Melody from chords lesson - tablature Below is the tablature for the example in the movie. I kept it as close to being pure D7 to illustrate the point. Notes colored blue are all D7 pattern notes, namely 1s,3s,5s and b7s (the chord tones). It's important to know which are which; 1's are naturally the strongest; 5's are always there, anchored to the 1's; 3's are trickier to deal with, and in the blues/jazz genre, can be flatted. This piece uses a flat 3. The b7 is really the note that's setting this chord apart from a plain old major. You can see where other scale notes (red) and chromatic scale notes (black) come into play, filling the gaps between the chord tones. You can also hear that the same descending line (approximately) is used twice, but in different parts of the fretboard.
There's a neat trick to keep track of all of this, a simple visualization trick that nails it all down to the fretboard. The pattern of notes that is the subject of this lesson is still too complicated to commit to memory, especially considering we've only looked at one flavor of one chord. The 'trick' is the subject of my book PlaneTalk which has been selling from this site for over 6 years now. If you're still pulling your hair out wondering how to confidently navigate your way around the whole fretboard, all the time, then do yourself the favor and check it out. It will save you from going bald and will have you weaving your melodic way through any chord progression within a couple of weeks of practice. Check it out here.
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