Today I want to talk about a classic, the pentatonic scales. They are the classic scales that a beginner starts learning first but there is more to them than you might think of. They go way back in time as among the first scales ever created and they have a way to sound either major or minor and neither of those at the same time (give you know how to use them properly of course.
One of the ways I see them on the guitar is as a sort of 'simplified version' of the full scales because they have 5 notes rather than 7. On the guitar, we can find 5 different shapes that fit perfectly within the modal scales so you can see that at the end of the day if you can play them both in your improvising one can think it doesn't matter what notes you're playing. But that's not exactly the case.
If used well you can apply them to many genres, not only blues and rock but also jazz, soul, RnB and so on.
I'll be sharing ways to approach them both when you're practising them and when you play them in other posts. In the meantime check the videos attached to learn them all in the key of C major.
Remember that they are always in
the same order, what I like to say is that they are like a train that has always the same order of couches, it doesn't matter from where you start counting, it'll always come around, like one of those kids toys where the train just run in a circle every time. So even if you change the key and you start counting from a different point on the fretboard, you'll always come back around to the same fret!