Arpeggio Connections (Major)

Peter Sklaroff
(Chromatic Root Progression - play through all 12 keys)

bœ bœ nœ bœ bœ
&C œ œ œ œ œ bœ nœ #œ nœ œ bœ
5 (Minor 3rd Root Progression - play through all 12 keys)
bœ bœ bœ œ œ #œ
œ b œ b œ œ
& œ nœ œ œ bœ bœ
9 (Cycle Root Progression - play through all 12 keys)

nœ œ œ bœ bœ
& nœ œ œ bœ
œ œ bœ œ œ œ bœ
13 (Whole Tone Root Progression - play through all 12 keys)
œ nœ œ #œ #œ
& œ nœ œ œ #œ œ #œ #œ
œ nœ #œ

Notes: Each of these exercises is to be played within a range of five frets only. (*You can however use open strings,
which technically gives you a span of 'six frets', when you are at the beginning of the fingerboard 1st-5th frets)

The five fret 'blocks' of the fingerboard are: *1st-5th fret, 5th-9th fret, 9th-13th fret.

Play each of the above exercises through ALL 12 keys. Only the first four keys are shown in the illustrations above.
The major arpeggios are all played alternately ascending and then descending in quavers (eighth notes)
Fingering is up to you. You will also find that some arpeggios have several fingering possibilities within a five fret span.

Use alternate picking throughout, beginning with a downstroke of the pick and then an upstroke.
When you have completed the exercise, play it again reversing the pick attack by starting with an upstroke/d-stroke.

As a reminder, the root progressions are as follows:

a) CHROMATIC - C, Db, D, Eb, E, F, Gb, G, Ab, A, Bb, B,

b) MINOR 3rds - C, Eb, Gb, A / Db, E, G, Bb / D, F, Ab, B

c) CYCLE OF 4ths - C. F. Bb, Eb, Ab, Db, Gb, B, E, A, D, G,

d) WHOLETONE - C, D, E, Gb, Ab, Bb / Db, Eb, F, G, A, B,

Initially play the exercises without a metronome to check for fingerings etc. Once you are completely comfortable with
all the major arpeggios then start playing with the metronome set at 60 BPM.

Increase the BPM gradually until you can play all the exercises at 120 BPM or above with no errors.

Copyright © P.Sklaroff 2011