Hey guys!

I am sure that the song “Isn't She Lovely” by Stevie Wonder from his 1976 album “Songs in the Key of Life” doesn’t really need an introduction at this point. It has become a very popular Jazz and Pop standard, covered by a ton of artists over the years.

A very famous guitar interpretation of the tune is from the guitar duo album “Duet” released in 1999 by Biréli Lagrène and Sylvain Luc. From beginning to the end, this track contains a lot of wisdom and you will discover a treasure of cool licks.

You can find the full transcription of the recording (chords/melody and both solos) at the bottom of this page. But before you practice this, let’s have a more detailed look at some of the parts that we might draw some inspiration from.

First of all, the melody. You might have heard before that all great singers never sing the melody the same way twice. They always try to put a different touch on it by varying it a little bit, to make it more interesting and organic sounding.

This is an awesome example of how putting simple little embellishments on the original melody will make it sound much smoother and jazzy.

The melody is based on a simple G major pentatonic or G major scale. The motif of the melody always starts with the major 3rd and the perfect 4th. Now Biréli does slide from the minor 3rd into the major 3rd basically every time during the melody. Sliding from the minor 3rd into the major 3rd is a very easy trick to spice up a melody and “jazz up” your regular major pentatonic. If this is the first time you learning and memorizing a jazzy solo, knowing this little detail alone might help you as a mnemonic bridge or thought support to memorize the whole thing much easier.

Also notice that in the very first round, Biréli plays the next two notes on downbeats. Purposefully stiff, correct, and straight sounding. In the second round though, he simply starts anticipating the second note:

Little things like anticipating or even delaying the notes will make a melody sound more interesting and natural sounding.

As I have mentioned above, this recording is filled with great guitar licks and ideas so it will be impossible to cover all of this here, but let’s have a look into a few examples of the first solo that Sylvain Luc takes.

Sylvain starts with a simple idea on the 3rd and 4th string that is immediately followed by a response on the lower 5th string:

This is almost like a “call and response” technique that a piano player would instinctively play with his right and left hand. Sylvain divides this into different strings on the guitar.

It goes on for just about 3 - 4 bars, but it still gives the quick illusion of having two voices talk to each other. This is something you could use immediately for any other solo or scale you are practicing right now, without even playing the same notes as Sylvain does here.

In bar 53 we have a great minor lick over Em7:

Notice that many of the licks that are being played over the Em7 chord on this entire track never touch on the 13th or♭13th scale degree. Yes, the Em7 chord in “Isn't She Lovely” is the VIm7 chord and theoretically, you would have to play the Aeolian scale. But these licks never really outline or tell you if the tonality is Dorian, Aeolian, or sometimes Melodic Minor. They only hint at the tonality and carefully play around it. So you can universally use the minor licks you find in this transcription over any other minor chords easily.

Let’s take a closer look at how Biréli starts his solo in bar 81:

Before you try to analyze the note choices, pay close attention to the rhythms. Biréli plays a long stretch of triplets for 4 bars. If most people would play a long line of consecutive triplets, it would probably sound terribly constructed and boring! On top of that, Biréli starts his solo with a risky move like this…

How come this sounds so interesting? Any ideas?

As you can see Biréli is actually voice leading with upwards motion through the chord progression. He is maneuvering through a bunch of strange triads over the existing chords while at the same time keeping an ascending motion to it. This will make a long stretch of triplets sound more interesting and purposeful. This a concept you can try out for your guitar solos right away.

Isn't She Lovely - Biréli Lagrène & Sylvain Luc | Free PDF Guitar Solo Transcription