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Scales
Familiarity with the basic scales are essential to the guitar player, whether playing solos or just lines in harmony with a song.
There are three principle scales of interest: the major, the minor and the blues.
Major
Here is an example of a
major scale, G major:
E------------------------------------------------------------------------
B------------------------------------------------------------------------
G------------------------------------------------------------------------
D-----------------2--4--3--4--2------------------------------------------
A--------2--3--5-----------------5--3--2---------------------------------
E--3--5-----------------------------------5--3---------------------------
a minor scale, A minor:
E------------------------------------------------------------------------
B------------------------------------------------------------------------
G------------------------------------------------------------------------
D--------------------6--7--5---------------------------------------------
A-----------5--7--8-----------8--7--5------------------------------------
E--5--7--8-----------------------------8--7--5---------------------------
and a blues scale, in A:
E------------------------------------------------------------------------
B------------------------------------------------------------------------
G------------------------------------------------------------------------
D--------------------6--7--5---------------------------------------------
A-----------5--7--8-----------8--7--5------------------------------------
E--5--7--8-----------------------------8--7--5---------------------------
Scales give you a kind of map in the wilderness of the various notes on the fret board. When working out ideas, for melodies, for riffs or for solos, understanding scales will help you figure out what goes and what doesn't.
Scales belong in their corresponding key. Let us look at a simple example of this: strum the chords G, F, C, G, four beats each. This sequence of chords is in the G major key - the logical chord to return to is G, and the notes which sound harmonious with it are in the scale.
Try this out for yourself. Record this chord sequence played a few times over onto a dictaphone, and play around on the G major scale in time. You will hear that all your notes are in tune. Now play a note out of the G major scale, say G#, and you will how awfully discordant it sounds.
Blues scales go with the corresponding minor key. For example, the blues scale above, in A, belong with chords in an A minor key e.g., Am, C, D. Play around and prove this for yourself.
Scales are not etched in stone, there are certain contexts in which it makes sense to play notes outide of a scale, if it sounds right; nevertheless, scales are an invaluable guideline. Eventually your playing around scales will no longer be a conscious thing, it will be as natural as talking grammatically.
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