Learning Guitar Scales

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In the previous lesson "Song writing" we've seen how to to harmonize or extract chords in a given key from the major scale. This lesson is about identifying and naming our chords in order to be able to play them.

You can check "Intervals", "Modes of the major scale" and "Pentatonic guitar scales", to have a better understanding of the music theory.

Let's take a look at the previous chart (the key of C):

C - D - E - F - G - A -B - C - D - E - F - G - A -B
C   -     E   -     G                     (C major)
      D    -    F    -    A                  (D minor)
            E   -     G   -    B                (E minor)   
                  F    -    A   -    C             (F major)
                        G    -   B   -     D          (G major)
                              A   -    C    -    E       (A minor)
                                   B    -    D     -   F    (B diminished)

Note: The fun part in all this is that this formula applies in all major keys (major - minor - minor - major - major - minor - diminished)!

I'm sure that now you're asking yourself: how the hell i know which chord is major and which chord is minor, here is the answer:

Let's follow these 3 easy steps:

1- In the first case, we take the notes succession of the first chord C - E - G.
2- We play the C major scale.
3- We see what these 3 notes represent to the major scale, if it's (Root, 3rd and 5th) it's a major chord, if it's (Root, b3 and 5th) it's a minor chord and if it's (Root, b3 and b5) it's a diminished chord

To make sure you understand this well let's have a look at the second chord: (D - F - A), we play the D major scale and obviously we can see that the note F represents a b3 to our major scale because the D major scale have (D - E - F# - G - A - B - C# - D), and that's why it is a minor chord.

To practice this and memorize it, make sure to apply these 3 easy steps to all the chords in our C major key.

If you have any question, put it in comment.

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After learning guitar scales and learning guitar chords, now it's time to make use of them in song writing. Just make sure that you've well learned scales and chords to make song writing very easy.

Song writing is what every musician should know if he (she) wants to be a professional musician, that's why we've learned all this theory (which was simple and easy), to write our own songs and play them.

Songs are written in a specific key or sometimes keys, that's why their chords sound really good together. We can't play chords just like that and say that we wrote a song, we have to follow the theory. Let me ask you a question: In a given key, what chords would sound good together? sure the chords that have the same notes as their scale. The concept of extracting chords of scales is called harmonization, so for example we harmonize the major scale to obtain chords that we can play with it.

Before we learn how to write a song make sure that you've read "The major scale", "Chord construction" lessons to be able to follow me. Let's take the example of C major scale (C - D - E - F - G - A -B - and C again).

To harmonize this scale (extract chords from it), we take the formula of : 1st (root), 3rd and 5th and apply it to every note on the scale, and this will look like this in 2 octaves:

C - D - E - F - G - A -B - C - D - E - F - G - A -B
C   -     E   -     G
      D    -    F    -    A
            E   -     G   -    B
                  F    -    A   -    C
                        G    -   B   -     D
                              A   -    C    -    E
                                   B    -    D     -   F

These are the 7 chords that we can use in the key of C with the C major scale. We take a note and skip the other and so on. Make sure you understand this well before moving to naming and playing these chords.

When learning theory make sure you move in this order: learning guitar scales, building chords and after that write your own songs or find an easy song to play on guitar.

Continue to read the part 2 of song writing "the 3 easy steps to naming any chord in a given key".


Any question, you're welcome.