Minor Pentatonic Scale

One more thing to add to your guitar arsenal of licks. We're going to take a good look at the Minor Pentatonic scale.

The great thing about this scale, is that it is almost exactly like the Major Pentatonic Scale. In fact, its safe to look at it as the same scale. It has the exact fingering in that classic "box" formation.

The only difference is that when you are playing the Major Pentatonic, you are ahead a note, and when you play the Minor Pentatonic, you are behind a note.

I've got both the Major Pentatonic and the Minor Pentatonic out of A in the post, so you can see what I'm talking about.

Here's the trick. If you play a major pentatonic scale and you wish to then go to a minor pentatonic scale, it is simply a matter of moving the major pentatonic scale down 3 frets.

You flat it by 3 frets and even though the fingering is the same, one could think of it as an audio illusion. It seems to change the sound entirely.

The pentatonic scales are a great introduction to soloing and learning to improvise. However, don't get too comfortable with them, as they are easy to play and can become addictive. I would even say this to blues guitarists. There are still a lot of things that you can do, outside of the box.





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