Chapter 2
Playing Lead
IN THIS CHAPTER
Learning scales, arpeggios, and lead patterns
Reading notation
Practicing riffs
Improvising good solos
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Lead guitar is the most spectacular and dazzling feature of rock guitar playing. Lead guitar can embody emotions that run the gamut from mournful and soulful to screaming, frenzied abandon — sometimes in the same solo. Whereas riffs are grounded, composed, and can manifest their power through their unflinching solidity, lead is beckoned by the music to launch into divinely inspired flights of fancy, to be forever soaring.
The greatest lead guitarists, from Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix to Eddie Van Halen and Steve Vai, have all been able to soar, but they have also all been disciplined masters of their instruments. They resolved the ultimate artistic paradox: total freedom through total control.
As you begin developing the basic technique for playing lead, never forget that your playing ...
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