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This week's skipping-thirds exercise combines the forward and retrograde patterns into a four-note pattern: forward retrograde.
In this video, Ethan talks a bit about what he’ll be doing in Weekly Mandolin Workout.
In these introductory lessons, Ethan talks about some things that you will use in all of the weekly mandolin workouts, including posture, right- and left-hand technique, the concept of I–IV–V chord progressions, and more.
Ethan gives you some ideas about basic mandolin technique in this lesson, including posture, using a strap, left- and right-hand technique, and more.
In this lesson, Ethan talks about the theoretical concept of I–IV–V chords, which are the most common chords in roots music. He talks about the concept and then shows you a few chord voicings for the I–IV–V chords in the keys of G (G, C, and D) and C (C, F, and G), and how to find the I–IV–V chords in other keys. He also talks about the three minor chords in a key: ii, iii, vi or Am, Bm, and Em in the key of G and Dm, Em, and Am in the key of C.
In these workouts, you’ll get four workouts a month to work on things like skipping thirds, diatonic arpeggios, chord scales, pentatonic scale patterns, and more.
In this first lesson, you’ll get four workouts using skipping thirds, also sometimes called broken thirds. You’ll use the G major scale and basically play intervals of a third starting on each scale tone. Getting comfortable with skipping thirds is a good way to start using and finding scale patterns. The first three workouts are in the key of G, and the fourth is in the key of A using closed position.
In this month’s workouts, you’ll learn diatonic four-note seventh arpeggios. It’s somewhat like the skipping-thirds workout, but you’ll be putting two thirds together to create a seventh chord. The first three workouts are in the key of G in open position, while the fourth workout transposes the workouts to the key of A.
In this series of workouts, Ethan uses the pentatonic scale to create some interesting patterns by skipping seconds in the pentatonic scale.
In this lesson, you’ll learn some pentatonic scale patterns that you can use to improvise on tunes like David Grisman’s “I6/16,” which has a soloing section with a vamp of Ebmaj7 and Dm7. Ethan shows you how you can use different pentatonic scale patterns to solo on each chord.
String crossings can be tricky, so practicing string crossings and crosspicking is essential in developing a fluid picking hand. There are two types of string crossings on the mandolin, assuming you’re using alternating picking: inside string crossings (where you play a downstroke on a higher string and an upstroke on a lower string) and outside string crossings (where you play a downstroke on a lower string and upstroke on an upper string). Ethan gives you some string crossing exercises and then gives you an arrangement of the traditional song “Handsome Molly” that uses crosspicking.
Left-hand slurs like hammer-ons and pull-offs are great articulations to add to your playing, and practicing them can strengthen your fretting hand. Ethan gives you a number of hammer-on and pull-off exercises and shows you how to use them to create syncopated phrasing on the fiddle tunes “Leather Britches” and “Big Sciota.”
Double stops are an integral part of the mandolin’s unique sound, and they’re a great way to add an additional bit of harmony to melody lines. In this series of workouts, Ethan shows you double stops in thirds and fourths on all the string sets in the key of G, and shows you how to fill out the melodies of the fiddle tune “Shove That Pig's Foot a Little Further Into the Fire” and the bluegrass standard “Long Journey Home” (also known as “Two Dollar Bill”) with double stops and drones.
In this series of workouts, you’ll learn various kinds of chord shapes, including chop chords, a wide variety of barre chords, seventh chord shapes that are great for swing playing, and more.
Using harp scales, a technique borrowed from the guitar, is a way to make the mandolin (or guitar) sound like a harp. The idea is to use as many open strings as possible and to have as many strings ringing at the same time as possible. On the mandolin that means you’ll play a lot of notes up the neck combined with open strings. You’ll learn to play G pentatonic and diatonic scales as harp scales and how to use the harp-scale technique to play the traditional tune “Elk River Blues.”
In this lesson, Ethan talks about the concept of chord scales, which can be thought of as the scales you would choose to play over specific chords in specific keys. You learn the chord scales for the I, IV, V chords in the key of G as well as for the C7, G7, and Am7 chords, and how to “voice-lead” lines through the chords. He wraps it up by showing you a chorus of 12-bar blues in G that uses voice-led lines and the scales and arpeggios you’ve learned.
