“This way, there’s a straight-line connection between the solo and the song itself”: Trying to craft a memorable solo? Revisit hooks from a song’s melody

A black-and-white image of David Grissom playing his signature PRS.

A great approach to crafting a memorable and musically effective solo is to revisit a melodic hook, theme and/or technique that appeared earlier in the tune. This way, there’s a straight-line connection between the solo and the song itself.

In this column, I’d like to present my approach to soloing over my tune Way Down Deep, which involves drawing on its main parts.