Music Lesson: Exploring Pinetop Smith Lick and Glissandi

So let's look at this.

On the chord four, he goes to this Pinetop Smith lick. There are lots of different variations you could do on there. That's the one he uses. Or you could go, "Why not increase the speed?" It's quite a cool little idea. Here are some little variations with that Pinetop idea:

• There's another cool variation which is based on that material.
• That's how the Pinetop lick starts.
• Why not just use the opening of that lick? That can sound really cool.

So you might go faster. You could increase the speed of it at the end there, maybe combine it with the actual Pinetop lick.

"So I was gone perhaps slightly more into blues language at the end there."

Or, a more blues sounding idea. I'll just play around a 12-bar once with that idea in mind.

So, yeah, there's a nice little lick you can use and develop again. Try it in different keys!

Actually, yeah, I think I've seen a couple of live clips of Jerry Lee playing that lick quite blisteringly fast with glissandi. He uses some repeatedly going into the V chord. Why not use them creatively?

He also uses them in that second solo section before that big rundown, and he's kind of using these as a nice rhythmic idea.

"As long as you use them in a nice phrase, you can use them however you like."

So let's try using some glissandi in some different phrases than the ones that Jerry Lee used. Just use them in the course of a phrase. It's nice using them as part of a repetitive thing.

• Going from the five chord:

  "There we go."

So you can see there, I've kind of used them with a sense of phrasing. I'm not just randomly going up and down those glissandi. It's actually part of a phrase.

So yeah, when you're improvising, whether you're using glissandi or any of the other musical ideas, really try to build your phrasing with a sense of that 12-bar form or indeed whichever form you're playing in at the time.

Moving towards the four chords and coming around the cycle again.

Right, let's look at something else.