The most obvious feature of the blues scale is that – you [...]]]> Scales – Part 8

Probably the most widely used scale in the whole of modern day music. The blues scale is used extensively in rock, jazz, blues, metal, funk, country and almost every other type of music you can think of.

The most obvious feature of the blues scale is that – you guessed it – it sounds ‘bluesy’.

Just about anyone, no matter how rubbish you are at playing the guitar, can have a go at twanging a few notes of the blues scale and instantly feel like you’re sitting on a porch in Memphis, dog by your side, watching the sun go down and singing how your girl left you cause you got no dough !

That’s the great thing about the blues scale and why it appeals to so many. When played over a basic 12 bar blues pattern, it almost plays itself.

Obviously, to become a really good blues player takes an awful lot of skill and years of dedicated practice, but if you’re a beginner guitarist and just want to have a bit of fun with minimum effort, this is the scale for you.

The blues scale is simply a minor pentatonic scale with an added note (which happens to be the b5 note or #4 note of the minor pentatonic).

If you are up for learning a section of this scale to mess around with in future, then go ahead and check out a couple of positions I’ve laid out below, but if you are intent on learning the whole scale across the entire fret board and more minor and pentatonic scales in the future, then I suggest you take a look at parts 1 to 7 of this sites ‘No nonsense guide to scales’.

Learning the blues scale and then going off and learning the minor and pentatonic scales later will effectively triple your work load as you’ll be working backwards, where as if you choose to learn the natural/pure minor scale first in its entirety (i.e. all 7 positions) you will then find it pretty easy to take away a few notes from the minor to form the pentatonic minor. Then you can simply add one blues note to the pentatonic minor to create the blues scale.

In doing this and following my guides, you will also be able to use the minor scales to easily form the minor, major and major and minor pentatonics in any key as well as the blues. So think about that before you take on the blues positions below.

It’s like learning to play snooker first as it hugely increases your ability to play pool in the future.

Below are the 5 positions you need to know. As usual, start with position 1 and do not move on to position 2 until you know it off by heart along with the orange root note positions and can play it forwards, backwards, sideways and anywhere on the fret board.

As before, in each position, learn the whole pattern of notes across all 6 strings. You don’t necessarily have to learn the names of the notes, just learn where the root notes are positioned in the particular pattern you are playing.

e.g. For position 1, the root notes are situated on the 6th string – 1st finger, the 4th string – 3rd finger and the 1st string – 1st finger.

This will allow you to move any of these fingering patterns up and down the fret board, and play the same pattern in a different key. i.e Playing the blank pattern below starting on say fret 5, would make all your root notes A’s, meaning you would now be playing an A blues scale.

Here is the minor pentatonic to compare with the blues scale below it.

Pentatonic Minor Position 1

Blues Scale – Pentatonic Blues Position 1

Blank Fingering Position 1

This blank position shows you can play these patterns anywhere on the fret board. Note the position of the orange root notes. The numbers correspond with your 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th fingers.

Pentatonic Minor Position 2

G Blues Scale – Position 2

Pentatonic Minor Position 3

G Blues Scale – Position 3

Pentatonic Minor Position 4

G Blues Scale – Position 4

Pentatonic Minor Position 5

G Blues Scale – Position 5

The 5 blues positions then repeat themselves starting with position 1 again played on fret 15 and so on. You can see this in the whole scale diagram at the top of this page.

Front Porch Blues Painting by Kerry Burch

A good way of practicing these blues scale positions is to Google ‘free blues backing tracks’. You will find hundreds of sites with free tracks or midi files to download.

Pick a backing track in G first and mess about with that for a while. When you’ve got the hang of it, transpose the scale into another key by moving the whole pattern up or down a few frets to a new root note like C, A, F or E. Then try and play along with another backing track in your new key.

If you’re in it for the long run, make sure you take a look at my other scales guides first.

Posted 14.05.09

Other Posts of Interest

No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Guitar Chords Made Easy
Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises

Back Home

The scale comprises of the black notes on [...]]]> Scales – Part 7

Pentatonic minor scales are extremely popular 5 note scales most commonly used in modern and classic rock, blues and jazz music. They are widely embraced by beginners and shred masters alike and are great practice scales for those learning to improvise.

The scale comprises of the black notes on a piano, and as the name suggests is made up of 5 notes from the natural minor scale. The good news is, if you have done your homework and learned the positions of the natural or pure minor scales in our previous guides then you will already know all the notes and positions that arise in the pentatonic minor.

To create the pentatonic minor, the 2nd and 6th notes are removed from the natural minor scale to leave us with the 5 notes of the pentatonic.

This means we only have 5 positions to get to grips with and we already know all the notes they encompass.

You’ll notice below I describe the minor pentatonics as being derived from the natural minor positions 3/7 or 4/5 etc. In this am referring to the positions I have shown in our minor scale positions page which show two different ways of learning the natural minor scale in either 5 or 7 sections.

Below I have shown the pentatonic minor scale position, and then the natural minor scale positions that the pentatonics ‘hide’ in, so you can see how the 5 pentatonic notes emerge from the full minor scale.

G Pentatonic Minor Position 1

This is the most popular and commonly used pentatonic shape. You can see the Gm pentatonic scale notes above hiding in the G natural minor scale below (we talked about the pattern below in our minor scale positions guide 1/5 and in our post on alternative scale fingerings).

It is easy to tell what notes are missing from the natural minor scale to form the pentatonic minor i.e A and D#.

G Natural Minor Position 1/5

Here is the next one.

G Pentatonic Minor Position 2

Again we can easily see notes 2 and 6 are missing from the minor scale below to form position 2 of the pentatonic above.

G Natural Minor Position 3/7 and 2/5

G Pentatonic Minor Position 3

The 3rd minor pentatonic position is derived from the natural minor positions 4/7 or 3/5 shown below and here.

G Natural Minor 4/7

G Natural Minor 3/5

G Pentatonic Minor Position 4

Found in

G Natural Minor 6/7 or 4/5

And last of all

G Pentatonic Minor Position 5

You can see is derived from any one of the two positions below.

G natural minor Position 7/7

or Natural minor 5/5

There you have it, all you have to do now, is practice these 5 pentatonic minor positions along with your natural minor positions. You should be able to switch easily between them once you’ve got the hang of it.

A good tip to get you used to playing the pentatonic shapes is to remember that in each of the 5 positions, you only have 2 notes to play on each string and those notes are either 2 or 3 semi-tones apart.

Here are the 5 pentatonic minor positions again.

Gm Pentatonic Position 1

Gm Pentatonic Position 2

Gm Pentatonic Position 3

Gm Pentatonic Position 4

Gm Pentatonic Position 5

When you learn these pentatonic positions, re-affirm your knowledge of the root note positions (coloured orange).

It should only take you a day or two to learn these.

Once you’ve got these under your belt, you can easily move move on to conquer the blues scale with the minimum of effort as it is simply a minor pentatonic with an added note.

Part 8 – The Blues Scale

Other Posts of Interest

No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Guitar Chords Made Easy
Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises

Back Home

Posted 24.04.09

In my guides to scales I have chosen to use the Gm as our working example and to learn this in 7 positions instead of 5. The reason being that [...]]]> As I mentioned earlier, you can learn the entire minor scale pattern across the fret board in either 5 or 7 sections.

In my guides to scales I have chosen to use the Gm as our working example and to learn this in 7 positions instead of 5. The reason being that I find 7 steps easier to learn due to the smaller transitions between each position. The fact that there are also 7 notes in the minor and major scales (not including the octave), means each position is only one scale note higher than the previous one, making life simple.

It is a good idea to familiarise your self with both methods, just to solidify your knowledge and make you aware of other paths musicians commonly use to navigate the minor scale. Below are the 7 positions of the G minor that you are already used to, followed by the 5 different positions used by many others.

If you have spent enough time learning 7 positions, then you should find the 5 position method very simple to grasp.

G Minor Position 1/7

G Minor Position 2/7

G Minor Position 3/7

G Minor Position 4/7

G Minor Position 5/7

G Minor Position 6/7

G Minor Position 7/7

G Minor in 5 Positions

Here we have the same scale divided into 5 sections instead of 7.

G minor 5 Part Scale Position 1/5

G minor Position 2/5

G minor Position 3/5

G minor Position 4/5

G minor Position 5/5

It doesn’t make much difference which way you decide to learn the minor scale either using 5 or 7 sections, as long as you eventually go out and do it.

Once you know the whole pattern across the whole fret board you will be able to use it to achieve many great things, including playing in any key and mastering the major, blues and pentatonic scales.

Just take it one pattern at a time, and don’t rush it. Give your self a good week or two on each section and play along with some backing tracks to keep you interested. That way it won’t seem such a massive chore.

Other Posts of Interest

No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Guitar Chords Made Easy
Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises

Back Home

Posted 24.04.09

When learning a particular scale across the whole neck, in our case the natural or pure minor, is it best to ensure there are no vague or hazy areas left on the fret board that leave you unsure of where to place your fingers in order to play the correct scale notes.

You may have noticed there is one small area in all our 7 Gm scale positions that hasn’t really been covered.

The Gm scale position 1 we learned in the very beginning of this guide misses a couple of notes in the top left corner and all the notes on the open strings, as you can see below.

G minor Scale Position 1

If we move our view over slightly, we can now see all the notes available to us just before position 1, including the ones on the open strings.

Don’t panic, you don’t have to learn a new finger position for this one, you just need to slightly adapt a fingering you have already learned to be used at the nut end.

As you know, the notes on the guitar repeat themselves as you pass fret 12 and this enables the 7 positions we’ve learned to repeat themselves as well. i.e after playing position 7 you then move up the fret board and then play position 1 again and vice versa.

This means that when playing the notes below position 1 on the first fret, we move back down to position 7 which we are normally used to playing much higher up the neck.

You can see here I’ve super imposed the nut usually on fret 0, and placed it on fret 12 in our minor scale position 7

Minor Scale Position 7

So by looking at position 7 and imagining the nut across fret 12, you can easily work out what notes you should be playing an octave lower on the first couple of frets and open strings.

In short, if you want to know where the scale notes are on the open strings and first few frets, simply transpose what you would be playing on frets 12 to 17 to frets 0 to 5. All you have to remember is any note struck on fret 12, should be played open at the nut.

Other Posts of Interest

No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Guitar Chords Made Easy
Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises

Back Home

Posted 22.04.09

As I stated earlier in my post on scale runs, you may find the [...]]]> In our previous scale guides you have been learning all seven positions of the minor scale right the way up the fret board and should now be pretty fluent in crossing the neck just about anywhere you like.

As I stated earlier in my post on scale runs, you may find the positions I use slightly differ to those shown in other people’s guides i.e some prefer to cover the minor scale in 5 positions instead of 7. But it doesn’t really matter which fingerings or paths you choose to cross the fret board, as those fingering positions are just reference points to work from.

You should generally practice crossing the neck using the minor scale, or major scale, in as many different ways and keys as possible to solidify your knowledge of the entire minor and major patterns.

Here is a quick example of a commonly used alternative fingering for our minor scale position 2.

G minor Scale Position 2

You will often see a variation of this position played like this.

G minor Position 2 Alternative

As you can see, they are both reasonably similar but the second example is a little easier (but less fun !) and doesn’t quite reach as high up the fret board.

If you have been reading my guide to scales, you already know all the positions you need to cross the guitar, but it is up to you to explore different ways to achieve this and to recognise these patterns when you see solo’s or riffs built around them.

Here are a few other alternative scale fingerings you should get used to, simply because they show other paths across the fret board. If you have already learned the 7 minor scale positions in scales sections 1 to 3 then you will find playing these variations come very easily and you won’t have to learn anything new to play them.

Remember : imagine these images as we did previously i.e as blank patterns with no note names, remembering where the orange root notes are. This is so when you feel like transposing them to other keys, you can use the same patterns on different frets, giving you different root notes, resulting in the scale being played in a different key.

G minor Scale Position 5

G minor Position 5 Alternative

G minor Scale Position 7

G minor Position 7 Alternative

As long as you can comfortably get from one end of the guitar to the other, leaving no blank areas from which which you are unable to cross, you will be well on your way to mastering the fret board.

Take a look at my page on minor scale positions to compare the two most popular methods of learning the scale across the whole guitar.

Other Posts of Interest

No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Guitar Chords Made Easy
Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises

Back Home

Posted 22.04.09

‘Why do I need to learn scales and what are their practical application in music ?’.

Scales are like the maths of music, the main reason to learn them is to give your self a [...]]]> I was recently asked a good question by one of this sites regular visitors.

‘Why do I need to learn scales and what are their practical application in music ?’.

Scales are like the maths of music, the main reason to learn them is to give your self a basic understanding of the structure and the way a piece of music works to enable you create and understand your own pieces, and allow you to integrate with other musicians.

Now you don’t necessarily need to go out and learn loads of scales to be a good guitar player. I played the guitar for many years and achieved a reasonably good standard by playing other people’s music, making up my own riffs and songs, and generally avoiding anything to do with theory. On the occasions I did bother learning a scale or two, I got extremely bored very quickly and as soon as I got passed the first step, was swamped by a ridiculous amount of meaningless information which really put me off.

I avoided scales for many years and to some extent got away with it, but no matter how good my playing became, I always felt something important was missing from my routine and I’d see other musicians jamming around in pubs, playing the blues and improvising over anything that gets thrown at them, and feel that my knowledge of music wasn’t really up to standard.

When musicians jam, it’s knowing what key to play in and what type or style of music is being played that helps them work out the best musical paths to take i.e what chords, riffs or licks to play and what notes will sound best to improvise and solo over.

This goes for all musicians and instruments from bass guitars to pianos, harmonicas, violins, and trumpets. It doesn’t matter what you play, if you know a bit of music theory and a few scales you can connect to others through the universal language of music.

Scales help musicians improvise and connect with each other through the language of music

Most guitarists don’t know much music theory at all, but a little knowledge can take you a long way, as long as you know the basics of what scales are best suited to play certain styles of music and what notes and chords to play where and why.

I will be doing a guide on this in the near future, but here’s a quick example.

Say you were asked to play a typical basic 12 bar blues chord progression in E. If you know a bit of blues theory you would expect the chords to go something like this.

E – E – E- E

A – A – E – E

B – A – E – B

or

E – E – E- E7

A – A – E – E

B7 – A – E – B7

These are commonly known standard blues progressions built from pre defined formulas used in blues music. There are many variations of these formulas and they provide basic starting blocks to build from.

Blues Guide Coming Soon

Once you’ve got a chord progression to work with, you can be pretty sure that soloing over these chords using a Em Pentatonic or E blues scale will sound pretty good. But that is just one option, there are many other scales that would also sound great played over this progression, and your knowledge of music theory will define how you interpret and improvise over these chords and the complexity of your riffs and solos.

The same works in reverse. If you have a particular solo or lick you need to write a chord progression for then knowing the keys and scales used in that solo will help you form chord progressions that sound great around that piece.

Music theory is not a fixed code that you have to follow strictly, but knowing the building blocks of a piece of music and why it sounds like it does will allow you to integrate and deviate from the norm and create your own compositions and style.

Understanding scales and music theory will give you a freedom to express yourself in which ever way you feel as you learn how to express your thoughts and emotions through your fingers.

Jamming musicians at MerleFest in Wilkesboro

If you needed to create a moody piece of music, or something with a slightly spanish feel, then you’d be best off starting with minor scales or phrygian modes to help build chord progressions and solo’s. Major scales will often define happier moods etc.

Practicing scales is also a really good way of training your fingers and improving your strength, speed and dexterity across the fret board, and provides good practice when learning to improvise.

Along with chromatics, scales are also really useful when used as warm up exercises.

The one thing you must ensure is that you don’t get too obsessed with scales and following strict musical guidelines. It is those musicians who use theory to enhance their music but are not afraid to play ‘out of the box’ and experiment with new techniques and methods that really make the most out of knowing a few scales.

Learning scales will provide you with a solid knowledge base to work and learn from and will definitely enhance your guitar playing and make life easier for you in the future, but don’t let them stress you out or rule your life. They are just one element in a guitar players tool box, and although they are important, they are not the be all and end all.

If you feel you are ready to tackle the subject, take a look at my section on Music Theory and check out our No Nonsense Guides to Scales. These guides will help you learn the basics, slowly and step by step. If you are not up to it yet, go and learn a few chords and lyrics from one of your favourite songs and have a go at busking a tune.

Other Posts of Interest

Busking
Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises
How to Buy a Guitar – A Beginner’s Guide
Conquering Bar (Barre) Chords
Guitar Chords Made Easy

Posted 20.04.09

Back Home

The tab shows pretty much the same run (with slight alterations at the endings) [...]]]> Now we are going to take our previous run highlighted here in blue, and play it in various other G root note positions and at different octaves on the fret board, indicated in yellow and red.

The tab shows pretty much the same run (with slight alterations at the endings) but starts from different G’s so the pattern of notes you play as you ascend is exactly the same as before. If you have the previous ascending pattern memorised then you shouldn’t even need the tab.

One thing you have to keep an eye in this first example on is when you play the ending few notes. As you cross from string 3 to string 2, due to the nature of the way the guitar is tuned, you have to remember to step up one fret on string 2, and instead of playing frets 15, 17 and 19, you play 16, 18 and 20.

The last exercise on the page takes the same run again and transposes it to Em. Without having to work anything out, just move the whole thing down to fret 0 on strings 5 and 6. Easy.

Here’s the Em scale.

Try playing it at all the other E root notes as well.

In fact, have a go at playing this all over the fret board, in keys of Cm, Am, Fm, Bbm, Dm and any other key you can think of. The more you mess around with any run or lick you learn, the more versatile you will become. While you are doing this and transposing into various keys, you are also learning where all the different root notes are on the fret board which will really put you in good stead for your future playing.

When you’ve finished messing around with these, have a go at moving and transposing the descending run you learned on the previous page, and then make up a run or two of your own. That should keep you busy until my next post.

Loads more stuff to come..

In the next lesson we’re going to mess with this some more, alter the picking patterns, change it from minor to a major scale and just about anything else I can think of.

Kier

Other Posts of Interest

Chromatic Scales and Exercises
No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Strum Like the Pro’s
Guitar Chords Made Easy

Posted 11.04.09

Back Home

First we’re going to take an easy minor scale run on strings 5 and 6. [...]]]> Below is a full scale diagram of the G minor scale. We are going to work on some runs from one end of the fret board right the way to the other and back again.

First we’re going to take an easy minor scale run on strings 5 and 6. You can see from the diagrams below that once you have got the pattern sussed starting from the root note G on the 3rd fret, the pattern repeats itself in most other places on the neck where you find the same root note.

This means that you can easily move it around to almost all the other G root notes on the fret board. This is shown by the coloured zones in the diagram below.

The only string you can’t do this on is when you place the pattern on a root note on string 3. This is because the pattern crosses strings 2 and 3 which due to the way the guitar is set up are out of symmetry by one fret.

The great thing about any run or lick you make up in a certain key is that it can easily be used in any other key you like by simply keeping the same shape and pattern of the run and moving the root note to a new one.

Take a look at this Em scale below.

I have used the exact same colour map and run as in the Gm and simply placed it over the E root notes. It now becomes an E minor run.

Here’s a tab exercise of a G minor scale run. Start with your first finger on the 3rd fret, 6th string and using alternate picking and preferably a metronome, play 3 notes per string, making your way up to the 17 fret. Start the exercise at a slow manageable pace until you have got it sussed and then gradually increase your speed until you are playing it as fast as and as accurately as you can.

Once you are at your top speed, work on getting it cleaner and faster over the next week or so. You will soon find your speed and finger strength noticeably improve.

These exercises sound best when played with some mean distortion and a bit of delay, but you really should try and get into the habit of playing them with a clean tone and as little fx as possible as they tend to mask what’s actually going on with your playing. Just switch off your racks or pedals every once in a while just know whether your playing is messy or accurate.

G Minor Scale Runs

Note : These scale runs are designed to be relatively easy to learn and great for building speed, strength and picking skills etc. They are not supposed to be amazingly technical, flashy, or melodic, but they are great starting blocks and should get you into the habit of creating your own runs and licks in your favourite keys and scales once you get used to it.

Feel free to improvise with these first 2 exercises and vary them as much as you like. Try making up your own start or finish to each run.

Over the next few sections we will be working through these and other simple runs and exercises, moving them around, changing keys and varying the patterns to give you and idea of how you can mess with ideas and take them anywhere you like across the fret board. The main aim is to get you used to doing this and for you to feel comfortable in making up your own more complex and better sounding runs and licks in the future.

Once you’ve got the hang of the exercises above, try the next section where we are going to shift these runs to different root note positions, like in the Gm colour map, and then change the key of the runs, as in the Em example.

Moving and transposing the scale run.

Other Posts of Interest

Chromatic Scales and Exercises
No Nonsense Guide to Scales
Strum Like the Pro’s
Guitar Chords Made Easy

Posted 05.04.09

Back Home

Look at the pattern of notes between frets 1 and 6 of the minor scale, and compare them [...]]]> Scales – Part 6

Take a look at the two scale diagrams below. At first glance, the G minor and G major scales at first look completely different from one another.

Look at the pattern of notes between frets 1 and 6 of the minor scale, and compare them to the shapes between frets 10 and 15 of the major scale.

Although the notes and root positions are different, the patterns that the notes are spread across are the same. Below you can see the pattern with all the notes and root notes removed

Blank Pattern 1

You can recognise this pattern as being identical to G minor scale position 1 you learned in the first part of this no nonsense guide. It also happens to be G Major position 6 of the patterns needed to play the G Major scale.

G Minor Position 1

G Major Position 6

Now take a look at frets 3 to 8 of the G minor scale, and frets 12 to 16 of the G major scale.

Again, the notes and root positions are different, but the patterns that the notes are spread across are identical. Here is the pattern with all the notes and root notes removed.

Blank Pattern 2

This pattern is identical to position 2 of the G minor scale and also position 7 of the G major Scale.

G Minor Position 2

G Major Position 7

Just to prove the point once more, take a look at frets 5 and 8 of the minor scale, and frets 14 to 17 (or 2 to 5) of the major scale.

Again, apart from different notes and roots, you have already learned this pattern as position 3 of the G minor scale and also position 1 of the G major Scale.

Blank Pattern 3

Position 3 G Minor Scale

Position 1 G Major Scale

As you can see, by learning the 7 positions of the minor scale earlier in this guide, you have already learned all the necessary shapes required for you to play the major scale.

Below are all 7 positions of the G major Scale. You will find if you’ve done your homework, you will easily recognise and be able to play them all already.

7 Major Scale Positions

Position 1

Position 2

Position 3

Position 4

Position 5

Position 6

Position 7

So apart from the positions of the root notes and where the patterns are played on the fret board, you should already know all 7 shapes. They also progress up the fret board in the same order as the minor patterns. It just so happens that when sticking to the same key, the major scale patterns happen to be -3 frets behind the minor scale patterns (or +9 frets in front, if you prefer).

Test this out for your self.

Play any minor pattern on the G scale. Now move down the fret board -3 frets and play that same pattern. Then check the G major scale at the top of this page and you will find (apart from the root notes) you are following the G major scale pattern.

Do the same again, but this time move up the fret board +9 frets. You also end up on the G major scale pattern.

So using the knowledge that our minor scale patterns are interchangeable with the major scale patterns, there are two ways we can play the major scale in any key using our minor scale knowledge. Method 1 moves you up or down the neck a few frets, and method 2 will keep you in the same place on the fret board. Use both methods at your will.

Method 1 – Play 3 Frets Lower or 9 Higher

Let’s say you want to play a major scale from a specific root note, i.e the C note on string 6 – fret 8.

Simply…

1. Think of the minor pattern that you can play in that spot. e.g. C minor pattern 1.

2. Now move down the fret board -3 frets and play that same pattern again. Remember where your C root notes are, and you are now playing the C major scale.

Alternatively you could move up the fret board +9 frets and play that same pattern to hit the C major scale.

Here’s another example.

Take this G minor pattern 4, with it’s G root notes on frets 10 and 8.

If you want to play the G major scale, just move this pattern down -3 frets and play it there. Work out where your new G root notes lie on the fret board, then you are done. See the result below.

Check this against the G major scale at the top of the page.

Method 2 – Stays in the Same Area

If you want to play a major scale on a specific root note, say the G major on string 6 fret 3, simply

1. Think of the minor pattern that you are used to playing in that spot. e.g. G minor pattern 1.

2. In your mind either a) picture moving up two positions, or b) imagine moving +3 frets up the neck, still following the minor shape patterns. You should end up visualising G minor position 3 as below.

3. Take this pattern, and move it back three frets to your original spot i.e from G major, on string 6 fret 3,

4. Now find your new major root notes. If you aren’t sure where they are you can find them by remembering the positions of the old root notes in the blank pattern and moving them forward 3 frets or 3 notes (inclusive of the root)

5. Now you should be playing the major scale with the right root notes as shown below.

So there you have it, two easy methods of playing the major scale in any key by using the minor scales you already know.

If you practice running up the major scale starting from position 1 to 7 like you did with the minor scales earlier on in this guide, it will solidify your knowledge of these patterns, and as you practice jumping between major and minor scales using the above methods and the relative minor and major theory, you will will soon find it becomes so easy you don’t even have to think about it.

If you’ve managed to complete all the sections from 1 to 6 in this guide, you should now be well on your way to mastering the fret board, and it’s time to head for the pentatonic’s and blues scales.

By the way, if you already know the major and natural or pure minor scales, then you also know the major and minor pentatonics as they are derived from using only 5 notes of their parent major and minor scales.

You also know half of the melodic minor scales (the descending side) as it is exactly the same as the natural minor scale.

And to top it all, the blues scale should be pretty simple from here, as it too is simply a minor pentatonic scale with an added note. If you have ever stuck your nose in a guitar book before, you are probably familiar with a few positions of that scale already.

Now you have got the hang of scale and pattern learning, just take a quick look at the few scales I have mentioned above and have a go at them. By the time I post the next part of this course in the weeks to come, you should already have a good head start.

Part 7 – Major & minor pentatonics, and the blues.

Part 7

If you want to solidify your knowledge of the scales you have learned and increase your speed across the fret board in all directions, check out my new pages on scale runs.

Other Posts of Interest

Scale Runs and Exercises
Chromatic Scales and Exercises

Posted 01.02.09

Back Home