Questions & Answers with Neil Hogan #2.0.7

Q. I’d like to know more about guitar scales of the pentatonic variety. Are they real scales or just something I can use to play lead?

A. Guitar scales of the pentatonic variety are very real and very important. One of the places you hear them outside the world of guitar playing is in your everyday set of wind chimes that you can pick up at the local garden store.

They are very important to guitar players because they are easy to learn, easy to memorize, and easy to use to construct leads. Frequently, the first thing I show a student about lead is the minor pentatonic pattern in the key of A. This would place the pattern at the fifth fret and be used to play a blues or rock lead to a progression that used A7, D7, and E7, or any twelve-bar blues tune like Johnny B. Goode.

Additional info is available here- guitar scales.