Free Flamenco Guitar Lesson 11: Phrygian Degrees
This lesson is probably the most important in all of these introductory lessons, because it will teach you about the basic construction of music. When you understand how the notes in the melody are related to each other, to the harmonic structure, and to the underlying scale, you will not just be playing notes, but you will have a deeper sense of why certain notes and chords occur in a given piece.
The degrees of a mode are simply the chords that are built on each note in the mode. The first four degrees of E Phrygian mode are as follows: E major, F major, G major, and A minor. These are the degrees that occur most commonly in a traditional Solea (Soleares) piece. You will also find them in other forms.
After your instructor plays each degree chord, he demonstrates the partial chord forms on the first four strings. Learning these partial chord forms will come handy when you play certain transitions, or when you want to imply the harmony but do not complete the full chord for textural reasons, such as having no available left-hand fingers, or alternatively, prefer the sound of the partial chord in that particular passage of music.
Learn these degree chords well, because we will be using these raw harmonic materials to construct our first Soleares falsetta.
Before you do, however, there is one more important iingredient you need to learn before you play your first Soleares falsetta. That ingredient is the all-important compas, or basic rhythmic structure of Soleares. Your next lesson will teach you about this unique facet of Flamenco music.
