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Lessons, Music Theory

How to Play: The Legend of Zelda Secret Sound

The Secret Sound from the Legend of Zelda is a short, mysterious cue in the game that you’d just unlocked something hidden like a new passageway or discovered a treasure chest. Despite only being eight notes, it is deceptively hard to play, especially on the guitar where there isn’t necessarily one way to play it that is clearly the easiest.

In this lesson, we’ll explore different possibilities on how to play this enigmatic melody as well as cultivate an understanding of balancing playability with what sounds best, theory, tone tips, and practice tips.

Theory: I think of the first four notes (G, F#, D#, A) as coming from a D# Half/Whole Diminished Scale. It might help to think of it as a D# diminished triad (D# F# A) with an added G melody note. It also helps me to visualize a B7b13 chord.

The second beat is an E augmented triad (E G# B# or E G# C, again for simplicity’s sake). Here is an applied harmony. Note that there is no B note in the first group of 4 notes, but relating licks like this to a familiar chord shape can be very helpful.

There were plenty of chances to hear the Secret Melody while exploring the overworld, too!

 

Fair Warning! This lick can be pretty stretchy in certain places on the guitar. Be sure to warm up properly before trying any of the more gymnastic stretches in the following licks. Now, without further ado, here are a few ways to play the secret sound.

 

 

Practice Tip 1: As previously mentioned, warming up before playing this lick is a good idea since this melody can be quite technical on the guitar.

Practice Tip 2: Playing in classical position can be very helpful to facilitate the stretches that are involved with many of these options. Put your guitar on your left thigh, then prop you left foot up with a classical foot stool ideally. Don’t worry if you don’t have a classical footstool; a chair, some books, or your guitar case will do in a pinch, too.

Classical position makes stretchy licks and chords much more accessible!

Practice Tip 3: The “Popcorn Exercise.” This exercise involves muting the fret hand notes, but still picking the strings as you would with any lick that you’re working on. The resulting muted sound on each string kind of sounds like popping popcorn to me (hence the name). This exercise works wonders for sorting out pick hand problems.

Once you feel comfortable with the picking hand, try the licks again.

To hear these options in action, check out this video.

A few more considerations…

Sound vs. Playability: Balancing the best sounding version with playability is a crucial skill and it’s especially important when what you’re playing is tricky. In general, picking the best sounding way to play something is the most important, but choosing an option that is playable and naturally repeatable is a very close second priority. Both options need to be considered carefully when deciding how to play something that is difficult to play.

Tone Tips: In my YouTube video where I play through most of these options, I used a clean sound with a very light amount of gain and a healthy amount of reverb to simulate the sound of the melody happening in a cavernous dungeon, which is where Link often discovers secret items and passageways. For a shreddier or more fusion-like sound, try adding some distortion to the mix.

*Here are a couple of bonus ways to play the secret melody that are not in the YouTube video lesson. They’re both fingerpicking options and one has a Jake E Lee chord in it (thumb on the fretboard from below).

Thanks for checking out this lesson. Have fun!

 

Lessons

How to Play: Ash’s “Set it All Free” Guitar Solo

My daughter asked me to cover Ash’s guitar solo from the song “Set it All Free” from the movie “Sing,” over a year ago, so I learned it, had a bit too much fun recording it, and posted it on Instagram to pretty lukewarm results. A lot of my followers on Insta are either headbanging metalheads or serious jazzbos, so understandably, my cover of an animated porupine’s guitar solo didn’t turn too many heads… but it did on YouTube!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’ve gotten a lot of kind words and quite a few requests for a tutorial and tab for this solo, so here it is! Scroll down for the tab.

I recorded my cover of this solo pretty quickly between lessons and missed a couple of details such as not playing the first part with a wah, playing the first melody with slightly different phrasing, and keeping the whammy set down at an 8ve up in the last measure as opposed to rocking it back and forth. These are easily changeable if you want to be 100% accurate, of course.

Once again, have fun learning this solo, and give me a shoutout if you post it on social media. I’d love to hear you play it!

 

Lessons

The Star Spangled Banner (easy Acoustic Version)

Here’s a quick lesson on how to play “The Star Spangled Banner” for acoustic guitar.

This version is played on the top 3 strings and is relatively simple. Using multiple strings confines the wide range melody to fewer frets.

If you’ve been playing for a while, you can try adding your own nuances to the melody by adding things like…

  • Legato Techiniques (hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, and tapping)
  • String Bending
  • Vibrato

I deliberately kept the melody simple to allow for my students to express themselves as their technique and musicality develops. Give me a shout out if you post it on social media; I’d love to hear how you play it. Happy shredding and woodshedding!

Lessons

The Star Spangled Banner (easy electric version)

Here’s a quick lesson on how to play “The Star Spangled Banner” for electric guitar. I’ve taught this version to many beginner guitar students, and they’ve had a blast playing it this way.

This version is played on the 1st string alone which simplifies things quite a bit. The melody has a wide range, but it can be played freely with a variety of fingerings and even with only one finger!

If you’ve been playing for a while, you can try adding your own nuances to the melody by adding things like…

  • Legato Techiniques (hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides, and tapping)
  • Tremelo Picking
  • String Bending
  • Vibrato
  • Whammy Bar Techniques
  • Distortion and/or other effects

I deliberately kept the melody simple to allow for my students to express themselves as their technique and musicality develops. Give me a shout out if you post it on social media; I’d love to hear how you play it. Happy shredding and woodshedding!

Lessons, Music Theory

If Figured Bass was a Groceries List

Wait… What? You want me to sight read figured bass on the piano? Why?

Back in college, I learned traditional harmony first, which meant learning Figured Bass. Figured Bass is a system of notating chords that is used primarily for baroque and classical music. It shows the roman numeral analysis as well as the relevant intervals from the bass note of the given chord.

Figured Bass

It isn’t practical since it is not used in most musical styles. There is a better way not only to write chords but also to analyze the chord progressions. We keep the roman numeral but lose the intervals and simply write 3rd, 5th, or 7th for the inversion. Here is the same progression written with modern analysis and with chord symbols.

Modern analysis with chord symbols included

The modern way of analyzing chords is more direct. Instead of writing a I6/4, meaning a I chord in 2nd inversion with a note a 6th above the bass and another note a 4th above the bass, we can write I/5th, meaning a I chord over the 5th in the bass. Writing the chord symbols out (for example C/G or G7/F) is more specific to the key and situation.

I accepted that I had to use Figured Bass in music theory class and learned it the best that I could… and then the final test was sprung on me. SIGHT READING Figured Bass examples on piano! 

This was too far. This was an outrage. How much more impractical could this be? When was I ever going to have to sight read (meaning play something on first view without seeing it or practicing it beforehand) Figured Bass in the real world? The honest answer is never. I’m sure there are a few people who use Figured Bass in their work, but I doubt they’d be ballsy enough to put Figured Bass in front of a musician and say, play.

The final nail in the coffin for my absolute disdain for Figured Bass at the time was when I showed it to my Dad, an accomplished pianist with over 70 years of consistent playing experience, and he didn’t recognize it or understand it. After sitting with it for awhile, he remembered studying it back in college but hadn’t used it in all of the time since.

While I found the intervallic study of inversions interesting about Figured Bass, everything else about it seemed horribly archaic. I equated analyzing chords with Figured Bass to going to the grocery store with a list that said “A crunchy fruit at the end of the visible spectrum of light” as opposed to just calling it a “Red Apple.”

If Figured Bass was a groceries list…

While I wasn’t wrong about the lack of practicality in learning to sight read Figured Bass, I was missing the point entirely. I learned later through reflection why this skill was important to me as a musician.

Why was it important that I learned to sight read Figured Bass?

1. The Process: My wife Leah taught me in college that it wasn’t always what I learned from the end result that mattered, but what I learned from the process of figuring out a problem. The ability to work through any problem is a crucial skill, and understanding Figured Bass and being able to sight read it was important for my musical and personal growth. Intervallic structure, function, and harmony are emphasized while learning this system, all things that are useful.

2. Ear Training:  Figured bass shows the intervals of the notes from the bass note, which is handy for ear training. A I6 chord in the key of C would be a C/E, which has the interval of a 6th between the bass note E to the next note, C. Understanding and analyzing chords and inversions with intervals this way ties the music theory to the ear training. Ear Training to a musician is like the Force to a Jedi; it is a powerful ally. The more you know, the better.

Actual footage of me reaching out to my Harmony I instructor asking, “Why Figured Bass?”

3. Wax on, wax off: In the movie, “The Karate Kid,” Daniel LaRusso comes to his master, Mr. Miyagi to learn karate and how to defend himself from bullies. Daniel quickly finds himself painting Mr. Miyagi’s fence and waxing his car rather than learning karate. After many sessions of doing these seemingly pointless tasks as payment for learning karate, Daniel gets frustrated and quits to which Mr. Miyagi gives Daniel his first lesson. <Spoiler Alert> Mr. Miyagi then shows Daniel that the skills he learned in painting the fence and waxing his car were key fundamental movements in defending himself. Learning Figured Bass is a fundamental skill for any serious music student at college or interested in analyzing classical music because of the details learned when studying and analyzing with it.

This is EXACTLY what learning Figured Bass feels like.

4. Speed of Mind: But why learn to Sight Read it? Learning to sight read Figured Bass is not at all about learning a practical skill for the real world. It trains how quickly one can assimilate the notation in front of them and turn it into music. If one is good enough and familiar enough with Figured Bass to sight read it, then mastery has been achieved, which is particularly important when analyzing longer pieces of music and for strengthening one’s music theory chops.

I have rarely encountered Figured Bass in the real world and have never had to sight read it in a professional situation, but the lessons learned in the process and reflection of learning to sight read Figured Bass were well worth the discomfort. I’m not suggesting that you go out and learn to sight read Figured Bass right now, but rather to embrace the process of learning any skill you are developing regardless of what it’s perceived end value may be. It is ok and highly advisable to ask what the purpose of what you are learning, but try to keep an open mind to new ideas and in this case, old ideas. Relish being a student of music and know that the skills you develop are helping you become the best musician you can possibly be.

Keep analyzing, shredding, and woodshedding, and please… try to have a better attitude than I did in my early music theory class days!