blues scale (with flat third)

[shaytrager trager]

Hey Richie
One of the most characteristic scales of blues
is the blues scale ( using the flat third against the one chord)
In most bkues solos I’ve heard in jazz their’s been a lot of use with this scale
and this flat degree on the 1 chord as well as the blue note
Will we learn to combine scales we’ve learned by now with the foums blues scale?

[Richie]

The blues scale is what is known as a synthetic scale…in other words it is not a mode of an established scale. I am really focused on teaching the heptatonic scales since they gave birth to all the existing synthetic scales (eg., blues scale, bebop scale ,etc). Most synthetic scales just omit “avoid notes” to make the scale easier to play.However, when playing bebop we are not focusing so much on the scale, rather on the 7th chord arpeggio and targeting them with various approaches. In doing so we use the same notes that are in said synthetic scales, only that from a different perspective. The true original bebop players did not know what a bebop scale was and were not thinking in those terms.

When properly analyzing the so called blues scale against a dominant chord, the b3 is really acting as the #9 and the b5 as the #11 (if we resolve to them), something which we cover when learning the super locrian or altered dominant scale…

I gather that most players enrolled in this course already know how to use a pentatonic or even blues scale which simply adds the “blue” notes. If you want to explore this further, take the dorian and omit the 2 and 6 and you end up with the minor pentatonic. Do this for all the 7 dorian fingerings and you end up with 7 minor pentatonic fingerings. Next add the b5, to each one…

[Richie]

PS. You can freely combine the mixolydian with all the approaches you’ve learned and switch to the blues scale for more of a pure conventional blues sound anytime…especially over the I7.

[shaytrager trager]

thanks richie

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