Music Minute Monday: How to Get More Out of Your Pentatonic Scale
For every beginner-level guitar player or bass player, the “pentatonic scales” are the bread and butter of learning how to create solos. They’re very useful because one scale pattern yields so many notes, and you can easily move them around the fretboard. Once you have learned the “minor pentatonic” pattern in one key, you can play them in any key just by starting your root note on different frets on the neck.
What is really helpful is knowing how to take that same “minor pentatonic” scale pattern, and move it to a different neck position so that it sounds “major”, instead of minor. This is helpful because you are taking a scale pattern you already know, and utilizing it to create different tonal sounds without having to learn an entirely new scale pattern. (Double the fun for half the work!)
All you have to know is how to find the “relative minor” of the key you are currently in. The relative minor of ANY major key is the 6th scale degree or note in that major scale. For example; the key of C major has these notes or scale degrees: C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C. The relative minor would then be “A” because it is the 6th scale degree.
So now, you can take your minor pentatonic scale pattern, begin it on the fifth fret of the low E string (which is an A), and now you sound like you’re playing a major scale pattern!
Check out the video below for more. Good luck — and happy practicing!
