Pentatonic Minor Archives - Riff Ninja Academy

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Pentatonic Minor Root 5 Scale (1 position, closed)

The best way to learn the fretboard is one chunk at a time, until you’ve got enough to cover everything, and then you begin integrating things. In this lesson, we’re going to learn the final chunk that we need to effectively cover the entire fretboard. This is the pentatonic minor scale, root 5, 1 position closed scale. Phew! That’s a mouthful. But when you see the lesson, you’ll discover it’s just a functional name that describes what it is. Some folks call it Aeolian, and depending where your starting point is, Phrygian.

We’re in C major / A minor.

Here’s the Root 5 Pentatonic Minor Scale / Aeolian tab:

And if you want to add in the extra three notes on the 6th string (and who doesn’t?), you’ll need this:

When you’ve finished this lesson, move on to part two, and add a couple more notes to make this same pattern diatonic.

E Pentatonic Minor Scale (Two Position, Open)

E pentatonic minor is one of the most important scales you can learn, because it is used so often. This lesson talks about how to use it in the two position. Before watching this lesson, please checkout the previous one on E Pentatonic Minor Open.

Here’s the tab for the E Pentatonic Minor scale, two position open:

E Pentatonic Minor Scale (Open Position)

This lesson covers the E minor pentatonic scale, in the open position. This is a great scale for beginners to start with; it will help you with pick control, string spacing, familiarity, crossing strings, timing and your ear. Your chord changes will improve, and your hand will get stronger. What’s not to like?

Once you’ve mastered this lesson, move on to the next one, on the same scale in the Two position is an extension of the one you just learned (One position), and can be overlapped and interchanged in any imaginable way.

Also, once you’ve got those scales down, you might like to learn a closed position as well, so that you can move it to any key you’d like. Checkout that lesson here.

You may not know this, but E pentatonic minor open is the SAME PATTERN as A pentatonic minor, it is just raised to the fifth fret. We do not have the advantage of the open notes like we do in E, but it is the same pattern.

Here’s the tab for the E Pentatonic Minor scale, open position:

The Pentatonic Minor Scale (for the Bass)

This lesson is on the pentatonic minor scale, for the bass.

Make sure you’ve gone through the Tones and Semitones (Bass Guitar For The Total Beginner) lesson first, because that lays the foundation for what you’re going to learn in this lesson.

In this lesson, we’ll cover pentatonic minor scale in the 1 position, plus the open position, plus the Mixolydian scale, also known as the pentatonic climb. We’ll also look at how this applies to four and five string basses.

Once you’ve mastered the pentatonic scale pattern, the next step is to learn some riffs from that scale!

A Pentatonic Minor Scale (Closed, Root 6) – Scales For Beginners

If you’ve never played a scale before in your life, then THIS is the place to start.

The pentatonic minor scale is the most universal scale, meaning you can apply it to an incredibly broad selection of musical genres. It is used in blues, rock, metal, country, pop, R&B, funk, gospel, bluegrass… the list goes on and on.

In short – you need to learn this scale!

Here’s the tab for the scale in this lesson: