# Thinking about scales as step patterns; tricks to make this easier?



## nbs2005 (Mar 21, 2018)

I've been putting in some steady work on my technique. Watching a Griff Hamlin video he was talking about being able to pick up a scale right from a note on the neck and knowing the pattern intuitively. As an example G9 chord with root on string 5. The ability to know how to play a major or minor pentatonic scale off that note either direction is a big help.

But I started thinking about step patterns as it MIGHT BE easier (maybe not, learning the boxes is pretty straightforward) to remember the W, W, W, W+1/2, W and W+1/2, W, W, W+1/2, W. But maybe it's not ;-)

So I guess the question would be; how did you learn this? Did you learn the boxes, patterns, or just the notes? If you learned the step patterns, where there tricks to help?

This is a bit of a jumbled question/statement; I apologize for that.


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## KapnKrunch (Jul 13, 2016)

nbs2005 said:


> ... knowing the pattern intuitively... where there ticks to help?


Just keep plugging away at any system until you "know intuitively."

And no, ticks never help. 

I am interested to see the responses of other members...


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## Wardo (Feb 5, 2010)

Learned the boxes when is was in grade 10 from a book about blues guitar which had a picture of Johnny Winter on the cover.

So that and listening to music and playing along. Connected the boxes and go by ear. I seldom learn anything note for note except things like the intro to Tuesday’s Gone which you pretty much have to get right but for solos I just make them up - if I have time to get something down I’ll do more fishin around for notes and patterns that fit and then I’ll play it that way most of the time.

Also try to phrase solos like a vocal where you maybe pause for a bit like taking a breath and use various intensity and attack and bends to express with.


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

The pattern is the box, really.

Unfortunately I learned major, minor and pentatonic so long ago that it's just muscle memory. I have to think a little more for the major pentatonic as it's probably used the least.

Once you learn the pattern across 6 strings, you're done. You never need to think about it again - you only need to know which key you're in. It's one of the beauties of playing guitar over piano. I literally never think about if something is whole tone or half tone - I know where the next fret is and that's that. Sure I "know" that two frets is a whole tone but I never have to process it.

Just learn how to play the basic scales (major, minor, pent maj and min) across 6 strings in one position. The rest is easy from there.


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## ezcomes (Jul 28, 2008)

I'm not the best to answer this...I learned a little, and go from there...to me...there is no wrong note...

Hell...even Miles thinks the same...


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## Mooh (Mar 7, 2007)

I learned the major and minor diatonic (heptatonic) scales vocally, as if they were melodies, when I was a child. The other modes were added on an as needed basis.

Then I learned them on piano allowing my fingers to follow my ears and voice. 

Then I learned them in music theory as a constructed pattern of whole and half steps (tones and semi-tones). 

In every case I was taught to repeat them ascending and descending. Ascending is important because we measure intervals and therefore chords ascending, descending is important because muscle and vocal movement is not necessarily the same in opposite directions, both are important to the ears and technique.

When I started guitar, I simply mapped out all the notes in each key on homemade fretboard maps, recognized the same patterns I always knew from voice and piano, and understood that shifting the patterns was just transposition.

Pentatonic scales simply leave 2 notes out, the blues scale removes the same two but adds another. By the time I got to these my ears did most of the work and I ended up memorizing the patterns because they're already contained within the diatonic patterns.

Glad I got all this before I was 15 or 16 years old, but the application of it takes a lifetime and I'm not done with that yet.


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## nbs2005 (Mar 21, 2018)

Thanks for the replies. I found an error in my major pentatonic pattern; that did not make things any easier. Once I sorted that out, I think it's going to work for me as I'll know immediately the steps to get the major or minor scale in either direction from a root note. 

Or so I hope..........


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## Cardamonfrost (Dec 12, 2018)

By no means should you listen to anything I say as guitar gospel. I have been trying to sort it out myself. I have played with lots of other people who have their own way of unlocking the fretboard. No 2 brains are the same.

Get some lessons and ask for basic theory (Triad development and scale development)

If you open a book and learn box shapes, you will not learn anything more than just where to put your fingers. At least you will usually be in key....However, the most important part of the entire exercise of music, is to learn what the different scale degrees sound like. This will only come once you have put in the work on paper, and on the guitar.

Learn how to build chords on paper from the Major scale starting with Natural Scale (no sharps, always with BC and EF together and spaces between all the rest. I.e. C D EF G A BC), apply the formula (TT1/2,TTT1/2) write out the major scale. Flatten the 3 (and the 6 and 7) and write out the minor scales. Number the degrees 1-8. Build major 1,3,5 and minor 1,m3,5. You need to have it on paper before you will get it on the fretboard. Now below he numbers 1-8 write out the majors/minor harmony denotation....M,m,m,M,M,m,m,M. Build more chords based on every scale degree. Fill pages of paper.

Learn the tonic notes on the fretboard and the octave shapes.

What seems to work for me (which is pre-emptive, because I don't have it yet...) is having a firm understanding of the location of the 3. That is the first note you hit that defines what's going on, and its always easy to find. This understanding gets me closer to actual understanding and hearing the modes than anything. It is usually my first target note after the root when I'm lost. Consider getting a book on the CAGED system (I used Scales Over Chords, boring but useful), it reinforces the triad sounds and development (so you learn the 1,3,5 for every chord).

Once you have your 1 and 3, the 2,4 never change. The next for me is the 7 because its right below the root (or octave), and its easy to see if its flat or not. Then you just have the 6 to deal with, which for me can go either way....Eventually you will start hearing the m6/M6 very clearly, as its the second mode you will learn (Dorian). Personally, I find the four successive notes starting on the minor 6 (m6, M6, m7, M7) to all have too much tension for regular use and use sparingly, the key is that I can hear it when I am caught in there and know to go UP to the octave, not try and keep going down though the landmines. lol.

And of course, there is no magic. There is only practice. Really, a hybrid of what you are already doing (Major and Minor pentatonic to learn the 1 and 3, and then stepwise to fill in the other degrees). To quote Lenny Breau, "You have to, uhhh, learn the discipline. But, ya know, its the discipline that sets you free".

Finally, practice scales with the root on your loop pedal to hear what they really sound like. Learn to hear the Tension in 2/6/9.

C


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## Mark Barron (Mar 18, 2019)

It's definitely more important to think about the SOUND of the scale rather than the fingerings, because the fingerings change drastically depending on what position and inversion you play them in. Any time you learn a new scale, practise playing it on a single string for a few minutes to give your mind time to absorb the sound and mood the scale evokes, and then try playing it in different positions over two strings and slowly expand from there.

VERY IMPORTANT that in the early stages, you should clearly visualise what each note should sound like BEFORE you pick it. You don't ever want the note you play to come as a surprise to you. So start very slowly, and think more with your ears than with your fingers. Hope that helps!


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