Learning Guitar Scales
Let’s face it – scales are not the most fun part of learning to play guitar. They’re repetitive, uncreative, and somewhat boring. Many beginning guitarists get frustrated with scales and just focus on playing chords. I would advise against this. Scales are not only central to your understanding of the guitar’s whole fretboard, they’re also the foundation of advanced soloing. You simply cannot learn how to solo well without an understanding of scales. That should be reason enough for you to invest some time in them.
As you probably know, scales are played in an ascending or descending sequence of notes. The choice of notes is based on the type of scale being played. We’ll start with the most basic scale.
Playing the Chromatic Scale
- Play the open bass E string.
- Use your index finger to apply pressure to the 1st fret on the E string and play the note.
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your middle finger.
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 3rd fret with your ring finger.
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 4th fret with your pinky.
- Now move down to the A string and repeat these steps. Follow these steps for each string except for G. On that string, play only the first three frets before moving to the B string.
Chromatic Guitar Scale
Learning scales allows you to jump between notes that are tonally far apart without moving you fingers unnecessarily. It’s a great way to learn all the notes of the fretboard.
Playing the Major Scale
The next scale to learn is the standard major scale. We’ll also play this scale in the key of E.
- Play the open bass E string.
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your index finger (F#).
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 4th fret with your ring finger (Ab/G#).
- Play the open A string.
- Play the A string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your index finger (B).
- Play the A string while applying pressure at the 4th fret with your ring finger (C#).
- Play the D string while applying pressure at the 1st fret with your index finger (D#/Eb).
- Play the D string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your middle finger (E).
- Follow the diagram below to play the rest of the notes in the scale (note: bold string letters mean play the open string).
Major Guitar Scale
Playing the Minor Scale
- Play the open bass E string.
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your index finger (F#).
- Play the E string while applying pressure at the 3rd fret with your middle finger (G).
- Play the open A string.
- Play the A string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your index finger (B).
- Play the A string while applying pressure at the 3rd fret with your middle finger (C).
- Play the open D string.
- Play the D string while applying pressure at the 2nd fret with your middle finger.
- Follow the diagram below to play the rest of the notes in the scale.
Minor Guitar Scale
When practicing these scales, make sure you play them with descending notes as well as ascending notes. If you practice these scales enough, your fingers will quickly memorize the fretboard and you won’t be left searching for the right note when it’s your turn to solo.
June 12th, 2009 at 7:39 pm
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