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The Pentatonic

Traf	Date: April 5, 2004 @ 10:56 AM Hi all, it's great to find a site with so many like minded friends with a passion for playing. From what I've heard so far, there's some great players here... I'm from the UK and one of the most popular guitarists over here is Gary Moore, but there seems no mention of him on the site. Is he not well known outside the UK? He's been my favourite for years.. These forums are great... It gives me a chance to have a moan about this pentatonic scale (I'm not really a moany person), but I think this scale causes far more harm than good to hopeful guitarists. It has 5 notes... what good is 5 notes. Why we are told to learn this totally useless scale is beyond me. Oh dear, I've gone and got myself all worked up now... Anyway, really pleased I found this site and looking forward to some meaty conversations. I have a Blues Workshop site if anyone wants to take a look. It's under construction, but you can read my full views on this pentatonic thing.. http://www.thebluesworkshop.com
sqrlcub	Date: April 5, 2004 @ 12:04 PM I personally had never heard of Gary Moore. From a cursory search, he seems to be a blues player. I'm not in the UK and rarely listen to blues music; so, I am probably not the best person to use to judge his fame by here. Anyway, the pentatonic scale is great. No matter what you play it sounds right, you don't ever have to worry about hitting a tritone and making your solo suddenly sound out of key. It is totally not a waste of time. Most non-western music prior to the twentieth century was based off a 5 note scale. It isn't the major pentatonic scale that you hear now but it was still a 5 note scale. Try listening to some old Chinese music for something that would sound more innovative if applied to western music. The beauty of the pentatonic scale is that it's simple to learn and play and easy to improvise with while not making things sound out of key. I personally think it sounds better with well placed blue notes and other interprative practices thrown in (like bends, slides, and slurs). It sounds like you have blues burnout. A lot of mediocre blues guitarists produce nearly identical sounding solos since they don't put in many (if any) sweet notes to make the music more interesting. Hell, even some of the blues greats played some really boring solos by today's standards. With that said, the pentatonics can make some very interesting and unique sounding music but they just need a novel interpretation to make them sing. I'm sure someone will come along with some suggestions of performers who have unique and interesting interpretations of these types of scales.
Traf	Date: April 6, 2004 @ 2:43 AM Thanks for your comments sqricub. It's always interesting hearing other peoples views on the pentatonic. As for Gary Moore, he's more a rock guitarists, but also plays a kind of heavy blues. He really is our top rock/blues player over here. I'm amazed he's not well known outside the UK... I've done a version of one of his songs that's on my page http://guitardodge.dmusic.com/ I don't really do it justice but it'll give you an idea of his music. He writes some incredibly, haunting guitar stuff.
pog	Date: April 6, 2004 @ 4:24 AM Cool thread topic !!! I havn't heard much about Gary Moore since "still got the blues"... I think it's the only track that made it particularly big here in oz. The pentatonic is a slightly underrated scale, but also cool at the same time. I think it's a minor thing... Most guitarist tend to learn it first (I did) because it's the easiest scale (less notes) and does truly point out the most "in" notes you can play in any given key. I think it's more attractive scale, because it is the basics behind working with a dark, minor sound (as opposed to the happy major sound.) I can't explain the thrill when I discovered if you add a few notes here and there, you come up with the natural minor scale. I've always felt that these 2 scales, like I said, are the most underrated. Simple to learn, but to truly master them is another story. On the other hand, I'm inclined to agree with you as it's the most abused of scales in the western world. I guess it's just another rule that we learn in order to know we're breaking them properly.
smooka	Date: April 6, 2004 @ 10:48 AM I've been to the pentatonic, cool place in DC
DevonPowell	Date: April 6, 2004 @ 8:02 PM "Carry on my wayward son" by Kansas - intro/main riff based on A-minor pent. scale (woo-hoo!) Lots of (ahem) good music smacks of the pentatonic scale. All scales are good scales. However, PRACTICING scales is a pain in the butt. Oh, and I'll take a ginandtonic
leflaw	Date: April 6, 2004 @ 11:07 PM Generally, scales are about what notes NOT to play, and the pentatonic is sparse. No altered notes, no 9ths no 6ths, no major 7th. Its a cool sound, especialy when constructed over two or three octaves. Try playing all pentatonic over blues progression, then switch to wholetone or altered scale ( i.e. + or - 9, 11, 13th) over the V chord ( think, for example, of playing an A flat minor scale over a G chord). Cool.
Traf	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 5:37 AM Well I reckon the only time the pentatonic sounds good (if goods the right word) is when played on Scottish Bagpipes. they have to play it cuz that's all the notes they have... I agree with Devon that in some cases as a melody it can work but for improvising it's totally useless. It doesn't matter how good a player is, no one can make 5 notes sound interesting for long even with a plethora (wow, what a great word for this time in the morning) of techniques... And yes, adding the 9th 6th and major 7th (or dominant 7th if playing blues) makes it into a proper scale, so why do these books and teachers not give beginners these proper scales in the first place? Talking of place.. Do we have any fisherman on site? If I'm not practicing my pentatonic, I'm fishing
pog	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 6:10 AM I often ask ppl if they like fishing... then hand them a pile of twisted and tangled guitar leads KIDDING ! I wrap my leads using the under/over technique.
Arthen	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 7:13 AM Gary Moore fucking rocks. Listening to Empty Rooms, it's really good. And of course Still Got The Blues is his most famous track... The pentatonic is one of the coolest scales in the world, Dodge! 5 notes yeah, but you can get some of the coolest licks in that scale. Hendrix, Moore, Paul Gilbert, you can hear pentatonic stuff in 90% of their usual playing. Then again if you don't feel anything for blues...there's always neoclassical.... :laugh:
Arthen	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 7:15 AM Powell....carry on wayward son is another one of my favourite kansas song
Traf	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 8:54 AM Hey, this is becoming a good discussion.. Hi Arthen.. I've never heard Gary Moore use the Pentatonic in his life. I've seen him play about 30 times and have all his stuff. He uses all the notes available to him like all good blues players do. I s'pose you could say that the scales these class players are using has the minor pentatonic notes in them sometimes, but they are adding so many other notes. And of course I feel for the blues.. I just love it and that's why I feel so strongly about the misuse of this scale. My argument is not with players who use the pent, it's with the books and teachers that promote it, I agree it's a starting point and you get something that sounds ok for very little input, but I've seen so many people get stuck in this 5 note mode. It's a minor scale for goodness sake and it's mostly used over a major key blues. Whatever happened to the third? and the other notes mention by leflaw.. if anyone has a moment, please come over and have a listen to bit of blues I've upped... and there's not a pentatonic in site.. Thanks for your interest in this chat.. I hope I'm not going on too much.. I'm a new member here but just love chatting about music and stuff. There's some cclass players here.
pog	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 11:48 AM Yah.. it is kinda easy to get limited by the pentatonic.
sqrlcub	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 1:31 PM Um, the pentatonic isn't necessarily a minor scale. There is a minor pentatonic but that is a different scale altogether. The main pentatonic scale you hear is based off of the MAJOR diatonic scale without the 4th and 7th scale degree. The triad the tonic chord makes is a MAJOR triad. C, D, E, G, A, C. One octave of the major pentatonic scale. Notice that it can be made into the minor pentatonic very easily, just like the major scale can be formed into a minor scale by starting on the 6th scale degree rather than the tonic. Do you like BB King? He uses the pentatonic scale. Hell, Eric Johnson, Steve Vai, practically all of the blues greats use the pentatonic scale at some time or another. The musicality comes when the performers know when to stray from it. Really, you would do that with any type of scale pattern while playing. Anything that is played too rigidly ends up sounding trite. I have heard most of your arguments at various times while listening to lectures from various 12 tone composers. They say the same thing about modes, major/minor scales (and all the derivitive scales), unique scales, the mystic scale (yeah, you're probably not a Scriabin fan), etc. If it doesn't have 12 western tuned notes in the scale it isn't musical, it is trite, etc. I can bet that places that use microtones (India springs to mind) would think quite the same too. I have seen some classical composers divide the octave up to 36 places. They say that the 12 notes is too limiting. The one specific one, I had to sit through a lecture when I was in music school. I don't remember his name, but he was a professor at Rice University I think. He said, much the same about the chromatic scale as the 12 note scale folks said about the diatonic scale, and you say about the pentatonic scale. His music even with all the microtones sounded trite. Not only that, it sounded out of tune to my ears. However, there were others out there whom I have heard who use variuos microtone scales that end up sounding interesting or good. Ravi Shankar used intervals in his sitar playing that aren't found in western music, at least not intentionally and I quite like the various ragas he plays. To go onto the true minimalist side of the argument, you should try listening to something like Elliot Carter's "A" there is only one note in that composition. I believe it is for the clarinet. Of course, the note is A. It is textural composition and very expressive if played by a talented performer. If it is played by a crappy performer it just sounds like the note A being played in a lot of different octaves. Even Ravel's Bolero (I think it is excessively boring) only has one repeated theme that is played with different nuances of tone color. Many people consider it Ravel's finest work. I don't but that is beside the point. Basically, what it boils down to, a good musician, like any good artist, can make a masterpiece out of the tools that are used regardless of how expansive they are. Even if the tools are very limited. The pentatonic is like giving the artist only a stick of charcoal (well it would be more like a primary color pallette) to draw with. The charcoal can still draw an amazing and even photorealistic and expressive picture. In short, it can create a masterpiece in the hands of a masterful artist. The same holds true with the pentatonic scale.
Traf	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 3:13 PM Yes, sorry sqrlcub, you are right of course... When I said that it's a minor scale, I was referring to the pentatonic that's generally used for Rock and blues. I actually think the major pent is a rather beautiful scale. I live in England and we have a lot of Irish and Scottish (Celtic) musicians that use this scale to incredible effect. Yes I love BB King... He's been a great influence to a lot of English guitarists, But like Johson, Via and all those, they have the ability to embelish with other notes. Personally, scales fascinate me. I've dabbled with most of them from time to time, but not been able to use a lot of them to great effect... that's not the scales fault, it's mine. I have to say I haven't dabbled with the scriabin scale for long time. Wasn't he that wierd Russian.. in fact I seem to remember it being a pentatonic scale ..lol.. Isn't it that funny little scale like a 6th arpeggio but with an added flattened 2nd... Does anyone actually use it? Antway, back to sanity... I have to totally agree with you, it's how the musician uses these scales that makes all the difference. We can all learn to type, but it doesn't mean we can write a good poem or book The Elliot Carters "A" sounds interesting. Reminds me of anther strange event... Did you ever hear of the performance by David Tudor of John Cage's 4'33"? It was at Woodstock in 1952 when he sat at the piano and played nothing for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. He even occassionally turn the music over. Isn't music great... Thanks for your comments sqrlcub
sqrlcub	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 3:37 PM It's not pentatonic but it is based off of 6 notes (aka hexatonic). Here is the scale with the tonic of C: c c# d# e f# g# c which equates to the following intervals H W H W W W (then back to see for a major third). I don't really think of it as an arpeggio because it is so linear but I can see where others would. When I played in a grindcore band (amazing for a classical player, I know), I would make riffs off of the Mystic scale (and diminished and chromatic scales but that is another story) I've seen 4'33" performed before in addition to many other pieces by Cage. 4'33' in my mind is really a piece of performance art where you are supposed to listen to things happening around you. It's an interesting concept, but I think it was something Cage conceptualized on one of his frequent mushroom trips. He must have had a very good publicist to sell that. The performance notes in the piece itself say when to turn the pages. "A" isn't really anything like 4'33" though. It is a tone piece like Bolero but significantly more minimalistic (ie, the one note "scale" and all). However, Living Room Music (by Cage) is quite fabulous if you like percussive pieces on non-traditional instruments.
leflaw	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 10:55 PM I think that if you can't play blues, you can't play rock or jazz or country. Blues is the foundation of all those and more.
Arthen	Date: April 7, 2004 @ 11:58 PM Agreed.
100thmonk	Date: April 28, 2004 @ 2:15 PM if you need to spice up your major pentatonic weedling try this! first off, learn your major pentatonic in all twelve keys . then, instead of playing from the root note(1)of a given chord, try playing the major pentatonic scale from 7, or 2. in other words, say your playing a d minor 7, sometimes playing a major pentatonic(cdegac)will produce surprising results, like in this eg where you have ended up with 7, 9 and 11 in your soloing sound. experiment by playing major or minor pentatonics from any degree in a given chord and you will find some amazing results harmonically will start to come up. alot of the great jazz players use this type of harmonic analysis and approach. it result in very melodic and personal sounding lines, especially if spiced up with the use of modes and other types of scales. NO SINGLE SCALE WILL SOLVE YOU SOLOING NEEDS! but pentatonic is a pretty great place to start. also, if you are bored with anything theory related, you are missing something. theory is an almost endlessly deep and rewarding subject. remember when you first started to read the alphabet, and then you could read words like cat and bus and mom, then you moved on to sentences, and then to paragraphs. most of this stuff is just the beginnings of the grammar. once you have the vocabulary, you will begin to see the point of theory. please feel free to ask questions or tell me i am ignorant.
woodhead	Date: April 28, 2004 @ 10:54 PM Gary Moore , and some guitar players never heard of him I think hisbest work personally was when he was with thin lizzy, the solo to holywars was totally the sh*t. As fro the penatonic, if you use your theory you can play the major and minor for example c major has no flats or sharps as does a minor. The basic penatonic is cool but I beliveto use all scales that you have at your finger tips is the best approach. and when it comes to wrong notes some players have made that work as well. Listen to George Lynch's playing he was notorius for using notes that were not in the scale, but he made it work and George is one hell of a guitar player IMHO
chrismacmanus	Date: May 8, 2004 @ 10:53 AM The pentatonic is not bad for bluffers (might include myself in that category), it certainly serves as a good starting point for anyone who is learning guitar. For those of us who don't know a huge amount of theory (or are too lazy to learn) it's a good template for solos around which notes from other scales can be thrown in - again, being too lazy to learn scales, this would come through trial and error. As for Gary Moore, I've heard he's supporting Bob Dylan this summer, thinking of going to see him at Stormont Castle in Belfast.
Traf	Date: May 10, 2004 @ 11:51 AM Go and see him.. He's awsome live... Not sure about Bob Dylan though... :
Intergalacti...	Date: May 12, 2004 @ 3:18 PM Gary moore wasnt he with Thin Lizzy? There was somethin Moore with think lizzy not sure about his first name.
Traf	Date: May 12, 2004 @ 7:58 PM Yes.. It was THE Gary Moore... I actually saw them the night he got the sack.. He came out on the stage holding a large bottle of wiskey about half full and before they had played the first number, he had downed it all.. He fell over and they carried him off... That was his last gig with them.. Shame really.. Still.. he's got himself together since then and come up with some great songs and performances... I've never understood why he never got a name in the States... He's certainly got one here in the UK..
MisledMayhem	Date: May 12, 2004 @ 8:00 PM You know what's weird that i just learned yesterday...there's a major and minor pentatonic, the minor one is the one we are all familiar with, but the major one sounds like something out of a kung fu movie, it's weird.
kyodylee	Date: May 12, 2004 @ 9:45 PM Well, I don't know about the rest of this site, but I mentioned Gary Moore in MY list of favorite guitarists here: http://www.dmusic.com/forum/guitar/8069 I Led Clones w/ Ozzy !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Traf	Date: May 13, 2004 @ 8:31 AM aha yes MisledMayhem.. It's a great sounding little scale isn't it.. It's used a lot in Celtic music and Irish music.. In fact, the early bagpipes only had these 5 notes.. (auld langs eyne an example) I wonder what they'd sound like used on a 12 bar blues?
chrismacmanus	Date: May 13, 2004 @ 8:43 AM Someones probably already mentioned this I'm sure by now in this thread, but the major pentatonic is quite a nice one to use in country solos (some might not think the words 'country' and 'nice' can be used in the same sentance) and as can sometimes be thrown over the Vth chord of a I - IV - V blues progression.
bastardo23	Date: May 20, 2004 @ 12:35 PM traf.. try what that monk was talkin about it works!! even on blues chords..
Rythameen	Date: May 21, 2004 @ 3:50 PM Most blues players switch between minor and major pentatonics during the course of a song. Listen to Freddie King's Hideaway (Freddie's version, or Clapton or Jeff Healy) for example, it begins with straight major pentatonic for the first chorus and then moves into minor pentatonic for most of the rest of the song. BB King is another that makes great use of the major pentatonic.
jof1029	Date: July 15, 2004 @ 1:30 AM i learned the penatonic first, i find it to be useful as a moveable scale. i now use the diatonic more just to give myself more to work with. i use these when improvising a solo usually. i find the best way to use scales is to map them out on a fretboard diagram and find clusters of notes to make your own patterns. i find the penatonic scale to be too limiting, and i like slides from place to place
Smokindog	Date: July 27, 2004 @ 1:21 PM After playing guitar for 25 years I decided to learn some scales, then I discoverd that I was playing the pentatonic scales since I was 13 and did not know it. I use mostly pentatonic scales ( I mostly play blues).
BedroomSessions	Date: July 27, 2004 @ 2:00 PM gary moore= cool
Traf	Date: July 28, 2004 @ 7:18 PM It's interesting what Rythameen has written about the minor and major pentatonics... and he's right.. If you play the A minor pentatonic shape on the 5th fret and then play exactly the same shape 3 frets down (so you are starting on an F sharp note) you will in fact get the A major pentaonic. It does work quite well to drop down to this when the chord is A... If the chord changes to the D or E then it's probably better to nip back up to the Minor pentatonic on the 5th fret. This is really a little cheat mode and in fact when you put the 2 together, you're not actually playing a pentatonic scale at all, but more of a blues rock scale that includes the notes that players who stick to the minor pentatonic are missing out on. The best thing to do is to play around on the 5th fret position and try and add the notes that are in the major pentatonic that are not in the minor ... eg B, F sharp (I wish I could find that poxy sharp sign on my computor keyboard) and C sharp (gotta be careful with that last one and it only works well when the chord is an A)

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