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A common problem faced by many aspiring guitar heroes is that despite their arsenal of technical skills they just can’t seem to come up with a cool sounding killer guitar solo. Below I have laid out some tips & techniques for creating some memorable melodies.

Melody Tips

• Keep in rhythm of main melody

• Change the rhythm of the notes. A common cause of lead playing boredom is doing everything with the same rhythm. Singers don’t sing like that!

• You should use some repetition
• A simple melody repeated on and off within your solo will make it a memorable one
• Repeat notes or groups of notes
• Play the same riff in two or three different octaves

• Runs and ideas
• A “RUN” is a part of a guitar scale played in an upward or downward direction

• An “IDEA” is 2-3 notes that repeat and add tension to your guitar soloing

• Target tones - These are natural target points in the particular key you are playing in. Eg 1st, 3rd, 5th but aim especially for the 9th, 11th, 13th

• Copy the singer’s main vocal riff from the verse or chorus
• Embellish your own melody with double stops
• Or play half of those notes, filling in the remaining notes with either SILENCE or sustained notes

• Let a note ring out, play a couple slow notes, then a couple fast ones

• Start with a big fat string bend

• Steal a riff from a famous guitarist. But not the exact riff in the same scale in the same key! Adapt it to the new key or scale you’re working with. Remember though, stealing from one person is plagiarism, stealing from lots of people is research!

• Learn a major scale across the entire neck
• But don’t play the scale back & forth like an exercise

• You don’t have to show every trick in EVERY MEASURE. Too much is not often a good thing. Besides you’ll lengthen your creative career by keeping some tricks up your sleeve for future songs.

Guitar Solo Tools

• Hammer-ons
• Hammer your finger on the guitar string firmly
• Hammer your finger close to the fret
• Let the first note ring slightly before hammering
• Really think of a hammer hitting a nail

• Pull-offs
• Let the fingertip grab the guitar string slightly as it pulls off
• The finger should pull up and over the adjacent string
• If you are doing a pull-off from a fretted note to another fretted note, put both fingers on their frets and then pull-off

• Double stops (two notes strummed or played at the same time)

• String bends / Vibrato

• Slides
• Begin each slide from the 1st fret
• Quickly slide your finger up to the fret # specified
• Be sure to keep the pressure on the guitar string as you slide
• The whole left hand should move when you slide the finger
• Let the note that you slide to ring for 1 to 2 seconds
• Some of these slides are 2 frets long, others are just 1 fret

Armed with these new tips & techniques you should now be able to create some better guitar solos that might just lead you to fame and fortune. Happy jamming!

Click here to listen to a showcase of my recordings.