Trying to do my own solo for the first time need advice.

[slope]

I am currently listening to a backing track in Am. But I don't know how to best do a solo over this jamtrack. I only know first position pentatonic yet, so root note on fifth fret of the sixth string (thick E string).

I can kind of work out how to do this, but as I only know first position the sound I make is kind of lame. Would changing root note along with the chord progression help? Like swap position? Or should I just play the varies notes within the 2 octave pentatonic minor A scale, and try to come up with more melodies?

So far I've stayed put in the first position with root on the fifth fret, the A note on the E string. It does sound ok-ish and does not sound wrong, but at the same time does not sound very interesting or worthwhile listening to.
If it is possible to move that shape around, where should I move it, and when? On each chord change? Or kind of "in between" kind of like the bass walk from one chord to the next if that make sense.

Here is the chord progression;

| Dm7 | G7 | C | Am7 | Bm 7 | E7 | Am7 | A7 |

I noodle around to I find notes that fits the progression.


And one final thing that kind of got me puzzled:
What surprised me was I accidentally played the wrong note on the B string, it was the F on the 6th fret. From what I have seen the F is not part of the A minor pentatonic scale. The note I was aiming for was in fact the E. But it didn't sound bad or wrong it kind of sounded right.
Why does that F fit in with the A minor pentatonic scale? Or does it really fit in?
I've tried it over and over and still seems to be ok.

Here is the jam track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idTePWt5Ez4

<font color="#494949"><span style="font-family: &amp;amp">

[BetThisNameAintTaken]

Two SUPERB lessons to take to help you understand this are
Blues Roots to Rock particularly lesson 1 http://members.jamplay.com/workshops/workshop/9

and Jam Tracks More Fun Less Theory http://members.jamplay.com/workshops/workshop/32

[slope]

I was kind of hoping for some general pointers, just ain't got the time to work my way thru the entire lesson at the moment. I am sure that is a great lesson and as soon as I got some spare time that lesson will be on my to do list.

I kind of stumbled across something called Aeolian scale and for that scale I can see the note F is played on the B string.

This led me into thinking what other notes can be played when playing a pentatonic scale? Yeah I know PENTA. But humor me, I am at the fifth fret playing a pentatonic, and the F note on the B string fits well to my ear. What other notes could I add in to give it a little tweak without mastering more position og scales?

[BetThisNameAintTaken]

I think the best way to answer that is to suggest you pick all the notes while the track is playing and see what works. You are never more than half a note away from a good one. That was what Dave Walliman taught in his more fun and less theory lessons.

[deannabonds]

Hi slope
For the progression | Dm7 | G7 | C | Am7 | Bm 7 b5 | E7 | Am7 | A7 | The First thing to notice is that it is D Dorian mode.

How do I know it is D Dorian mode? The first clue is to look at the G7 in the middle of a progression. If you know your harmonized
diatonic scale, you know that the only major chord with a dominant 7th is the V. As a reminder the harmonized scale is
I ii iii IV V vi and vii(b5) and with 7ths it is I(maj 7) ii7 iii7 IV(maj 7) V7 vi7 vii7(b5)
[Uppercase roman numerals are Major chords, lower case are minor chords]

Back to the G7. If we are dealing with G7 being the V7, then we know the I chord is C (from the circle of 5ths, or you could just know how to find
a 5th on the guitar fretboard and find the C). We can test that theory by applying that pattern to the harmonized scale pattern and see if
the chords match

C Dm Em F G Am Bm(b5) and all the chords match but the last A7 (more on that later)

So we know we can play out of the C maj scale (anywhere on the neck and we will be in key).
While playing out of this scale, or any scale for that matter, always be aware what the chord tones of
the chord underneath are.
During the Dm7 The D note sounds the strongest, F and A still sounding strong but not as stable as D.
Then during the G7, G will be strongest, but the other chord tones sound good too.
This goes for all the chords. Be aware of the chord at all times.

There are other ways of playing and thinking about this. Each has a slightly different sound.
The most common way would be to play out of Dm pentatonic. The same thing applies to
being aware of the chord underneath. It sounds good to also add in the chord tones to the Dm pentatonic
and make sure you are not landing on notes that clash with the chord tones. The concept of target (or landing)
notes are important. These are the notes that you want to emphasize in your current phrase that matches the chord.
Target notes are usually the notes you want a phrase to resolve to, but also it is good to start a phrase on them.
The exception to this is when you want to create tension, then you should be playing a tension note.
A lot of music uses this method.

The more jazzy way of playing this is to change pentatonic's on each chord change. I find this harder since
you have to mentally switch the chord scale before you start playing. That context switch for me takes too
much time. Still working on that.

Now about the A7 at the end. The most important chord progression is the cadence. The cadence tells the listener
that this is the end of the phrase. In a perfect cadence, it is a V7 to I or a V7 to i.
In the Dorian mode the v is a minor chord, so we don't get the perfect cadence sound. To have the cadence sound
we substitute a major chord for the fifth (as a V7) only when we are ending the phrase.
Now a D minor pentatonic has 1 note that clashes with the V7 (A7), it is the C. In D Dorian it is a C natural, in A7 it is a
C#. The easy way to deal with this is just over this chord modify the pentatonic to have a C#. You could avoid a C altogether,
but it sounds really cool to throw that C# in there. When you break down the theory of what you have actually done here, you are
actually playing D harmonic minor over this chord. But it is much easier to think about it as just changing that one note in the pentatonic.

Now all this can be applied to ANY pentatonic form. So it isn't just a form 1 thing. You can use the same reasoning for almost any progression,
blues has slightly different rules. All of this is movable anywhere.

All that is kind of long winded, hope it helps.

[slope]

Thx all. Much obliged.