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#285094 - 21/05/11 10:56 AM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Tinyghost]
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Wolfe
Professional Forumite!
Registered: 19/07/06
Posts: 978
Loc: Scarborough
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They're post it notes from your ancestors..........
Seriously. Like you, they spent a lot of time just randomly "picking and bashing it until it makes noises I like and feel good". Then they wrote what they had discovered down so that subsequent generations wouldn't have to waste years of their life doing the same and effectively trying to reinvent the wheel.
So a scale is just an observation by your long dead ancestors that these notes "sound rather good together" and "these don't". Shaves a few years off your learning time if you listen to their advice instead of trying to figure it all out by yourself.
Another thing that most people don't realize is that every single person who's ever listened to music already knows scales (including you). When you whistle an aimless tune you just made up as you walk down the street or overhear your mother doing likewise while cleaning the toilet, neither of you are picking notes at random. Your picking notes from a scale.
OK. Because neither of you are musically trained you have no idea what scale your using or what the name of the notes are, but you are using a scale. Furthermore. If you overhear someone playing out of tune and hitting bum notes, you immediately recognize that fact. Something you can only do if you know 'WHAT IT SHOULD OF SOUNDED LIKE". Something you can only do because you know scales and how they should sound.
Like speech, you learn scales as an infant listening to western music on the TV and Radio. And like speech, you can tell when someones saying something wrong musically (hitting bum notes etc).
Just as you don't need to go to school in order to learn how to speak, you don't need to learn music theory in order to know when notes sound right or wrong. Going to school and having someone teach you reading and writing is simply explaining something you've been doing for years (speach) and giving you a system of storing that information in a graphically symbolic way (writing). Likewise, learning music theory simply gives you names and a graphical and verbal way of explaining stuff you've been hearing in your head for years.
Both are useful skills to have. While you don't need to be able to read/write in order to speak, you wouldn't be able to participate in this forum if you couldn't. And while you don't need Chord/Scale theory in order to Play, you'll have a hard time explaining what your hearing in your head to another musician without it (other than "it sort of goes... la la la, tum ti tum, dum de di").
In my older age I'm wondering if I should learn stuff...it'll stop me getting into a rut I guess. But then won't I just sound like everyone else? My worst scenario is to be something like a session player, guiarist for every occasion! Errrrggghhh. guitar karaokeists.
Actually, most "guitar Karaokeists" tend to be the ones who didn't learn any theory and just download TABs and put their fingers where the TAB says without making any effort to understand WHY. After a few years, they tend to have a large collection of 'tunes' they can play to entertain people, but no comprehension of how it all works, so very little in the way of improvisational skills (one of my pet peeves induced by my TAB centric nephew).
I guess I had to work out basic chords at some point (otherwise I'd be very stuck), so maybe I can get something out of "scales"?
If you know chords, then you already know scales, you've just strummed three or four notes out of one. All you have to do is learn the other three missing notes from that chord and you've got the whole scale. How hard is it to learn three notes when you've already learnt four of them?
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#285101 - 22/05/11 03:01 AM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Wolfe]
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DaveBass
Old Timer
Registered: 30/10/02
Posts: 6462
Loc: The wilds of Surrey
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Good post from Wolfe.
Music is basically a combination of rhythm, melody and harmony. Different types of music have these in different proportions, for example rock is much more rhythmic than classical, but classical has a far more advanced harmonic structure than the typical three-chord rock song.
Anyway, you already know what these three are. Rhythm is what the drummer specialises in, and is mostly concerned with timing rather than pitches (notes). Harmony means chords: a number of pitches played simultaneously. And melody is what singers, lead guitarists and bass guitarists do: essentially it's one-note-at-a-time stuff, what most people would call a tune. A bass line is a sort of tune in its own right.
As Wolfe points out, the notes in a melody are picked out from a collection of pitches. In western music there are only twelve pitches available, namely A, A#, B, ... up to G#.
But twelve notes is too many for most people to handle, so scales are used: a scale is essentially just a subset of the twelve notes. Pentatonic scales use five notes. Actually any five different notes could be used; the conventional pentatonic scale is only one of many! Most scales use seven notes.
A conventional scale is just an ascending or descending sequence of notes. Mostly the ascending and descending scales are the same, but there are some (notable the melodic minor scale) where they differ. So A minor melodic ascending is:
A, B, C, D, E, F#, G#, (A')
(where A' is an octave above A) whereas A minor melodic descending is:
A', G, F, E, D, C, B, (A)
So you can see that there are huge numbers of possible scales. You can invent your own!
There are exotic scales such as the whole-tone scale:
C, D, E, F#, G#, A#, (C')
There are bluesy scales like this one (one of my personal favourites):
E, G, A, A#, B, D, D#, (E')
which is just a pentatonic with an added A# and D#.
Given a particular scale, we can invent harmonic structures (chord progressions) by taking combinations of the scale notes.
A mode is just a scale but using a different reference note. So for example the bluesy scale above could be transformed into this one, by making the G the reference point (the keynote):
G, A, A#, B, D, D#, E, (G')
This effectively turns it into a different scale. As far as I'm concerned, scales and modes are the same thing; it's not very productive to argue about the differences, which are somewhat academic.
So, to sum up, scales are just an arbitrary collection of notes that musicians use to put together a melody. Not totally arbitrary, because some scales seem to sound better than others. It's just a question of picking ones you like.
Dave
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#285106 - 22/05/11 02:06 PM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Wolfe]
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stickyfiddle
Spam Commander (Forum Council Member)
Old Timer
Registered: 22/04/04
Posts: 6168
Loc: London, UK
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Actually, most " guitar Karaokeists" tend to be the ones who didn't learn any theory and just download TABs and put their fingers where the TAB says without making any effort to understand WHY. After a few years, they tend to have a large collection of 'tunes' they can play to entertain people, but no comprehension of how it all works, so very little in the way of improvisational skills (one of my pet peeves induced by my TAB centric nephew).
Oh my god yes. It's a big deal to me right now as I'm currently looking for new people/bands to play with. I've played with so many people who know roughly how to bash out a tune but no idea how notes link together, or why. Drives me mad.
It's all become a big thing since the rise of internet tabs and guitar Hero (yeurgh :(). It's all about the notes and not about the music.
_________________________
PSN: stickyfiddle
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#285188 - 28/05/11 07:14 AM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Wolfe]
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Richard - Richards Guitars
Administrator & Forum Council Member
Old Timer
Registered: 30/07/01
Posts: 5500
Loc: 5 Tiddington Road, Stratford U...
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Wolfe - Despite some obvious differences in the past sometimes I have to check your posts to make sure I haven't written them myself as you so often prioritise the very sames points I try and get people to understand. Couldn't agree more.
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#285189 - 28/05/11 10:01 AM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Richard - Richards Guitars]
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Oldjono
Professional Forumite!
Registered: 15/09/09
Posts: 852
Loc: Dorset
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The scales or modes are nothing more than points or reference within themselves.
We interpret what sounds right or wrong by our ears primarily but there is the odd occasion when something that sounds off kilter on it's own, sounds sublime in the right context.
Learning the scales is important but more important is learning 'how' to interpret/ manipulate them with embellishments like slides bends vibrato and other skill we tend to do when mastered without actually thinking about them.
For example if you listen to a singer, they will more often than not apply some vibrato towards the end of a held note to give it some richness or other emotive sense stress. We do it too when we know how, often without thinking overly about the note but more about the effect it conveys.
Soap box vacant...
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#285211 - 29/05/11 08:09 AM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Wolfe]
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Oldjono
Professional Forumite!
Registered: 15/09/09
Posts: 852
Loc: Dorset
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I would like to hear that...
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#285224 - 30/05/11 08:23 AM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Oldjono]
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Wolfe
Professional Forumite!
Registered: 19/07/06
Posts: 978
Loc: Scarborough
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I would like to hear that...
It's not rocket science, lol. Basically, all guitarists/bassists are trying to figure out what notes can be played against chords without it sounding like a strangled cat. Before plucking a note, a small Laurence Olivier pops into their head asking them......
... "Is it Safe...". (or is that just me..)
A lot of this is subjective and changes from culture to culture and throughout history. Most Europeans from 500 years ago would be shocked at the amount of Dissonance and Bass in modern music (we've come to enjoy strange oscillations and combinations of pitches in our music and bass simply didn't exist back then).
"So what are the safest notes"?
Well, the safest note you can play in music is the Root note of the current chord being heard (A over an A Minor chord, C over a C Major chord etc). It doesn't allow for a lot of variation or soloing options but it's certainly "SAFE". It's not much use to lead guitarists but it's been the staple of many Bass players for generations....
After a while, most Bass players realize that these 'fancy chord type things' that the rhythm guitarist is playing seem to have more than one note in them (you'd be surprised how long it take most Bass players to figure that out ;)... ). It then occurs to them that they could also play the other two or three notes in the chord and this would be equally as 'SAFE'. Increasing their repertoire to 3 safe notes (bass Einstein).
However. For most lead Guitarists, 3 notes isn't a lot to base a solo or riff around (unless your U2's 'The Edge', in which case you can pick those 3 notes with a lot of reverb and delay and convince people your a genius). No. For most guitarists the minimum number of notes to do any decent soloing with is FIVE. Or as it's known in ancient Greek, 'PENTA'. Yep, you've guessed it, we are talking the Pentatonic scale, like so.....
A collection of five notes, all of which work reasonably well with the chords associated with that scale (some sound better than others with certain chords, but none of them sound that bad either). For most beginner guitarists, the Pentatonic scale is the safest scale to use. But it does get a bit boring. Most intermediate guitarists will know how to 'step ouside' the scale to add extra notes in to add more flavour to their playing. But the more notes you start playing over chords, the less 'SAFE' you become.
"So you just throw random notes in to the Pentatonic scale".
Not exactly, there is a logic and reasoning behind the extra notes you can throw in to flavour your playing. Most are simply borrowed from other scales that are similar. Lets take that Pentaonic scale and focus on one section of it. The middle section (most players should recognise that box shape, but remember that the whole pattern is the pentatonic Major and Minor scale, both utilize the exact same overall neck pattern).
A nice 'SAFE' green for you
So what extra notes can we throw in there that will also work? How about the two extra notes that make up the popular scale that all western music is based around. These two notes....
It makes the neck pattern a little more complicated to learn, but does add extra 'flavour' to your playing (it can also improve your technique as it forces your fingers into a more rippling '3 notes pers string' movement instead of the 'rocking back and forth' movement of only 2 notes per string).
By the way, these extra two notes are being used in the chords associated with the scale your rhythm guitarist is playing behind that pentatonic scale, even if your not (yes, that was the chance for the Rhythm players out there to look smug).
"Is it Safe?"
No. Not to the same degree as the five pentatonic notes, with some of those extra two notes sounding really bad when held over some of the chords associated with the scale, but if you don't linger too long on them and use them as passing (grace) notes, you can't mess up too badly.
That gives us Pentatonic + 2
Lets see what else we can throw in there...
How about notes from the equivalent Harmonic scale. After all the Harmonic scale is nigh on identical, with only one note different (sharpened). While you could play both the sharp and unsharpened note, it's best to play just one or the other IMO (experiment).
"Is it Safe?"
No. Slightly less so than the other two notes we've added, but it WILL work in various scenarios (experiment).
Which brings us upto EIGHT possible notes (Pentatonic + 3).
"Any More?"
Well, we could always throw in the infamous 'BLUE' note. This is the extra note most blues players throw into the Pentatonic scale to get the six note 'blues scale'.
"Is it Safe?"
No more than the Harmonic note we added, it does tend to generate a lot of tension, but does sound great if you use it while ascending/descending from the two notes to either side of it (try it).
Which brings us up to a much more complicated pattern of NINE notes (Pentatonic + 4).
By which point we are pretty much using every note of the western musical scale bar three. And if you really wanted to, you could even throw those extra notes in and go fully chromatic....
Needless to say, those three extra red notes sound very, very, bad and are the three "UNSAFEST" notes on the entire fretboard. That's not to say you can't use them but it takes a bit of experience and musicality to pull it off.
The general rule when throwing these extra notes into the equation is to do so sparingly. If you fall back to the Pentatonic for 90% of your note selection when soloing/riffing and then throw the odd extra note in here and there, you won't go far wrong. These extra notes tend to work best as 'grace' notes. Notes that aren't lingered on but simply touched on in your journey from one pentatonic note to another.
It always seems to me there are two types of players. Ones who learn formal scales and theory and those who learn to play by ear alone. The formal players typically start out with a minimum amount of notes they know how to play over things and slowly expand that knowledge as they progress and figure things out. The 'Ear' players do it the other way round. They start out plucking every note on the fretboard (chromatic) because they don't know any better and then, through years of practice and ear training, start to be more selective in what they use.
Both types of players end up in the same place, they simply get there from opposite ends of the equation.
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#285232 - 30/05/11 03:10 PM
Re: Breaking free from the pentatonic scale.
[Re: Wolfe]
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Oldjono
Professional Forumite!
Registered: 15/09/09
Posts: 852
Loc: Dorset
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Fantastic...
Query... The reds dotted 'bad' notes, can't they be used in C# or Db instead then?
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