The Guitar Player's Resource
Welcome back! In this lesson I would like to give you a nice sweep picking arpeggio workout using the chord progression from Pachelbel's Canon in D. I felt this is a common and a great progression to apply these arpeggios too and it will help you learn how to apply it to other progressions as well. All the arpeggios are played on all 6 strings of the guitar and are major and minor triad type arpeggios. We won't go too in depth with the theory, this assumes that you know your basic arpeggios and how they are built. If you are not sure of the interval structure of the arpeggios, they are major (1, 3, 5) and minor (1, b3, 5) - for example the notes in a D major triad will be (D, F#, A).
The chord progression for this piece is (D, A, Bm, F#m, G, D, G, A). A lot of these arpeggios are common 5th and 6th string shapes linked together that use all 6 strings across the neck. This arpeggio progression is divided up into 2 parts, bar 3 begins the second variation of arpeggios and it is the same progression just played in a different way. I move up a little higher on the neck and link different arpeggios shapes together across the neck. If you are new to sweep picking, go slow at first and be sure that you are playing all of the notes very clean and even. It is important not to let the notes run together like a chord, it will sound messy. Also, I put a few right hand picking symbols in the beginning that I use for most of the arpeggios, but be sure to experiment with your own.
MP3 - Sweeping Arpeggios
Be sure to apply this concept to different pieces and and don't forget to check out my latest CD, "Chameleon". and please visit mikecampese.com for more information.
Mike Campese is an all-around music performer, session artist and teacher competent in many musical styles, electric and acoustic. He has studied at G.I.T. (Honors Graduate), and with Paul Gilbert, Norman Brown, Stanley Jordan, Scott Henderson and Keith Wyatt.
