i never anylised prince's guitar playing in terms of what he plays.
i know he uses pentatonic but every guitar player in the world use pentatonic even george benson.
but judging by his solos i think prince use other stuff in his guitar solos beside pentatonic.

when you listen to eric clapton the only thing you hear is pentatonic.
but in prince's playing you can hear a lots of things.

i heard on org that lets go crazy ending is not pentatonic but some jazz scale.
computer blue solo (melody) is some kinde of mode right?
does prince plays modes ?

if he does name the modes he plays and in what songs.
i belive he knows teory because prince said :beyonce sings in lydian mode.

damn! thats some intellectual shit

Compared to most other rock and funk guitarists, Prince does in fact have a bigger melodic vocabulary.

Most of his playing is still based on pentatonic or blues scales, but he throws in some other stuff now and then. Usually it's the rather common and accessible modes like mixolydian, aeolian or dorian. He also uses quite a lot of chromaticism, that's not related to any particular scale or tonality.

I've almost never heard him play any "jazz" scales, like the different modes of melodic minor, bebop scales, or diminished scales. Sometimes he'll use a little harmonic minor (you might recognize it as an "eastern" sound).

To me it's quite obvious that most of the time, Prince doesn't really "know" what he's doing, theoretically. He plays by ear and chooses whatever note he likes and can come up with at the moment. There is very little consequence to be found in the way he uses different scales or combinations of notes, which to me shows that he has a limited understanding of what notes "belong" together. But then again, that's also one of the things that makes him a unique musician.

I feel he's "searching" a lot when he's improvising. Instead of playing familiar patterns, he's looking for new notes - notes that he sometimes might (or might not) hear in his mind, but has yet to find on his instrument. Which, in a way, might be just what improvisation really is about.

RealMusician said:

wow!

When Prince sings the lyrics to, "I like it there" Prince questions, "What can I say that Shakespeare hasn't said before?" The song lacks a full sweep in Iambic pentameterism, as do many of his lyrics, the songs are mostly trochaic, which in turn leads me to believe, Price is guilty of a little false advertisement. That's okay.

Tame said:

wow!

i doubt it. just look what he can do with his voice! he mimics his guitar or does the guitar mimic his voice?

in the words of the great lyricist and quoting from coma pimp



like wow!

lottielooloo1968 said:

Actually, a voice ALWAYS mimics the MIND - or the "inner ear", so to speak (or the soul, if you want to be spiritual about it).
You can only sing the notes that you can hear inside!

With an instrument, such as a guitar, you can do the same thing - and that's what most musicians strive for, to play what they actually "hear".
However, to translate what you hear in your mind into which buttons to push on the instrument of course requires a certain amount of knowledge.
Sometimes your "inner ear" might be more developed than your instrumental proficiency - with the result that you can't get all your ideas out.
Sometimes, I think that applies to Prince.

On the other hand, your instrumental skills can also be more developed than your ability to hear things in your mind - there are numerous examples of that.
In such cases, a person's fingers might be trained to play certain patterns, execute certain movements that produces certain sounds, although those sounds never even exist in the person's mind. And that's usually NOT something to strive for.

The easiest way to expose such a person is by asking him to sing the same things he's playing on the instrument.
If you can't do that, it usually means that your mind and ear are not involved, only the muscles.
[Edited 1/4/08 5:03am]
[Edited 1/4/08 5:05am]

RealMusician said:

thx! thts what i meant! i think p sometimes gets frustrated when his guitar cannot always get him where he wants 2 b...
[Edited 1/4/08 6:21am]

at a certain point scales dont matter..you FEEL where the notes are..much like typing on a computer keyboard..and just like you could type !!!! to emphasize a point, you could also use ... or ?!?! or " "
they all have a place..and any musician at Prince's level of development will use them all and some that wont make any sense to some people..There Aint no rules ! and the ones that are there are usually learned then Unlearned by Badass Musicians !

Great topic!

No he uses a lot of natural major & minor scales, too

When Doves Cry, So Far So Pleased, Sensual Everafter, Everlasting Now, Why U Wanna Treat Me So Bad and on and on

But that's still pretty basic. Fact is, not many guitar players really need to stray into weird scales, and pentatonic/blues can cover much of what we play. I'm sure he strays a bit into other scales, but not often.

It's not so much what you play, anyway, it's how you play it

And modes are really no different than major/minor scales, they just start on different places of them.

So using lydian, mixolydian, is the same as playing a major scale, just from a different starting points.

Prince unlike 99% of most artist, creates based on the creation itself.The rules are 4 the other guys.

Don't believe me? Just LISTEN 2 his more "princely" songs.

Tame said:

Shakespeare also used trochaic quadrameter. In MacBeth, for example, the witches speak in trochaic quadrameter when they are talking among themselves...

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

But they speak in iambic pentameter when they speak to humans.

prince don't know his scales and theory....and some of yall still call him the best....
would u hire a baker who dont know seasoning?


would u hire a dentist who dont know all his stuff?

i told yall prince was musically deficient

mirrorbestfriend said:

People l;ike you are just bitter because despite that he's still a million times more creative than folks like you, who have to make up for a lack of real creativity by knowing these scales and theories. The truth is those scales and musical theories are only in existence as a way for people who don't have the real creativity a way to understand. It's like giving them a synthetic way to create when their brains don't really have the complexity for it, I think that's the best way to explain it. Other than that I'd say, stop hating on Prince, bitch.

mirrorbestfriend said:

If I tasted the baker's cooking and it happened to be the best I'd ever tasted, then I couldn't give a shit less if he knew his seasoning.

Accujack said:

Dont sweat the comment. You gotta remember this is the same guy who posted about Prince needing to work with Soulja Boy...

SEXYMF2002 said:

youeeeee

RealMusician said:

Prince plays the way you have describe because he can not read music, he has stated this in an interview and does play by ear and pure emotion, which makes him a musical genius in my mind He does play the mixolydian scale on "Alex Da Paris" I learned to play this song a couple of years ago.
[Edited 1/4/08 17:13pm]

Kstyles00 said:

makes him second rate...until he learns how to read music and learn his scales and theory like quincy jones,pharell williams,chick corea,herbie hancock.....he wont be considered a genius by other musicians

I'm sure Prince knows his scales and music theory. It's not necesarry to read music to know these things. Most guitar players know learn scales when they learn to play. Once you get good enough, you don't have to think about playing. What it somes down to, is that there's only 12 notes in our western scale and that's that. You just shut up and play yer guitar.

Don't know if Prince knows music theory or how to read music, but for the sake of argument, let's assume he doesn't.
He made:
Dirty Mind
1999
Purple Rain
Parade
SOTT
Lovesexy
Etc.
How would these albums be any better if he did know these things?
You can't improve upon perfection.

Accujack said:

they would be alot better becausw he would know not to use parallel octaves and correct voice leading

mirrorbestfriend said:

I'll be totally honest with you. I don't have a fucking clue what you are talking about, and I'm not so sure that you do either.
I know you're just yanking some chains (at least I hope you are). You know good and well that shit don't have anything to do with making great pop records.

Accujack said:

yes it does...thats why quincy is so good

Explain to me how Quincy Jones' music is any "better" than anyone else's.
I could care less about music theory. Just like anyone else, I like what I like because I like it.

RealMusician said:

Yeah, I hate it when I'm listening to a great song and realize that the notes don't belong together.

Who are these tools that mismatch notes?

If only they'd spent 20 years studying how to piece together music like a car part instead of playing shit that sounds good.