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John McLaughlin’s Solo on the John Coltrane Tune, “Impressions” : Pick’s Transcription Workshop
Meet Lucas Pickford
John Coltrane’s seminal modal jazz composition ‘Impressions’ is as challenging as anything he composed even though it only has two chords in it. The form is 16 bars of D-7 followed by a bridge section of Ebmin7 for 8 bars, and finally 8 more bars of D-7 again at which point the form repeats. The default scale/mode used to improvise over both these minor chords, is the Dorian Mode.
*So for the D-7 the Dorian Scale looks like this:
D-E-F-G-A-B-C-D
*For the Eb-7 the Dorian Scale looks like this:
Eb-F-Gb-Ab-Bb-C-Db-Eb
Although the default scale for the chords in this tune is the Dorian Scale, John McLaughlin’s solo is by no means completely relegated to using just the Dorian Scale. McLaughlin makes liberal use of both chromaticism and also of the Melodic Minor Scale in which the 7th degree of the scale is major. This adds a different color so to speak to both minor chords. I will cover the Melodic Minor Scale in more detail in future columns. Suffice to say that the master improviser (in this case guitarist John McLaughlin) incorporates several different melodic devices, scales, intervals, modes, and chromatic passing notes to get the widest array of colors available to him or her. This solo has a lot of 32nd notes in it. Don’t be scared by this. It’s not so important that you play this solo rhythmically perfect but rather that you discover the different melodic shapes and note patterns that are in this solo. Pick out the lines you really like and hear, and then begin to add them to your own melodic vocabulary. Many of McLaughlin’s lines lay very comfortably on the bass fingerboard because of the similarity between the guitar and the bass guitar. This is especially true if you play a 5 or 6 string bass with a high C string. I think you’ll find this solo technically challenging while at the same time it will begin to open up your ears to the sound of mixing straight modal playing with highly chromatic passages. When both of these ways of playing are combined it sounds really cool. Good luck with this. See you in the summer!
Please click below below to download the transcription of guitarist John McLaughlin’s solo on the John Coltrane tune called “Impressions.”
John_McLaughlin-Impressions-Jun09
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Photo: Self-portrait by Melissa Auf Der Maur
Melissa Auf Der Maur is a Canadian bassist who played with Tinker, Hole, and The Smashing Pumpkins. She released her own work and is a photographer with photos published in Nylon, Bust, and National Geographic. She released her ‘90s Rock Memoir “Even The Good Girls Will Cry” on 17 March 2026.
KB: Did you always want to be a singer-musician growing up?
I’ve played music my whole life. In school, I played trumpet and sang in a children’s choir, so music was always within me. My mother was the first female disc jockey on the Montreal airwaves; her record collection played a huge role in my inspiration and love of music.
KB: When did you start playing bass, and why this instrument?
When I was 19, the early 90s music explosion began to percolate in tiny clubs around the world. I was lucky to be a ticket girl at Montreal’s underground music club. In one year, I saw Hole, Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins, White Zombie, and The Breeders – all had female bass players. That’s when the seed was planted. By the age of 22, I was the bass player of Hole.
KB: Which brands of basses have you used in your career, and which one are you using now?
The first bass that I learned on was a vintage Squier Precision. Hole was sponsored by Fender guitars, so I upgraded to Fender Custom Shop Precisions. That is all I play, but I have a cool vintage 8-string Greco that I use on recordings to thicken up guitar parts.
KB: What equipment do you use or have you used with your basses?
Ampeg SVT amps and cabinets, a couple of Sans-Amp pedals, and that is it.
KB: How did you become a member of Hole, and what is your fondest memory of that time?
Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins was helping scout a replacement for (RIP) Kristen Pfaff, Hole’s bass player. My band, Tinker, opened for them on the Siamese Dream tour, so Billy had seen me play and could vouch for me. Courtney trusted her talented friend, and that was it. I initially said “no thank you” due to my commitment to my photographic studies and the drama and chaos surrounding the band during the “Live Through This” album release. Courtney took it as a good sign that I said no, so convinced me to reconsider, and soon after, I accepted their invitation, in the name of helping put females in the male-dominated landscape of rock music. My fondest memory is every show we played as a mostly female band, symbolizing what a woman could do in a rock band. Every show had a purpose: get more women to play music.
KB: You are a photographer as well. What makes a great picture? Do you shoot in color or b/w?
I started shooting photographs at age 15. Initially only shot black & white and worked in the art school darkroom. In university, I took a color photography course, and shifted mostly and forever to that, because it was easier to process film on the road when I joined a rock band. I experimented with many cameras, point and shoots, manual, polaroids, medium format, and vintage finds. The trick to a good photograph is to shoot many and all the time – the magic is in the edit and selection process.
KB: Are there artists you would love to collaborate with or wish you had?
??I’ve been lucky to collaborate with some of my favorite musicians in my career. I would still love to collaborate with a new generation heavy electronic artist on an analog bass, heavy electronic drums, and synths collaboration project. Take me out of my usual zone, merging the past and future: my love of 80s dark new wave and new artists exploring that genre. It was very futuristic back then, and we are now, after all, living in the future. I am in the mood to play bass to heavy beats I want to dance to.
KB: What are your 7 favorite bass lines in music across all genres? And why these 7?
“Mountain Song” – Jane’s Addiction (love a rambling, rolling bass line – feels like the ocean waves)
“Black Top – Helmet” (was the first bass line I taught myself)
“Gold Dust Woman” – Hole from “The Crow 2” Soundtrack (it was my first bass line contribution to the band)
“Get Ready” – The Temptations (Motown just feels so good, because of the bass)
“Lucretia My Reflection” – Sisters of Mercy (makes me want to hit the dance floor and play bass simultaneously)
“Be My Druidess” – Type O Negative (full chord bass playing at its best by iconic, demonic, Peter Steele, RIP)
“Romantic Rights” – Death from Above (1979 – unique distorted overdriven tone, combined dance rhythm and melodic intelligence, all in one shot – also! Shout out to a bass & drum only band, which is awesome, and we should have more of, but the bass player needs to be a killer to fill that role.
KB: What are you currently up to?
Releasing my ‘90s Rock Memoir “EVEN THE GOOD GIRLS WILL CRY”. Visceral healing process, it was to get it out of me and write it, but I suspect the real magic will begin by putting it into the world and reflecting with others on what the magic of the ‘90s was all about. Powerful music decade that carried us into what is now a brave new world of digital corporate weirdness – may the past shed a light on our future. That’s my hope for this book release and tour.
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