Articulation-driven Fingering Strategies For Jazz Guitar

This study examines how bebop articulation principles can serve as a framework for determining guitar fingerings for Charlie Parker’s melodic material. There are two challenges that guitar players face when performing Parker's lines: the difficulty of finding fingerings that support stylistically authentic articulation and the non-idiomatic sound produced by alternate picking.A literature review and analysis of Parker's playing was conducted to identify the characteristic saxophone articulations. Guitar-equivalent techniques along with their respective fingering requirements were then established in order to approximate these articulations. The techniques were applied to Charlie Parker's motives to derive fingerings that support idiomatic phrasing. The resulting fingerings were organized into four positions on the guitar fretboard designed for practical application.This process produced fingering solutions that prioritize idiomatic articulation and the positional frameworks enable guitar players to improvise stylistically authentic phrases without having to worry about technique or alternate fingerings. keywords: Guitar, jazz, bebop, articulation, fingerings, improvisation