the supreme guide to scales mastery for electric … supreme guide to scales mastery for electric...

47
© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar By Mike Philippov Video Transcript Hello and welcome to the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My name is Mike Philippov and I’m happy to have you here and I want to commend you for making this awesome choice to invest into your guitar playing and to learn more about this important topic of mastering scales on your guitar. Regardless of your goals as a musician, scales will play a central role in anything and everything you ever do in music and since you are watching this video right now it’s likely that you already realize this fact to be true. And also like a lot of guitar players, you probably have found yourself at one point or another overwhelmed and frustrated because you did not know the best way to practice scales in your guitar playing. Guitar players typically face two problems when learning to play scales. The first of these, is not knowing how to go beyond playing a certain scale in only one position on the guitar and extending it to playing it throughout the entire fretboard. The second problem is not knowing how to take the scales that they have already learned and actually knowing how to apply them creatively in music. Usually what happens is after not being able to solve these problems on their own, guitar players will simply move on to learn the next new scale hoping that learning more and more new scales will somehow solve these problems that they are having. Unfortunately most of the times that does not happen. What usually does happen is that guitar players will simply accumulate a whole bunch of different scales that they can play only in one position but still struggle to actually use them in any meaningful way in their music. And this cycle continues on and on and on leading to only more frustration and disappointment. In this course you are not going to find fingerings for dozens of obscure and exotic scales that may or may not have any relevance at all to the music you want to play. You are also not going to find hundreds of different guitar licks that will leave you with nothing other than the ability to play the notes of those licks. Instead what you will find here is a proven and reliable system for taking any scale that you want to learn to play and knowing exactly what to do step by step in order to master it in your guitar playing. You are also going to develop a much greater level of fretboard visualization so that you can actually take the scales that you learn and know how to apply them creatively in making guitar solos or just general guitar playing. By the time you make it to the end of this course, you will have taken a major step towards becoming a highly creative musician and you will have the tools that you need to achieve a much greater level of freedom in your guitar playing. The first thing you need to realize about learning scales on guitar is that any scale regardless of what type of scale it is spans the entire length of the guitar. So if you want to master any scale in your guitar playing, you must learn how it lays out throughout the entire length of the guitar neck. And before we get deeper into the rest of this

Upload: vannga

Post on 29-May-2018

276 views

Category:

Documents


3 download

TRANSCRIPT

Page 1: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar

By Mike Philippov

Video Transcript

Hello and welcome to the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My name is Mike Philippov and I’m happy to have you here and I want to commend you for

making this awesome choice to invest into your guitar playing and to learn more about

this important topic of mastering scales on your guitar.

Regardless of your goals as a musician, scales will play a central role in anything and

everything you ever do in music and since you are watching this video right now it’s likely that you already realize this fact to be true. And also like a lot of guitar players,

you probably have found yourself at one point or another overwhelmed and frustrated

because you did not know the best way to practice scales in your guitar playing.

Guitar players typically face two problems when learning to play scales. The first of these, is not knowing how to go beyond playing a certain scale in only one position on

the guitar and extending it to playing it throughout the entire fretboard. The second problem is not knowing how to take the scales that they have already learned and actually knowing how to apply them creatively in music.

Usually what happens is after not being able to solve these problems on their own,

guitar players will simply move on to learn the next new scale hoping that learning more and more new scales will somehow solve these problems that they are having.

Unfortunately most of the times that does not happen. What usually does happen is that

guitar players will simply accumulate a whole bunch of different scales that they can

play only in one position but still struggle to actually use them in any meaningful way in their music. And this cycle continues on and on and on leading to only more frustration

and disappointment.

In this course you are not going to find fingerings for dozens of obscure and exotic scales that may or may not have any relevance at all to the music you want to play. You

are also not going to find hundreds of different guitar licks that will leave you with nothing other than the ability to play the notes of those licks. Instead what you will find

here is a proven and reliable system for taking any scale that you want to learn to play

and knowing exactly what to do step by step in order to master it in your guitar playing.

You are also going to develop a much greater level of fretboard visualization so that you

can actually take the scales that you learn and know how to apply them creatively in making guitar solos or just general guitar playing. By the time you make it to the end of

this course, you will have taken a major step towards becoming a highly creative

musician and you will have the tools that you need to achieve a much greater level of

freedom in your guitar playing.

The first thing you need to realize about learning scales on guitar is that any scale regardless of what type of scale it is spans the entire length of the guitar. So if you want

to master any scale in your guitar playing, you must learn how it lays out throughout

the entire length of the guitar neck. And before we get deeper into the rest of this

Page 2: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

course there is a very important video that I want you to watch that goes over the

fundamentals of what it means to practice scales all over the guitar.

You may have already seen this video before on my website, but regardless, it will be

very beneficial for you to either go and watch this video now if you have not seen it

before, or even if you have watched it in the past it will also be helpful for you to go and review it once more so that these concepts are very clear in your mind before we

continue. So go and watch this video now (you can find the link to it here:

http://www.practiceguitarnow.com/howtopracticeguitarscalesvideo.html ), and when you are done, you can come back here and we are going to pick up from where that

video left off, talking about some more advanced and a lot more fun concepts that are

not discussed it the free version of the video. So go on and check this video right now and I will see you back here in a few minutes.

Okay, now that you understand more about the fundamentals of practicing scales and

you also understand more about how scales are laid on guitar, it is time for your first practicing assignment. With this course, you have received a PDF document that contains fingerings for a variety of scales that are most commonly used in music.

The first one I want you to look at is the set of fingerings for the major scale shown to you in the key of A Major. What I want you to do is take the seven shapes of the major

scale that you see in the PDF document and spend about the next 2 weeks or so getting those shapes completely memorized. If you spend about two days or two practice

sessions on each shape drilling it over and over before moving on to the next one, that means in about two weeks or 14 days time you are going to have all seven of those

shapes memorized. And the good news is after you learn those seven shapes you will be

able to move them up and down in order to play the major scale in any key on the

guitar. So you only have to learn one set of major scales and that will enable you to play them in any key. We will talk a lot more about what that means later in this course.

There are many good reasons why you should do this assignment right now. The first

one is that having the knowledge of how the major scale is laid out on guitar and having the ability to play all seven of the shapes of the major scale on guitar will make it a lot

easier to understand and apply the material you will learn later in this course. And in addition, (speaking generally) practicing scales all over the guitar neck is a great

exercise for your technique that will enhance your 2 hand synchronization specifically.

If you already know how to play the 7 shapes of the major scale, then you can skip this

assignment and continue watching this video until you get you get to your next

assignment that will come a little bit later. But if you do not have this skill down yet, then it is very important for you to not move on until you have those seven shapes

completely memorized.

The speed at which you can play these scales is not important for this assignment - in fact it does not matter at all. All that matters is that you are able to play these scales all

the way through without stopping and without having to think about what notes come next. After you have this skill down at least to that level you will be ready to move on,

but please do not make the mistake of rushing through the rest of this course and not

doing any of the assignments. If you really want to improve your guitar playing, then

Page 3: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

you will get a lot more benefit from doing these assignments in the order in which I give

them to you before moving forward.

Okay, now that you have some experience of actually practicing scales all over the

guitar neck, it is time to talk about the next very important topic that all great guitar

players master in the process of learning to be free with playing scales on guitar and that topic is scale sequences. Scales are said to be played in a sequence, when instead

of playing the notes of the scale linearly or one note after the other in a straight order, a

certain pattern is picked and applied to the notes of the scale to create what is called a sequence.

To illustrate this visually, when you think about playing the scale one note after the other in a straight line, just think of a line literally moving up and moving down. And

when you think about a scale sequence, visualize the notes moving up and moving down

in a manner similar to the steps of a staircase. In both cases, whether you will be

playing the scale linearly or by using a scale sequence, the goal is exactly the same. You want to get from the first note of the scale to the last note. But when using a scale sequence idea, a lot more musical interest is created and it is a lot more enjoyable to

listen to. And you will hear a lot of this in the examples that I will demonstrate to you throughout this course.

There are many reasons why it is important for you to learn about how scale sequences work and all of these reason will help you become a vastly better guitar player. Here is

why. First, as you practice scale sequences, that automatically forces you to do a lot of practicing of the actual scale shapes from which the scale sequences are built. And it is

obvious that the more time you spend on practicing the scale shapes, the better you will

memorize them and the easier it will become for you to actually to use them when it

comes time to play a guitar solo. The second reason is when it comes to playing actual music, scale sequences are used a lot more frequently than scales that are played in a

linear way with one note after the other. This is especially true in the context of the guitar solo where scales sequences can be used as faster passages. So by practicing

scale sequences you will be bridging the gap between practicing scales as a theoretical exercise and actually being able to use them creatively in your guitar solos.

The third reason why practicing scale sequence is important, is because doing so is an

excellent way to improve your guitar technique. In particular, your two hand

synchronization, your picking articulation and your general ability to play things cleanly on guitar will all improve as a result of practicing scale sequences. So in addition to the

other benefits I mentioned, you will be come a better general guitar player as a result of

this kind of practicing also. And last but not least, practicing scale sequences is simply a lot more fun than just playing scales straight up and down.

Before we begin talking about how to actually practice and create scale sequences in

your guitar playing, there are a couple more points that I want to make sure you understand about this topic. First, there are literarily hundreds of possibilities for

creating and playing scale sequences, and the purpose of this course is not for me simply show all of them to you. Doing this would not only take far too long, but will also

simply overwhelm you with too much information that you are not going to able to use.

Page 4: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Remember that the goal is not for you to know every single scale sequence possibility

that exists in order to be able to use them in your guitar playing. Instead the main thing

that you really need to know is what scale sequences are, how they can be created and how you can apply this information to creating any scale sequence on your own anytime

you need to do so in your music. So in this course you are going to get the tools to do

exactly that.

The second thing I wanted to mention is that scale sequences can be broken up into

several different groups or types. Within each type, there are many individual scale sequences that are possible. In this course we will deal with three main scale sequence

groups. The first one will be sequences played on one string at a time, the next one will

be scale sequences played on string pairs or two strings at a time, and finally we will get to scale sequences played on all six strings of the guitar.

First I will introduce each group of scale sequences to you and show some examples of

how they are constructed, then I’m going to show you how you can create these sequences yourself and I will give you some assignments that will help you practice this skill. And finally, in a later section of this course, I will show you how to put all of these

scale sequences together and how to actually start using them creatively in your music.

Scale Sequences On A Single String

Okay, now we are ready to get started with talking about some actual examples of scale

sequences, and the first group of sequences we’ll talk about will be scale sequences played on one string at a time. With the PDF document you received with this course,

there are some examples of scale sequences shown in there. And the first one I want

you to look at is the example of an A Major scale sequence played on the high E string.

That one sounds like this:

[Audio Example 1]

Page 5: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

The most important thing I want you to notice about what I just played are the first four

notes of the scale sequences that sound like this (listen to the example on video).

This is the pattern that sets up the scale sequence and this is the pattern that gets

moved up through the rest of the scale one note at a time. So rather than playing the

scale one note after the other in a linear way like this:

[Audio Example 1a]

we instead set up a pattern that also moves through this scale one note at a time, but the notes within each pattern are not occurring in a step-by-step order as they would if

you play the scale simply straight up and straight down. You can see this for yourself if you look at the tab of the example within the PDF document. The first fragment of the

scale sequence starts on fret number seven, which is the second note of the A Major scale. Then it moves to the seventh note of the scale at the fourth fret, then it moves to

the fifth fret or the first note of the scale and then it moves again to the second note of the scale.

So this is the pattern, and as you can see, the notes are not occurring one after the

other. After this first pattern is played, it gets moved up to the next note of the scale and it gets repeated. And then it gets moved up to the next note and repeated again,

then the next note, then the next, then the next. Let me play it for you again, and if you

didn’t hear it the first time listen for how the pattern repeats as it moves up through the

scale. [Audio Example 1]

Page 6: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

This way it takes a little bit longer to make your way through the scale to the highest

note, but as you can hear, a lot more musical interest is created by playing the scale in

this way as opposed to simply playing it straight up and down. It’s important to point out that the reason why we are spending so much time looking for the initial pattern

that sets up the scale sequence is because being able to find it and identify it will make

it a lot easier for you to transpose these ideas to other keys and other types of scales later. We’ll talk a lot more about that later in this course.

To help you hear more clearly how the initial starting pattern makes a big difference in the way the final scale sequence is going to sound, there are two more examples I want

to show you. In the second example that you can see in your PDF document, there is an

example of the same exact scale (A Major), but now we are using a completely different sequencing pattern to play through that scale. And as I play the example for you, you

will hear right away how it sounds quite a bit different than the first example, even

though the notes are going to be exactly the same. Here is how it goes.

[Audio Example 2]

So as you can hear right away, the two examples (this one and the one before) sound

quite a bit different. And the difference is that here we are using triplets and specifically 16th note triplets as opposed to 16th notes that were used in the last example. And here

the initial starting pattern of the scale sequence sounds like this: (listen to the example

on video).

Page 7: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

And as you can hear, it is six notes long as opposed to being four notes long as it was in

the last example. And this initial starting pattern of 16th note triplets then gets moved

up all the way through the scale one note at a time. So we start on note number two (listen to the example on video), then we move up to note number three (listen to the

example on video), then we move to note number four (listen to the example on video),

then note number five (listen to the example on video) and so on. And again, as we did with the last example, as I play it through slowly you should be able to hear how the

pattern starts over every time I move to the next note. Let me play it for you again, and

listen to how that pattern starts over.

[Audio Example 2]

When I was playing just now, I was intentionally over emphasizing with the pick the

note that marked the moment where the initial pattern of the scale sequence started

over, to make it easier for you to hear.

In this next example we are going to again use 16th notes to sequence the scale in the

same way we did in the first example, but there will be a few differences in how the scale sequence is played. First of all, we are going to start on the first note of the scale

instead of the second, and also the pattern itself will be a little bit different. So let me

play it for you and then I will explain some more things about this example. It sounds

like this:

Page 8: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 3]

So as you could see and hear, we started on the first note of the scale, and in this

particular example the initial starting pattern sounds like this: (listen to the example on video). Then it gets moved up to the next note of the scale, and that sounds like this:

(listen to the example on video), then we move up to the third note of scale (listen to the example on video), then move to the fourth note (listen to the example on video),

then fifth note (listen to the example on video) and so on.

So again, the principle of creating these scale sequences do not change from one

example to the next, but the details of how each individual pattern is arranged are going

to be different of course which is what creates a unique sound in each case. It is important that regardless of what pattern you chose to use to create your scale

sequence, the pattern must stay the same as you move it up through the scale in order

for the scale sequence to work and sound correct. You heard examples of this in each of the examples I demonstrated. The pattern, once it has been identified, is being held

constant as it moves up through the scale. This is very important.

If you have trouble memorizing the fingerings for some of these scale sequences, then

what would really help you is learning to visualize the fretboard, not so much in terms of one note to the next note, to the next note or one note at a time, but rather in terms of

patterns or shapes that your hand can be in when you play. For example, when I was

playing the three scale sequence examples for you just a moment ago, my hand was

only in one of three different shapes. They were:

Page 9: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

a half step followed by a whole step

[Audio Example 4]

or a whole step followed by another whole step

[Audio Example 5]

or a whole step followed by a half step

[Audio Example 6].

It becomes a lot easier to memorize the fingering of something when you can visualize

in advance the shape that your hand has to be in as opposed to having think about one note individually.

When you visualize an entire shape that your hand has to move into, then you automatically think three or four or five or six notes in advance as opposed to thinking

about only one note at a time. Obviously this helps your mental processing it allows you

to play more quickly with less effort.

There are also going to be other fingering patterns and shapes that you will encounter

when you play other types of scales and scale sequences and they are:

Page 10: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

a half step followed by a whole step and a half such as like this:

Audio Example 7]

and also a whole step and a half followed by a half step

[Audio Example 8]

These particular patterns are not so important at this time, but the general principle of visualizing patterns and shapes in addition to one note to the next is what’s important

for you to learn here.

Okay, now let’s take a look at how the same scale sequences that you learned to play ascending from the lowest note to the highest note can also be played descending,

which is from the highest note back down to the lowest note. And the way they work is going to be exactly the same; we are going to have the same exact starting pattern

that’s going to move through the scale only this time we are going to move from the highest note to the lowest note. Here is how the first example sounds

Page 11: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 9]

So when descending, the starting pattern is exactly the same as it was when we were

ascending. In this case it sounds like this (listen to the example on video). These are the same four notes as when we were ascending (listen to the example on video). So you

can hear the similarities and the pattern is exactly the same - it simply moves down the scale in the opposite direction.

Now let’s take a look at the second scale sequence played descending. It goes as follows

[Audio Example 10].

Page 12: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Everything about this scale sequence played descending is exactly the same as we

talked about with the previous examples. Here the starting pattern when descending

sounds like this (listen to the example on video). It is again six notes that are exactly the same as the six notes that started the ascending pattern. Here are the two side by

side so you can compare them. Here is the descending version again (listen to the

example on video) and here is the ascending version (listen to the example on video); descending again (listen to the example on video) and ascending (listen to the example

on video). And as we descend, the initial starting pattern moves down the scale one

note at a time.

And here is the third example played descending

[Audio Example 11]

Everything about it is exactly the same as we talked about for the previous examples.

One very important thing I want you to notice and pay attention to is that when you play scale sequences on one string, they actually contain portions of larger scale shapes

that span all six strings. One of the reasons why I had you practice the major scale

fingerings all over the guitar neck on all six strings, is so that you can see this idea at work now.

It’s important for you to realize that when you practice even something like single string scale sequences, you are not simply playing isolated finger patterns in one area of the

guitar - you are actually practicing one section of a much larger whole. It’s important for

you to see how it all connects with the big picture. As you continue to study the system

of how scales work and how they are laid out on guitar in sequences, it will be a lot easier for you to take this knowledge and apply it to any other new scale that you may

want to learn and have this knowledge be transferable into any musical situation that

you may find yourself in.

Essentially, you can learn to think about the process of mapping out scales on the guitar

in the same way as you would think about solving the Rubik’s cube puzzle. Although it may seem at first that there is an infinite number of ways to twist the sides of Rubik’s

cube together, just like it may at first appear like there is an infinite number of patterns

Page 13: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

and shapes that can be played on guitar, there’s a definite system and logic that can be

applied to learning how scales work on the fretboard just like there is also a system to

solve the Rubik’s cube puzzle quickly. And as we work deeper into this course, you will see all the different ways in which these ideas can help you to master playing scales in

your guitar playing.

The next step in the process of mastering single string scale sequences is for you to

learn to come up with them yourself. The three examples that you saw earlier are only a

few of the possibilities that exist for creating single string scale sequence ideas. And the two main steps you must follow are as follows. In the first step, you must come up with

an identifiable melodic pattern that is anywhere between two and six notes long that will

take you all the way through the scale, and in the second step you must be able to hear how that patterns start over as it moves from one step of the scale to the next and to

the next.

In other words, as a pattern moves through the scale, the way in which the notes of the scale are grouped within the pattern must be consistent so that your ear anticipates each shift of the pattern to the next step of the scale.

You should spend some of the practice time that you allocate to working on scale sequences in general to making up scale sequence ideas on just a single string at a

time. It does not matter what scale you do this with, but since we have just spent a lot of time talking about the major scale, it will be better for you to start with the major

scale for right now and then later introduce other scales also.

This will be a great exercise not only for your musical creativity, but also for your guitar

technique. And when we get to the section of the course where we talk about

transposing scale sequence ideas to other types of scales, I’ll give you more ideas on how to use this concept in your guitar playing. You do not need to spend the next month

coming up with hundreds of different scale sequence ideas on a single string but I want you to spend at least the next seven practice sessions over the next seven days coming

up with as many scale sequences as you can during that time. After seven days have passed and you’ve practiced this exercise, you can come back and keep working on this

course. But it will be better for you to not go further in the course past this point until you work on this assignment for at least one week.

Your goal should be to come up with as many scale sequence ideas as you can during that seven day period of time. You do not have to memorize the scale sequences you’ve

created and you do not also have to necessarily use them in your music right now. The

point is to go through the process so that you develop the skills needed to create scale sequences when the situation calls for it. So whether or not you use the ideas you come

up with right now, that’s not important. As long as you know how to create scale

sequences when the situation calls for it, you will be able to it quickly and creatively

while improvising or doing anything else in your guitar playing.

I should also point out that even though you can of course create scale sequences on any of the six strings of the guitar, it is a lot more common to play specifically single

string scale sequences on the two or three highest strings of the guitar. That is because

when scale sequences are used in a melody or in a guitar solo, they are typically played

Page 14: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

on the higher pitch strings. So, work on this assignment over the next seven days and

then in a week from now, come back here and we will continue working further in this

course.

Scale Sequences On String Pairs

Okay, now we are going to talk about the next group of scale sequences which are going

to be called scale sequences on string pairs. Just like the name applies, it refers to

playing scale sequences on groups of two strings at a time instead of one string at a time. Even though we are only adding one extra string, the number of possibilities for

playing different scale sequences actually goes up by a lot when you introduce the idea

of string pairs. It actually goes up exponentially compared to playing sequences on just one string. However the general idea is exactly the same as before. You are going to

come up with an identifiable pattern that will be used to sequence the scale starting

from a certain note in the scale and moving up one step at a time. Take a look at the

first example in the section scale sequences on string pairs inside the PDF document with the notation that you received with this course. You’re going to see a very common example of a scale sequence that occurs on string pairs using strings D and G and it

sounds like this. [Audio Example 12]

First of all, I want you to notice that this is an A Major scale which is the same scale we

used in single string scale sequence examples. And here we’re starting the sequence on

note number five of the scale, which is note E. When we first begin playing the scale sequence, the initial pattern is six notes long and it uses the notes of the scale played in

a straight order like this (listen to the example on video).

Page 15: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

So at first glance it may seem like we’re playing just a regular scale with the notes

played in a strict order. However, the cool thing happens when the starting pattern

moves up to the next note of the scale to start over, because it does so in a very special way. When we finish the starting pattern, we are on the third string playing the third

note of the scale, but when the pattern starts over, it starts over on the fourth string,

not the third string. So, this creates a cool gap between the notes and this little space is what breaks up the otherwise linear progression of the notes and creates a cool sound

which is the scale sequence in this case that we hear.

I also want you to notice how the scale sequence that I just demonstrated using strings

D and G uses portions of the larger six strings scale shapes of the A Major scale that I

had you practice earlier in this course. Again this ties back to how everything on guitar is connected. Even though at first glance it may seem like you’re practicing isolated

finger patterns, it all fits together into the bigger shapes that you practiced earlier.

If you’re having trouble visualizing what I just said, then go back and review the bigger six string shapes of the A Major scale that span the entire fretboard. Play them one after the other and then come back and review this example of a scale sequence on just two

strings. You will then see easily how the scale sequence follows exactly the larger shapes that you learned before. In addition, you should also of course practice playing the scale sequence descending, which means playing from the higher notes to the lower notes.

And that will sound like this.

[Audio Example 13]

The next concept involves transferring the scale sequence you have learned to other

pairs of strings. In order to remain in the correct key, which in this example will be the

key of A Major, you need to change the fingering to make the scale sequence work with

Page 16: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

the correct notes on another pair of strings. So for this example, we’re going to transfer

the scale sequence that you’ve just learned on strings four and three, and we’re going to

move it to strings one and two. And that’s going to sound like this.

[Audio Example 14]

In the example I just played, the notes that I used are the same exact notes of the A

Major scale, but the fingering is different because of course we’re playing on different

strings. Here is another example of the same exact scale (A Major) and the same exact

sequencing pattern, but now we’re going to be playing it on strings six and five. Here’s how that sounds.

Page 17: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 15]

As you were practicing this exercise just now using strings six and five, it should be very

easy to see how it essentially forms the starting points to all of the larger six string scale shapes of the A Major scale that you were practicing earlier. The point of this is to help you visualize how scale shapes and scale sequences are laid out not only vertically,

which means from the sixth string to the first string, but also horizontally from the first fret all the way up to the 24th fret.

For the next part of your assignment, I want you to find the descending versions of the

scale sequences that I played for you using strings one and two and strings six and five. If you understand everything that was covered so far in this course, it should be very

easy for you to do and it should only take a few minutes.

Now, let’s take a look at the second example in this series of scale sequences on string pairs. And this next scale sequence is going to be quite similar in feel and sound to the

first example we’ve played, but it’s also containing several differences that are

important. So, here’s how it sounds.

Page 18: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 16]

The interesting thing about this scale sequence is that the initial starting pattern is a

descending group of six notes. So, we’re starting on a higher note and we’re descending to a lower pitch (listen to the example on video). But then, when the starting pattern

moves up to the next note of the scale, we are moving up in pitch to a higher note while the pattern itself is descending. So, we get this cool effect of both ascending through the

scale one note at a time, but the notes within each pattern are descending. So that is a

very cool sound and feel. This is different from the notes of the first scale sequence we

looked at with string pairs where the notes of the initial starting pattern were ascending and of course the pattern itself was also ascending through the scale as well.

After you learn the scale sequence on strings four and three, it’s time to practice moving into other pairs of strings as well. Here’s how it sounds when played on strings two and

one.

Page 19: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 17]

And here’s how it sounds when played on strings six and five.

[Audio Example 18]

And of course once you learn to play the scale sequence, it’s also important to practice it

descending from the high notes to the lower notes. And here’s how this sounds when

played on strings four and three.

Page 20: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 19]

And after you move this scale sequence from strings four and three to strings two and

one and strings six and five, you should also work out for yourself the descending versions of each of those. And this should be very easy to do if you’ve understood and

practiced everything we talked about up to this point.

The third example we’re going to look at is quite interesting because this scale sequence combines both the first example and the second example we did on scale sequences

with string pairs. And you can see the tab for this third example shown in the PDF document as well. Here’s how it goes when played on strings four and three.

Page 21: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 20]

The cool thing about this particular scale sequence is that it uses what is essentially a 12 note sequencing pattern. If you think back to the very first example we looked at in this

section of the course when talking about scale sequence with the string pairs, the initial

sequencing pattern of the first example was an ascending group of six notes like this: (listen to the example on video). And then in the second example, the initial sequencing

pattern was a descending group of six notes like this: (listen to the example on video).

And in the third example that I just played for you it combines both of those. So here’s how the initial sequencing pattern of sequence number three sounds: (listen to the

example on video). I just played 12 notes and that was the entire sequencing pattern that was moved up through the A Major scale creating another bigger type of sequence.

This creates a very cool sound.

So this is simply yet another example of how you can take two basic ideas and put them

together and do something that is even cooler. There's virtually no end to the

possibilities you can come up with.

And here's a descending version of this third scale sequence.

Page 22: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 21]

And like we’ve done with the previous examples, you should also practice moving this scale sequence idea to strings two and one and strings six and five. Here's how this

sounds on strings two and one.

[Audio Example 22]

Page 23: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

And here it is played on strings six and five.

[Audio Example 23]

Now as some additional practice, you should come up with descending versions of the

two examples that I just played on strings one and two and six and five.

Now that you’ve seen some examples of scale sequences on string pairs, it’s time for

you to practice creating a few of them on your own. The process for doing so is exactly

the same as everything we have done up to this point. First, you create your initial sequencing pattern and then you move it through the scale one step at a time. But the

point I want to emphasize here is that it’s not important for you to begin the scale

sequence on note number one of the scale. So just because you're playing a scale sequence in the key of A Major, that does not mean that you need to start each scale

sequence on note A. As you have seen, in each of the examples we've done so far in this

course, a scale sequence can begin on any of the notes in the scale.

Just like you did with the scale sequences on a single string, I want you to spend about the next seven days or the next seven practice sessions coming up with as many

different scale sequence possibilities and string pairs as you can. You can also continue

coming up with scale sequences on a single string as well during this time, but put more of your focus on working specifically with sequences on string pairs because this is a

new concept that you’ve just learned. So come up with as many different possibilities as you can over the next week and then come back here to this course and you'll be ready

to continue with what will come next.

Page 24: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Scale Sequences On 6 Strings

Now, we’re ready to talk about the most common type of scale sequences you'll see in music, which are six string scale sequences. And after going through the process of

constructing scale sequences on a single string and also working with them on string

pairs, it will be a lot easier for you to understand and visualize how six string scale sequences are built.

Take a look at the PDF document that you have that contains notation for all the examples, and under the section for six string scale sequences, you'll see the first

example that sounds like this.

[Audio Example 24]

The first thing you need to notice about this scale sequence is that it follows exactly the

fingering of the first shape of the A Major scales that I had you learn earlier when we

first started this course. The second thing I want you to notice about the scale sequence

is that the initial starting pattern here contains not two, not four, but sixteen notes. Here is what they are: (listen to the example on video).

This is the initial sequencing pattern that, when moved up through the scale, creates the

sound of the sequence that we hear. I'm going to play this for you once more slowly and

I'm going to put heavier accents on the places where the pattern starts over so that you can hear it more easily. Here's what that sounds like.

Page 25: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 24]

Here's the descending version of this same scale sequence and I want you to watch carefully the notation shown in the PDF file because it is a little more tricky to practice

descending a six scale string sequence, since the fingering is a little bit different from the ascending version. Here's what that sounds like.

[Audio Example 25]

Page 26: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

In this descending version that I just played, there's also a sequencing pattern that is 16

notes long that sounds like this (listen to the example on video).

You can see in your PDF document with the tab that this is the entire first measure of

the descending part of the sequence and once this pattern is played, it is moved down to

the next note of the scale and repeated. This pattern continues all the way to the end of the scale sequence. Here's how both the ascending and the descending versions of the

scale sequence sound together (listen to the example on video).

After you have learned and practiced the scale sequence I just demonstrated in both the

ascending and descending forms, it’s time to extend it by practicing it all the way

through the seven shapes of the major scale we have learned way back in the beginning of this course. This is a very effective way to practice, and you'll find that by doing so

you'll experience several benefits in your guitar playing:

First, your ability to memorize and play the actual scale sequence itself will improve a lot as a result of practicing in this new way. Second, your mastery of the seven shapes of the major scale will also go up because you will have yet another opportunity to

reinforce them deeper into your muscle memory. Third, your two hand synchronization will also become tighter and more accurate because through practicing scale sequences, your synchronization becomes challenged a lot more as opposed to running scales

strictly up and down. And finally, practicing scale sequences is simply a lot more fun than running scales straight up and down; so you'll enjoy this assignment and do it a lot

more.

To practice this exercise effectively, I recommend following an alternating approach of

playing the scale sequence through each of the shapes of the major scale and it works

like this. You ascend the scale sequence through playing the first shape, then you descend by playing the second shape. Then you ascend the scale sequence again by

playing the third shape and you descend by playing the fourth shape. Then you ascend again through the fifth shape, descend through the sixth and then ascend again through

the seventh.

I'm going to give you a short demonstration of how to practice this by using the first three shapes of the major scale. And then your part of the task will be to extend the

scale sequence further by using the remaining shapes of the scale. You should spend

about the next seven practice sessions making sure that you can play the sequence all the way through from start to finish. The speed at which you can play is not so

important. The important thing is that you can play it all the way through without having

to stop and think about what your fingers should do next. Even if you can only do this slowly right now, that’s fine. And in the tab PDF booklet that you have, you can see the

notation for the part that I'm going to play for you. By looking at the notation, it will be

easier for you to understand how to complete the rest of the pattern that you need to

practice. Here is how it should sound.

Page 27: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 26]

Page 28: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Page 29: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

So this is just a short excerpt by using the first three shapes of the major scale and you

should now come up with the rest of it by using shapes four, five, six, and seven.

Now let’s take a look at the second example of scale sequences across all six strings

shown here in the key of A Major. You can see the tab for it shown in the PDF notation

booklet that you have and here's how the scale sequence sounds.

[Audio Example 27]

Page 30: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

You can see that here I played both the ascending and the descending versions of the

scale sequence together. And to break this down, the initial sequencing pattern of this

scale sequence is also 16 notes long and it sounds like this: (listen to the example on video).

So, the length of the initial sequencing pattern here is the same as it was in the last scale sequence, but of course it sounds different. And as usual, this pattern sequences

up through the scale to complete the sequence. When you are descending, the same

thing happens, the initial sequencing pattern is also 16 notes long and it sounds like this (listen to the example on video). And it also is developed going down through the scale

one note at a time creating the descending version of the scale sequence.

Here is some advice that will help you to memorize these longer scale sequences that

contain a lot of notes, and that is to accent (meaning hit much harder with the pick) the

notes that fall on the downbeats. These are also the notes where the initial sequencing

pattern of the scale sequence starts over. And this will help you to stay on track mentally with where you are in the playing of the scale sequence, especially as you start playing them all over the guitar neck. It will help you to not get lost in the process. To

show you an example, I’m going to demonstrate the same scale sequence that I just played a moment ago only I’m going to accent the places where the initial sequencing pattern starts over so you can hear this more easily. Here is how this goes:

Page 31: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 27]

So, practicing in this way will help you to stay on track mentally as you go through these

sequences and will also help to improve your picking hand articulation in the process.

As you had done that with the previous scale sequence in this series of examples, you

should now come up with an extended pattern all over the guitar neck by extending this

scale sequence through each of the seven shapes of the major scale. I’m going to show

you again a short demonstration of this by using only the first three shapes of the major

scale. Your part of the task will be to extend it further and to come up with the rest of

the pattern. Look in the PDF booklet to see the notation for the part that I’m going to

play for you. It sounds like this.

Page 32: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 28]

Page 33: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

So practice this exercise for about the next seven days and then you will be ready to

come back to this video and continue on with the next example.

And now here is the third example of a scale sequence played across all six strings

shown here in the key of A Major. It sounds like this.

[Audio Example 29]

Notice here again that I played the scale sequence both ascending and descending in one position. When you ascend the scale sequence, the initial sequencing pattern is only

eight notes long here instead of being 16 notes long as it was in the previous two

examples. And it sounds like this: (listen to the example on video).

Page 34: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

These eight notes set up the sequencing pattern that is repeated one step at a time to

take us through the scale. And when you are descending, it is also an eight note long

initial sequencing pattern that sets up the sequence and it sounds like this (listen to the example on video). These are the eight notes that are developed when you are

descending the scale.

Now I’ll play the scale sequence for you once more and I will emphasize the places

where the initial sequencing pattern starts over by accenting it more heavily with the

pick so it’s easier for you to hear when you are practicing the scale sequence on your own.

[Audio Example 29]

Page 35: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

As you’ve done with all the previous examples, after you learn the actual scale sequence

itself both ascending and descending, it’s time to extend it all over the guitar neck by

taking it through each of the seven shapes with the major scale. Here is a short example to get you started using just the first three shapes of the major scale. It sounds like

this:

[Audio Example 30]

Page 36: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

As you’ve done for all the other examples in this part of the course, continue the scale

sequence by using the remaining shapes of the major scale. And of course practice it

until you get it very solidly into your muscle memory.

After you go through the process of learning the specific examples of six string scale

sequences that are demonstrated to you, it is now time for you to take matters into your own hands and begin coming up with scale sequences on your own using all six strings

of the guitar. You will have a lot more fun doing this than when you did it on a single

string or even on string pairs, and the reason is because there are so many different possibilities that are available to you when you have all six strings to play on.

As before, the goal for you is not to necessarily come up with hundreds of different scale sequences over the next week, it’s only for you to go through the process of learning

how to do it so that you have the skill at your disposal whenever you need to come up

with a scale sequence on the spot when you are improvising or writing a melody or a

song. So, spend about the next seven days coming up with as many different scale sequences as you can, have fun while doing this assignment and then come back here and we are going to take everything to the next level.

Transposing Scale Sequences

So far in this course we’ve only used one scale (A Major) and we’ve used it to illustrate how a scale can be sequenced by using one, two or more strings. And the reason why I

specifically avoided introducing other types of scales up until now is so that you can learn to hear how each of these scale sequence ideas sound on their own without

introducing additional foreign elements of using completely different sets of notes for

each example. However, now it is time to begin transposing these concepts to different

types of scales, and you will see that by applying all the knowledge and the tools that you have acquired so far in this course doing so will be very easy. And more

importantly, as you practice the exercises that follow you will start to see a lot of new doors open up for your guitar playing and for your creativity.

In order to transpose a scale sequence from one key to another or from one scale to

another scale, it is important to understand the order in which the notes of the scale are being used in their original scale sequence. Now, to be clear I am not talking about the

letter names of the notes or the pitches in the scale. I’m only talking about the

numerical order of the notes or the scale degrees and the way they are organized in the original scale sequence. If you don’t understand what the term scale degrees means

here is an example to illustrate.

In the key of A Major, which is the key we’ve been working with so far in this course,

there are seven notes (seven pitches) and each of those pitches has a letter name.

Those letter names are A, B, C#, D, E, F#, G#. And each of these specific letter names

corresponds to a more general labeling system of numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. So, the first letter name of the scale (A) corresponds to scale degree 1, the next letter in the

scale (B) corresponds to a general scale degree label 2. So, scale degrees are basically a general labeling system for referring to very specific pitches in any key. So instead of

talking about specific pitches or specific letter names in the key of A Major, we can make

everything general by only talking about scale degree relationships. So instead of talking

Page 37: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

about letter names “A, B, and C# in the key of A Major”, we can simply say “notes 1 2

and 3 in any major key”. And this general system of using numbers for letter names is

called scale degrees.

Getting back to the topic of transposing scale sequences, once you know how scale

degrees of any scale are grouped in the original scale sequence, you will have all the information that you need to easily transpose the original scale sequence to any other

key that you want. Let’s see an example of how this can be done by using an example

that you’ve learned way back in the beginning of this course. We’ll be again working with a single string scale sequence starting with the original key of A Major. So, taking

the scale sequence on a single string in A Major, the original scale degree formula went

like this (listen to the example on video).

We start the scale sequence on scale degree two, then it is scale degree seven, one,

two, three, one, two, three, four, two, three four, five, three, four, five, six, four, five,

six, seven, five, six, seven, one. And then from there, the scale sequence repeats in another octave by following the same exact pattern. But the point is, now that you understand the general scale degree formula, it is easy to take this information and

transpose it to another key. Let’s do this right now and transpose this scale sequence from A Major to A minor.

Now before we do this, let’s make sure that we are on the same page regarding the music theory aspect of this. The notes of the A Natural Minor Scale (in case you don’t

already know) are: A, B, C, D, E, F and G. And if you look side by side at the notes of A Natural Minor and A Major, you will see that the three notes that are different between

the two scales are C# F# and G# in A Major (these notes are all a half step lower in A

natural minor). So the C# in A major become C natural in A natural minor, F# from A

Major become F natural in A natural minor, and G# in A Major becomes G natural in A natural minor.

So, when we apply the scale degree formula from the scale sequence in A Major we

need to make sure that we lower by one half step notes 3, 6 and 7 whenever they appear. And that is what will allow us to transpose a scale sequence from A Major to A

minor. So here is how the A minor version of this exact same grouping off scale degrees will sound like.

[Audio Example 31]

Page 38: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

I only played it in one octave because then it continues again using the same pattern.

So you can see that the grouping of the scale degrees did not change at all. We play the

notes of the scale (scale degrees) in the exact same order. But what did change were the three pitches that are different between the two scales (A natural minor and A

Major). And this is what gives the two scales sequences their different sounds due the

unique sound of each scale.

We can now take this information and apply this idea of transposing scale degrees from

any configuration of the original scale, whether it will be the scale sequence on a single string, or a sequence on string pairs, or even a sequence across all six strings. The same

exact concept applies. To give you another example, let us take a look at another scale

sequence that we learned not too long ago, which is a six string scale sequence example, and let’s transpose it from A Major to A minor. There original scale sequence,

as you might remember, sounds like this: (listen to the example on video).

And when you transpose it to A Natural Minor using the exact same scale degree formula, you get this:

[Audio Example 32]

Page 39: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

As you probably noticed right away, both of these examples sound very very similar to

each other. And the only difference comes from the fact that three of the seven notes in

A natural minor are different from the notes in A Major.

Armed with this information, you should see how any new scale sequence you learn

does not give you only one way of applying it in music but in fact gives you dozens of different possibilities of how it can be applied to virtually any scale and musical situation

or context you may encounter. And this should get you very excited, because now you

can see how a lot of new doors are suddenly opening up for how you can use scales in your music. In order for you to practice and to make sure that you really understand this

concept of transposing scale sequences from one key to another, I want you to spend

the next several days taking all the scale sequences you have come up with in the previous assignments that you were working on and begin transposing them from the

key of A Major to the key of A natural minor in the same exact way as you have just

seen in the previous examples. And doing this will help to make sure that you really

have this concept down and can apply it in your music.

Musical Application Of Scale Sequences

The main reason why you have spent all this time learning how to practice scale sequences is of course so that you can apply them into a real musical context. And while

this course is not about learning how improvise or how to solo specifically (because these topics are way too big to cover quickly here), I am going to give you a few

practice assignments that will help you to get started with learning how to practice applying scale sequences into a specific context of a guitar solo. In addition to practicing

scales and scale sequences in pure isolation, here are the steps you need to follow in

order to practice these scales in contexts that are specific to improvising.

First, find a backing track that is in the same key as the scale you want to practice

improvising with. So for example, if you want to practice your A Major scale sequences, find a backing track that is either in the key of A Major or F# minor. Both of these keys

will work very well for A Major scale. The next step is to turn the backing track on and practice coming up with improvising and soloing ideas by using one shape of the scale at

a time. So for example if you are in the key of A Major, you would want to spend a few minutes soloing only in the first position of the A Major scale. Notice that we are not

playing across the entire fretboard board just yet. There is a reason for this we will get

to that in just a moment, but first you need to practice just in one position for about three to five minutes as the backing track is playing.

And what you should be doing is simply coming up with any melodic phrases that you want to use in a solo and combine them of course with scale sequences that you are also

familiar with. Don’t worry at this point about coming up with a greatest guitar solo in the

world, because you are intentionally restricting your creative options by only restraining

yourself to one position of the scale sequence. So spend about 3, 4 or 5 minutes only soloing in this way. Do the best that you can during this period of time, to come up with

melodic ideas for solos and combining them with specific scale sequences. And then when the time period is up, change scale positions. So as the backing track is continuing

to play, you should now start soloing in the second position of the scale for the same

Page 40: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

three to five minutes, and doing the exact same thing that you did a moment ago in the

first position of the scale.

Continue practicing in this way of playing in each shape of the scale for about three to

five minutes, and within 20 or 30 minutes of practicing you will have thoroughly covered

the entire area of the fretboard and will have practiced each shape of the scale in great detail along the way. Again don’t worry so much about coming up with the most

expressive guitar solo in the world at this point. Because of the way you’re challenging

yourself to practice this is going to be hard to do. But the goal here is for you to become more familiar with how each shape of the scale functions and also to start getting used

to practicing the scale sequence ideas in the context of improvising.

I’m now going to give you a short demonstration of how everything I have just

described could be applied to real practicing. I am going to solo for a few moments over

a backing track in the key of A Major and I am intentionally going to restrict myself to

soloing only in the fourth position of the A Major scale. So everything I am going to play is going to be restricted to that general area of the guitar. And you will hear how I am going to be applying the scale sequence ideas that you have learned in this course

combined with general melodic phrases (listen to the example on video). So this was just a short demonstration of how you should practice the same assignment

on your own. Here I was basically soloing using mainly the fourth position of the A Major scale, but you should do this in every shape of the major scale, spending about three to

five minutes on each shape before moving on.

When you do this, it should take you between 20 and 30 minutes to cover all seven

shapes of the major scale. And when you have done this, you can stop practicing this

part of your practice routine for the day. And then the next day when you practice working on your scales, you should do this assignment again the second time. So you

should practice soloing in each key for two days, and then after two days have passed, move on to doing the same assignment but in a different key. So for example, if you

have practiced this type of soloing assignment in the key of A Major for two consecutive practice sessions, the next two practice sessions should be done in a different key, such

as C major or D major or something else. And even though the fingerings for each of these Major keys are going to be the same (only played in a different area of the

fretboard), there is still a certain mental challenge that comes along with playing in a

new key because your mind has to remember to move the finger positions to a different fret in a different area on the guitar. So this is something that will take a little bit of

getting used to, but with some practice it will be very easy.

In addition to the practice approaches that I just demonstrated, there is another very

powerful idea the will help you greatly with applying scale sequences and scales in your

improvising and playing. One very powerful way of using scales in guitar solos is to

apply them as sort of an anticipation device that connects notes of an earlier phrase to a note that you want to emphasize in a phrase that is coming up. The way I like to think

of this is as sort of a bridge that starts from the last note of an earlier phrase and takes the listener all the way through to the note that you want to emphasize in the next

phrase.

Page 41: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

To show you some examples of what this means and how this idea can actually be

applied in real music, I'm going to show you three specific example of guitar solos,

taken actually from my instrumental solo record called 'Reflections', and I'm going to explain to you how scale sequences were used in those solos, so that you can hear how

the scale sequence starts at one note of an earlier phrase and takes the listener through

building up all the way to the next note that I want to emphasize in a later phrase.

First I'm going to play each of the examples for you and then I'm going to talk about it

and demonstrate some things on the guitar, so you can see exactly what is happening.

Solo 1 (listen to the example on video)

The solo you have just heard mostly consisted of string skipping arpeggios which do not

really apply to the topic of scale sequences, but at the very end of the solo, there was a

fast scale sequence being played using the harmonic minor scale. And the scale

sequence sounds like this (listen to the example on video). The actual scale sequence itself is not what's important, the important thing is how it

builds up to the final note of the solo that the solo ends upon, and that note is this (listen to the example on video). That note is a high D played as a bend from the 21st fret on the high E string to the 22nd fret as a half step bend (listen to the example on

video).

But that note sounds a lot cooler as a result of the scale sequence that came before it. And an additional element of that is that the scale sequence was played fast and it was

played from a low note to a high note. Now I will play for you a part of the solo

consisting only of the arpeggio that comes right before the scale sequence, then the

scale sequence itself, followed finally by the last note of the solo. This is to show you how all three of these parts are connected together, and more importantly how the scale

sequence builds up to the last note of the solo. And I will play this for you at sort of a medium tempo so you can more easily hear how each note sounds, and I will also only

use lead guitar without a backing track. So here is how it sounds.

Page 42: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 33]

And here it is a little faster.

[Audio Example 33]

Page 43: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

You can see the tab for when I played shown in the PDF notation booklet. And even if

you don't already know how to play the harmonic minor scale, it should be easy to see a

pattern in how the scale sequence is developed because it uses the exact same principles that we've been talking about all the way through this course.

This next example is going to use a track that's quite a bit different in feel compared to the previous example you heard. But the basic idea of using the scale sequence to build

up to a climatic note in the solo is still the same here. So listen to it and then I'm going

to talk about exactly what is happening there.

Solo 2 (listen to the example on video)

In this solo, the scale sequence that I want to use as the example is also using the

harmonic minor scale just like the previous track was using. But if you look in the PDF

booklet with the tab of this scale, you will notice that it is actually a transposed version

of a single string scale sequence that you learn way back in the beginning of this course when we talked about single string scale sequences. And you should be able to recognize just by the way it sounds that it has familiar feel to it. It sounds like this when

you play it slow. [Audio Example 34]

In this case, the final note that I ended up on (the bend) is the climactic note that the

scale sequence is building up to. And it sounds especially cool once the scale sequence is up to speed. It sounds like this when played at full speed:

Page 44: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

[Audio Example 34]

Solo 3 (listen to the example on video)

In this solo, there is also a scale sequence being used to build up to the final note of the solo. And in this case it happens to be the harmonic minor scale again. But the reason

why I wanted to show you this particular example is so that you can see how the scale

sequence that we are using here is an exact transposed version of an earlier example

that you’ve learned when we talked about scale sequences on string pairs. In fact if you

compare the tab of the scale sequence shown in the solo together with the example it

relates to, it will be easier to see how the two scale sequences use identical patterns despite being in completely different keys. So here is how the scale sequence sounds

when played slowly and using only lead guitar by itself without a backing track so you can hear everything clearly.

[Audio Example 35]

Page 45: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

And the last note that the last sequence stops on is the climactic final note. Here is what

it sounds like when the sequence is played by itself up to speed.

[Audio Example 35]

So in all three of these solos that you heard, the scale sequence actually contributed a

lot of musical value in terms of building up our anticipation for the final note as the

sequence progressed. And if there was no scale sequence being used at those points in

the solo, the music would definitely sound very different.

At this point, we have covered quite a lot of ground in terms of working with scales and scale sequences. If you have kept up with doing all of the assignments, such as working

through the examples on a single string to scale sequences on string pairs and all six strings as well as connecting all of these ideas through all the shapes of the major scale

all over the guitar neck, and you have done all of these for at least four weeks, then you are ready to move on to doing the exact same steps but with a different scale.

As a bonus with this course, you have received the document containing fingerings of the most commonly used scales for rock music. What you need to do is pick out some of

those scales that you feel you need the most work on and take it through all the steps

that we have done together in this course so far. So for example, let's say you want to work on mastering the harmonic minor scale next. What you need to do then is first

practice the seven fingerings of the harmonic minor scale and then begin from step one

of learning how to construct scale sequences on a single string, then on string pairs,

then on all six strings, then connect them all together and of course also practice applying them to improvising and soloing by using the two ideas that we discussed just

a moment ago. The steps for mastering any new scale are going to be exactly the same

as what we went over when working with the major scale. So now, armed with this

knowledge, you can take any of the other scales you want to learn, take them through

the same process until you get same great results of being able to feel very confident

when you play this scale in your music.

Page 46: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

There is one more comment I want to make regarding the playing of scales and scale

sequences in general. And that is in this course, we have primarily focused on the

fretboard visualization aspect of playing the scale sequences which simply means we are working on learning how to play the scale sequence all over the guitar neck without

feeling lost. However, there is another way in which scale sequences help you generally

as a guitar player and that is they are a great exercise for your guitar technique and speed. However in this course, we did not get into this topic very much at all. And there

are two main reasons for this. The first reason is that there are almost no truly

comprehensive resources out there that address the topic of fretboard visualization for scales in the needed amount of detail.

So it is very important for you to learn this topic in the amount of detail that we've covered it here in this course so that you actually understand how to use scales in a

musical situation when you actually apply them to your guitar playing. The second

reason is that the topic of building speed and technique on guitar is so big that it

requires a completely different course to cover it in as much detail as it requires. And if we focused on both of these topics together in this one course, it would have only pulled you in so many different directions that it would make it much harder for you to make

progress in either area. So this is why it's important for you to learn about this topic of fretboard visualization with scale sequences now, and we are going to talk about the topic of building speed and technique in a separate course.

More Practicing Advice

Great job on getting all the way through to the end of this course. If you have diligently

been applying all the concepts that I've shared with you so far, then you certainly should

have a greater feeling of confidence in knowing that the process of learning to play

scales no longer feels like a mysterious maze of finger patterns and fret numbers. And you should also have realized by now that now that you are at this point, you have not

really finished anything but you have only just begun. It should take you quite a long time to get through all this material completely. However, the initial investment of time

that you put into working with these concepts will pay back huge dividends in terms of increasing your ability to express yourself much more creatively in your guitar playing.

All of that being said, it would of course be a mistake for you to suddenly abandon

everything you’ve been practicing so far in order to only work on this course. What I

recommend to do instead is to set aside between 15 to 25% of your total daily practice time at least four days per week to work on this course. If you can practice this for five

or more days during the week, that would be even better. But at least four days per

week 15-25% of your time would be a good goal.

When it comes to a skill such as learning to play scale sequences, it is much better to

work on it more frequently but in smaller time increments as opposed to setting aside

several hours to work on scales one or two days per week. During the 15-25% of your practice time, go through all the steps for learning a particular scale all over the guitar

neck and then being applying it in more creative ways in your improvising and soloing.

Page 47: The Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric … Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric ... the Supreme Guide To Scales Mastery For Electric Guitar. My ... playing it throughout

© Guitar Mastery Solutions, Inc. All Rights Reserved

As you become more advanced, then the time spent on the steps to actually learn to

play the scale all over the guitar will be much less, leaving you a lot more time to focus

on the creative aspects of your playing. If you are consistent in applying the information and practice methods that I discussed with you in this course, then you will soon amaze

yourself by the amount of progress you have made, and you will have developed a much

greater level of confidence that is needed to take the next step to move you closer to becoming the guitar player you want to be.

As you work through the materials and concepts covered in this course, make sure to frequently come back and visit my website http://PracticeGuitaNnow.com where I will

often be posting new lessons, articles, videos and other resources which are all designed

to help you get maximum results from your practicing.