I’ve found out in solo writing that it often sounds good for the mood of the song to change between relative parts of the main scale. This is an example of a lick in either C major or A minor.

What I did was, I started on the C major arpeggio and changed to the relative A minor arpeggio to change the mood to a more minor feel which I thought creates a good effect. Relative basically means either scale/arpeggio consist of exactly the same notes, in this case all natural notes (A B C D E F G). This is also were a bit of theory knowledge comes in handy if you know your key signatures just find the relative scale and you have a whole new door wide open for you to experiment!

So, after you have learnt this, experiment combining other relative scales with each other be it in a run esque form or arpeggio. This lick can be either played slow or fast, you decide the tempo!

E—–15-p-12—— —————————————–12–p–8———————————————-8–
B——————13————————————13—————–10———————————-10——
G———————–12———————–12——————————–9————————9————
D—————————–14———–14——————————————–10———-10—————–
A————————————15———————————————————–12———————–
E—————————————————————————————————————————–

(You can use Sweep Picking)

Keep Shreddin’

© Richard Niczyperowicz 2005