Arpeggio Ideas

by Mike Campese

Welcome Back Everyone!!!!

I hope everything is well. I'm happy to announce the release of my new cd "Vibe". So feel free to check it out on
my website at www.mikecampese.com.

This time I'm going to give you some fun arpeggio licks that I use in my playing and hope that you will learn from
them and make up your own arpeggio-licks. Be sure you follow the fingerings above the notation. Lets get
started...

Example 1:
We have 4 arpeggios from the key of C major on the first 3 strings.
The first arpeggio is a C major (C,E,G)
the 2nd one is B dim (B,D,F)
the 3rd one is Am (A,C,E) and
the last one is G Major (G,B,D).

These are some of my favorite arpeggio shapes,you can really get these flying up and down the neck. I don't use
sweep picking for these, I alternate pick the notes and use a pull off on the first string. Make sure you move these
shapes around the neck to different keys.

Click HERE to hear Mike play the example above...

Example 2:
Now we are going to do string skipping arpeggios. This is a really cool way to play arpeggios.
This is a lick from my "Vibe" CD, its a small segment of the song "The Whip". The arpeggios are played on the first
4 strings,but we don't even play the B-string.

The first arp is an Em arp (E,G,B), the 2nd arp is G major (G,B,D ), the 3rd arp is a F#m (F#,A,C#) and the last
one is D# dim (D#,F#,A)
I use hammer-ons and pull-offs to make them more fluent sounding. The progression is based off a E dorian scale
except the D#dim, which is from the E harmonic minor scale.

Click HERE to hear Mike play the example above...

Example 3:
This is the main theme from my song "Touch the Sky" from my "Full Circle" CD.
The arpeggios are based off the E major Scale (E,F#,G#,A,B,C#,D#) in 6/8 time. The first arp is a E maj9.
(E,G#,B,D#,F#).
The 2nd one is a C#m7#5 arp (C#,E,A,B) and the last one is a B add9 arp (B,D#,F#,C#).
I don't use any sweep picking for this one either, just alternate picking.

Click HERE to hear Mike play the example above...

Example 4:
Our last lick starts off with some extended arps, in the first bar we have a F#-11 arp (F#,A,C#,E,G#,B).
I rearranged the notes so it drapes across the neck. The next arp is Gadd9#11 (G,A,B,C#D) which is based off the
G lydian scale. Playing this one, I again spread the notes across the neck... pretty cool, huh?

The second measure uses smaller triad arps A Maj (A,C#,E), G maj (G,B,D). The last 2 arps are Bm7 (B,D,F#,A)
and F#m7 (F#,A,C#,E). The last measure of this lick sounds great over a A Dom11 chord, because the notes in
the triads A and G make up that chord.

Again no sweeping is used, but feel free to experiment.

Click HERE to hear Mike play the example above...

This wraps up our lesson! I hope you find it inspiring. Feel free to email me any questions you might have.

Take care
Mike