John Petrucci Guitar Lessons #09

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Odd Man Out
Using different meters to accommodate your technique.
For our final lesson on chromatics, I thought I'd throw you a little curve and 
give you a few odd-meter exercises in 5/8. Now you might ask, "Why play 
anything in 5/8?" Well, I came up with this sequence because it's easier for me 
to play across the strings.
As some of you already know, I use alternate (down-up-down-up) picking 
exclusively. This can present a bit of an efficiency problem when crossing 
strings to play a three-note-per-string pattern, because the first note on every 
other string lands on an upstroke. To avoid this awkward movement and make 
my patterns flow a bit better, I try to craft them so that each time I cross 
strings, the first note falls on a downstroke.
Let's get the 5/8 feel under our fingers first. FIGURE 1 is a good place to start. 
 AUDIO 
FILES FIGURE 1
AIFF Audio File (Macintosh)
WAVE Audio File (Windows)
Practice it by playing it on each string up and down the neck chromatically to 
the 12th position and back. Don't be intimidated by the odd meter: the one 
important thing to remember is that even though the rhythm is syncopated, 
the picking remains steady and strictly alternate (down-up-down-up).
Once you feel a little bit more comfortable with 5/8 meter, play FIGURE 2, a 
great exercise to work on your string-crossing technique. Notice that I added 
accents to the pattern as if it were written in triplets. But if the pattern was 
simply three 16th-note triplets (or 9/16 meter), crossing strings would be 
awkward. To make it easier to pick, I added one note to that 9/16 pattern 
(making it a figure in 5/8 meter) while still accenting the notes to keep a bit of 
the triplet feel.
AUDIO FILES FIGURE 2
AIFF Audio File (Macintosh)
WAVE Audio File (Windows)
One way I make FIGURE 2 more exciting is by playing it up the neck using a 
metronome with the guitar set to the bridge pickup. When I reach the 12th 
position, I'll raise the metronome setting a few clicks and change to the neck 
pickup, and work my way back down. I keep repeating this until I either reach 
my target metronome tempo OR I feel sufficiently warmed up. I change 
pickups just because I like the way the neck pickup sounds in the upper 
register.
Carlos Alberto Veiga
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Carlos Alberto Veiga
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To make this exercise even more interesting, try applying the 5/8 sequence to 
a diagonal four-note-per-string chromatic scale. Though Chopin's Etude No. 2, 
Opus 10 [see Mar. '96 GW] doesn't have any measures in 5/8 time, it's full of 
"diagonal" chromatic moves such as those found in FIGURE 3. 
AUDIO FILES FIGURE 3
AIFF Audio File (Macintosh)
WAVE Audio File (Windows)
Make sure to practice these patterns with a metronome-this will certainly get 
you playing fast, clean and with a lot of authority.
Lest you think that 5/8 is too impractical a time signature, play FIGURE 4, a 
riff that doesn't sound "odd-meterish" at all-in fact, it rocks pretty hard. 
AUDIO FILES FIGURE 4
AIFF Audio File (Macintosh)
WAVE Audio File (Windows)
If you've worked on the other chromatic exercises in this lesson, you should be 
able to feel the 5/8 pulse pretty easily by now, so this one shouldn't be too 
difficult.
If you haven't been practicing your chromatic exercises, you better start 
cracking, 'cause you're sure gonna need to know 'em inside-out by next 
month, when we finally tackle Chopin!
Carlos Alberto Veiga
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Carlos Alberto Veiga
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