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Enclosures & Chromaticism; Turn Triads into Jazz Lines! (Patreon)

Published:
2026-06-06 13:00:16
Imported:
2026-08
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Content

In this beast of a lesson we’ll learn how to transform basic triads and arpeggios into killer, exotic jazz lines with the use of enclosures and chromaticism.

I’ll show you how to apply these ideas over chord changes, in this case a moody i-iv-V minor blues with a gypsy flavour.

You’ll also see just how powerful a looper is as a practice tool and why I recommend them to everyone I teach!

There are 8 pages of lesson materials to accompany this, as well as a pre-recorded chord progression you can use if you don’t have a looper handy!

Files

Enclosures: Turn Triads into Exotic Jazz Licks! Gypsy Infused Minor Blues Guitar Soloing Lesson!

Full lesson materials available on my Patreon page at the link below; https://patreon.com/AlexFarranGuitar If Patreon isn’t your bag, you can purchase the 8 pages of lesson materials for this lesson alone, directly at the link below; https://smogfalls.gumroad.com/l/isvdbl Book in for a private Zoom lesson!.. just choose a slot at the link below; https://tidycal.com/alexfarranguitar/guitarlesson For this latest instalment in my “Survival Guide” series, we take a deep dive into enclosures and chromaticism and learn how to transform basic triads and arpeggios into killer, exotic jazz lines! I’ll show you how to apply these ideas over chord changes, in this case a moody i-iv-V minor blues with a gypsy flavour. You’ll also see just how powerful a looper is as a practice tool and why I recommend them to everyone I teach! There are 8 pages of lesson materials to accompany this, as well as a pre-recorded chord progression you can use if you don’t have a looper handy! ⏱️Time Stamps ⏱️ Reference videos; Jazz Chords Survival Guide; https://youtu.be/YuGjk8Hqpnw?si=Iuibh3I2nXscMy7Q CAGED System Survival Guide; https://youtu.be/v8bNsQhYYP0 Diminished Chords Survival Guide; https://youtu.be/cE7DTVknkXU?si=x6ePOZku3vFLv1dU Turnarounds Survival Guide; https://youtu.be/JJlv1zc3v-o?si=oqYtkSiS9cNAkBUI Tritone Substitution Survival Guide; https://youtu.be/Djm-tN43Q2g?si=BXd8IiaRgQiNxDGi Chord Inversions Survival Guide; https://youtu.be/beNIoPZsq6Y?si=MMwPOUbnhHXICQ4S Three Note Voicings & Spread Triads; https://youtu.be/fvvIc93f-EU?si=rQiZPIhQtTgy5oEK --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thanks for watching and please do leave a comment down below, and if you could hit the like button and subscribe to my channel, that would really be so appreciated. If you'd like to support the work I do, you can buy me a coffee at this link; https://www.buymeacoffee.com/alexfarran I'm also very active on instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alexfarranguitar #guitarlesson #triads #enclosures #jazzguitar #bluesguitar #looper #practice #gypsyjazz #minorblues #guitarsolo #improvisation #djangoreinhardt #wesmontgomery #guitarlicks #guitartips #arpeggios #scales

Comments

Rick

genius lesson! Autumn Leaves my first lesson and many peoples first favorite.Early childhood, my parents played a lot of Henry Mancini and Ray Coniff. mostly commercial stuff Take 5 and Green Onions etc Thanks Alex

Ron Culbertson

Great lesson Alex. Nice to get away from the blues scales and into some other sounds. Glad you found the time to turn us onto this. Gonna be a lot of fun. Should help with improvisation around our other Django songs.

Tyrone Miller

Great stuff ,been out of the loop a bit.When I get back into it,this is my first rejoiner.Thanks for another great lesson.

Johan

One simple concept that is dense with treasure.

petelet

sorry if I missed this but do you have any recommendations for a Looper?. Great lesson!

Steve Carr

Fantastic lesson, Alex! Your explanation of what an enclosure is and then demonstrating it helped me to visualize and hear what you were trying to teach. This is a lesson that I will keep coming back to in the future!

martyn spooner

There is many many months of learning and practice for myself in one video. Thanks a lot really enjoyed this lesson.

Carlos Funk

The key to the highway....There's a Guthrie Govan quote that says....everyone who deserves to be a guitarist is one....something like that. This lesson and so much of your work provides a clear path and a healthy dose of inspiration to get there

John Bent

Fabulous lesson Alex. Helps build on the triad stuff we’ve done in our one to ones. Joining the dots up!! ✔️

Daniel Wiener

Great lesson as always. Any chance you can explain why A harmonic minor is the parent scale with this two chord vamp (Am6, Dm6)? The 6 in the Am chord is a 6 but harmonic minor has a b6, right? You may have explained and I just missed it or perhaps you can send me to a prior video?

Brad Wendler

As a lad I learned music through the violin, pre Suzuki, specifically Wohlfarht Studies, and Etudes from various sources all of which were at least 200 years old.. No one was teaching us Stephane Grappelli or that youngster Vassar Clements. But, from that, I now read music. So here comes Jimi Hendrix and Jimmy Page and away goes the violin. And I suck at guitar. My question is, as a multi-instrumentalist , does CAGE let you speak to guitar learners or is that how you learned guitar ? In violin you learn the "positions" , with the arced bridge there's only double stops. No chordal positions that relate to a full three note chord, although moving the bow to hit that third note is unique to the instrument, and at times spine tingling. Did you come at guitar as a musical note reader from another instrument and now CAGE is the best way to teach guitar ?

Patrick

Alex, Great lesson and quite timely as I have been concentrating on minor scales, modes, and chords built from those scales. I recall in a Q&A video you held up a copy of Mick Goodrick’s The Advancing Guitarist; thin book, with a lifetime supply of information. I do have a few questions that may be deemed pedantic. Perhaps I should simply, “bow to my sensei” and practice more. But here goes. At around 13:50, where we learn more about your grooming habits, ;-) also, you discuss the formulation of the diatonic E7 chord from its parent scale A harmonic minor - E, G#, B, D. Great, makes sense. Previously, during the description of the full enclosure of the i chord triad, around 7:37, you cite the A Harmonic Minor scale, while demonstrating the F-natural half-step above the 5th scale degree E, thus a full enclosure built from half steps above and below the target note. Again, that all makes sense. OK, so when stacking 3rds from the parent scale A Harmonic Minor, from the root, we get A, C, E, and G# - Amin-Maj7. OK, I know you didn’t go into that in the lesson, and that is fine, we’re dealing with triads. But when you set up the chord progression, you use Am6, “spelled” A, C, F#, but F# is not in the A Harmonic Minor Scale. Wouldn’t Am6, built from the A Harmonic Minor scale be spelled A, C, F natural? I don’t even know what that would be called. Maybe, Am#5, Am♭6, or something else entirely. Playing A Harmonic Minor over Am6 (with the F#, perhaps coming from the G major scale, A Dorian??) would seem to create dissonance. It’s pretty easy to add F natural on the B string, 6th fret, to the Am6 fingering in the chord chart. The simultaneous F# and F natural definitely sounds unstable crying for resolution. In looking at the “Gypsy Blues in A minor” chart, I see you avoid F and F# entirely over the Am6 (except the first pickup note prior to measure 1), and F natural appears only over the Dm6 and E7 chords. Is this an example of an “avoid note?” In the video, you do mention on the i and iv chords, focusing on arpeggios with enclosures, and using the scale and chord tones on the V7 chord. Finally, when you lay down the “static” Am6 into your looper at 10:20, it appears that on beats 3 & 4 of the second bar, you play an F7 to E7. Why? These seem to be dominants, VI7 and V7. Is it simply to punctuate the end of the loop, or something deeper? I am probably overthinking this. Thanks for the time and effort you pour into these lessons and material. It all greatly enhances my pursuit of better musicianship. Kind Regards, Patrick

David Thorburn

Great lesson Alex as always - what scale would you use over a major chord progression or is that another lesson ?!

Jonathan Hubbard

Wow - there’s a lot of amazing content in that one. Another inspiring and fab lesson Alex, thank you

Alex Farran Guitar

Thanks Rick, glad you enjoyed it! Man, I keep meaning to do an arrangement of Take Five.. thanks for the reminder!

Alex Farran Guitar

I love my old Boomerang 3 looper, but there are so many good choices out there nowadays. I'd recommend looking into the TC Ditto range, along with the MXR one.. both very no-fuss, easy to use loopers. I despise the ones with built in drum machines etc!

Alex Farran Guitar

Love your words Carlos, thank you my fiend. Very glad you enjoyed the lesson!

Alex Farran Guitar

Absolutely! Moving those triads forward into some more elevated sounds. Magnificent stuff 👌🏻

Alex Farran Guitar

Great questions Patrick, and I do have good explanations for these things, but it's too in depth to type. I think I'll film a little follow up video for you and the others who asked the same question. In the meantime, I'd encourage everyone to let their ears tell them whether they're hearing anything clashing, or any unwanted dissonance. Was Django clashing every time he played over a minor chord? I don't hear an issue. Sounds great to me! In short, I would stress the difference between a target note and a passing note. There's a reason we don't rest on those passing notes! But yes, I will do a proper video going into all this and more! :)

Alex Farran Guitar

Another lesson in there for sure, but in the meantime, you can simply use the Major scale. It works beautifully!

Alex Farran Guitar

Thanks Daniel! I've received this question a lot, and will film a video to make things nice and clear, but in the meantime here's a response I gave to somebody else: Great question, and I do have good explanations for these things, but it's too in depth to type. I think I'll film a little follow up video for you and the others who asked the same question. In the meantime, I'd encourage everyone to let their ears tell them whether they're hearing anything clashing, or any unwanted dissonance. Was Django clashing every time he played over a minor chord? I don't hear an issue. Sounds great to me! In short, I would stress the difference between a target note and a passing note. There's a reason we don't rest on those passing notes! But yes, I will do a proper video going into all this and more! :)

Rupert Hawkes

This is such a fantastic lesson. Getting so much out of it. Thank you! I do have a question, for scales (harmonic minor) in this case, the fingering can be crucial, you have to think ahead. For example do you tend to slide up with the 3rd finger and down with the 1st? Also avoid the pinkie on the G string and use 3rd to help the hand pivot as it moves up to B and E string? Any tips here could be useful or is it just grab with whatever you can ? Thanks!

Patrick

That sounds great Alex. I look forward to viewing your video clarifications. I'm sure they will be illuminating. Thanks!

Tim

A brilliant “teach a man to fish” lesson for me. Hope to make good prep work of it before I re-attempt the Charlie Christian lead studies. Many thanks Alex!

Matthew Casey

i am sorry to ask this, i haven’t been on patreon for awhile, i no longer see the course material but still a member? How silly am I being 😁

Chris White

Absolute gold! Thanks Alex

Julian Gurr

Hi Alex. This is my first lesson here for a while and the one which made me rejoin. Such musical riches! Please could you recommend other lessons in your back catalogue which you think would best complement this one. Thank you.

Rupert Hawkes

Question more generally for Alex and other players. What do you think is a ‘reasonable’ speed for 16th notes? 60, 100, 160, 300 BPM? Maybe a weird question, I’m not a shredder, hence why I’m an Alex fan, but curious to know what might be a ‘reasonable’ standard? Thanks

Paul Brown

I just joined up. Is there a lesson on how to use a looper?

Alex Farran Guitar

It’s a bit of both I guess. I do practice multiple fingerings so I can afford to just land stuff hap-hazardly if needed.

Alex Farran Guitar

Thank you buddy, really glad you enjoyed it! I guess my Marc Ribot studies and the Django “Douce ambiance” lesson would be good counterparts to this. Also my “minor blues soloing; essential triads and looper practice routine” video.

Alex Farran Guitar

Great question! For the sake of good agility and finesse I would say to try and get comfortable up to sixteenth notes at 100bpm.

Rupert Hawkes

Have to say it again but this leason is blooming brilliant! Moved up to 70 and probably very capable of much faster BUT and this is the key, it wouldnt be even timing wise and note quality/tone. So sticking to 70 for another week or so 😍