I was curious when people refer to pentatonic major and minor scales, most only refer to the first mode I guess you would say. What about the other 4 modes within each scale, how often are they applicable say compared to the major scale and it's 7 modes??
John
John,
I'm not quite sure I follow your question, but I think you're asking whether you can or should play the pentatonic in different positions up and down the neck. The answer is yes, absolutely. When you're building a solo you should experiment with moving from one box to another in the pentatonic scale.
I hope that helps.
Well we all shine on--like the moon and the stars and the sun.
-- John Lennon
I don't use modes in pentatonic scales, nor were I aware they existed. Seems kinda pointless to me, since my blues usually consists of a mix of major/minor pentatonics, appergios and passing notes and is relatively simplistic structure-wise it is easier to me to just take a scale and add whatever notes I feel like then constantly think in different modes. When, for example, playing a blues in A I might continue the A blues scale over the D chord, and I could take the D blues scale.
Modes are probably the most misunderstood bit about musical theory. All they are is a snapshot of the major scale from a collection of different starting points, and different rules apply when you're using them. They are not subsets of pentatonics. For now, avoid them.
Best,
A :-)
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I don't really think he means modes in the pentatonics. I think he's referring to the five "boxes" you use to play the pentatonic up and down the neck.
Well we all shine on--like the moon and the stars and the sun.
-- John Lennon
Wouldn't the minor pentatonic technically be a mode of the major pentatonic?(NoteBoat I would think you'd know this)
Because a minor scale is just the Aoleon (sp) of the Ionian.
I don't think other modes apply in the pentatonic though....just major and minor. Could be wrong though.
Well, if they'd exist they would:
C D E G A, C major pentatonic.
A C D E G, A minor pentatonic.
But I seriously doubt you can use 'modes' in pentatonic like you would with major/minor scales, makes very little sense to me.
I guess I think of it, however erroneously, more in terms of diatonic relationships than modes. Check out Nick's Gin & Diatonic from which I stole this diagram of the sixth string root box for the major and minor pentatonic:
.
At any rate, rather than thinking of it as a modal relationship I always learned to think of it as a diatonic relationship.
Well we all shine on--like the moon and the stars and the sun.
-- John Lennon
Well, if they'd exist they would:
C D E G A, C major pentatonic.
A C D E G, A minor pentatonic.
But I seriously doubt you can use 'modes' in pentatonic like you would with major/minor scales, makes very little sense to me.
I'm guessing he's asking if you could start a pentatonic scale on each note and get a different "mode" like you do with a regular major scale...
CDEGA
DEGAC
EGACD
etc....
The major and minor pentatonics are the most common for sure, but a pentatonic scale simply has five notes, and there are others with different intervals, such as altered pentanonics and pentatonics used in other cultures, say E, F, A, B, D (Japanese "in sen scale").
You can also shift pentatonics - I like to use the minor pentatonic up a minor third from the key I'm in...for example - play Cmin pentatonic (C Eb F G Bb) over an A chord (Am or altered A7th is good). C=minor third (or sharp 9), Eb is lowerd 5th, F is raised 5th, G is dominant 7th, Bb is flat 9...gets you outside real quick :)
Forgot about this - modal pentatonics:
http://www.guitar9.com/columnist232.html
There's been a few articles on shifting pentatonics and modal pentatonics in "Jazz Improvisation" magazine, which I read at the book store, so don't have any issues around the house.
It figures that jazz players would know! The article looks interesting.
Well we all shine on--like the moon and the stars and the sun.
-- John Lennon
Dsparling: cool article. A bit confusing though, for example one of those new pentatonic boxes is just the standard blues scale minus the fifth. Kind of seems like putting nametags on different passing notes added to the pentatonic (here the blue note). But it is a nifty idea to take on variation and base the entire solo around it, going to try some of those things. :D
Ok... I'll see if I can straighten things out.
The word 'mode' comes from the ancient Greeks. We know they had things in music called modes, and we know what the names of these modes were. We do not know what they sounded like, or if there is any relation to today's modes in any way!
The word 'scale' comes from the Latin scala, meaning ladder. Scales are the arrangement of tones in a pattern that rises or falls with tones in the same sequence each time it's played. A scale can have one pattern rising, and another one falling, like our melodic minor - but in a single direction, the notes never vary.
The use of the word 'mode' to describe a scale dates back about 1500 years to Boethius, who took the names from the early Greek texts and applied them to the scales then in use in church music. There were eight of these: the Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, and Mixolydian that we use today, and the exact same sets of notes called Hypodorian, Hypophrygian, Hypolydian, and Hypomixolydian. Which name fit a scale depended on rules based on the shape of the melody as well as the tones used. When they talked about 'Dorian mode' in those days, they meant Dorian scale... modes were not related to the major scale in any way - because the major scale wasn't around yet!
About a thousand years later, the major and minor scales were coming into fashion, particularly in non-church music. Theorists suddenly realized that all the modes used the same notes with a different keynote basis - and that the new major and minor scales fit a pattern which included the older church modes.
So modes aren't related to major scales - it's the other way 'round.
Within the last century, theorists have applied this keynote relationship to other scales, leading to a profusion of 'modes'. These are not related to the historical modes in any way - you need to understand modes as scales in their own right to be able to use them, and if you can't use them it's just a mental exercise.
That said, you can shift a tonal center on any scale pattern and come up with a new scale. But the odds are really good it's already been done - in the case of the pentatonic scale, the five-note pattern is used extensively in Eastern music (China, Japan, etc.), and they already have names for those scales... but they don't think of them as modes of each other.
So if you base your major pentatonic around the fifth, yeah - you could think of that as a 'mode' based on the fourth scale degree. Or you could think of it as a Japanese Ritsu scale.
And in Japan, they'd look at your original pentatonic and say it's the Yo scale. Your major pentatonic is their Ryo scale, etc.
If you apply modal relationship theory to scales other than the major, you'll probably discover that any useful pattern you find is already being widely used somewhere with a different name. Odds are good that the ones that aren't useful are already named by some theorist - but if they're not useful, why learn 'em?
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I was referring to the 5 different box patterns within the pentatonic scale. For example in key of G, starting on g, a, b, d, e, all starting on the 6th string. I think the 5th box pattern is the most popular, or well recognized pattern.
Here is Dansm's website which I first learned about pentatonic scales:
http://westcom.no-ip.info/Downloads/www.dreamscape.com/esmith/dansm/scales/majpent.htm
John
The different patterns aren't 'modes' - they're just where the scale notes are found in various positions.
Most people learn the 1st finger 6th string root pattern first, because it's compact (no shifts), and has a clear relationship to the root. Most soloists will use all the patterns, though - otherwise you're stuck in just one register.
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