More Pentatonic Scales in Blues

[Robert****]

Alright, last time I mentioned that over a blues in the key of A, you can use both A Major Pentatonic and A Minor Pentatonic (also referred to as F# Minor Pentatonic) for variety. Well, the thing is there are more Pentatonics.

Let's say we still have a blues, or a some groove, in A7. Try playing B Minor Pentatonic and E Minor Pentatonic as well. You'll have to watch which notes you land on, or emphasize. They will all "work", but some do not work as well as others. Landing licks and phrases on the note G or A or C or C# would be a good idea.

There's still more Pentatonics that can be used, but this is a good start.

So to sum it up, playing over an A Dominant 7 chord, you can use any and all of the following:

• A Minor Pentatonic
• F# Minor Pentatonic
• B Minor Pentatonic
• E Minor Pentatonic

Take this idea and play over, for example E7. We are then in a different key, so you need to move these pentatonics accordingly.

Practice question for you - what 4 pentatonics do we then end up with, playing over E7? All you need to do is move them down one fourth, because E is one fourth down from A. You can also just count how many frets there are, going down from the note A down to E, and then move those Pentatonics down the same number of frets. What do ye get?

[aeolian]

Robert, this is very interesting and likely will help me a lot.

I try not to think in terms of any particular key; instead I think in terms of what key degree relative to the home key. So I 'translated' your idea into notes within a key from your idea, and I come up with this:

home key 7th 1 3 5 7b (dominant 7 chord)

home key minor 1 3b 4 5 7b
6 key minor 1 2 3 5 6
2 key minor 1 2 4 5 6
5 key minor 1 2 4 5 7b

Now it becomes clearer to me how each pentatonic works for the home key. I notice the 'blues' notes, like 3b and 7b. You mentioned there are other pentatonics we can use, I assume that can be something that introduces the 6b, for example.

I need to try your idea out. Man, I wish I have a looper.

[Robert****]

Uhh, I am dense, since I have no idea how to decipher what you wrote...

You totally lost me with the "key degree relative to the home key".

Did anyone else figure out what keys those 4 Minor Pentatonics would become if you transpose the blues from A to E?

This stuff must be boring, since not many replies? :

[sunvalleylaw]

Au contraire, Monsignor of Blues! It is just a super busy day and I have not had time to play with it yet. I want to play around with the concepts and then get back to you. Gotta go to a business meeting with some of my coaches (at a local tav) and will look at it later. Thanks!

[tjcurtin1]

Same here - looks really interesting, but I can't play with it till later...!

[thearabianmage]

Nice tip Robert! I guess another way to look at this would be that you can use position 1 of the minor pentatonic of the relative minor, the major 2, and the perfect 5th all in relation to the key center - which in your example - was A.

To answer your question, C# is the relative minor of E, F# is the major 2, and B is the perfect 5th. So, over an E7, you can play position one of C#, E, F#, and B.

At least I hope that's right

[Robert****]

The ariabianmage gets a feather to put in his hairdo. :

Now practice this same approach over the remaining 10 keys. :

How did you ever come up with that handle, by the way?

[thearabianmage]

How did you ever come up with that handle, by the way?

Woo hoo! I'll add my feather to my growing head-dress. Maybe one day I'll be chief. . .

Handle? How do you mean?

[Robert****]

Your nickname, "theariabianmage" - where did that come from?

[thearabianmage]

Your nickname, "theariabianmage" - where did that come from?

Ahh, okay. Well, there's 3 reasons for it:

1. My dad is from Syria, so I am half 'arabic' (though Syria is more Mediterranean sociologically/genealogically speaking)

2. 'Mage' comes from, for this context, 'black mage', which was a race of people in the Final Fantasy games. I love them, they're so awesome. Look at my dA gallery and you'll see no less than 5 or 6 drawings of black mages. They are only the ones I scanned

3. The combination of the two is almost completely unique on the cyberwebs so I can use it as a username anywhere I go - i.e. hotmail, deviantart, myspace, thefret - or any forum I use. It just saves having to remember loads of different names.

And 'Blachmaninov', in case anyone wanted to know, is a disambiguation of 'Rachmaninov' that my friend called me one day on account of the only colour I choose to wear.

Hope that clears things up

[Jipes***]

Very interesting Post Robert, as a limited blues player I never consider to play those extended pentatonics but I will surely give it a try Thanks a lot :

[sunvalleylaw]

Ok, I just played with it for a while and I think I see what you mean. But picking notes, it is easier for me to think of it in terms of pentatonic modes.

My instructor had showed me a while ago that if you have the standard minor pentatonic shape in A, then you can extend toward the nut two frets on high E, B, A, and Low E and three frets on G and D, and up toward the bridge two frets on high E, B, G, and low E and three frets on A and D. I tried to scan a pic of the modes he showed me but my multi machine is not cooperating. These modes pick up some of the same notes that you pick up by playing the other minor pentatonics you list, but not quite all, and some of the notes are different. (maybe not E minor so much). Does this relate? I am almost there on getting how things are relative to one another, but although I get the idea, it is still hard for me to see right away on the fretboard.

[thearabianmage]

My instructor had showed me a while ago that if you have the standard minor pentatonic shape in A, then you can extend toward the nut two frets on high E, B, A, and Low E and three frets on G and D, and up toward the bridge two frets on high E, B, G, and low E and three frets on A and D.

The first sounds like position 5 of the A Minor pentatonics to me. . .

e--------------------------------3--5------
b--------------------------3--5------------
g--------------------2--5------------------
d--------------2--5------------------------
a--------3--5------------------------------
E--3--5------------------------------------

The second sound like position 2. . .

e------------------------------------8--10---------
b-----------------------------8--10----------------
g-----------------------7--9-----------------------
d----------------7--10-----------------------------
a---------7--10------------------------------------
E--8--10-------------------------------------------

If you put position 1 between those two, you will notice many common notes, all are fair play for bending, sliding, etc.

And on 'picking notes wisely', I would like to elaborate on what Robert mentioned about this. Obviously getting people to discover it themselves is the best way, but sometimes, people may need little clues.

Now, the pentatonic is an excellent scale to improv on because every note always works. The two notes that can go 'wrong' have been removed, thus why it's a 5 note scale. But sometimes it's best to put a little extra thought into this scale when improvising - imagine, if you will, you are playing over a I-IV-V progression. When you get to the IV chord, there is one note that you would rather not want to hit. What note would that be?

The note that is a perfect 5th from the root. Why is that? Because that note is only a major second from the root of the IV chord, and that can lead to dissonance. Of course, as always, it depends on what you want. I like a nice bit of dissonance every now and again - but where I to live 400 years ago and were composing sacred music, I would be hung for including this interval in one of my compositions.

They call these types of notes 'avoid notes', but it's best to think of them as 'caution notes' because you can use them in passing, just don't focus your melody around this note or use it as a main note in a melody.

So when you are playing around with these scales, try and keep these intervals in mind. Or, in other words, try and understand the relation of the note you are playing with root note of the chord it is being played over (or any other note for that matter)

I hope that helps!

[sunvalleylaw]

Yep, those are the modes I have worked with. I memorized the shapes, but did not understand the theory about why it was so. I am just cresting the hill of getting to that understanding now. I will get it, then it will escape me. We also add in chord tones, and add notes from other modes (mixolydian, aeolian, etc.) depending, to broaden the pallette. I am working now on connecting all these dots between these theories so I can really use it to develop phrases on the fretboard, rather than hunt and peck in these patterns I have memorized. Thanks for the help, both of you, Robert and 'Mage!

[thearabianmage]

Yep, those are the modes I have worked with. I memorized the shapes, but did not understand the theory about why it was so. I am just cresting the hill of getting to that understanding now. I will get it, then it will escape me. We also add in chord tones, and add notes from other modes (mixolydian, aeolian, etc.) depending, to broaden the pallette. I am working now on connecting all these dots between these theories so I can really use it to develop phrases on the fretboard, rather than hunt and peck in these patterns I have memorized. Thanks for the help, both of you, Robert and 'Mage!

I think right now it's probably worth noting that 'modes' tends not to be a phrase used to refer to the pentatonic scales. Not that it's wrong, because I completely understand what you are saying, but it tends to be reserved for the full 7-note major scale. 'Position' is what you would call the pentatonic scale in different areas. Every 'theorist' (sounds arrogant, I'm sorry) would know what you meant if you said 'A minor pent, position 2' even though it means the same thing as 'Ionian without the II and VI degrees'.

But, in any case, I'm more than happy to be a help!

[sunvalleylaw]

Fair play, to quote you. "Mode" is the term my instructor used when he wrote it (chart of the pentatonic positions) out for me, but I bet he was trying to keep it simple for me. Thanks for pointing it out though. I frankly find using the correct terms more simple in the long run, as then you know what you are discussing.

For instance, I have been working on all the modes of the G Major scale, and they are completely different from the positions we were discussing here. I like to see how they relate though.

[Robert****]

Hmm, I also think Pentatonic Modes may be a confusing term. There aren't modes, they are 5 patterns of playing the same 5 notes, so Position or Box is a better term. Otherwise you risk confusing them with the actual Modes of the major scale (which is not related to the "position" on the neck).

Hope that was clear - just trying to be helpful.

For reference - Modes of the C Major Scale.
# Ionian/Major Scale: C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C
# Dorian: D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D
# Phrygian: E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E
# Lydian: F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F
# Mixolydian: G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G
# Aeolian/Natural minor scale: A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A
# Locrian: B, C, D, E, F, G, A,

[thearabianmage]

Fair play, to quote you.

I'm glad to be of help! In both theory and the subsequent addition to your vocabulary


Although,

Otherwise you risk confusing them with the actual Modes of the major scale (which is not related to the "position" on the neck).

You are very right, but there is a way you would refer to using the 'positions' of the modes in relation to using them in a certain area of the neck - but this is a tad confusing, so I think we'll leave it for another day

It just goes to show the importance of learning and appropriately using the right terms when dealing with theory - otherwise things can get hard to understand!

[slow&alive]

Robert,

This is fabulous info. For your example, I new about the relationship of

* A Minor Pentatonic
* F# Minor Pentatonic

but I didn't know about the

* B Minor Pentatonic
* E Minor Pentatonic

could be added as well!

Mama mia and hold the phone!!! This has opened up my playing immensely.
Thanks!!!
You are a Gem, Sir!