10 “Minor Swing” guitar exercises

In this course, Tim takes you through all you need to know to begin to improvise over this gypsy jazz standard.

The 10 exercises become incrementally more challenging as the course progresses. It starts off simply, introducing the most standard arpeggios, followed by an exercise using those arpeggios over the solo section of “Minor Swing” in strict quarter notes.

Gradually, Tim introduces more material into the exercises. By the end of the course, you should have an excellent grasp of minor, major, minor 6, dominant 7 and diminished 7 arpeggios in all positions, together with the minor and harmonic minor scales.

Most importantly, you will understand when to use these “building blocks” in your improvisations, while also getting a solid foundation for further study.

The course does not cover playing the melody of the tune (the “Intro” and “Outro” sections). It is solely concerned with the 16-bar solo section. It does not cover the rhythm guitar part, although chords are suggested in the arpeggio lesson sections.

Finally, for your practice sessions, you can toggle on/off the lead guitar recording and hear only a rhythm guitar backing track for each etude. Click “Video” at the bottom of any etude and switch the audio source. Enjoy!