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Home Alt Forums Improvisation Using the minor blues scale over the Major key in exercise 1

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  • #20245
    Michael Bishop
    Participant

      Hi Johnny,
      I was noticing on the first Basic Blues exercise that we’re using a minor blues scale over a Major key and it’s interchangeable with the Major Pentatonic Scale–you make mention of it at the bottom of the page. Usually playing a minor scale over a Major key would stick out like a sore thumb (Major with Major, minor with minor) but in this blues exercise that your demonstrating the minor blues scale worked perfectly..how is that possible? It kind of blows my mind because of the differences that you bring out between this minor blues scale v.s. Major Pentatonic.

      #20247
      john
      Keymaster

        Those types of rules such as playing a minor scale over a major key don’t apply in blues because we’re using dominant 7 chords in all three chords of the 12 bar progression. This makes just about all the notes sound good over the entire 12 bar, such as the 3rd always being interchangeable between major and minor no matter what. Again, it’s because of the dominant 7th chords that allow this to happen because of the “blues” sound they provide.

        #20248
        Michael Bishop
        Participant

          So it’s the dominant 7 chord, okay makes sense. Yeah, as I started learning about all of this from you I came to realize that the major/major and minor/minor didn’t apply here….and I like that 🙂 I wondering why that is….seems like this stuff is so, so wide open; can do almost anything and make almost anything work. That’s freedom! 🙂

          #20261
          john
          Keymaster

            yes that’s the blues anyway. it’s important to know the difference in the 3 scales I include in Killer Blues. Mind you, you can’t use the major over a minor blues.

            #20262
            Michael Bishop
            Participant

              Exactly–I’m going to be doing my Green Onions Instrumental on Tenor today, it will be uploaded to youtube and put here on Member’s Videos on the forum sometime before the end of the day.

              #20266
              john
              Keymaster

                Ok looking forward to hearing what you’re doing. Experiment with what sounds good to you and with what you’ve learned so far and I’ll check it out.

                #20267
                Michael Bishop
                Participant

                  I played it and my son is editing it right now; so I’ll upload it to youtube in a couple of hours or so.

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