Guitar Scales & Modes from A to Z

Learning guitar scales and guitar modes can be enlightening or confusing, depending on how you approach it.

Musical scales have existed for millennia all over the world -they are probably as old as the spoken word -and they are one of the pillars of musical theory. However, in general, they are very poorly understood. In fact, a scale is more a system of relationships than a "ladder" of tones: this last view limits our ability to use them with musical sense.

And of course, the way we visualize and study them on the guitar is a key determining factor in what we can do with our instrument.

Figure 1: Different views of the C major scale

Figure 2: An ascending chromatic scale, starting on C

Figure 3: A minor pentatonic scale (E minor)

So what exactly is a musical scale?

Most systems for learning scales on the guitar fretboard are based on two octave fingering patterns. So you can spend years learning every possible scale in all possible inversions and positions (a flabbergasting number of patterns!) and not have gleaned any in-depth understanding of the fretboard: how many guitarists out there can only solo by playing scales up and down, top speed?

If you are bored of that too, you've come to the right place. Truth is, I get bored stiff of listening to such players after the first two minutes of awe at the speed of their fingers!And I don't object to playing fast, but if it's the only thing you can do, you're missing out on so much.

Most music theory courses start out by showing you the C major scale. So do most guitar scale systems. Instead of looking at a box diagram with two octaves of the C major scale, let's take a look at it first along each string and then on the entire guitar fretboard.

Guitar Scales: Section Overview