i have been playing guitar for a few years and have not yet mastered (or even nearly mastered) the scales. So I was wondering: are they totally necessary? Will knowing them put a damper on the naturalness of my playing? Does anyone ever totally master the guitar without learning scales? And - if I do need to learn the scales, which ones should I start with, and what is the best way to go about learning them?
It's much harder playing without the scales, but it's possible. I recommend to play within the scales (unless you have a very good ear). If you don't it might sound like "chromatic gibberish''. The most common scale (in rock) is the pentatonic blues scale... |------------------------------------------0--3-| |-----------------------------------0--3--------| |-------------------------0--2--3---------------| |------------------0--2-------------------------| |--------0--1--2--------------------------------| |-0--3------------------------------------------| (example in E) Play within this scale. When your comfortable with it learn it on all the fretboard... I recommend this site. www.all-guitar-chords.com/guitar_scales.php?qqq=FULL&scch=E&scchnam=Blues&get2=Get I don't think learning a scale removes the naturalness of your playing, I think it will actually make it sound better!
scales are essential to mastering the guitar, but not necessary to make music. Scales help to link your riffs together, and as you learn more riffs they will come in handy. Its the kind of thing that one keeps working on and getting better with over the long run.
scales are necessary lern the 5 forms of the minor pentatonic scale. 5 forms of the major scale. then take the minor pentatonic and add a flat 5 and you have 15 scales to play my guitar teacher bitched at me to lern those 15 forms for a full summer and i never did it then finally i sat my ass down and lerned them and my playing increased 10 fold. so you should put the time into lerning them
Some of the best guitarists I know don't have any idea about scales, so no I don't think they're neccesary, but I do think they're worth learning and that they won't dampen the naturalness. This is the way I see it: You know scales whether you like it or not. You have heard them so many times within the musical tradition you were brought up in (presummably western) that you know them inside out back to front and upside down. It's just that you don't know that you know them. If you learn them then you're free to pick and choose whether you play within them or not. If you learn them then you can also expand your horizons. If you learn a few scales, you may find that everything you did before naturally stuck really rigidly to for example, the major scale. You may then decide, nah - screw that, I'll break the mould and play a pent(atonic) for my next lead line. See what I mean? What I did was learn only a couple of scales (major and pentatonic) then learned how a scale was contructed; and then I just toyed around in moments of boredom (sitting in front of the TV with a guitar, not really watching what the fingers are doing; that sort of thing). Good luck Sebbi
yes but id like to c some guy be able to play all of the different modes of the melodic minor scale and harmonic minor scale by ear. to be a very good guitar player you need to know your scales. i have no doubt that you dont need to lern all the forms of the major scales to play guitar but to really progress into a good player you need to know scales
Learning scales is not hard at all, just do it. You can't be a good guitarist without knowing your scales. How do you plan on playing solos and not sounding like complete shit? And even if you learn your scales, if you don't read music, youre still essentially learning by ear.
I play mostly by ear. But I can read sheet music, and tablature. I also have played keyboard though, so scales kinda come natural to me.
ive always self taught myself guitar by ear before learning tableture and then scales, but i could play a lot when i taught myself by ear.
there's no reason for you not to learn scales or theroy. I hate it when peop;e think hat they limit you. Nothing tells you how or what to play.
I agree. Most people who don't use scales spend most of thier time guessing around the neck hitting many "bum" notes along the way. People i play with who know scales can use that foundation and build off of it. I HATE it when people say scales limit playing. Guessing around all day hitting tons of bum notes and going nowhere with it isn't creative guitar playing, its just bad music.
its like a combination of both knowing scales and playing by ear...its not enough just to know the scale and what frets to play, u have to know what that note will sound like and how it will sound compared to the other notes in the scale. so what im saying is to practice some simple scales (penatonic, blues penatonic, etc...) and not necissarly memorize what every note on the fretboard sounds like, but what the notes in the scale sound like in comparison to the base note of the scale (the note that the scale starts on). hope that helped
Memorizing scale shapes is really just a way to keep track of where each interval and note is. You still have to use your ears. It allows you to play what you want on the fly instead of just using the guess and check method for each consecutive note.
django reinhardt had 2 playing fingers and only played by ear and i think hes the craziest guitarist i ever heard
You need to learn scales. They make you so much better, and then you can just jam over a song, if you can find the key, because you could tell what notes sounded good.
The most common would actually be the pentatonic minor. And if you are going to learn scales learn the major scale first.
