Summertime - Chords and Melody for Guitar

For more information from the source site of this video please visit: http://secretguitarteacher.com/youtube/intermediate/jazz/hAa40L96N_s/91778025-summertime-chords-and-melody-for-guitar.php This is a sample lesson from the Secret GuitarTeacher web site (see link above). It is for intermediate players, particularly those interested in blues and jazz. Here's the abridged transcript: Originally written by George Gershwin as an aria for the Opera Porgy and Bess, Summertime is featured by the UK's Independent Newspaper at number seven in the list of most-covered songs of all time. Now the version of the song we are going to start out with in this lesson is a fairly bluesy one with a 12/8 rhythm and a nice set of chords: This same movable shape is used for both Am6 and Bm6. Once we have that shape in place we can play it for two main beats. Next we slide the whole shape up the fret board two frets to play the Bm6 for the second half of the bar. Next line we switch to the Dm7 and Em7 pairing using the 'A' shaped barre chord. So far we could be playing just another 12 bar blues sequence, but in the 7th bar we find ourselves heading off to the 5th chord instead of back to the key chord as we would have expected in a 12-bar. And here we see the E7#9 chord, which frequently crops up in jazz arrangements of blues - especially minor blues. This is paired up with the same shape moved up a fret to F7#9 and back again to E7#9 to effectively create a dramatic pause in the sequence Ok, so we're halfway through the sequence. Let's just recap and play what we have covered so far. Let's fast forward to the last bar in the third line where we find a descending chromatic run of minor seventh chords. Start this with an Am7 played like this...strum this just for one main beat so that's 1 & a ...take it down a fret keeping the same shape ... 2 & a ...take it down a fret keeping the same shape - that gives us Abm7 ...down another fret for Gm7 ... 3 & a and one more fret for Gb m7 4 & a Let's look at the next bar and then we can look at how it all links up. Here we can see a couple of slash chords - we call them C slash B and Am slash G. We'll take a close look at how those are formed in case you haven't encountered slash chords before...C slash B is sometimes referred to as C over B - it means the chord of C, but with the note B in the bass and so with the normal C chord we have the root note C here, but for C/B we move it down to the note B here. Next chord is Am again using the normal open chord...followed by Am/G which is Am but with the note G in the bass. To get that I just reach across here with my pinky which serves both to play the G note here and mute out the A string. Ok...into the home straight. This descending bass line continues from G to F played as the root of the F M 7 chord. Notice that the fingering I am recommending for this chord uses a dead fifth string. Then to work our way back to the opening line, we use another version of the Hendrix chords the E7#9 which looks like this. So then we finish off the sequence by returning to the opening chords Am6 Bm6. Before we move on to learning the melody here's the whole chord sequence played straight through at normal speed. The melody is pretty simple to learn, especially if you learn it in a way that connects it to the underlying chords and scales. For the first part of the melody have the E-shaped A minor chord in mind. You can see there is only one note that is not in the basic minor chord. We then target this same note, D in the next phrase which coincides with the chord change to the Dmin7 chord. The next phrase targets the B note which is one of the notes in the chord E7#9. Then it's back to the opening phrase. For the rest of the melody it helps to follow the pattern of the A blues scale first position. Sliding into the E note here on the fifth string ... on up the scale pattern then targeting the blue note Eb for the final phrase terminating on the key note A. ] So once more from the beginning...working the Am chord shape...targeting the D note then the B note (fifth from the chord E). Back to the first phrase... then working the A blues scale make sure we time the G note to coincide with the C chord - (remember G is the fifth in the chord of C). Then up to the blue note, the Eb for the final phrase finally ending on the keynote A. Here it is against the backing track So that's walked you through how to play the rhythm part and melody of this arrangement of Summertime. In the next lesson we'll look at how we can use what we have learned in this lesson as a basis for an approach to improvising over this classic jazz band jamming favourite. I hope you'll join me for that.