Collecting Royalties as a Composer

Q: Hi Chris!
I took your music business class at the Los Angeles Music Academy last year. I need some help with a situation that has come up with my career. I am currently in Phoenix recording my first record. One of the songs I wrote, another band really liked and wants to record. I'm totally happy about that and want to let them do it. I also want to make money for letting them use it. I'm not really sure what the rules are here and I don't want to get screwed. If you could give me any advice I would really appreciate it.

A: Hey that's great! I would suggest that you should make a publishing company as a DBA. register with BMI as a publisher and writer. This will make sure that you collect performance royalties when the song gets played on the radio, in film or TV. As you'll recall from the class, as a composer you are entitled to points when a CD gets sold. You can get paid directly for mechanicals from the record company or sign with harry fox to administer and collect (maybe this is better as you don't have much experience).

A DBA stands for "do business as." More about that here:
http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-dba.htm

-CJ

Blues Power

Q: I was reading your blues lesson on your site and am wondering: what do you think makes the Blues greats, great? I mean, what do they have that all the others don't?

A: Man, what a question! It is really hard to talk about Blues from a theoretic point of view but I'll give it a shot. First let's just talk about the few things you have to have:

1. A complete understanding of the chord changes when you solo - This means you really have to be able to hit the right chord tones as the chords come by, to the level that you can stop thinking about it and your fingers know the way. That is why simply playing the minor and/or major pentatonic scale over the progression doesn't guarantee you anything but a very mediocre solo although it is a start.

2. Knowledge of at least some of the traditional licks - You see, even playing the right scales and chord tones doesn't guarantee you a great solo either. There is a definite vocabulary and the only real way to be able play an effective solo is to learn the vocabulary from the best. You have to know where the licks work too: the I, IV, V and turnaround licks for example. If you copy from a wide variety of players, you'll be sure to not sound like any one player and eventually a little time with them under your fingers will lead to a natural evolution of the phrases and your own personality will start to emerge.

3. Good Blues Tone - I'm not saying your tone has to be just like everyone else's but there is a generally excepted tone that involves a certain amount of warmth and/or twang. Of course there is a wide variety of this tone, from Strats and Teles to Les Pauls, but you know it when you hear that Blues tone. You certainly are going to have a rough time milking it from a Roland Jazz Chorus amp.

4. Power - I'm not sure how to describe this, but let's just say the greats all have this power that just knocks you out. It isn't really a technical thing but just this overwhelming sense of strength. Take a look at the great Freddie King and see if you don't feel it:

Guitar Tools pt.2

My second installment of the column I write for guitartools.co.uk. This one is dedicated to treble boosters and especially the most famous one, the Rangemaster.

Treble Boosters – As we learned in part 1 of this column, guitarists in their quest for rock and roll tone often turned to fuzzes to push their amps to the breaking point, but another group of guitarists used a different device. To add some sparkle to the dark British amps in the sixties, many guitar players turned to treble boosters. In addition to adding more high frequencies, they also helped drive their amps with a dbl boost and some added distortion. Although a very 60s sound, the treble booster sounds completely different than the fuzz but if you want and need a varied classic type sound, having one of these in your bag is a must. More >>>

Recording Advice

Q: My band is recording our first EP in a couple of weeks. Could you please share any insight on how you prepare to perform your guitar parts in the high pressure, clock ticking environment of the recording studio? I don't mean engineering advice, but performance/guitarist tips or even mentality. So far I've been woodshedding the most difficult guitar parts I have to pull off (two shred solos) at home. I record myself, listen back and work specifically on the parts that get sloppy. I play them out of time, then with a slow metronome speed, and then finally up to speed with my goal being to eliminate unwanted noises and to play each note clearly in tune and in time.

A: If this is your first time in the studio, it will be an eye opener. Since the session is your own, there are different thing to consider as opposed to a session for someone else. In some ways it is a lot less pressure, because after all the time is your own and not somebody else’s. Things you might want to think about besides your guitar parts: 1. Get the endings and intros straight before hand. Rehearse your band and figure out how you want to end the songs. Live endings and recorded endings are usually different. Live endings, you bash out a chord and your drummer does a fill and you end it and he play another drum fill. In the studio, you usually don't do live endings that way. Have a listen to various studio recordings and check out how the bands end the songs. For reference, here is two versions of one of my songs, check out the endings. You’ll have to click on the titles of the songs individually but there are four live version songs of songs that appeared on my second CD, compare them and see.

Have a listen to “House on the Hill,” and “Tell me A Story” here:

http://magnatune.com/artists/albums/bigbadsun-strange/

and then have a listen to the studio cuts here:

http://magnatune.com/artists/albums/juergenson-badsun/

You would be surprised how much time gets sucked in the studio on intros and endings so try to get it straight a head of time or you'll end up rehearsing on studio time.

2. Rehearse your band with a click track. If you guys can't play to a click, you will also suck time trying to get in sync. This goes for your guitar parts as well, practice them to a click or rhythm track, this will help you lock in when the time comes.

3. Figure out how to play without any effects on your guitar. Ambient effects definitely come after you record your part so get used to doing it that way. You can use distortion, just make sure you turn it on at the very last second because it is noisy. As it is your time, the engineer might not say anything about you bringing delay or reverb but it will ruin your sound possibly and maybe even make your part unusable if your delay rhythm is different than the song tempo. It is much better to record dry.

4. Get you headphone mix right before hand. Since you have to play dry, have the engineer send you back your guitar mix wet. I sometimes have him send it back really wet, even wetter than I would have him mix it, but this can make it very easy to record. Don’t forget, what effects he sends back to you in your headphones, doesn’t stay in the mix. If you are not sure how to describe what you want, and you are used to playing with a wet sound, just ask him to send it back with about 700 ms and two or three repeats. Maybe have him give you one channel dry guitar and one channel effects on your little groovy headphone mixer and you can mix it there yourself.

5. Try to record Drums, Bass and guitar together. You can throw away the guitar track later so it doesn’t matter if you screw up or not. Your guitar part is just to help your drummer and bassist keep track of where they are in the tune. If you are using a vocalist, it also helps to have him sing as well just to keep everybody true to the form. As I said you can scratch the tracks later and redo them. If you don’t have any booths, you can record your scratch track direct. You bass player will most likely get recorded direct anyways so you can all be in the room with the drummer this way. You can of course move your amp into a booth if there is one but as you are throwing away the track anyways, it doesn’t make much difference. When you record your guitar part (the one you are going to keep), if you have a big room, you can be in there with your amp. I tend to record this way a lot. It helps if you keep the amp far away from you because the loud amp can overwhelm your headphone mix leading a variety of problems. You should definitely practice through the amp you will be recording with because if you practice through something else, the difference in tone might be enough to throw you off.

6. As far as getting nervous, there is no real reason to. As I said, it is your project and your studio time so you shouldn’t feel pressured. The time you should feel pressured is when you are recording for a pain in the ass producer who wants the perfect guitar part done in ten minutes. But if you are having a real hard time getting it together, just simplify. It might help to prepare a simpler part ahead of time if you really need to be out quickly. If worst comes to worst, record the other parts for all the songs minus the guitar solos first, because you can always do your guitar parts after the fact without your band there to bug you. So even if you need an extra day, you can knock out your tracks in one day.

7. If it is a pre-written part, make sure you have it 120 percent down because you lose about 20 percent because of nerves.

Hope this helps, -CJ

Dominant Pentatonic Scale

Q: I read a column about the dominant pentatonic and I'm feeling a little confused. Here's why... The dominant pentatonic comes from the Mixolydian Scale, and I know this mode and have no problems with that. Now the pentatonic takes only five notes of this scale. My problem here is what are these five notes? The Mixolydian looks like this: 1-2-3-4-5-6-b7 What should be the formula for the dominant pentatonic? Should it be this: 1-3-4-5-b7 (referenced in here): http://www.premierguitar.com/education/200608_educationcenter_intenseguitar.asp

Or should be this one: 1-2-3-5-b7 (referenced in here): http://www.premierguitar.com/Magazine/Issue/2009/Mar/Shredding_Dominant_Pentatonic.aspx

Because in fact both use only five notes, and in both, the five notes come from the Mixolydian Scale, so which one to use? I've seen in several places the first one, and in others the second one. Thanks a lot for any info!

Q: I can see how this might confuse you. Let me see if I can shed some light on the subject. First of all, you'll be happy to know that there is no set standard pentatonic scale called the dominant pentatonic scale, so there might be several different examples floating around out there. As you probably know the most common pentatonic scale used for dominant chords would be the minor pentatonic: 1-b3-4-5-b7.

The examples you picked up are synthetic pentatonic scales, for the lack of a better name. Now this does not mean that they are wrong or anything and are fine to use in the right circumstances. Pentatonic simply means five notes so there are plenty of combinations you could make from any 7-note scale. Now the first one you describe is a common synthetic pentatonic scale that was probably made popular by Jan Hammer (matter of fact, I have heard it referred to as the "Jan Hammer Scale" before.

Here is the trick with this scale and how you can do the trick to make different pentatonic scales. Before I do this, let's make sure you know exactly what the "standard" two western pentatonic scales are. They basically eliminate the half steps from both the major and minor scales:

Major Pentatonic: 1-2-3-5-6

Minor Pentatonic: 1-b3-4-5-b7

These "standard" pentatonic scales work well with the 7-note modal scales because the same pentatonic scales work as good replacements for most of the modal scales. In other words the major pentatonic (1-2-3-5-6) can be found in the three major modes (ionian, lydian and mixolydian) and the minor pentatonic (1-b3-4-5-b7) can also be found in the minor family modes (aolian, dorian and phrygian):

Ionian: 1-2-3-4-5-6-7
Major Pentatonic: 1-2-3-5-6

Lydian: 1-2-3-#4-5-6-7
Major Pentatonic: 1-2-3-5-6

Mixolydian: 1-2-3-4-5-6-b7
Major Pentatonic: 1-2-3-5-6

Nothing changes here right? How about the minor modes:

Aolian: 1-2-b3-4-5-b6-b7
Minor Pentatonic: 1-b3-4-5-b7

Dorian: 1-2-b3-4-5-6-b7
Minor Pentatonic: 1-b3-4-5-b7

Phrygian: 1-b2-b3-4-5-b6-b7
Minor Pentatonic: 1-b3-4-5-b7

Now let me explain what we will call, modal pentatonic scales. Again this is my description and just like there is no standard term like "Dominant Pentatonic" there also is no standard term "modal pentatonic." But let's just use the term for the lack of a better one. What we are going to do is use the formula for the minor pentatonic (1-3-4-5-7) and use it for the major family modes adjusting the intervals accordingly. After that, we will take the major pentatonic formula (1-2-3-5-6) and apply it to the minor modes.

First let's take the minor pentatonic (1-3-4-5-7) formula and apply it to the major family modes starting with mixolydian. We will have to lower the 7th because the mixolydian scale has a minor 7th:

Mixolydian: 1-2-3-4-5-6-b7
Mixolydian modal pentatonic: 1-3-4-5-b7 (based on the formula for the minor pentatonic scale) This is the scale that was referred to as the "dominant pentatonic scale," we made it by applying the minor formula to the mixolydian scale.

Lydian: 1-2-3-#4-5-6-7
Lydian modal pentatonic: 1-3-#4-5-7

We can take the major pentatonic formula (1-2-3-5-6) and apply it to the minor modes as well:

Dorian: 1-2-b3-4-5-6-b7
Dorian modal pentatonic: 1-2-b3-5-6

Phrygian: 1-b2-b3-4-5-b6-b7
Phrygian modal pentatonic: 1-b2-b3-5-b6

Aolian: 1-2-b3-4-5-b6-b7
Aolian modal pentatonic: 1-2-b3-5-b6

Locrian: 1-b2-b3-4-b5-b6-b7
Locrian modal pentatonic: 1-b2-b3-b5-b6

So there is how your first dominant pentatonic scale comes about. Your next example is also just synthetic and the person who made it simply eliminated the 6th from the major pentatonic scale and replaced it with the b7th from mixolydian.

Mixolydian: 1-2-3-4-5-6-b7
major pentatonic: 1-2-3-5-6
synthetic: 1-2-3-5-b7

There are actually countless pentatonic scales used all over the world, for example this one used by the Japanese in Okinawa: 1-3-4-5-7

To make this even more confusing, you can also superimpose various pentatonic scales over individual chords for outstanding results. Just for example: Lydian = minor pentatonic on the 3rd, 6th and 7th (E lydian = G#, C# and D# minor pentatonic scale).

But as far as I know, there is no one standard dominant pentatonic scale. So as far as which one to use, whichever you like is fine.

Link:

• Pentatonic Scales

Modes and Slash Chords

How are you? I was just going over some of your lessons online and found them very interesting. I do have a question:

Q: I am currently using the C Mixolydian mode to jam/solo over the root of the mode (C). I am very confused on what chords to use. I saw a video of Frank Gambale explaining this but I can't understand this. He mentions to use the 4th and 5th chord of the major scale. To me, the major scale of C mixolydian is F major...correct??? do I play a B and C? If I am wrong, what am I doing wrong??? I would appreciate any help

A: Glad you like the lessons. You have to understand the diatonic system to use the modes properly. As you described, you always use the mode over the diatonic chord of the same name right? So C mixolydian works over a C7 chord. Here is the diatonic system for C mixolydian, the key is F major:

I - F (or Fmaj7) - Ionian
ii - Gmin (or Gmin7) - Dorian
iii - Amin (or Amin7) - Phrygian
IV - Bb (or Bbmaj7) - Lydian
V - C (or C7) - Mixolydian
vi - Dmin (or Dmin7) - Aolian
viio - Edim (or Emin7b5) - Locrian

Now probably what Frank is saying, is that the IV and V chords of this key, played over the root of the mode are good slash chords to play for a modal vamp. The IV and V chord in the key of F are Bb and C right? So play these over the C root, as in: Bb/C - C/C (C/C is really just a C triad). So this is a good progression to jam on. This will work for any of the modes:

Bb lydian for example: Bb and C over the lydian root: Bb/Bb - C/Bb (really Bb - C/Bb). This is good for Bb lydian.

D aolian: Bb/D - C/D
A phrygian: Bb/A - C/A

All these examples are simply the IV and V chord played over the modal root. Of course this is just a simple way to practice and you can simply make up progressions from the modal chord. Just don't mix up the chords too much or you will lose the modal sound. Two chords are usually best. C mixolydian: C7 - Dmin7 or C7 - Bbmaj7 for example.

Links:

• modes, starting with dorian
• mixolydian

Mixolydian vs. Lydian Dominant

Q: I have to play a solo over a C9 vamp, and I realize I have several scale choices. let me see if my theory is correct here: The mixolydian scale is totally diatonic, but the #4 in the lydian dominant scale works because the ear also accepts the blues scale (b5), right? So in a way, the lydian dominant works like a pivot between inside (diatonic mixolydian) and out (blues with b3 as well), which also lets the Dorian work sparingly too. Does that sound about right? (or am I trying to get into heaven here?)

A: You pretty much have it but not completely: Some people would argue that lydian dominant is actually more inside than mixolydian because the natural 4th in mixolydian would technically clash with the major 3rd in the C9 chord. There is some truth in this I think. Technically lydian dominant has no "avoid note" so to speak, the #4 being far enough away from the 3rd in the chord. Some players would tell you, me too for that matter, that mixolydian is better used for a 7sus4 chord. It is all a matter of taste I suppose. C Dorian would only work over a C9 chord because it sort of looks like a combination of the C major pentatonic and C minor pentatonic scale. But it leaves out the most important note, the major 3rd. And it seems clumsy (too big) for blues. So I think that a C dorian scale over a C dominant chord isn't really a great choice. Also, I wouldn't put the cart before the horse, meaning that I wouldn't think that (as you said) a scale is diatonic to a chord, it is really the other way around: chords are diatonic to scales. So C9 is diatonic to both C mixolydian and C lydian dominant. But you are right to think that we like the sound of the b5 because it reminds us of the blues scale (again, a matter of opinion).

Besides the major and minor pentatonic scales, mixolydian and lydian dominant, you can also create some tension by using the half/whole diminished scale.

I've posted on dorian over a blues before. Here>> Other links:

• lydian dominant
• mixolydian
• half/whole diminished