Lead Guitar Scales: These Can Help You Become A Master
If you want to be inspired by guitarists who know their scales, then give Steve Morse or even Ritchie Blackmore some listening time. You’ll enjoy their playing in a huge way. And really, their ability all started with the scales they practiced. Even though it sounds cool, if you play scales long enough, it can become a bit long. But remember that if you want to master your scales, you’ve got to play them over and over. And afterwards, the payoff can be very handsome. Your ability to play just about any solo you can come up with… becomes a reality.
There are a number of ways you can learn guitar scales but some of the major ones include the pentatonic scale and the major scale. The pentatonic scale is one of the most important lead guitar scales, since mastering the minor and major pentatonic scales covers virtually every playing situation you may encounter. In technical terms, a pentatonic scale is a musical scale that is made up of just five notes.
You can begin learning the minor pentatonic scale on a single string of the guitar. Pick a fret on that string and play the note. Now move up three frets and play the note that you land on. Move up two frets, play; move up another two frets and play. Move up another three frets and play. Finally, move up another two frets and play; this note should be the octave of the first note played.
Now once you’ve mastered this scale, you’re golden. You can use it to play the Minor Pentatonic anywhere on your axe. (that’s “guitar” for the uninitiated!). You will also use this pattern to play the major pentatonic scale, but will begin on the second note of the pattern. Now with the major scales, the only differences is you will be using all seven notes, vs just the five notes of the pentatonic scale. Just keep in mind that when playing major scales, you want to always keep your fretting fingers in the right position.
One idea for learning major scales is to play just three notes per string; and by doing this, you’ll increase the speed of your playing…. once you’ve mastered it. Lets begin with the sixth string. Now just use your first, third and fourth fingers for fretting and position them separated by one fret. Strum them downwards, then upwards and then down again. Repeat with the fifth string, but in the up direction. Now go down and up again.
When you move to the fourth string, shift your first finger one fret downwards but keep the other fingers in the same position; stay in the same position for the third string, then on the second string, shift again with the first finger moving one fret downward, the third finger two frets downward and the fourth finger one fret below that. Play and maintain the same position for the last string. Throughout, continue to alternate picking patterns.
Want to find out more about Lead Guitar Scales, then visit Soudai Kunai’s site on how to learn lead guitar lessons.
