Beginner Jazz Guitar - 10 Tips to Get Started


Learning how to play jazz guitar can seem like an overwhelming task. 


But it doesn’t have to be. 


Yes, you need to learn technique, concepts, tunes, and transcriptions. 


But. 


You don’t have to be overwhelmed in the process. 


Playing jazz guitar can be a fun and exciting, all be it challenging, experience for any player. 


You just need to start…

How to Start Learning Jazz Guitar


You’ve made the decision to learn jazz guitar, and now you’re wondering:


“Where do I begin?”


Whether you’re taking in-person lessons, an online course, or self-study, the amount of jazz guitar info out there is enormous. 


But, with a little knowledge you can avoid headaches in the practice room. 


Most of them anyway…minor ii-V-I’s will still have you reaching for an aspirin or three. 


The material in this article helps you organize your thoughts and answers your questions as you begin your jazz guitar journey. 


Who Should Read This Article?


If you’re wondering where to begin when studying jazz guitar, this article is for you. 


If you’re studying on your own, this article provides ample background to help you teach yourself the fundamentals of jazz guitar. 


If you’re studying with a teacher, in person or online, this article is helpful in a slightly different way. 


The information below helps you organize your approach to studying jazz guitar between your private lessons. 


It also gives you questions to take to your private guitar teacher so you can maximize time in your lessons. 


If you’re looking to begin learning or improve your jazz guitar skills, there’s something for you in this article.

Tip 1 - Work with a Jazz Guitar Teacher


Studying with an experienced jazz guitar teacher is the most efficient way to learn jazz guitar. 


Hands down.


Studying with a private teacher is the best way for an experienced guitarist to hear you play, then address your strengths and weaknesses. 


From there, they can give you targeted exercises and guidance on the best path to take in your studies. 


Having said that, a private teacher can also be the least practical option for many aspiring jazz guitarists. 


What If Private Lessons Aren’t an Option?


There are many reasons why private lessons may be out of reach at this point in your development. 


Private lessons take time and commitment, cost money, and there may not be a teacher close by to study in person.


Any of these reasons can put up a roadblock between you and studying one-on-one with a jazz guitar teacher. 


But. 


This doesn’t mean you can’t learn how to play, or that you can’t find ways to study with a private jazz guitar teacher. 


If you don’t have access to a private teacher, or can’t afford regular jazz guitar lessons, try some of these options. 


They won’t totally replace the experience of regular one-on-one lessons. 


But. 


They provide many of the same benefits, without a regular commitment or hefty price tag. 


  • Attend a jazz camp for a weekend or week.
  • Sign up for a free or paid online jazz guitar course.
  • Save up and take one in person or Skype lesson with a teacher.
  • Post videos in a community such as MWG The Studio to get feedback on your playing from an experience jazz teacher. 


These are just some ideas, in place of private lessons, which you can explore to help you organize your practice routine and learn jazz guitar. 


Take Lessons at Your Own Pace


If you do decide to take lessons with a jazz guitar teacher, know that you don’t have to commit to a once-a-week schedule. 


When I taught privately, on Skype and in person, most of my students would take lessons every 2-4 weeks.


Many of us have families, jobs, and other commitments that make weekly lessons unproductive. 


It takes time to properly digest and learn material between lessons. 


Go at your own pace and talk to your teacher about finding the best lesson schedule for you. 


You want a schedule that it motivates you to practice, but that’s not too often that you can’t learn the material between lessons. 


Finding that balance can make the difference between a successful and unsuccessful jazz guitar learning experience. 


Picking the Right Jazz Guitar Teacher for You


Finding the right teacher of your style and learning method is a key element in achieving your jazz guitar goals. 


Do research before you try out a lesson to see if that teacher will be the best choice for you at this point in your development. 


One of the best ways to do this is to ask other students about their jazz guitar lesson experience with that teacher. 


As well, don’t be afraid to take one lesson with a few teachers and then find the right fit for you. 


From there you can commit to a longer block of lessons. 


There’s nothing more frustrating than buying a chunk of private lessons, then realizing that you don’t click with that teacher. 


Don’t get stuck in that situation. 


Try a lesson out. 


If it works then go forward. 


If not move on. 


With a bit of research and trial and error you can find the right fit. 


Importance of a Mentor


Learning how to play jazz guitar can seem like an overwhelming task for any player, but it doesn’t have to be. 


With an experienced teacher, you can develop an efficient practice plan and avoid wasted time in the practice room. 


Making the cost of a private lesson seem small in comparison to the benefits. 


I know that I wouldn’t have got to where I am today on the instrument without the help of private teachers. 


It’s because of their help that you’re reading this article today.


Tip 2 – Listening is as Important as Practicing


One of the first roadblocks I encounter with jazz guitar students is that they’re gung-ho to play, but don’t listen to jazz. 


You can see how this is a problem. 


You can learn all the scales, chords, lines, licks, and more. 


But. 


Turning that material into authentic-sounding jazz is going to be impossible without knowing what jazz sounds like. 


Now, there are some people who come to study jazz because they believe it will help them learn their fretboard. 


And if that’s you, you might think: 



“If I can play jazz, I can play anything.”


Which is a comment I hear from many guitarists inquiring about learning jazz guitar. 


There is some truth to this, at least from a technical perspective. And…


There’s a difference between learning how to play jazz techniques and learning how to sound like a jazz musician. 


To accomplish the latter, you need to have a strong understanding of what jazz sounds like. 


And that understanding is built through listening. 

Listening to Develop Jazz Skills


For those that want to learn to play jazz, beyond learning fretboard concepts, you need to master specific skills. 


These essential skills can’t be learned with time on the instrument alone. 


These skills come by listening to jazz records, and later by jamming with other musicians and learning in real time. 


Here are a few examples of how listening to jazz benefits your playing.


  • Develop Time Feel
  • Better Phrasing
  • Learn Solo Construction and Contour
  • Understand Musical Interaction
  • Be Able to Hear Jazz Vocabulary
  • And much more


Now that you know listening to jazz is essential, the next question is, “What should you listen to?”


Spending Time with the Classics


Just like in literature, film, and art, there are certain albums that every jazz guitarist must spend time listening to. 


These records come from guitarists and other instrumentalists, and they contain some of the best playing, writing, and interaction in the genre. 


Becoming familiar with these records develops an understanding of what elements make up a classic jazz recording. 


Here are 5 albums that I recommend every beginning jazz guitarist check out, at least once, in your listening room.


  1. Kind of Blue – Miles Davis
  2. Everybody Digs Bill Evans – Bill Evans
  3. Smokin’ at the Half Note – Wes Montgomery
  4. Bright Size Life – Pat Metheny
  5. Blue Train – John Coltrane


Now, there are countless albums that are worth spending time with, from both an educational and enjoyment perspective. 


But. 


These 5 albums give you an overview of how the greatest players approached writing jazz tunes, arranging, and improvisation. 


If you haven’t heard any of these albums yet, stop reading now and go listen. 


You can always come back to this article later. 


But, listening to any of these records just might change your life. 


Listening to each of these records surely changed mine. 


How to Listen to Jazz


Now that you know the “why” and “what” when listening to jazz albums, you can learn how to listen to jazz. 


Listening to jazz as a student is different from listening for the pure enjoyment of it. 


That’s not to say that educational listening is not enjoyable, it’s just different. 


When listening to jazz records, listen for the nuances that go into creating those tracks. 


These items include:


  • How is the tune arranged?
  • What is the structure of the form?
  • Does everyone solo? If not, who sits out?
  • Is the playing chilled out or is there a lot of tension?
  • How would you describe each solo in 3 words or less?
  • Do the players interact in the solos, and if so, how?
  • What is the “best part” of any solo to your ears?


By learning how to listen for these elements, you train your ears to listen beyond the surface, getting to the heart of any jazz tune you hear. 


This improves your ability to hear jazz and prepares your ears for transcribing when you’re ready to add that to your practice routine. 


Lastly, knowing how to listen for these elements allows you to add them into your playing when the time comes. 


If you know how Trane organized his solos, how Miles phrased his lines, or how Wes built intensity, you can bring those items into your playing. 


That sounds pretty cool to me. 


Tip 3 – Practice Slow. Really Slow. No, REALLY Slow


With the rise of online jazz guitar lessons, on top of books and DVDs, it seems like you need many lifetimes to learn how to play jazz. 


Yes, there’s a wealth of information out there to study, and it can seem overwhelming. 


But. 


You don’t have to learn everything, especially all at once. 


One of the most important lessons to learn when starting your jazz guitar journey is:


“There is no rush to learn jazz guitar.”


Once you’ve learned this important lesson, time in the practice room becomes much more effective and efficient. 


Learning Jazz Guitar One Bite at a Time


The first step to slowing down your practice is to pick a few elements, or just one, and practice until it’s fully comfortable in your playing. 


This could mean digging into just one key of a major scale until you can play it from memory and solo over a Maj7 backing track.


If it takes one day, one week, a month, or longer, that’s fine. 


Work on this one item, or at most a few, until you can nail it. 


Then move on. 


When you stand back and look at the mountain of information out there, it can cause you to half-ass a whole lot of concepts in the woodshed. 


Overloading your routine and jumping to new concepts before you’ve learned old ones causes major problems in your playing. 


Slowing down, focusing on a few items, and working them until they’re solid, is the best way to avoid problems in your playing. 


If you’re worried that you won’t progress fast enough to achieve your goals, think about it this way. 


If you learn one new item each month in the practice room, after a year you have 12 new concepts under you belt. 


And not just skimming the surface with these concepts, you fully learned them. 


That is huge growth on the instrument in one year. 


If you continue that slow and steady growth, you’ll reach your long-term playing goals before you know it. 


Slowing Down the Tempo


The other way to slow things down in your practice routine is more literal. 


When working on any technique, tune, vocabulary item, or anything you study in the woodshed, go as slow as you can possibly stand. 


This could mean working scales at 10 bpm to start your practice. 


Or it could mean jamming over a jazz blues progression at 30 bpm. 


Whatever is slow for you, tempo wise, should be where you spend your time practicing. 


By slowing the tempo down, you notice all your bad habits, fix them, and prevent new ones from grabbing hold in your playing. 


Developing Concentration with Slow Practice


Slow tempos are also tougher for keeping the form on a tune or keeping track of the notes in any technical exercise you work on. 


This means that you must maintain concentration for the entire exercise. 


Being able to concentrate greatly increases your ability to jam confidently over jazz tunes with other musicians. 


It’s easy to be distracted, even for a second, in a jam session, and before you know it you’ve missed a cue, or worse, lost the form. 


By practicing slowly, you increase your ability to maintain focus for entire tunes, which make it easier to keep your place when jamming. 


Lastly, practicing slowly allows your ears to properly digest any concept you work on in the practice room. 


When you rush through an exercise, besides making the same mistakes you usually make, you’re going too fast for your ears to keep up. 


Practicing slowly brings your ears into the game, which is always an added benefit to any exercise you spend time on in your studies. 


Tip 4 – Use the Pentatonic Scale in Jazz. Seriously


When working with new jazz guitar students, I’ve found a common misunderstanding that many players have about learning jazz. 


They think that you have to forget everything you’ve ever learned on guitar and start from scratch when learning jazz. 


This couldn’t be further from the truth. 


There are items from rock, blues, classical, etc. that transition to jazz, and make your life easier when first learning jazz soloing. 


One of the main “bridge” concepts, and one that everyone forgets, is the minor pentatonic scale. 


Jazzy Pentatonic Scales


If you’re looking at Day 1 of your jazz guitar studies, look no further. 


Begin here. 


This exercise allows you to apply the minor pentatonic scale to your jazz solos right away. 


Here are the steps to bring the minor pentatonic scale to your jazz studies.


  • Review the Dm pentatonic scale position 1
  • Solo over a Dm7-G7-Cmaj7 track with that scale
  • Review the Em pentatonic scale position 1
  • Solo with that scale over the 251 track
  • Review the Am pentatonic scale position 1
  • Solo with that scale over the 251 backing


There you have it; you’ve completed your first series of jazz guitar solos. 


Wasn’t so bad, was it? 


That’s because you took previously learned material, the minor pentatonic scale, and applied it in a jazzy way over those chords. 


Now go back and repeat with the same blues scales, Dm-Em-Am, over the same 251 (Dm7-G7-Cmaj7) track to take it a step further. 


Congrats, you’ve graduated onto Day 2 of your jazz guitar studies!


Bebop Pentatonic Scales 


Now, while those scales fit those chord changes, and sound correct, they probably don’t sound like Kenny Burrell just yet. 


So, let’s look at a concept you can use to spice up your minor pentatonic scales when using them in your jazz solos. 


This concept is one of the most important to learn and study in jazz; it’s called an enclosure. 


Here’s how you can apply this concept to your pentatonic scale soloing. 


  • Play one fret above the root note of the scale.
  • Play one fret below the root note of the scale.
  • Play the root note of the scale – that’s an enclosed root note.
  • Repeat on each note of the minor pentatonic scale.
  • Add enclosures to the pent scale over backing tracks. 


There you have it, easy to learn and you’re starting to sound like Bebop. 


Good work!


Jazz is Easier Than it Looks…Kinda


As you can see from these two exercises, getting started with jazz guitar isn’t impossible. 


In fact, it’s easier than it looks when you take a step back and break jazz down into small, easy to digest chunks. And..


Minor pentatonic scales are an effective place to begin your jazz guitar journey. 


You may struggle to make these scales and enclosures sound like your favorite player right away. 


But.


You don’t have to learn a million new scales, chord subs, voicings, arpeggios, etc., before you can play jazz. 


Start today. 


Then build up from there, one concept at a time. 


Before you know it, you have a strong foundation of jazz guitar fundamentals under your fingers and in your ears. 


It all began with the minor pentatonic scale. 


Tip 5 – Practice Jazz Standards


Before reading ahead, ask yourself, “Why do you want to play jazz guitar?”


Is it to learn scales, arpeggios, and chords? 


Maybe. 


Is it to build your chops? 


Possibly.


Is it to improve your ear training? 


Might be the case. 


These are all good reasons to study jazz guitar. 


But. 


In my experience, most players learn jazz guitar to play music. And…


Playing jazz means playing tunes. 


Tunes are the vehicles that jazz musicians use to communicate with each other. 


Building your practice routine around learning tunes accomplishes two very important goals. 


1) It breaks down the endless list of material out there, focusing your attention on concepts needed to play just the tune that’s in front of you. 


2) Tunes provide you with a common language that you can speak, jam, with other musicians. 


Using Tunes to Provide Practice Room Focus


With so many concepts and techniques to study, it can be hard to narrow down these items into what’s important right now. 


Tunes provide this focus. 


Instead of learning every chord, scale, and arpeggio, you learn the chords, scales, and arpeggios in the tune you’re studying. 


That narrows things down quite a bit. 


While you won’t cover everything in one tune, you will work on several essential concepts over just one standard. 


Then, when you move on to the next tune, you learn a few more essential concepts. 


By the time you learn 10 tunes, you have learned a large number of foundational concepts needed to play jazz with confidence.


And the most important part. 


You also have 10 tunes that you can now play with other musicians. 


Pretty damn cool if you ask me. 


Tunes as Communication Devices


For me, the best part of playing jazz is jamming on a standard with musicians I’ve just met. Even if we don’t speak the same language.


Because I know a fair number of jazz tunes, I can jam with any other musician who knows those same tunes. 


This is one of the beautiful things about jazz, the ability to converse with musicians from all over the world using standards. 


By focusing on tunes in your studies, you build your repertoire list, which allows you to jam with people when the opportunity arises. 


If your goal for learning jazz guitar was to play music, then this is the opportunity you need to achieve that goal. And…


It all begins with studying tunes in the woodshed. 


Here are the 5 jazz tunes, or common forms, that I see people play at jam sessions around the world. 


  1. Jazz Blues (Major & Minor)
  2. Blue Bossa
  3. Autumn Leaves
  4. Summertime
  5. Take the A Train


If you learn these five tunes over time, you give yourself the best start possible for jamming with other musicians. 


Tip 6 – Technique is a Means, Not an End


Guitarists love technique. We really do. 


We can spend hours running scales, arpeggios, and chord shapes around the fretboard. 


Bringing our facility on the instrument and knowledge of technical concepts to dizzying heights. 


But. 


There’s a stark reality that many jazz guitarists have a tough time facing. 


“Learning the essential chords, scales, and arpeggios, is not the end of your fretboard study, it’s the beginning.”


This can be a tough pill to swallow for many of us that have dedicated time to mastering these items, thinking that was the end of the road. 


Before you read on, know one thing. 


Having a strong foundation with these technical concepts is essential for most jazz guitarists. 


If you can pick up a guitar and rip a solo that sounds like Jim Hall meets Mike Stern, with no jazz knowledge, then skip to the next section. 


If you’re not one of those players, read on. 


Building Your Jazz Foundation


To learn jazz guitar, you need to think of chord shapes, arpeggios fingerings, and scale boxes as the foundation of your jazz house. 


The foundation needs to be strong, supportive, and well-built. 


But. 


You also need to build the rest of the house on top of that solid foundation. 


This means learning tunes, developing vocabulary, developing strong time feel, expanding your rhythmic knowledge, etc. 


Important concepts that allow you to play jazz with authenticity and confidence. 


All which are built on a strong understanding of fundamental items such as scales and arpeggios. 


Now, this doesn’t mean that you must wait until you know every chord, scale, and arpeggio to begin playing music. 


It means that as you learn technical items, you also work on turning those techniques into music. 


Foundational Exercise


Here’s an exercise that you can do to see how this process works. 


  • Learn one shape for a 6th-string root Maj7 arpeggio.
  • Run that shape in all keys on the fretboard.
  • Add an enclosure to the root note of that shape.
  • The enclosure will be fret above-fret below-root note.
  • Solo over backing tracks with that arp and enclosure.


You can see how this type of study approach is beneficial. 


As you learn a new technical item, the arpeggio, you learn vocabulary, the enclosure, and use both over a jam track.


Combined, these three elements secure your foundation, and build your jazz house on top of that foundation, right from day 1. 


Improvisation As a Learned Skill


Learning how to improvise is a skill that’s not much different from learning how to play scales. 


You just have to do it. 


With practice it gets easier, and you become more confident as a soloist. 


If you wait to move on from your foundational techniques, you won’t develop the ability to improvise. 


Chords, scales, and arpeggios are important, only if you apply them to improvisational, musical situations. 


Tip 7 – Learn to Speak the Jazz Guitar Language


When I was first studying jazz guitar, I got a lot of advice that went like this:



“Learn all the possible scales, chords, and arpeggios. That’s the way to play jazz guitar.”



Wow, that’s not bad. 


If I just put the time in and learn all of these technical items, I’ll sound like Joe Pass. 


Turns out that wasn’t quite right. 


I learned all the scales, arpeggios, and chords I could. 


Then, when it came time to go jam with other people, my lines sounded like I was running scales and arpeggios up and down the fretboard. 


The notes were “correct”, but they didn’t sound like jazz at all. 


This was frustrating. 


I was doing everything right in the practice room, but I couldn’t quite get the jazz sound in my playing. 


What was I doing wrong?


Moving Beyond Technique


As you just read, learning technical items on the guitar is important. 


But. 


You must take it a step further in order to sound like a jazz guitarist. 


This means learning the jazz language. 


This was the lesson that had the biggest impact on my playing. 


Taking time to learn to speak the jazz language, rather than only running techniques in the woodshed. 


At this point you might be asking yourself, “What’s the Jazz language?”


What is Jazz Vocabulary


The language of jazz is the idiomatic phrases and bite-size melodic lines that jazz musicians on all instruments play when they improvise. 


These items include:


  • Enclosures
  • Passing Tones
  • Lower and Upper Neighbor Notes
  • The Honeysuckle Rose Riff
  • 1235 Outlines
  • And many more


These are the musical concepts that, when combined with your scale and arpeggio knowledge, that allow you to sound “jazzy” in your solos. 


Start with one and build up from there. 


Before you know it, your lines sound less like scales and arpeggios and more like the phrases you hear on your favorite jazz records. 


Finding Your Own Voice


It’s not easy, but with time, effort, and a focus on the language, you can get there. 


Now, you might be worried that if you study the language, you’ll never develop your own voice on guitar. 


That’s a valid concern for any jazz guitarist. 


But. 


If you do one thing, then you needn’t worry about becoming a “line” player. 


Learn all the language you can early on. 


Study lines, phrases, micro-phrases, solos, anything you can get your hands and ears on. 


Memorize as many of these patterns as you can and work your butt off to get them into your solos, both consistently and with confidence. 


And then move on. 


If you learn the language and integrate it into your playing, you start to sound like your favorite players. 


Which is a good thing early on in your studies. 


But, at some point you need to find your own voice. 


And the best way to do that is move on from studying the language and really digging into your own musical ideas on guitar. 


Having a strong understanding of jazz vocabulary gives you a solid foundation to build upon when you’re ready. 


Where the problem lies, is learning language and never finding your own voice, or being original with no foundation in the genre.


Either approach causes problems in your playing. 


As you begin your jazz guitar journey absorb as much vocabulary as you can. 


Then, when ready, figure out what you want to add to the jazz language in your playing. 


It’s the best of both worlds - being grounded and developing originality. 


Tip 8 – Learn the Fretboard Inside and Out


The guitar is a shape-oriented instrument. 


Chord grids, scale boxes, arpeggios fingerings, almost anything you learn on guitar can be memorized as a shape on the fretboard. 


This gives you a distinct advantage compared to other instruments that must learn note names to play these same musical concepts. 


Or does it?


While shapes make musical quicker to learn than other instruments, they can also leave holes in your knowledge of the fretboard. 


This can lead to serious problems down the road as you progress to the next level in your jazz guitar studies. 


To avoid these holes in your knowledge from holding you back in your development, take time to learn the notes on the fretboard. 


Filling in the Fretboard Blanks


Now, what does that mean exactly?


It means that you can play any note on the guitar and name it immediately. 


That you can play any chord, scale, or arpeggio, and name all the notes in those musical devices. 


It means that you can quickly play every F, Gb, B, Db, etc. on all 6 strings from memory, without counting from the open strings. 


OK, that sounds like a tough task, I know. 


But. 


It can be done. 


You just have to start doing it.


Today. 


Here’s one of my favorite exercises for learning notes on the guitar. 


Start here, it will help make this process much less painless. 


  • Begin with the C major scale (C D E F G A B).
  • Play them on the 6th string from the lowest note possible.
  • Name the notes as you play them.
  • Play them backwards down the same string.
  • Repeat on each string.
  • Put on a Cmaj7 track and solo one string at a time over that chord.
  • Repeat these exercises with every other key, one at a time.


As you can see, this helps you learn the notes on the fretboard and improves your soloing chops at the same time. 


Doesn’t sound so bad, does it?


Reading Music – Don’t Run Away!


Now, we need to talk about Kryptonite for guitarists - reading music. 


Learning how to read music, notes not tab, greatly improves your knowledge of the fretboard. 


You probably already know or suspect this. 


But most guitarists won’t learn to read.


It seems too hard. 


Well, it’s difficult to learn how to read music on the fretboard. 


But. 


If you learn how to read notes on guitar, the benefits to your playing are enormous. 


As well, you gain access to a ton more learning materials that are only written in notation.


Best of all, you can quickly learn any tune you want from a Fake book. 


This creates many new possibilities for learning and performing as a jazz guitarist. 


Possibilities that would be locked behind a closed door if you didn’t learn how to read music. 


So, make some time in your routine, even 5 minutes, to work on reading music. 


You don’t have to be able to sight-read the Omni Book or read Coltrane solos. 


Aim to be able to pick your way through a standard melody from the real book on guitar. 


Start there and see where it takes you. 


Learning notes on the staff, rhythmic notation, and how to translate that information on the fretboard transforms your playing. 


It’s not that painful, honestly. 


Tip 9 – Transcribe, Even If You Don’t Feel Ready


transcribing lines, chord changes, and melodies from records is one of the hardest things you can do as a jazz guitarist. 


Start now. 


Even if you don’t think you could hear one note correctly and learn it by ear, try. 


Put on a jazz guitar solo you want to learn to play and give it your best shot. 


Listen to the first phrase over and over until you can sing it in your sleep. 


Then spend as much time as you need to find that first note on the guitar. 


Once you have that first note learned, even if it takes hours, move on to the second note. 



“The journey to a fully transcribed solo begins with a single note.”


All Technique and No Ears


I’ve met many students and peers who have incredible technical facility on the guitar. 


But.


They can’t pick out a single line by ear. 


They’ve spent countless hours in the woodshed improving their chops, but forgot one of the most important things about jazz guitar:


It’s an aural art form. 


All the chops in the world won’t help you achieve your goals as a player if you don’t have the ears to back up that technique. 


I know you don’t feel ready to learn a line from your favorite jazz solo. 


But.


This is the main reason you should begin transcribing jazz guitar. 


It won’t get easier if you don’t start. 


Start today. 


Which Solo to Transcribe First


If you’re looking for a solo to begin with, especially if you have trouble learning jazz guitar by ear, here’s what I suggest. 


Start with “Movin’ Along” by Wes Montgomery.


Yep, that Wes Montgomery, the one with all the chops. 


While Wes had amazing chops on the guitar, this solo starts out chill. 


It’s a beautiful solo, clearly played, and highly melodic in its construction. 


All elements that allow you to get the lines into your inner ear, and then take them to the guitar from there. 


Begin with the first note. 


Then get the second note. 


Don’t give up. 


Take as long as you need to hear those notes and find them on the fretboar. 


Keep going until you’ve got the first line. 


Then move on to the next line. 


Before you know it, you have the first 12-bar chorus down. 


Wasn’t so bad, was it?


Making the Impossible Possible


If you find transcription to be difficult, or seemingly impossible, practice it every day. 


It will frustrate you to no end at first, and it will get easier. 


When it does, your playing improves in ways you never expected. 


Hearing music and immediately playing it on guitar is a very cool skill to have. 


It takes hard work…and it’s worth it. 


Tip 10 – Never Turn Down a Jam


One of the most important lessons to learn is that there are experiences you can’t find in the practice room. 


While studying at home is important, you need to play with other people to really grow as a jazz guitarist. 


There’s a famous saying by Sonny Rollins that sums this tip up perfectly. 


“An hour on the bandstand is worth a month in the practice room.”


Now, that doesn’t mean you have to go out and hit up a jam session, or book a gig, especially in the early days of learning jazz guitar. 


But. 


If you get asked to jam with a friend, in a community music school combo, or to sit in with a band even for one tune, take it. 


Jam Tracks Are Cool, But…


There’ a big difference between jamming with a backing track at home and playing with human beings. 


This difference will quickly show you where your strengths and weaknesses are as a jazz guitarist. 


Then you can emphasize these strengths and target those weaknesses in your studies to quickly progress as a player. 


If you’re used to jamming with backing tracks, they become predictable. 


But. 


Human musicians aren’t predictable. 


Keeping the tempo and form, without the option of rewinding, teaches you more in one jam session then in months of study at home. 


Go Make Mistakes


If you get the chance to jam with another person, take it. 


It probably won’t go well at first, but that’s the point. 


Go make mistakes. 


Then learn from those mistakes. 


Allow those mistakes to help you improve as a jazz guitarist. 


You Will Never Feel Ready to Jam


Now, I know what you’re thinking. 


“But I just started to study jazz, I don’t feel ready to jam with people.”


That’s valid, and I can tell you one thing:


You will never feel ready.


None of us is a perfect player, and we never will be. 


Waiting until you feel ready, until your playing feels “perfect,” to jam with other people is a waste of time. 


You’ll never be perfect, so don’t worry about it. 


If you get the chance to jam, go have fun. 


Take the opportunity and don’t put any pressure on yourself, it’s not worth stressing about. 


Do your best; make mental notes on what went well and what didn’t. 


Then, after the jam go home and practice those items you felt need work. 


If you do this, the next time you jam those sides of your playing will be improved, so you can work on new items in your studies.


Each time you jam with people you will see your improvement from the last time and find new material to focus on in your studies. 


This leads to vastly improved growth as a player compared to just jamming at home. 


Take a chance. 


Play a tune you know, or don’t. 


Have fun. 


You may be nervous before a jam. 


But. 


You won’t regret it afterwards.