When it comes down to contemporary music, there are two “modes” of the major scale that are used the most often. If “modes” have scared you in the past, or you just really didn’t understand them, then you’ve found the right blog post!

Once you know how to incorporate them into your playing effortlessly, then you’ll really start to have fun with your playing.

Everyone know that the pentatonic is the basis for all soloing. (and for your extreme classical and jazz nuts who beg to differ, get over it. It’s true!)

But once you hit the intermediate level guitar you start to look at other options outside the pentatonic scale to get some licks. This is the wrong attitude.

All music is interconnected, so don’t think that you have to abandon the pentatonic scale to “learn something new”. That’s just not the case.

I’m going to show you how to use the two most commonly used modes, the Aeolian in this post, and the Dorian in pt. 2, WITH the pentatonic that will allow you to quickly and easily learn these new scales, but also start using them today in your playing.

If you keep the pentatonic as your core foundation, then moving out into some more progressive fusion based music will be a breeze.

So let’s go to the key of A.

Here’s the A Minor pentatonic scale –

E|——————————-5-8—————————–|
B|————————-5-8———————————–|
G|——————-5-7—————————————–|
D|————-5-7———————————————–|
A|——-5-7—————————————————–|
E|-5-8———————————————————–|

For the sake of the this training post, I’m just going to cover the G,B, and high E strings. The rest of the strings just work of the octaves of these notes.

E|——————————-5-8—————————–|
B|————————-5-8———————————–|
G|——————-5-7—————————————–|
D|—————————————————————-|
A|—————————————————————-|
E|—————————————————————-|

Now let’s start adding modes, the first mode we’re going to work with is the Aeolian. Most people now this as the natural minor scale, but lets use the pentatonic to make this a real simple learning process.

All you’re going to do is add 3 additional notes to the pentatonic scale above.

E|——————————-5-(7)-8————————|
B|————————-5-(6)-8——————————|
G|——————(4)-5-7————————————-|
D|—————————————————————-|
A|—————————————————————-|
E|—————————————————————-|

The notes in the brackets mark the added notes.

So if you add all the notes together you will get this scale:

E|———————————–5-7-8———————–|
B|—————————5-6-8——————————-|
G|——————4-5-7—————————————-|
D|—————————————————————-|
A|—————————————————————-|
E|—————————————————————-|

So solo the way you normally would, just add these new notes as passing tones, and now you are jamming with modes and it only took a minute to learn.

David Gilmour is the master at using this scale, and it fits perfectly over any minor based rock.

I still remember the day I made the decision that I was going to play guitar for the rest of my life. I was 11, flipping through the TV stations, and came across the Stevie Ray Vaughn PBS special.

When I heard Voodoo Child Slight return for the first time, I locked myself in my room for the next year, armed with nothing more than an $8 acoustic I got at a garage sale.

I learned the hard way. Hours a day, with my cassette player; listening, stopping, figuring out a note, hit play again, stop, rewind, figure out the next note, and so on.

I grew up dirt poor and couldn’t afford guitar lessons. At that time, $80 a month (the average for guitar lessons) was not even an option.

I justified my position by saying that I don’t need a guitar teacher showing me how to play like him, I’ll play the way I want to play!

And I was an idiot.

There was nothing I loved more than the guitar. Blues, Rock, Jazz, anything that I could listen to and get some emotion, and one thing that I know is true, if you love something you need to invest everything you have into it.

I used to say with pride that I was self taught, and that I could play by ear. However,  after almost two decades of playing, if I could give people just one piece of advice it would be TAKE FREAKIN’ LESSONS!

I used to spend 8 hours a day, 7 days a week trying to figure stuff out, and it wasn’t until a year and a half later when I started to play in bands that everything clicked.

You’ll learn more in one hour jamming then you will in a year and a half of isolated practice, and that’s a fact. Why should you spend hours a day trying to “figure stuff out”, when you could have someone that knows how to play show you the exact same thing in 5 minutes?

Also, the 2nd biggest piece of advice I would give is to always, always, always invest into jam tracks. Like I said, you can learn more in an hour jamming, then years of  ‘running scales’.

I never could afford lessons, and now with the internet that’s not even an issue anymore. You can get world class training from some of the industries best teachers for less than the cost of ONE conventional lesson. That’s crazy!

So if you wanna be a great guitar player fast, then I would highly suggest checking out Jamorama. You can download a free lesson, but the thing I love is that you have world class teaching, and some of the best jam tracks I’ve ever heard in one place.

If you want a complete guide to playing guitar fast, then you will not be disappointed!