Paul Marossy's Blog - The Improvising Guitarist

A Word About "SonKist"

I was feeling kind of down yesterday morning and I took out my acoustic and started playing it. It was still in my favorite alternate tuning - D, A, D, F#, A, D. Before I knew it, I had a nice sounding little progression. So this morning I decided to try and record something, and this is what came out. Three guitar parts on this tune - one with chords, one is doing various harmonics and the other one is a classical guitar. Whenever I do something like this, I am reminded of Phil Keaggy who crea… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on June 30, 2009 at 8:00am — No Comments

A Word About "The Journey"

This is something I initially recorded on 5/8/09, right before leaving on a short weekend vacation. When I returned, I added the keyboard part to it and then my friend in Texas added the drums to it. I like how it turned out, I like the feel of it and the tone of the guitar. This is another example of what I call "intervallic composition", where a lot of what I'm playing is strictly certain intervals between two strings. On this one, I'm using a vintage Colorsound wah circuit that I built mysel… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on May 17, 2009 at 8:00pm — 2 Comments

A Word About "Experiment #1"

"Experiment #1" is really just that, kind of an experiment - more so than my other tunes anyway. I was messing around with a chord progression idea I've been playing with for a little while and thought I'd also try doing that octave thing I hear so much these days (but I don't think that I really like it for my own tunes much, however). The rhythm guitar heard mostly on the left channel is the DiMarzio FRED pickup on the bridge of my SpankenStrat. The other guitar is my Mojo Nitefly using the ne… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on August 19, 2008 at 8:30am — No Comments

A Word About "Can You Hear The Sound?"

This one started out as something I just stumbled on one morning while practicing. I kept adding parts to it over the course of a week or so until I thought it had enough substance to become a piece of music. I am playing all of the instruments on this one, and it was recorded all on the same evening. It also the musical interpretation of a vision I had of a war in the spiritual realm, the classical battle between good and evil, if you will. More specifically, it is a vision of the ongoing war… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on July 28, 2008 at 7:00am — No Comments

A Word About “Panic Attack”

This is just a drum solo that I recorded last night and is something I’ve just been goofing around with trying to see how fast I can play. This theme kept coming up, so I decided to connect the drum set to the AW16G and record it. It’s a first take, after doing a couple of trial runs. I guess I’m not doing too bad for a guy who has literally only been playing drums for about eight weeks. I think I am definitely influenced by all of the drum work of Chad Wackerman and Gary Husband on the Allan H… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on March 6, 2008 at 7:08am — No Comments

A Word About "Hidden Place"

This is another spontaneous tune that came about from sitting down at the keyboard this afternoon. There's three keyboard parts, a bass line and my Parker Mojo Nitefly thru my DOD FX-17 wah/volume pedal for the volume swells. The keyboard is my Yamaha S08. There's lots of great patches on that thing. On 2/17/08, Gary Oppert graciously added some percussion to this track for me. Gary is a great drummer and is writing music with Steve Sexton and Brandon Vaughn. They just released their first "OSV… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on February 17, 2008 at 3:00pm — No Comments

A Word About "Belt Of Bombs"

This one is built around a 5/4 drum groove I have been messing around with. It only took about a week of practice before I decided to try and record it. This is the second version I came up with, after many takes. Not too bad for a guy who has only really been playing drums for a couple of weeks. I have never knowingly played anything in 5/4 time before.

Anyhow, the bass line is really kind of the first thing I thought of when I plugged the bass in. It was massaged a little bit, but it

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on February 7, 2008 at 8:02am — No Comments

A Word About "Wholed Me"

This tune happened very spontaneously and I recorded all the parts in about one hour's time. The guitar part was a first take, played along with a patch from my Alesis AR-16 drum machine. All I really wanted to do with it was to demonstrate to myself what nifty things I could do with the whole tone scale and Allan Holdsworth's "Most Usable Scale 10", some chromatic runs and a few other various scales thrown in there. I played my Parker Mojo Nitefly thru my '73 Maestro Boomerang wah pedal, whi

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 22, 2008 at 7:45am — No Comments

A Word About "The Green Room"

This is another tune that kind of takes me to a place I haven't been, musically speaking. I'm messing around with my Yamaha S08 keyboard on this one, too. There's a lot of nice sounds for recording on that keyboard. And I'm finally putting it to use after 2-1/2 years of it sitting around...… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:59pm — No Comments

A Word About "Stratosphere"

I was goofing around with the keyboard again and came up with this tune. I called it "Stratosphere". It's just a basic drum loop, two keyboard parts, bass and my Mojo Nitefly. This was one of the rare times when I could kind of clearly hear all the parts in my head. It's pretty different for me, but it has my usual dreamscape kind of feel. I do really like the Tangerine Dream album called "Stratosfear", but I di

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:59pm — No Comments

A Word About "When I'm With You"

I recorded a slow, flowery piece of music again...

It's called "When I'm With You", and it is a II-V-I thing that I was playing around with a little bit before just going for it at the recorder. I laid down most of it yesterday and mixed it down this morning.

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:58pm — No Comments

A Word About "Chit Chat"

"Chit Chat" is a drum-bass groove that I recorded about a year ago. One morning I decided to add a new guitar part to it. It's basically using variants of the good old pentatonic scale and the whole tone scale thrown in there, too. It reminds me of a Steve Vai meets Scott Henderson sounding kind of thing, or maybe a little like Frank Zappa. The electric part is a first take after a quick run thru of what I wante

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:58pm — No Comments

Allan Holdsworth Scales & Theory De-Mystified

For a long time, I have been stumped by Allan Holdsworth's choice of scales. I have tried many different scales and modes and none of them ever really got close, except for the whole tone scale, which still wasn't quite right.

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:57pm — No Comments

Paul Marossy In Guitar Player Magazine (8/2007)

One of the most notable days from 2007 was when I was informed by a reliable source that I made it into the August 2007 issue of Guitar Player Magazine! (In the "Editor Boy Big 8" section)

I heard about this at the Parker Guitar forum where I hang out most of the time:

"Hey Paul, I was just reading the new Guitar Player and saw where they gave a nod to your work with Steve Sexton on MySpace. Congratulatio

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:54pm — No Comments

3 Tasty Scales- Extended Lydian Mode, Whole Tone and Extended Pentatonic

Here's three scales that I really like to use, two of which sound pretty distinctive.

1. "Extended" Lydian Mode. I call it this becaus

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:54pm — No Comments

A Word About "I Let Go"

This is another thing that I threw together in a couple of hours to try out some ideas on a piece with lots of "texture". I am playing some colorful chords, like a 13th #5 #7 and various other favorites that I have (not sure what they all are!). I am using three different scales - pentatonic, phrygian mode and selected notes from the harmonic major scale. I like the way they all go together.

Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:52pm — No Comments

A Word About "Wild Ride"

On this fun little tune, I was having some real fun with the Melodic Minor Scale, Lydian Mode, alternating fretted & open string notes, and the major thirds & minor 6th parts with the intense wah going on. Recorded with my Parker Mojo Nitefly, of course. The electric guitar part was done in my typical improv style, with a more thought out bass line than I usually do. The V2 is on the end of the name because it is Versi

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:52pm — No Comments

A Word About "Sexton Demo 1"

Last June, I was tentatively going to be doing some colloboration with a guy named Steve Sexton on MySpace. He asked me if I would like to play guitar on some tracks for his OSV Project. The OSV Project consists of Gary Oppert (drums), Steve Sexton (bass) and Brandon Vaughn (keyboard) and various guitarists on MySpace. Their concept is to record solid backing tracks to be brought to completion by guitarists of their choosing.

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Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:50pm — No Comments

A Word About "Sexton Demo 2"

When Steve Sexton sent me this track, as I was listening to it, I got strong feelings that this tune was telling the story of Absalom. The beginning is like the rift between father and son, the middle part is the tension between trying to take over the kingdom and staying alive and the end part is his attempt to escape and meeting his sudden demise. My guitar playing is attempting to convey the kind of chaotic thinking that mu

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 14, 2008 at 7:48pm — No Comments

A Word About "Tears Of War"

I just sat down and recorded this piece one morning. It employs an ebow and it is something that I was playing around with for a little while, and I decided to do it on my fretless electric guitar this morning. Everything is a first take and I think that contributes to the unrehearsed spontaneous feel of the tune. I'm using three different presets on my Zoom 9030 - I even got to use the "bomb effect" preset for something! It o

… Continue

Added by Paul Marossy on January 12, 2008 at 2:30pm — No Comments

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Paul Marossy's Blog (23)

A Word About "SonKist"

A Word About "The Journey"

A Word About "Experiment #1"

A Word About "Can You Hear The Sound?"

A Word About “Panic Attack”

A Word About "Hidden Place"

A Word About "Belt Of Bombs"

A Word About "Wholed Me"

A Word About "The Green Room"

A Word About "Stratosphere"

A Word About "When I'm With You"

A Word About "Chit Chat"

Allan Holdsworth Scales & Theory De-Mystified

Paul Marossy In Guitar Player Magazine (8/2007)

3 Tasty Scales- Extended Lydian Mode, Whole Tone and Extended Pentatonic

A Word About "I Let Go"

A Word About "Wild Ride"

A Word About "Sexton Demo 1"

A Word About "Sexton Demo 2"

A Word About "Tears Of War"

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