Improvisation is a scary topic for everybody to begin with. It's hard enough to learn songs and solos in themselves without being asked to make up your own on the spot!
However, there is so much to be gained from the process of learning to create music that this is an essential topic for anyone. It is particularly crucial for those that either struggle or refuse to learn to read music, as the only other way to get to a higher level is to at least partially learn to improvise and/ or learn music by ear (usually the two go hand in hand).
The aim of this lesson is to give you a go to scale to use as the basic of improvisation over any piece of music, and to give some logic as to why we choose this scale. This way, you can make the most of the jamming section that is coming up next!
However, there is not really one scale that will work every time, there are two. Two basic scales that will work over any piece of music in any genre; the minor pentatonic scale and the major scale.
Broadly speaking, the major scale or the minor pentatonic scale will work for lead guitar over any piece of music, but they rarely work in the same piece of music, so we have to choose one of them.
Blues style/ Minor pentatonic example
Minor pentatonic scale notes generally works for Rock and blues riffs and lead lines and other related genres such as metal and even funk (discussed in chapter 1)
However, lead lines with the minor pentatonic tend to be more licks based i.e. spend most of your time learning licks and trying them over songs, backing tracks and riffs
Example; Power chords A5, C5 and D5 with a riff and solo with A minor pentatonic scale notes.
Pop song/ Major scale diatonic chords example
Major scale notes are used to form the chords in that key (known as diatonic chords). This scale therefor works over any song in any genre that uses diatonic chords, i.er. chords in the key of C.
Major scale lead lines and guitar solos tend to focus more on melody, chord tones and intervals, and far less on ‘licks’.
Key of C example;
|C |Dm |Em |F |
|C |Dm |Em |G | with C major scale over the top
Interactive Tab - Key Learning points
Want more scale ideas?
In my opinion, the triads and arpeggios approach is a far better method for coming up with your own lead lines and riffs over a chord sequence quick and instinctively (by which I mean without thinking).
However, there are other scales that are quite easily used as a substitute for either of the above without too much effort.
Similar scales to the minor pentatonic include;
Similar scales to the major scale include
