Learn to play this Tritone Exercise

This is a fun and great-sounding exercise that works the fingers and develops picking technique moving across the neck three strings at a time. The concentration is on the interval of the tritone (augmented 4th/diminished 5th). Play 1–2–3, 1–2–3, 1–2–4, 1–3–4 across the neck and then reverse this 4–3–1, 4–2–1, 3–2–1, 3–2–1 when returning from the high E string. Start on the 1st fret and work your way up and down the neck.

You can also reverse the order from the low E string, etc. 3–2–1, 3–2–1, 4–2–1, 4–3–1 and back from the high E string 1–3–4, 1–2–4, 1–2–3, 1–2–3, or just take any of these 3-note cells and move them up and down the neck.

About the author

Russ Spiegel is a commissioned composer and arranger as well as a highly respected guitarist, producer, bandleader, writer, musicologist, and award-winning sound engineer. He received his undergraduate degree in Philosophy from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and continued his studies in Jazz Performance, Composition, and Arranging at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Afterwards, Russ spent more than a decade living and performing in Europe, recording a number of albums, performing at numerous jazz festivals, receiving the city of Frankfurt, Germany’s prestigious Jazz Stipendium award (1999). In 2001 he returned to the US, settling in country’s jazz capital of New York City, quickly becoming an established part of the music scene. Russ earned his master’s degree in Jazz Performance at City College of New York on a Barbash scholarship (2004-06) before going on to receive his doctorate in Jazz Composition at the University of Miami Frost School of Music as a Henry Mancini Institute Fellow (2013-16).