What up guys this is Amar from amarguitar.com, in this video I'll give you some tips on improvising over They Love Each Other, one of my favorite 3 chord Grateful Dead tunes. 

A lot of guitar players complain that when they improvise, it sounds like they're playing scales.

One of the most effective steps to train yourself out of that, is to learn the vocal melody of a tune, which is what we'll do in the first part of the lesson. 

It is a great way to train your fingers and your ears to think melodically, and break out of limiting habits. 

In the second part of the lesson, I'll give you a few easy ways to get started soloing in this song.

Scroll to the bottom of the page to get a copy of the PDF.  Grab your guitar and let's dive in!

Verse Melody

Here's the main verse melody that Jerry Garcia sings, arranged for lead guitar:

Jerry's vocal melody is based on the G major pentatonic scale, which sounds like this:

Chorus Melody

I like to play the chorus along the G string, on the 5th 7th and 9th frets. 

And then mix it up by adding Wes Montgomery-style octaves.

Octaves can be very tricky at first but keep going and you'll definitely get it!

Improvising Over The Verse

For soloing, we can use our G major pentatonic over the G chord in the verse progression.

Alternatively, we can add the minor third to give us the G Major Blues scale:

When we move to the C chord, we can use the C major blues scale over the C chord, which is also a sound that Jerry Garcia used a lot in They Love Each Other.

Improvising over the Chorus

For the chorus chords, we have two beats of F, two beats of C, and then four beats of G.

We can use the same shape of the Major Pentatonic scale and transpose them over each chord:

  • For the F Chord, we can use the F major pentatonic
  • For the C Chord, we can use the C major pentatonic
  • For the G Chord, we can use the G major pentatonic

Let's look at each of these:

Final Thoughts

When you're getting these scales under your fingers, make your first goal to have fun exploring the sounds that these scales create.

If you've got a question, let me know in the comments or by e-mail, social media, or carrier pigeon.

PDF of They Love Each Other – Lead Guitar

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