Can someone explain pentatonic modes?

[frabarmus]

And I am glad to see this thread has come to its proper subject.

If you're using pentatonics to play "outside" then you should try Casu Marzu cheese (from Sardinia). Only problem, you'd have to travel to Sardinia to try it, you won't find it anywhere else.

[DawgBone]

Cont'd...

What's interesting about this is that in C, like the original example before, the natural A is in tune with C. Now in Gm the A is natural there too and that's why that works and the Ab doesn't.

But say the tonic key has no natural A, then what? Let's say the chords went:

DbM7 - Eb7 - Ebm7/Ab7 - DbM7

Playing the Bb dorian still doesn't work and the melodic minor does. I know, it's crazy. And wonderfully cheesy too :-)

That sounded beautiful to my morning ears.

[DawgBone]

I'm actually waiting for people to say they can't tell the difference between one and the other :-)

I'm a blues player, I only care if it sounds good or not. It sounded good.

[ragman1]

Sorry, I mis-edited that one. I forgot to say thank you.

I only care if it sounds good or not

Absolutely.

[ragman1]

Are you any closer to finding how to spice up your stuff without turning it into jazz?

[DawgBone]

Are you any closer to finding how to spice up your stuff without turning it into jazz?

No, not really, lol. I have some festival events next week that I've been sharpening up for but if I started adding new ideas right now it'd mess with me in my short game. This is long game, hunting for new stuff I can start adding once I've plowed through some of the gigs. It's gonna take me some time to absorb everything in this thread so it's a repository I can access later. I've given it all a once over but IME this stuff takes 12 to 18 months to add into actual real world use reliably so I have to carefully consider what I'll sink my focus into.

I'm not even sure pentatonic modes are my way forward. I may need to dig deeper into some standard modes. Since I'm mostly an ear player, if it doesn't sound like blues I discard it, possibly too quickly at times. Never mind some other work like double stops and string skipping licks I could definitely add in. There's just so much....if I had a few hundred years I'd really be nailing it.

[kris]

This is how I played 11 years ago...'Funny blues'... some penta modes...; -)

[ragman1]

if I started adding new ideas right now it'd mess with me in my short game. ...if I had a few hundred years I'd really be nailing it.

I know how you feel. It'll come out all right. Better than trying to get flash too quick. I've never heard you but I bet you're good :-)

[ragman1]

Hey, Kris, I've got your secret... It's a JUKE-BOX!



Nicely played. Very powerful.

[DawgBone]

This is how I played 11 years ago...'Funny blues'... some penta modes...; -)

Dang man, you sound great!

Kind of wondering what you were doing at a couple spots, especially the 2:27-2:40 mark, it sounded really interesting and I've heard similar stuff from Chris Cain that was in that vein. It's kind of "outside" but seemingly would fall back into straight blues playing pentatonics very easily. That's one of the sort of things I've wanted to add into my spice rack haha but don't really have a clue what the roots of it are.

@ragman, I never consider myself any good otherwise that'd lead to a mentality of not trying to get better, at least, for me.

[frabarmus]

Raw blues with some spicy chords

[DawgBone]

I was hoping Kris would answer my question but I guess not. Looks like he's decided to bail out altogether. Fair winds!

[John A.]

I was hoping Kris would answer my question but I guess not. Looks like he's decided to bail out altogether. Fair winds!

Try slowing it down on youtube and singing or playing some of what he's doing. I don't have a guitar handy, but just listening at half-speed and singing some of the phrases, it's mainly half-tone/whole-patterns and melodic minor (very much out of the Robben Ford playbook). In general, I'd say a good conduit to spicing up your blues playing is experimenting with h/w and w/h patterns starting on different notes. You can start on pretty much any note, either diatonic to the blues scale/key you're in or not, then play up and down h/w or w/h. That will yield a line that moves inside/outside and creates/resolves dissonance/tension without you even having to think about the "theory of it".

[ragman1]

I was hoping Kris would answer my question but I guess not. Looks like he's decided to bail out altogether. Fair winds!

I'm pretty well 100% certain that he didn't do penta modes in the sense you're using the term in this thread, as modes of the standard pentatonic scale. He certainly did pentatonics and recommended Gambale and Bergonzi, that's all.

The nearest person to delve into that was frabarmus.

Can someone explain pentatonic modes?

[ragman1]

Dawg -

I think what you need is to find some examples of what you're looking for in professional recordings and see what they're doing. If you can't figure it out I'm sure someone here could help with it and show you how it's done. And if you like it, it's yours.

[DawgBone]

Dawg -

I think what you need is to find some examples of what you're looking for in professional recordings and see what they're doing. If you can't figure it out I'm sure someone here could help with it and show you how it's done. And if you like it, it's yours.

That's a good idea. And I'll definitely try what John suggested....I sidelined a lot of new learning the past couple weeks preparing for last weekend's event and this week I'm cutting grass and hauling rocks so just doing chops maintenance. I am the host band for a jam this weekend then have two weeks open for uploading some new skills into my circuit board. Thanks for your help ragman and others here, it's appreciated.

[grahambop]

I transcribed that section of kris' solo, it's very cool. Essentially he uses a lot of chromatic passing notes and runs added to the basic pentatonic structures. Also his note-placement to make these lines 'land' well is excellent.

I added a couple of notes on the bit that sounds 'out' to explain what I think is going on (the H/W diminished thing is a typical John Scofield device).

Anyway here's my transcription, hope it helps.

[DawgBone]

I transcribed that section of kris' solo, it's very cool. Essentially he uses a lot of chromatic passing notes and runs added to the basic pentatonic structures. Also his note-placement to make these lines 'land' well is excellent.

I added a couple of notes on the bit that sounds 'out' to explain what I think is going on (the H/W diminished thing is a typical John Scofield device).

Anyway here's my transcription, hope it helps.

Thanks grahambop, that's above and beyond the call of duty. I'll have to sit down with that and work it out!

[grahambop]

Thanks, it was a rainy afternoon here so it kept me occupied. Actually I have been trying to get more ‘outside’ sounds into my playing so I was interested to see what kris was doing here. Getting ‘out’ is easy, but getting back in is harder to do in a musically satisfying way, I think. I like the way he connects them back into a chromatic run, that works well.

The first 10 bars can be played around a Bb minor pentatonic box (6th fret) quite well, after that it goes higher up of course.