Hi, how are you doing? Justin here.
In today's lesson we are going to be talking about a thing called
Legato Patterns.
What these are little ways of using hammer-ons and flick-offs
to give you really nice, fairly easy to make fast, repeatable figures.
All of the ones we are going to be looking at to start off with
have got eight notes in them.
It's two beats, with each beat divided into four notes - 16 notes.
We are going to look at one pattern to start off with
and then we are going to apply that pattern
and use it both horizontally, to move up and down the neck,
and vertically, to move across patterns.
It's really important that you understand
that this one little idea here works in both directions.
It works through any pattern,
any pentatonic shape.
Sometimes they are a bit harder than others to use.
Some patterns work good on one shape, not so well on another.
It's up to you to explore that a bit.
I'm not going to show you every way of playing the patterns.
If I give you a bit of a demo of one of them.
One of the patterns we are going to look at,
is pattern 2 on my tab sheet,
if you go to the website and download that.
The actual pattern is this -
But slowed down a little bit is -
That's the pattern, just eight notes.
It's important to realise that that pattern can be used to go
up the neck or across the neck.
If we start here, move the same pattern again...
It's the same shape, if you like,
of pick, flick-off,
pick, pick,
hammer-on,
pick, pick,
flick-off.
That's the pattern.
Same pattern as here.
But we could move that one over the string.
And we've got a pretty cool lick.
We could also use that same shape, same pattern to move up the neck
by moving it from say...
In this example I'm going to use
box 2, box 3, box 4, box 5 of the pentatonic.
So you end up with -
I've just taken that little pattern
and moved it up through each of the minor pentatonic shapes.
Let's get a close up and check out that particular pattern,
make sure you are doing it right and then I'll explain
how to move it round between the different boxes.
Let's have a look at that little pattern now, nice and slow.
This is pattern 2 on my tab sheet.
So literally pick,
flick, kick,
pick, hammer-on,
pick, pick,
flick-off.
You really have to practice that really slowly for a while first.
But slowly and smoothly so you can repeat it over again.
You don't want to go -
That would be really bad.
Doesn't matter the speed, it can be -
Doesn't really matter.
It's just about getting it right and smooth.
Eventually, of course...
It's important to realise here that this is part of...
..that minor pentatonic.
But the pattern is what you want to be learning.
The pick,
flick, pick,
pick, hammer-on,
pick, pick,
flick-off.
If we just take it down, for example,
it's quite easy to move it now into box 1.
Minor pentatonic.
I chose that one because it's simple
and the fingers are not stretched out.
But here, the same pattern just works.
Pick, flick,
pick, pick,
hammer-on, pick,
pick, flick-off.
That works really, really well.
There would be no harm in moving from one to the next.
You can muck around with it.
If you are familiar with box 3 minor pentatonic...
..you could apply it here.
This one is 13, 10,
12, 10,
13,10
13,10.
The next one moved up here will be
15, 13
14, 13
15, 12,
15,13.
A little bit harder because the first finger needs to shift back
but again it's just...
..from that minor pentatonic shape.
Again moves up into box 5.
And of course, the same pattern...
If you are going to do that last bend
it needs to be tone and a half - it's a tough one.
But hopefully you get the idea.
The next thing you want to do
is take that one pattern I have shown you
and apply it all over the fingerboard.
Learn it really slowly, let it become instinctive.
Get it comfortable under your fingers,
then try moving it horizontally up and down the fingerboard,
changing between the different boxes and get that under your fingers.
Maybe try and use it vertically
and stay within the one box shape or the one position
and explore how you can use it there.
Then try and mix it up a little bit and move maybe
one position over, toward the ground
and then one position up and then over
and then up or whatever.
Your creativity is the limit here.
You should be experimenting as much as you can.
Next stop, we've got a whole bunch of different legato patterns.
You don't have to just use that one I've shown you.
There are probably an infinite number.
I've got six together that I think work real well.
You can download the tab from the website,
which you will probably find pretty helpful to check that out.
I am going to do a close-up now of each pattern.
This is pattern 1.
Here is pattern 3.
Pattern 4.
Pattern 5.
And lastly, pattern 6, which is in groups of 6.
This one, of course.
One, two, three, four, five, six.
Now you have got loads and loads of patterns
to be getting on with.
Remember, you don't have to stick to using the one pattern.
You can mix them up, use a bit of one pattern,
a bit of the next one and a bit of the next one.
Finding which patterns work well within what boxes
of the pentatonic scale is probably a good idea.
As I mentioned earlier,
you can also apply this to scales that are not pentatonic.
You can muck around with bits of the major scale.
It's really the pattern that you try to get to grips with.
You being the creative force now
to find loads and loads of different ways of using it.
There are infinite possibilities here.
Hope you have a bit of fun with that
and exploring this concept.
It should keep you busy for some time.
It's something I still play about with because I find it really interesting
to find and make up new patterns
and see what other ways I can apply them.
Hope you have a bit of fun with that and I'll see you for another lesson
sometime real soon.
Take care of yourselves, bye-bye.