Forum - Banjo Ben Clark

Confession: I'm Scared of Jams

Wow, how a few months change a lot of things.

This may be a long post but I figured some might benefit from it so here goes:

I CAN JAM NOW!

The last time I posted on this thread I was a bit discouraged. A bit discouraged in a sense that I have put in at least 4 years of scale practice, watching videos, learning licks, learning from Tabledit files, learning from Ben’s Lessons, etc and I could still not “jam”. I was really starting to be hard on myself due to this fact…I mean I was really questioning my “creativity” and guitar playing as a whole and was about ready to take up bowling and become a character from King Pin or The Big Lebowski (A certified nut case).

Larry mentioned something in this thread somewhere about (paraphrased) “Focusing on learning to play a song by what chord you are in or are going to and learning the lick based on that chord”. With this I went back and started learning like this, instead of looking at the song in it’s entirety I spent some time on analyzing what was played in say “G” on a song, what was played in “C”, etc verses looking at the song as a “whole”. Man, it only took about 6-8 hours in doing this that it all started to come together. I just sat, without my guitar and listened to some common bluegrass songs.

Another thing I noticed once I picked my guitar and started to play after this exercise in “listening” is that time really slowed down…like a car crash, everything started to go in “slow motion” and boy did that help. I could likewise hear where the song was going for the next chord, be it by the base line, vocal emphasis, or maybe a banjo roll…there are hints there if you can hear it.

Once I sat down with the guitar, with Larry’s idea intact, the ability to hear what was going on, and a firm grasp of scales (probably my strong point) it all came together…I could play without thinking about it…I mean literally I started playing “sounds” verses specific notes and not to toot my own horn, but I even impressed myself.

I no longer have to look at the guitar or either hand when I play and this has really paid off in my new found ability to jam. This comes from a ton of scale practice over at least 3 positions over the past few years…but until a few weeks back I could not really make anything “musical” out of those scales…not the case now.

For those interested, I strummed guitar for probably 20 years. Not until around 5 years ago did I get into playing lead and I struggled with it. Sure I could play a lead break over and over and over and over then perform it, but I really did not understand what I was playing. I now understand what I am playing and why.

So, for all you guys out there that can’t jam and are intimidated by it, I will say that my learning curve was around 5 years from the time I decided to play lead until I could jam. Prior to starting to learn lead I had a solid background of chords all over the guitar (again, the ability to play the same chord in at least 3 positions) and could play just about any chord I wanted.

In those 5 years I would say I averaged on a weekly basis at least 30 hours a week in doing something with music to try and understand it. Sure there were times when I would not practice for a week, but then again there were times where I might log 60 or 70 hours a week in also…once you get those finger tips hard as rocks you can do this! (To show the amount of obsession there were a lot of days where I’d start playing at 9:00 in the morn with a few cups of coffee, by 1:00 I’d still be playing but now drinking diet coke, by 9:00 in the eve I’d be sipping a brew and playing until midnight - there were a lot of days where I would log 14-16 hours in straight on the guitar). :open_mouth:

A problem I think I ran into in my music was the ability for a teacher to explain how to jam. I searched for that high and low and really could not find anyone to convey the process to me…just lit tid bits here and there but nothing obvious in my search.

I now, in the past 2 weeks have joined 4 jams here in Nashville. I’m still a “beginner” at jamming, but I get a lot of compliments. I’m still weak, but it’s coming together. I jam now on Saturday, Sunday, Thursday, and Friday with some musicians that are all at about the same level and it’s fun. My hope is that in about 6 months to a year is to get up enough confidence to walk into the Station Inn on a Sunday eve (standing weekly jam session) and take the stage and jam out on a few songs.

I hope I have helped out some of those who can not jam and if you should have any questions to ask me then feel free…there is hope, learn those scales, learn those licks, learn the chord you are playing over on a lick, know your guitar well enough to not have to look all the time, and it will come together in an instant one day.

That’s awesome Jesse and way to go Larry for the good tip. So now that you can look back on it, what scales such seem to help you the most for the style you are playing?

MIke, it is the major scale (Ioanian) that helped me the most. I can see it in all it’s positions on the guitar just by looking, I can even see the patterns in my head when not looking. I can see the pentatonic inside of it and can add in the blue notes of the blues scale if I want/can see them also. I think that my go to is the E shape, D shape and A shape…I can see the major scale around these forms the best and can also see the major form in the 3 note per string major scale around these shapes also.

I went at it learning the major scale and the modes of the scale. I then learned what notes to remove to operate within the pentatonic and what notes to add for the blue notes if I want that sound (real popular in bluegrass).

I said something that made sense? How did that happen?