Jack here, jbf music and guitar lessons, in this quick guitar trick we’re looking at
the Dave Murray trill; I’ve got two examples to showcase, here and I’ll break it down
into some rules of thumb, so you can apply it to your own playing, soloing and improvisation.
It’s a really handy trick to have in the bag, the first excerpt I’m looking at here
is from Number of the Beast:
*Plays Guitar*
Ok, so lets dissect that a bit: We're starting on the + of the third beat of the bar there’s
a series of pull offs and hammers; which I’m referring to as a trill; you know, this sort
of thing; So that's what it starts off with, this 15 to 14 and then a slide down to the
12th, eh 14 to 12 3 times.
And then we've got another slide down, followed by another a group of 3 again, but this time
12 to 10 the and 8th note on the 10th sliding down to an 8th note on the 9th fret.
In the next bar, we sustain the 9th fret for most of the bar and then we pick up in the
4th beat of the bar.
this time it's a group of 4 this time, but because it started in the previous bar has
a cool displaced sound; for more on displacement heck out the link in the top right; So on
the 4th beat there, sliding up to 15th fret and on the and of 4 we start the trill and
we do this 4 times, after this we've got a group of 5 between the 15 and 18.
The next group starts on the 1st beat of the bar, again a group of 3 and to wrap up another
group of 3 between 15 and 18 followed by a bend, with a nice bit of vibrato on the 18th
fret.
Right,now this is a quit a clinical breakdown and in all honesty for learning proposes you
might be better off going by feel; I think this is largely how Dave Murray plays, or
at least improvises, I don’t think it’s meticulous structured, so much as ‘felt’
for lack of a better term.
However, doing this can help identify patterns to emulate the sound.
I mean, another way you could break it down, if it feels a bit disjointed and you can;t
quite get to grips with where you change between trills, eh just look at the beats in the bar;
so if we take a look at those last two bars, the switch to 15 and 18 is on the + of 2 in
both of them.
so, if you look for beats guitarist tend to favour it can also help identity trends in
there playing; although maybe not the most reliable approach.
Obviously the more examples you look at the more coloration's you can make, but what could
we surmise from this one here?
Well, groupings of 3 and changing on a less standard of intuitive beat was a large theme,
there are groups of 5 and 4 as well, the notes are mainly 16ths, using 8th notes to transition
between trills or between different sections.
Looking at the intervals, the smallest is a semi tome, there are some tones and the
largest seems to be 3 semi tones; all fairly comfortable stretches.
He’s playing with very little picking, often going up and down the strings this way.
The notes are in key; although on a side note there are solos where he’ll use some outside
notes, they are generally just in passing that anything else.
Ok, that’s pretty good, lets go through the start of the trooper solo and see how
many of these happen again, or if any new rules pop up.
*plays guitar*
Ok, so you'll probably notice a lot of the same ideas popping up here; starting on a
slightly odd beat of the bar, the + of 4 as a pick up, they're all 16th note, the first
in groups of 4 here, we've got a stretch of 3 semi tones, eh, but here he’s going across
the strings, rather than up and down, we can add that to the rule book rule book, the Book
of Dave.
The next few bars I just left in for context more than anything else, but we can see longer
notes, eh to transition to the next trill.
And this has got 4 groups of three again, all 16th notes; he does use triplets in other
songs, but I’m trying to keep this lesson as concise as I can, while still giving a
decent overview, so I'm not going to get in to that right now; and what this does is give
a displaced sound, because we'ge ot groups of 6 in a 4/4 time signature.
Em, there's some sliding, not much picking and playing up and down the string again and
building to an 8th note bend.
From those examples lets try and compile a rough ‘how to’ if you wanted t get the
basics of Dave Murrays Trill Technique add some of his sound into your own soloing:
mainly 16th notes (do consider using triplets for a bit of variation)
Groups of 3, 4 & 5 and longer groups as well, and I'd say this comes from Playing by feel
rather than 3 here, 4 there 5 here Vertical & Horizontal playing so playing this
way as well as this way Comfortable stretches, so I can’t think
of any songs where he does a major 3rd as a trill, other than the sweep in fear of the
dark; please correct me if I’m wrong and you can think of any
Largely playing in key and not just playing penatonics.
Now his playing is heavily blues influenced and there's a lot of pentatonics in it, but
he does lean on the Phyrigain and Aelioan modes in particular,and it kind of gives his
playing a bit more of an edge, than a kind of, you know, a blues rock sound.
This technique is all over his soloing, these are but two examples out there, so if you
want to go an research your own ones, I'd highly recommend doing that, see if you can
add your own rules to the book of Dave.
Using that set of rules we've just learned, what I'll do is improvise a solo over the
backing of the Trooper, hopefully this will give you a rough idea of how you can use this
in a more musical or practical context.
*Plays guitar*
I’ve also got a more in depth look at his approach to soloing coming up, which I’ll
link up to in the top right when it’s finished, so keep and eye out for that, if this is up
your street.
If you like snappy lessons like this, feel free to check out the Quick Tricks playlist;
again I'll pop a link to it up there.
Cool, so as always I really hope this video has been useful for you guys, you’ve picked
a up a new trick, which is pretty straight forward, but still sounds really flashy, gotten
a better idea of how to get a Dave Murray type sound and picked up some new concepts
to adapt and work in to your own craft!
If that has been the case you’ve taken away some new information, found it informative,
want to show some support for the channel, give it a wee pop in the youtube algorithm,
please do consider to share(left), like , comment and subscribe, if you feel so inclined.
Cheers guys.
*Yngwie Malmsteen Style Music Plays*