve only covered one so far. The others, unfortunately, will require another approach. I will describe two.
For both methods, you must be able to play the Em pentatonic scale in other positions. The rectangle and stack approach is a very flexible way to do this. As you know, the E minor pentatonic rectangle has the same notes as the G major rectangle, and the E minor stack has the same notes as the G major stack. Before continuing this lesson, ensure you’re comfortable finding E notes in different positions on the fretboard and building minor pentatonic rectangles and stacks around those roots. You should be in good shape if you worked through part one of this lesson.
Although we think of “Little Wing” as being in E minor, here we’ll think of each chord in the progression relative to G major. This will be a small abuse of the Nashville numbering system, but it will allow you to use these results more flexibly with other chord progressions in the future.
As a brief summary, the Nashville system uses Roman numerals to indicate the scale degree on which each chord is built, and those numbers are rendered in uppercase for major chords and lowercase for minor chords. In G major, G is the I chord, Am is the ii, Bm is the iii, C is the IV, D is the V, and Em is the vi. F does not belong in the key, but it is a major chord built on the ♭7 of G, so we call it ♭VII. This translation from names to numbers may seem like extra baggage, but it makes it easy to play a song in a different key.
If we learn the positions of the target notes for each chord relative to the Em/G pentatonic scale, we can use the rectangle and stack system to find chord tones near any E we can find on the fretboard.
Exercise 2: Find an E note on one of the top three strings and put your index finger on it. Visualize the Em rectangle that contains it. Practice targeting chord tones for each chord with short phrases. You may need to do this without a backing track at first.
Exercise 3: Repeat Exercise 2 with your ring finger on the E note and visualize the corresponding Em stack.
Exercise 4: Practice moving from one pentatonic shape to another. When playing the rectangle, practice moving vertically to a stack. When playing the stack, practice moving vertically to a rectangle or diagonally to another stack.
This approach to finding target notes requires memorizing the patterns from the figures on the next page. This will take some effort, but it’s worth it in the long run.
The exercises in the previous section are challenging, and using the Nashville system in this way is an advanced technique. If you’re not quite ready to commit to that approach, you can use your knowledge of the note names and triads on the fretboard to find target notes.
How it works:
If you know your triads really well, this isn’t too difficult. But if you’re still learning your triads, you will need to take things slowly. Remember that a major triad consists of a root, a major third, and a perfect fifth. A minor triad has a flattened third. There are usually three potential locations near a root where you can find the appropriate third and another three locations for the fifth. Here they are on an idealized all-4ths fretboard grid. You’ll have to remember the “warp” on the actual fretboard.
At the end of this lesson, you’ll find a full-page reference guide for each of the five Em pentatonic positions, showing the seven chords in the “Little Wing” chord progression. Use these guides to “check your work” as you practice finding triads on the fretboard, but avoid trying to memorize the diagrams outright. It’s better to practice reconstructing them from your knowledge of intervals—you’ll internalize the larger patterns organically over time.
Exercise 5: Find an E note on one of the top three strings and put your index finger on it. Visualize the Em rectangle that contains it. For each triad in the chord progression, find a three-string voicing that overlaps the rectangle you’re visualizing. Play a short phrase that includes notes from the pentatonic rectangle and the triad.
Exercise 6: Repeat Exercise 5 with your ring finger on the E note and visualize the corresponding Em stack.
Exercise 7: Staying in one position, repeat exercises 5 & 6 along with a backing track.
In the G-F-C-D turnaround, Hendrix shifts away from melodic playing and opts to play short licks based on each chord.
On the G and F chords, he plays the root on the high E string and bends the 2nd/9th on the G string up a full step to the major 3rd. This is bending into an inverted major third interval, and it’s a great lick to have in your arsenal.
On the C and D chords, he places his index finger on the 2nd/9th on the G string and his middle finger on the 5th on the B string, and he uses his other fingers to hammer onto and pull off from other notes relative to the triad. Hendrix was a master at incorporating nearby scale tones around a basic chord shape.
When I improvise over the “Little Wing” changes, I combine every approach described in the two parts of this lesson.
I often use the Em-pentatonic-plus-triad-targets approach for the first four chords (Em - G - Am - Em). In some positions, I use the Nashville system to find good notes, but in others, I find it’s easier to find the triad targets by name.
When the Bm chord arrives, I like to switch to the Bm pentatonic scale, and then I continue using short licks based on the pentatonic scale that goes with each chord.
The bottom line is that there’s no single best way to do this, and there’s a lot of opportunity here to practice fundamentals that will improve your improvisation on every song you tackle. Don’t be tempted to stop working on the more challenging methods once you find the first approach that works for you. Understanding all of these approaches and building up your capability over time is well worth your practice time.
Happy improvising!
Little Wing
E minor · 70 BPM · Em–G–Am–Bm…
The same changes at 70 BPM, held under a single E minor pentatonic scale — the move this lesson is about. The shape stays put and the triad targets travel across it, which is the whole reason the Nashville numbers are worth the trouble. Switch the board to “Scale per chord” to see Part 1's view of the same bars, and back again.
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