Pentatonic licks to combat boredom

N

Nitrobattery

Well-known member
I think like a lot of people these days, I'm working from home and am self isolating. The area that I'm in has banned all non-essential travel...and things are feeling pretty tense. To help combat the emotional weight of the situation, a lot of my friends across various social media platforms are doing livestreams of musical performances from their living rooms, uploading a ton of pictures of their pets, videos of their kids doing ridiculous things around the house, hilariously bad makeup tutorials...and I'll be honest, it's been a nice reprieve from the grim state that we find ourselves in.

I was chatting with a friend on Facebook who felt like he was just always just stuck in one pentatonic box, so I thought I'd draw inspiration from my buddies and record a little video showing a few really easy ways that you can spice up your typical pentatonic runs by just adding a couple of extra notes in there. If you're looking for a distraction and are stuck at home, hopefully you'll get a kick out of some of these licks.

Stay safe everyone.

 
Seriously, you really don't need anything else than pentatonics in your life. :rock:

Ok maybe minor and major scales also in some cases. :D
 
Cool video! It's crazy how certain notes sound soooooo sour...until they are resolved and then they sound perfectly spicy. First time I tried to learn a Django Reinhardt song I couldn't believe how many 'wrong' notes he made sound perfectly placed.

I'm trying to link modes to a base pentatonic (and making the minor/major scales the 'default' values for the other 2 notes) but I need to get better at knowing which 'other 2 notes' turn a pentatonic into a mode. And by 'get better' I mean on the fly while improvising. Simple enough to write out:

Major pentatonic (no 4th or 7th)
Ionian - Major scale, 4th and 7th normal
Lydian - raise the 4th
Mixolydian - lower the 7th

Minor Pentatonic (no 2nd or 6th)
Aeolian - Minor sale, 2nd and 6th normal
Dorian - raise the 6th
Phrygian - lower the 2nd

Locrian - FUBAR triple diamond black, proceed carefully (or just don't proceed)

But I still tend to 'think' in minor scale shapes. For example, if I'm noodling in A Mixolydian and get lost I know I can play a B minor scale and it's the same notes. That doesn't seem optimal. :no:
 
SpiderWars":14yoyidi said:
Cool video! It's crazy how certain notes sound soooooo sour...until they are resolved and then they sound perfectly spicy. First time I tried to learn a Django Reinhardt song I couldn't believe how many 'wrong' notes he made sound perfectly placed.

I'm trying to link modes to a base pentatonic (and making the minor/major scales the 'default' values for the other 2 notes) but I need to get better at knowing which 'other 2 notes' turn a pentatonic into a mode. And by 'get better' I mean on the fly while improvising. Simple enough to write out:

Major pentatonic (no 4th or 7th)
Ionian - Major scale, 4th and 7th normal
Lydian - raise the 4th
Mixolydian - lower the 7th

Minor Pentatonic (no 2nd or 6th)
Aeolian - Minor sale, 2nd and 6th normal
Dorian - raise the 6th
Phrygian - lower the 2nd

Locrian - FUBAR triple diamond black, proceed carefully (or just don't proceed)

But I still tend to 'think' in minor scale shapes. For example, if I'm noodling in A Mixolydian and get lost I know I can play a B minor scale and it's the same notes. That doesn't seem optimal. :no:
Click to expand...


I work at a music school that does a ton of one on one lessons, group rehearsals and there's a recording studio in the facility. With the health crisis, we're having to move all of the lessons to Zoom...and as a way to offer additional online content, I'm actually about to film a series of videos breaking down exactly what you're talking about. If that's something that interests you, I'd be happy to post those videos here. I have a couple of tricks that seem to help my brain process the information on the fly, and a lot of my students over the years have had luck with it as well. The most common thing I hear when I break it down is, "WHY DOESN'T EVERYONE EXPLAIN IT THAT WAY". A few little shifts with how you think about it...and everything falls into place. If an idiot like me can make sense of it, then I'm confident that anyone can. It's just that most people break it down in the most impractical way possible.
 
Nicely done! Great to have some time nowadays to do this stuff!

Thx for sharing!
 
Nitrobattery":xt4pkhxs said:
SpiderWars":xt4pkhxs said:
Cool video! It's crazy how certain notes sound soooooo sour...until they are resolved and then they sound perfectly spicy. First time I tried to learn a Django Reinhardt song I couldn't believe how many 'wrong' notes he made sound perfectly placed.

I'm trying to link modes to a base pentatonic (and making the minor/major scales the 'default' values for the other 2 notes) but I need to get better at knowing which 'other 2 notes' turn a pentatonic into a mode. And by 'get better' I mean on the fly while improvising. Simple enough to write out:

Major pentatonic (no 4th or 7th)
Ionian - Major scale, 4th and 7th normal
Lydian - raise the 4th
Mixolydian - lower the 7th

Minor Pentatonic (no 2nd or 6th)
Aeolian - Minor sale, 2nd and 6th normal
Dorian - raise the 6th
Phrygian - lower the 2nd

Locrian - FUBAR triple diamond black, proceed carefully (or just don't proceed)

But I still tend to 'think' in minor scale shapes. For example, if I'm noodling in A Mixolydian and get lost I know I can play a B minor scale and it's the same notes. That doesn't seem optimal. :no:
Click to expand...


I work at a music school that does a ton of one on one lessons, group rehearsals and there's a recording studio in the facility. With the health crisis, we're having to move all of the lessons to Zoom...and as a way to offer additional online content, I'm actually about to film a series of videos breaking down exactly what you're talking about. If that's something that interests you, I'd be happy to post those videos here. I have a couple of tricks that seem to help my brain process the information on the fly, and a lot of my students over the years have had luck with it as well. The most common thing I hear when I break it down is, "WHY DOESN'T EVERYONE EXPLAIN IT THAT WAY". A few little shifts with how you think about it...and everything falls into place. If an idiot like me can make sense of it, then I'm confident that anyone can. It's just that most people break it down in the most impractical way possible.
Click to expand...
I would def be interested in that! :thumbsup:

I have noticed that it's mainly only that one note that you change that really carries that mode's mood/flavor. Almost like a hexatonic scale (pentatonic plus the accidental) would be just as good.
 
Nitrobattery":2wooaknq said:
... I'm actually about to film a series of videos breaking down exactly what you're talking about. If that's something that interests you, I'd be happy to post those videos here. I have a couple of tricks that seem to help my brain process the information on the fly, and a lot of my students over the years have had luck with it as well. The most common thing I hear when I break it down is, "WHY DOESN'T EVERYONE EXPLAIN IT THAT WAY". A few little shifts with how you think about it...and everything falls into place. If an idiot like me can make sense of it, then I'm confident that anyone can. It's just that most people break it down in the most impractical way possible.
Click to expand...
Please post 'em, mate!

Theory does my head in. Always has, so this could be a breakthrough for me. :thumbsup:
 
I'm so glad that you guys found it useful/helpful! I just moved into a new place and currently feel like I got hit by a car, but like I said, over the next few weeks I'm going to be making a bunch of videos breaking down a lot of music theory into practical, digestible bites. It'll cover things like modes, the circle of 5ths, modulating keys, extending scale shapes to make use of the whole neck etc. If any of you have any suggestions, or things that continue to elude/frustrate you, I'd be thrilled to take some ideas for future videos.
 
Geez man, those subjects alone would do me the world of good.

It's always been about whether or not I can digest this stuff, and 'til now I've struggled with a theory block I've had since I was about 8 years old on piano. I gave up in the end 'cause I just wanted to play, not read the dots, which I still don't understand.

So yeah, TIA man; look forward to whatever you upload...
 
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