Hi! I'm Nate Savage and welcome to video #6 of the Blues Guitar Quick-Start Series.
In this lesson, we're going to shift focus from the rhythm blues guitar to lead blues guitar
by learning a shape for the blues scale. We're only going to concentrate on learning the
shape and learning where the root notes are for now.
The great thing about the blues and learning the blues scale is super easy. Once you learn
it, you just jump right in and start making some great sounding solos. In later lessons,
we're going to cover how to start choosing your notes out of the blues scale. But for
now, just learn the shapes and have fun of it. Now, there are several blues scale shapes.
We're all going to concentrate on one in this lesson. It's better to know one blues scale
shape and be able to use it really well, than it is to know all of them and not really
be able to use them very well. If you know your minor pentatonic scale shape,
they're really common that everybody knows. You're going to be a step ahead because all
we're going to be doing is adding a note, one note to that scale. And it’s called
a flat 5 note. This note is responsible for the really bluesy sound that you get with the
blues scale. So like I said, if you know your minor pentatonic scale shape, this one,
it's going to be really easy 'cause we're only going to add one note in each octave of the
scale to make our blues scale. So, let's just start from the very beginning.
Let's start from the lowest root note here on an open E string, play that note. Then you're
going to play the 3rd fret of the low E string. I like to use my third finger for this particular
shape. With the open strings anyway, so, those 2 notes, get those down. Memorize where they
are and then you're going to go over to the A string. We have 3 notes on this string.
If this was a regular minor pentatonic scale, you would have just an open A string and then
the 2nd fret of the A string with your middle finger, right? We have to insert the flat 5
note here, so we're going to play open, the 1st fret with your first finger, and then the
2nd fret with your second finger. So, experiment with those notes, get them down, and add them
to the rest of the shape. The next string over is the D string and the
notes on that string are pretty easy. It's just an open D string, and then the 2nd fret
of the D string with, I play that with my middle finger. So, add those 2 notes, memorize
them, then add them into the rest of the scale. And actually, that completes the first octave
for our blues scale. So, you have... Now, you have to play the second octave and
we're going to add in another flat 5 note. Over to the next string, the G string, you're
going to have that open. Then the 2nd fret with your second finger and here comes the
flat 5 right here, third finger 3rd fret. So those are the notes on that string. Get
those down; add them in to the rest of the scale.
Ok. The last two strings, the B and high E string are really easy 'cause they’re the
exact same pattern. So, we'll go ahead and we’ll learn both of those together. Play
the open B string, then the 3rd fret, the B string with your third finger. This exact
same pattern on the high E string so open high E and 3rd fret. So get those down. Memorize
where they are and add them to the rest of the shape.
So that's the entire sixth string open E blues scale shape and you're going to make note
of a couple of things. You're going to see black or filled in circles. Those black filled
in circles represents the root notes of this scale. So, your root notes are going to be
the open E string, 2nd fret of the D string and the open high E string too. Try to be
aware of where these root notes are as you practice and memorize this scale shape.
One easy way to kind of solidify where they are is to kind of pause when you get to them.
So open E, 2nd fret of the D, high E string open, right? Now, you can play this exact
same open E blues scale shape up one octave higher. The only real difference is instead
of playing all this open string, your index finger is going to be playing all of those
notes on the 12th fret. So, let's do that. Move this shape up from the low E to this
E note on the 12th fret. That's going to be your starting point now. So, instead of having
open on the 3rd fret, you're going to have the 12th fret with your first finger, the
15th fret with your pinky. Next string over, you're going to have the 12th fret again with
your index finger, then the next 2 notes with your second and third fingers. Next string
over, 12th fret again with your index finger, 14th fret with your third finger. Next string
over, 12th again with the first finger, 14th with your third, 15th with your pinky and
then again. The next two strings are the same again. So, we're going to learn those same
time. Index finger on the 12th, 15th with your pinky, same exact thing on the next string over.
So, that's the exact same scale. We're just
using our index finger to grab all the notes that were played with open strings with the
other shape, right? So...so same thing applies here. Try to memorize where the root notes
are and be aware of that as you play through this scale. 12 fret of the E, 14 fret of the
D, and the 12 fret of the high E, too. And you can also try to start memorizing where
the flat 5 notes that we put in are. Right there. And just know that the flat 5 note
is a very colourful note for this scale. It is more of a passing tone. Once you're fairly
comfortable with these shapes, what you can do is just pull up the jam track and work
on playing with this scale over some real music. And you still have the option to go
with either 70 beats per minute or 100 beats per minute depending on what you're comfortable
with. You can kind of view these jam tracks on this lesson as if dress up a metronome
or something that’s just more fun to practice your scales to. Here is how I would develop
or practice this scales with these jam tracks.
In the next lesson, we're going to talk a little bit more about the blues scale on how it's
actually made so get ready for that. If you have any questions about the blues scale or
these shapes in general. You can leave them here in the comments or e-mail me nate@guitarsystem.com.
I'll see you in the next lesson.