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Effective One-Octave Major Scales and Why! Part I

When you learn your first scales you usually start with two-octave scales, because they span all six strings of the guitar. You play from the Low E-string all the way up to the high e-string.

That’s great! It’s important you learn the two-octave scales inside out, but one-octave scales have their own effective purpose that will serve your playing in a different and complementary way.

Why You Want to Learn One Octave Scales

One of the reasons you want to learn one-octave scales is because of their simplicity. By using only one octave it’s easier to see the shape and structure of the scale, the notes within the scale, and the intervals. The scale is more user-friendly, easier to play, memorize and apply around the fretboard.

There’s another great benefit to learning one-octave scales. Once you got them under your fingers it’s only a matter of connecting the dots to lay out two octave and three-octave scales, since they are made up of one-octave scales.

Note: This post is part of a small series where you will learn one-octave major scale shapes across the entire guitar neck that will help you understand and own the major scale landscape.

Starting from the Root Note on the Low E-string

Today we’re learning three major scale shape/patterns with the first (root) note starting on the Low E-string (6th string).

Tip: For this lesson learn and memorize the notes on the low E-string so you know and recognize the key of the scale when you want to move the scale up or down the fretboard.

Major Scale Fingering

For the major scale examples and tablature below I’ve notated the left hand fingering (for right handed players). The numbers next to the notes on the note staff right above the tablature indicates the left hand fingers:

1 = index
2 = middle finger
3 = ring finger
4 = pinky

The numbers in the yellow neck diagrams also indicate the fingers. The neck diagrams also clearly show what the shape or pattern looks like. Learn to visualize and memorize the shape of each pattern.

3rds Intervals over 5 Major Scale Shapes/Positions

By Klaus Crow 2 Comments

I hope you are doing okay with everything that is going on now. These are crazy times, but we have to make the best of it. We have to help each other out while keeping a safe distance, be considerate of others, smile to people to relieve a bit of their burden, but with all that don’t forget yourself along the way. Being kind to yourself too. Have a bit of fun. Try to enjoy the present moment.

For those of you who stay at home, you might have some more time on your hands now to enjoy the guitar, develop a nice practice routine, and make some good progress. Well, here’s a great guitar workout for you…

Practicing melodic intervals really developed my skills to solo and improvise over major chord progressions. Just by going through the scale intervals on a regular basis you are training the muscle memory for your fingers and acquiring the vocabulary for your creative mind to help you shape your musical brain and come up with melodic ideas. It’s an exercise that is not to be underestimated.

In this lesson we are going to learn “melodic intervals in 3rds” following the major scale. We’ll practice these 3rd intervals over 5 different scale shapes/positions across the neck, so we’ve got a great workout for you! Don’t worry we’ll take it step by step.

Make sure you know the major scale in 5 shapes/positions before you start this lesson, but on the other hand you can also skip that for now if you just became excited to dive into this lesson. You can always come back to that later. I can imagine you want to try at least the first exercise to know what we’re talking about here. I totally understand.

Another upside is that the exercises will train your ear to recognize 3rd intervals. This will improve your aural skills, which is a important part of becoming an accomplished musician (Try to sing along the notes as you play the exercises). The practice of playing the intervals will also increase your dexterity. A win-win situation in many ways.

How to Learn a Scale Inside Out to Improvise a Guitar Solo

By Klaus Crow Leave a Comment

As a guitar student you want to learn your scales inside out, not just to expand your music theory or to develop dexterity, but to learn to solo and improvise.

In order to solo and improvise you need to know the words of the language. You need to know how to use those words in a fluent manner with confidence and ease to express your musical emotions.

This is where the scale comes in. The scale contains the letters and the words to tell your story.

In this lesson I will give you the exercises to really dig into the scale and memorize it from top to bottom, backwards and forwards so you can start your journey to learn to solo and improvise.

We will use the G major scale as an example, but you can apply this to any scale.

There’s a lot of exercises and examples here so take your time with it. Start with one exercise and practice it until you can play it at a comfortable level, then move on to the next. Before you know it your fingers are running the show.

Let’s dive in!

Play in Position. First learn the scale playing it in position using the appropriate fingering. “Playing in position” means your left hand remains in a fixed location, with each finger assigned to a specific fret. See below in example 1. Now play the scale following example 2 and use the finger positioning of example 1.

Numbers on the dots: 1 = first finger assigned to the second fret, 2 = second finger assigned to the third fret, 3 = third finger assigned to the fourth fret, 4 = fourth finger assigned to the fifth fret. The red dots indicate the root note of the scale (in this case the G note).

Example 1:

Example 2:

Play with one finger. In this exercise you play the scale with only one finger (see example 3), so you become really conscious of where each note in the scale is located. Don’t underestimate this exercise. It is really important. Play it like example 2, but with the fingering of example 3.

Example 3:

Mastering The Fretboard Through The Cycle of Fourths

By Klaus Crow 9 Comments

In becoming an adept guitar player it is important to master the fretboard, learn all the notes on the guitar, and be able to move freely around the neck and play all your scales, riffs, licks, chops and solos in every key.

You can cultivate this by using and practicing your musical ideas through the cycle of fourths. For in depth explanation of the cycle of fourths check out How to Benefit from The Circle of Fifths and Fourths. In this post we are going into the practical side of things.

Let’s say you play a cool lick in the key of A (See example below). Now the next thing you do is move the lick up a fourth (up 5 frets) and play it in the key of D (A to D is a fourth), then play it in the key of G (D to G is a fourth), next in the key of C (G to C is a fourth), then the key of F (C to F is a fourth), next key of Bb (F to Bb is a fourth), key of Eb (Bb to Eb is a fourth), key of Ab (Eb to Ab is a fourth), key of Db (Ab to Db is a fourth), key of Gb (Db to Gb is a fourth), key of B (Gb to B is a fourth), key of E (B to E is a fourth), and back to the key of A (E to A is a fourth).

Below an example of how to move the lick through the cycle of fourths from A to D to G. You try to figure out the other keys. If you want to learn this lick in a videolesson check out Cool Acoustic Electric Blues Guitar Lick

Now you’ve passed through every key via the cycle of fourths. Practice this with your chords, triads, licks, arpeggios, scales, etc and you’ll discover it’s purpose and benefits. You will feel it’s different, akward and challenging to play the same lick, scale or exercise in other keys. You have to relearn that lick or scale a bit in various positions, because you have moved it up or down the neck.

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