rock – Modern Music Theory Improvisation and Application

John McLaughlin’s Pentatonic’s for Coltrane Changes:[Giant Steps]

Posted on November 29, 2025November 29, 2025 by Modern Music Theory and Application

Hi Guys,

Today, a quick look at John McLaughlin’s “Pentatonic” guitar concepts for playing over the Coltrane Changes.

Although I am employing alternate picking guitar technique at quite a fast rate, these pentatonic’s simplify things enormously.

THE RHYTHMIC SIDE OF THINGS:

To keep the solo line tight, we will count in a basic manner,

1 and 2 and 3 and 4 and

This way, you will know where you are in the bar and what chord you are playing over.

To begin with I use the B major pentatonic scale. Next, I employ a simple 2 finger pentatonic scale over D7 and GMaj7.

I then play the second part [same fingering] up a semitone and land on the note D for the EbMaj7 chord, counting 1 2 3 4 in preparation for the next chord.

Sheet music diagram showing giant steps chord names BMaj7, D7, GMaj7, Bb7, and EbMaj7, along with tablature for guitar. John McLaughlin version. — John McLaughlin Giant Steps BMaj7, D7, GMaj7, Bb7, and EbMaj7 for guitar players.

For the first three chords I play what could be called “A Dorian Pentatonic”. But, I am not really thinking in that way. [I am just adding the F# note for the 3rd of D7]. This in turn creates a very simple and “Fluid” guitar fingering that is very common to most guitar players and hence easy to play.

Sheet music featuring john mclaughlin guitar tablature for Am7, D7, GMaj7, Bb7, EbMaj7, and F#7 giant steps chords. — John McLaughlin giant steps guitar chords Am7, D7, Gmaj7, Bb7, EbMaj7, F#7, and BMaj7.

On the F#7 chord I play an F#7 arpeggio that then resolves into an Eb minor arpeggio for the BMaj7 chord.

John McLaughlin Sheet music showing guitar tablature for the chords BMaj7, EbMaj7, and F#7, with annotations. — McLaughlin Musical notation showcasing the BMaj7 and EbMaj7 chords alongside the F#7 arpeggio.

For then next part, I again employ a simple Pentatonic to get through the first three chords.

This Bb minor leaning works well because over the Bb7 chord it gives us the “Blue note”. Finally we use our A Dorian Pentatonic again to resolve to GMaj7 for our last three chords.

Sheet music displaying John McLaughlin's chord progressions and tablature for Fm7, Bb7, EbMaj7, Am7, D7, and GMaj7 in giant stpes improvisation

Here, I just use C#m pentatonic and F# Pentatonic to land on the D# to nail the change to the BMaj7 chord. Very simple and very common guitar fingering.

John McLaughlin musical sheet showing chord progressions for C#m7, F#7, and BMaj7 with annotations for specific notes. — Musical notation highlighting C#m7, F#7, and BMaj7 chords for McLaughlin’s giant steps.

For the last part, I employ an Fm9 arpeggio and a C minor pentatonic scale that then goes up a semitone and repeats our C#m7 F#7 to Bmaj7 phrase.

Sheet music displaying Fm7, Bb7, and EbMaj7 John McLaughlin chords with tablature for guitar. — Music notation for Fm7, Bb7, and EbMaj7 chords, illustrating McLaughlin guitar techniques.

But, this time we land on an F# for the 5th of BMaj7.

A musical sheet showing the John McLaughlin chords C#m7, F#7, and BMaj7 with corresponding tablature. — John McLaughlin guitar pentatonic’s example

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John McLaughlin Rhythm Guitar Techniques: Pedal Notes Revisited.

Posted on December 5, 2024December 5, 2024 by Modern Music Theory and Application

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Please watch video above for detailed info:

Hi Guys,

Today, a quick look at how JohnMcLaughlin creates interesting time signatures with his rhythm guitar playing by employing the open E string as a pedal note.

This unique approach to rhythm guitar makes it easy to play in odd time signatures and create alternate time signatures.

Okay, so what is this E Pedal Note?

This is the open E string that is plucked as the time keeper.

mclaughlin-pedal-note-rhythm-guitar-technique-lesson

[It can also play rhythms and add rhythmic drive of its own as we will see later on].

Let’s begin with simple quarter notes: Here, will will add chords on beats 2 and 4.

Now, we will do the same thing but with 8th notes as the pedal bass:

Let’s take this further with 16th notes creating that rhythmic drive:

To create another useful effect we will play the chords on the off-beat:

Now, let’s mix it all together by applying all of the 1/4 1/8th and 16th notes in the E pedal bass!

MANIPULATING THE 16 BEAT CYCLE:

This is really useful because we can play odd/ uncommon time signatures and also alternate time signatures.

Let’s start by exploiting Indian “‘Teen Taal” or a 16 beat cycle and then alter it.

Above, we can see the 16 beat cycle with the accented red numbers/Beats 1 5 9 13

Now, we will count this and accent the numbers/beats 1 5 9 13 and repeat the cycle until it is effortless to do.

Next, we will break this cycle up, and only count to 11. From here, we will create a loop with our E pedal note holding time in quarter notes. So we have, 1 5 9 [11] REPEAT.

This in turn gives us an 11/4 time signature:

john-mclaughlin-pedal-note-rhythm-guitar-technique-lesson

From this point on we can see how easy it is to create interesting odd time signatures and rhythmic patterns with the E pedal as our base and time keeper.

Our understanding of beats 5 and 9 tells us where we are in the bar or beat cycle and hence what might sound complex in theory is actually pretty easy to do and exploit.

ALTERNATE TIME SIGNATURES:

These, are the combing of two or more different time signatures.

Here we employ a bar of 5/4 and a bar of 7/4. We will highlight the E pedal bass note with some quarter and eighth notes for good measure.

CONCLUSION:

This was just a brief look at this concept, but, exploiting just one of these techniques can lead to lots of interesting and useful guitar rhythms and time signature manipulations.

The E Pedal note as the time keeper is so useful because it means that we are in control of the timing/signatures and can accent chords off of it.

Lastly, these techniques are incredible for composition/songwriting. We hear this a lot with John McLaughlin’s Shakti, especially the great albums from the 1970’s where the rhythm of the acoustic guitar is prominent.

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The End of Guitar Techniques Magazine: A Tribute

Posted on November 16, 2024November 20, 2024 by Modern Music Theory and Application

Hi Guys,

Just a quick video [above] looking at the death/closure of the guitar magazine:

For me, the guitar magazine was an important part of guitar culture and a great source of learning, especially in the old days where there was very little information about.

The most important, educational and best UK guitar magazine was “Guitar Techniques” which has sadly published its last copy.

For me, this magazine was an amazing concept with real in depth and valuable lessons from the likes of, Shaun Baxter, Pete Callard and Guthrie Govan.

Examples of some truly great work!

Shaun Baxter……

Pete Callard…….

Guthrie Govan…..

guitar-techniques-magazine-guthrie-govan-example

Every subject under the sun was investigated and captured in detail. Explained with clarity and easy to execute on our guitars!

So, enjoy the video above if you were like myself a guitar mag nerd [lol!], as it is really just a tribute to the great magazines and an age and culture of a time now seemingly gone by.

Last cover: The Final Guitar Techniques Magazine R.I.P