Rhythms for Jazz Guitar Soloing

One of the issues that comes up time and again with my students in our lessons is that they are practicing harmonic material and melodic material but are rarely spending enough, or any, time working on the rhythmic content of their solos.

They are so focused on learning every possible Chord, Scale and Arpeggio and advanced sub that they ignore rhythmic practicing completely.

Because of this phenomenon, I’ve started working rhythmic ideas into every weekly lesson and workshop that I give, emphasizing the importance of rhythmic variation and control in every jazz guitarists playing.

While there are many different rhythms that we need to look at over the course of our development, I have found that master four (quarter notes, off-beat quarter notes, eighth notes and triplets) gives us a strong foundation in our rhythmic playing to move forward to more complex groupings of notes.

In this article we’re going to look at those four basic rhythms, break them down and look at ways that we can use improvisation and repertoire in our woodshed to internalize these rhythms, while adding more rhythmic variety to our solos at the same time.

To practice each rhythm or rhythmic grouping in this article, try improvising with each example through the following:

• Once Chord
• Section of a Tune
• Four Bar Phrase
• ii-V-I in Major and Minor
• Full Tune

This will allow you to isolate each rhythm, giving yourself time to properly internalize it, while applying it to a real life situation using improvisation. The best of both worlds!

The Rhythms

Let’s start by working on a simple rhythm for jazz guitar, the quarter note. While it is fairly easy to play, this rhythm is at  the heart of all traditional jazz, and a lot of modern jazz, as this is the rhythm that bass players use to drive the pulse of a song when they are “walking” bass lines.

Having a steady feel with quarter notes is essential to being successful as a jazz guitarist, so take you time, practice slowly, and concentrate on keeping each note even throughout the bar. One thing that catches beginner players when it comes to quarter notes is that they either slow down or speed up, which is not something we want to do in our playing.

Here is an example of a line I improvised over an F7 chord, try it out and then grab any tune you’re working on and try improvising yourself using only steady quarter notes.

Quarter Notes

While quarter notes on the beat are an important rhythm for jazz guitar, they can get boring after a while. So, let’s spice them up a bit by simply pushing each quarter note over by half a beat. All we’re doing is playing the same quarter note pulse, but placing them on the “&’s” of each bar.

This is also a fairly simple idea, but because each quarter note is syncopated (placed between the beats) for a long period of time, we have a tendency to speed up and let the time get away from us in these instances. So, make sure to practice this idea slowly at first, concentrating on really nailing the time and laying back on the beat, before increasing the metronome to a faster tempo.

Off Beat Quarter Notes

We’ll now work on the most common rhythm for jazz guitar improvisation, eighth notes. Having a strong, swinging eighth-note feel is essential to making it as a jazz guitarist, so having a command over this rhythm can’t be stressed enough.

For this exercise, we’ll run straight eighth notes, no rests, to focus on nailing this rhythm in our playing. Because we are playing eight notes per bar, it is very important to start slowly, maybe around 40 bpms, before working our way up to faster, trickier tempos.

A good way to practice our eighth note feel is to listen to one of our favorite players, say Wes Montgomery, and then play this exercise. As you are playing your eighth notes, concentrate on imitating Wes’ eighth-note feel, how he articulates each note, when he uses slurs etc. This will help you get into the groove of your favorite players, adopting their swing feel along the way.

Eighth Notes

 

With these three rhythms under our fingers we are going to finish up by working on triplets. Triplets are a great way to build energy in our playing, check out any Mike Stern solo for an example of this, but they can be hard to master since we are now playing 12 notes per bar.

Because they are so fast, I know I sound like a broken record at this point but it’s important, start by practicing these rhythms slowly. If you have a metronome that can click triplets for you all the better. This way you’ll be making sure that every triplet you play is exactly in line where it should be.

As well, because there are so many notes in each bar, and they go by quickly, feel free to add as many slurs as necessary to keep up with the pulse of the tune you’re playing on.

Players such as Pat Martino use few slurs in their playing, while Allan Holdsworth slurs almost every note, so feel free to play anywhere between these two extremes depending on where your ears tell you to go.

Triplets

Mixing Rhythms

One of the issues that a lot of jazz guitarists face early on in their development, or even at an advanced stage for that matter, is that they tend to play lines that contain only one rhythm, say running eighth notes for four bars.

This may be a good practice technique to help nail down our time feel, but on the bandstand it can get very old, very quickly.

While some players tend to play a lot of eighth note lines, others such as Kurt Rosenwinkel and Adam Rogers prefer to mix things up, often moving between three or more rhythms types in a single bar or phrase. So, in order to add more rhythmic diversity to our playing, let’s check out some ways to mix these rhythms up in our lines.

The first thing we’ll do is combine all four rhythms in a single bar, starting with the longest rhythm first. Take this phrase and use to improvise over an entire tune, sticking withe the same rhythm for each bar but changing the notes along the way.

Notice how the steady rhythm creates a motivic sound, in the same way that repeating a group of notes does melodically. This idea, rhythmic motives, can be used to add extra layers of interest to our solos, since most listeners can follow our rhythmic ideas but not everyone can grab a hold of our melodic or harmonic content

Mixed Rhythms 1

 

We’ll now do the same exercise but reverse the order of the rhythms, so the shortest rhythm is first.

Mixed Rhythms 2

 

To get a little more complex with this approach, we can now pair up both rhythms back to back. This can be tricky to remember, as we’re used to only playing one bar at a time for an entire tune, so make sure to concentrate on repeating the longer, two-bar phrase each time it comes back around.

It’s easy to day dream a bit and lost track of which group comes first, or what rhythmic pattern we’re playing next. But keeping these ideas in our minds and ears can help us build our rhythmic memory, in the same way that transcribing can help build our pitch memory.

Mixed Rhythms 3

 

And finally, we’ll play the two bar phrases together, but reversed. Again, focus on keeping track of the longer phrase. Try and hear each two-bar group, rather than think through it. This will help make your rhythmic soloing feel more natural and less forced, especially when you lock on to a longer rhythmic motive as is the case with this example.

Mixed Rhythms 4

 

Practicing rhythms and rhythmic concepts on a daily basis is essential for the development of any jazz guitarist, but often times we forget this idea and spend all our time on harmonic and melodic ideas instead.

If we can improvise with these and other rhythmic groupings, it makes it easier to sit down and work on them, as well as allows us to work on harmony and melody at the same time. A win win situation!

If you liked this rhythmic approach to improvising, explore it further with my ebook “Modern Time: Rhythmic Fundamentals for the Improvising Musician”

Do you have a favorite rhythm or way to practice rhythms for jazz guitar? Share it in the comments section below.

Check Out Related Jazz Guitar Lessons

Rhythm Patterns for Jazz Guitar

Modern Jazz Guitar Techniques: Tritone Division Soloing

Modern Jazz Guitar Techniques: Augmented Division Soloing