Learning Guitar Scales

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The reason behind learning guitar scales and all modes for guitar is of course to use them. Guitar scales in western music are played along with triads or "Chords", this process is called harmony, so what is harmony anyway?

Harmony is anything that's played along with a melody, in other words, harmony is "melody + chord". When we harmonize the major scale for example, we get 7 different chords from it in this order: MAJ - MIN - MIN - MAJ - MAJ - MIN - DIM, so if it's the C major scale, we get: CMAJ - DMIN - EMIN - FMAJ - GMAJ - AMIN - BDIM.

The most common scales that guitarists use are: The major scale and its modes, the minor scales (natural minor, harmonic minor, melodic minor), pentatonic guitar scales (major and minor) and blues guitar scales.

The most common way for beginners when improvising or soloing over a specific chord progression is to play one scale over all the chord progression, the key to find the scale is to find what chord this chord progression resolves to, if you discover this chord you can play the most appropriate mode or scale to it.

Note: This method is only if you're just starting and the only reason that makes great guitarists use it is with rapid chord changes.

The second and the more professional way is to play 1 scale or mode per chord, this means when the chord changes in a chord progression you have to play the corresponding scale to it (if you have 4 chords in a chord progression you have to play 4 different modes or scales).

The combination:

To make your playing perfect you have to use both of them, because sometimes you come across a fast chord change in chord progression, so you have to use the first one.

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Songwriting is the last step that you want to do in your music journey after learning guitar scales and chord construction, writing your own songs requires music theory understanding as well as experience, wither you want to write a rock song or a thrash metal song. Music theory will save you a lot time in your playing and songwriting, it will get you straight to the point where you'll be able to assemble notes and chords to build a harmonized piece of music.

Songwriting is a 2 part process:

1- Writing the lyrics of the song: (if it's not an instrumental song). Most musicians like to write song lyrics first in order to write the proper music that's compatible with the song lyrics theme.
2- Writing the music: That depends on the song theme itself, wither it's a sentimental song or a rage expressing song.

Because this blog is about music and guitar theory, i'm not going to enter to the details of lyrics writing, but i can assure you that a good lyrics ideas come from reading (books, article, listening to inspirational songs...etc), that's if you want your song to have a message in it.

If you want to write music, make sure you follow these 6 easy tips for songwriting:

1- The first thing that you have to do is to know what type of music you like or you want to write: (blues, rock, metal, jazz), i'm sure you're a fan of a specific type of music.

2- In general you can apply scales and chord progression principals in all genres of music, but there are some specific scales used in some specific types of music, like the usage of blues guitar scales and pentatonic guitar scales in blues and metal music...etc.

3- Any song have many parts in it, the most basic ones are (Intro, Verse, Chorus, Outro), you can add other parts like (Pre-chorus, bridge, Pre-verse) if you want your song to be more complex and complete.

4- Identify what key your song should be in, you can use one key in the entire song, or sometimes switch to other keys (but be careful!).

5- All great songs have what we call "The Hook", it is the part of the song that when you hear it, it sticks into your head and give you a good feeling of the song.

6- The last thing is to find other artists that play other instruments to help you play a complete song (with drums, bass...etc).

These are easy tips for songwriting, make sure to follow them and also that you're always learning and applying what you've learned, learning guitar scales will help you a lot in your playing and composing, so learn more scales and chords in order to write a rich songs.

Any questions, comment.

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A lot of guitarists like to write their own songs, but they don't know where to start, they think it's so hard to write your own songs, but with some dedication, practice and my tips for songwriting you'll be able to write amazing songs everyday!!!

In this lesson we're going to learn writing our own songs in a major key, and as i told you everything in music theory goes back to the major scale. When you learn to write a song in a specific key, the same rules apply to other keys, so make sure to follow carefully my tips for songwriting.

The major scale have 7 notes, each note of these have it's specific chord wither it's major, minor or diminished...etc. In the key of C we get these chords (C major - D minor - E minor - F major - G major - A minor - B diminished). The reason why those chords sound good together is very logical: because those chords are just combination of the same notes of the scale.

The major scale isn't the only scale that we can harmonize, we can harmonize (build chords) any scale starting with natural minor scale, melodic minor scale, harmonic minor scale...etc and every scale looks different, so you have to choose a compatible scale and key with the theme of your song.

Note: in this tips for songwriting lesson we're not going to use the diminished chord, because it's uncommon in rock and blues music, it looks dissonant with other chords, but some musicians use it, so it's up to you wither you want to use it or NOT.

Let's use a very basic strumming "guitar strumming for beginners" which is "Down - Down - Up - Up - Down - up", and play it 2 times per chord. The chords that we're going to use in this song are (The 1st "root", the 6th, 3rd and the 5th) in the major key chords, i picked them randomly so you can choose whatever you want to play.

Note: D refers to Down stroke, and U refers to up stroke.

           C chord                                                                  A minor chord
E------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0---
B------1--1----1--1----1--1-----1--1----1--1----1--1-------1--1----1--1----1--1----1--1----1--1----1--1---
G------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------2--2----2--2----2--2----2--2----2--2----2--2---
D------2--2----2--2----2--2-----2--2----2--2----2--2-------2--2----2--2----2--2----2--2----2--2----2--2---
A------3--3----3--3----3--3-----3--3----3--3----3--3-------0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0---
E------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0----0--0---
           D D      U U      D U       D D     U U      D U         D D      U U      D U      D D     U U     D U

        E minor chord                     G chord
E------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------1--1----1--1----1--1-----1--1----1--1----1--1---
B------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0---
G------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0---
D------2--2----2--2----2--2-----2--2----2--2----2--2-------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0---
A------2--2----2--2----2--2-----2--2----2--2----2--2-------2--2----2--2----2--2-----2--2----2--2----2--2---
E------0--0----0--0----0--0-----0--0----0--0----0--0-------3--3----3--3----3--3-----3--3----3--3----3--3---
           D D     U U      D U       D D      U U      D U         D D      U U     D U       D D      U U      D U


And here is your first song, this wasn't so hard at all, this is your first chord sequence, you can choose whatever chord you want to play, but make sure that it sounds good to you. So after learning guitar scales and chords, we've written an easy song to play on guitar, just make sure you practice and practice until you master it.