As one of the steps towards learning how to improvise, I am trying to learn to play arpeggio's of the chords from a page of chord changes, linking the arpeggio's by going to the nearest note of the next one. However, this is proving to be amazingly difficult for me. I know the major 7th, minor 7th, and dominant 7th shapes in all the positions, I know what each scale degree of each note in the pattern is, and I know all the notes ( letter names) in the chords i need to play over.
I can manage to play the arpeggio's if I start on the root on the 5th or 6th string every time, but making the jump to playing them without jumping to the root is not coming easily. The problem is that i rarely think of actual notes (A,B,C etc.) but think of scale degree. So when I go to switch from one chord to the next it is difficult because I usually don't know what note I am on.
After all of that here are my question(s).
Is it wrong to think of scale degrees instead of notes all the time?
(difficult question to ask lol... here it goes)
When changing chords should I use the root note and the scale degree I am on to find what the note that I am playing is, or should I just look at what fret I am on, or should I trying to always keep track of what note I am playing? (hope that is easy to follow)
And Finally, how should I practice this?
Thanks for any help you can give me
