Jazz Guitar Lesson 3: Whole-Tone Scale

[TrisofRoblind]

You rule! i Really like the whole tone scale! It is so crazy!!! Bless you sir! : D

[maniacguitar]

what an excellent guitar lesson... I wish I could learn from you in person

[RubinMusician]

poor Johnny...

[JoshuaVergara2777]

Thanks for this lesson Bro! appreciate the effort! ^^ learned somethin here...

[endauthority]

the whole tone scale reminds me of opening a treasure chest in Legend of Zelda

[Django5198]

is jazz more or less characterised by chords?

[TFIFH]

This is the coolest of all scales.

[pcnation11]

why would you play this over a major chord? where would you put an augmented chord in a progression?

[randalltomes]

Hello Geoff,

See if this helps your students.

at woodchoppers dott org

Something I put together to help me learn notes on the fretboard.

Its a game you play and learn to identify the music notes the fretboard as you play it.

Something I have failed to do over the years. Just all numbers in mind. Which is ok until you have to read sheet music or communicate with other musicians like a keyboardist.

[pyroseed13]

Funny how I never noticed the scale's appearance in dream transitions in TV shows haha. I feel enlightened!

[mattnsim]

great lesson Geoff, I love the bit about "remember when so and so hacked his arm off!!" that was cool. I am a teacher of guitar as well and I can hear myself saying something cool like that.

[ericrob2112]

thank s for all those good tips. for me everything makes sense now and i realise that the secret is in the connection. in the past a wase doiing ex. dflat altered scale & Ddorian and it was not sounds so good. but now, i play the same scales and it sound so jazz. i just work the connection . i think the magic is there. the way you connect the scales makes a big difference on the playing..

[mindtoonz262]

lol is realy like a dreamy sound

[ratraceloser]

thanks so much for the lessons! they're definitely helping me in my 'transition' from blues/rock to jazz.. What is difficult for me at this time is changing with chords. In this case, it would be resolving the tension between the whole-tone back to the I chord (in at II-V-I). Any possibility of lessons dealing with the process behind changing with the chords? this skill seems almost unattainable at this point.....

[geoffstockton]

@ratraceloser Try this: print out a row of blank chord/scale diagram boxes. Label above each box the name of each chord in the progression (or at least a section thereof). Decide what scales for each chord you want to focus on applying to each chord for now. Pick a 5 to 6 fret span of the fretboard on which to focus and chart out the shapes required to play each of those scales in there respective boxes. Don't use dots. Label the tones in R234567s as they relate to each chord.

[geoffstockton]

@ratraceloser (part 2) once you have these positions for each scale mapped out start improvising over a recording of the changes at a slow tempo and use nothing but the top string until you really see how you can connect the tones of each one scale to the next. Then do the same with each string. Then go back and do the same process with groups of 2, 3 & 4 strings. Try broken strings sets also.

Then up the speed. Repeat in all positions. Do the same with other scale and arpeggio choices.

[ratraceloser]

Great! Thank you again: you're a very generous teacher!!

[Privento]

You´re absolutely right! I like the video very much, it learns you something, rather than just giving you the notes.

[geoffstockton]

@Privento When I was younger as a teacher, I was awful . Because all I did was teach people scales without knowing all the ways to operate within them and apply them. Music is so multi-layered it's easy for us to get lost in one facet of it. That's why some people get stuck listening to one kind of music. They can't recognize the elements that they're aren't currently focused on. Music is humbling. I still feel like a kid in music. So far from knowing it all.

[zyruemusic]

@geoffstockton Say that Fam!!!  U R 1000% RIGHT PEACE!!!!

[keyofdminor]

good stuff man

[geoffstockton]

@keyofdminor "D minor. It's the saddest of all keys."

[kylemacabre]

4 minutes into it he's still talking

[geoffstockton]

@kylemacabre Am I not supposed to be talking? It's a guitar lesson, not a concert.

[bluelibra65]

very enlightening, this has always been a major grey area for me, thank you for sharing.

[bluefAng]

there are not two whole tone scales, but two modes

[geoffstockton]

@bluefAng No, theres one mode for whole-tone. If a scale has only one step in it's step pattern it only has one mode. The step pattern is *W*W*W*W*W*W. So what kind of step pattern do we get if we start at the second step? Let's see. *W*W*W*W*W*W.

[bluefAng]

@geoffstockton youre totally right, my mistake = )

[geoffstockton]

(This is part 2 to the response) No matter where you start, that's what you're gonna get. So theres only one mode of whole tone.  There are two wholetone scales that actually have different notes from one another. There are two modes of the diminished scale and two modes of the augmented scale but only one mode of the whole tone.

[bluessenior]

Thank You!

[wandersonfcastro]

absolutely amazing, nothing helps more to practice a scale than to know the chord progression that is fits in... you are very good instructor.

[chadisawesomeness]

you should do a lesson on different chord voicings

[BlikeNave]

Lol whenever I go to look up a cool concept your face keeps popping up :]

[SimplyStoopid]

are you happy with the pickups on that ibanez? I own a similar model (mine is the af-95) and the pickups are downright awful.

[geoffstockton]

So far they haven't bothered me, but I tend to be less picky than most guitarists about that type of thing. Most of my tone is a result of how I'm playing and ow I'm EQing myself. I really can't hear differences between this guitar with the factory pick ups and the same guitar wit SM jazz classics in it. Not enough to drive me to buying a set, anyway. It's probably just me not being tuned into te nuances enough, though.

[crazyfreak1919]

Yeah dude, that was a sick lesson.

[MrAlfredocolon]

i play more jazz on sax but me and my experimental way of thinking on guitar lured me into learning how to use these. ive never even played jazz on guitar lol. i should start it seems like fun

[gasforus]

Geoff, you're a fine instructor and guitar player. I haven't watched all of your lessons, but from the videos I've watched, I have enough material to keep me busy for many weeks to come. VIEWERS: if you're interested in Jazz and music theory, watch, listen, and discover! Saginaw, MI.

[geoffstockton]

Thanks for the kind words.

[pmasta333]

i knew this scale prior to this video but you play it better it seems like you cant play it out of key i like it over descending chromatic chords

[ibzmav]

thanks! 5 stars for you :)

[adudenamedrf]

LOL "do you remember that one time when johnny sawed off his arm?" great lesson. nice sense of humor too!

[jimbang]

excellent lesson well explained

[meghan3192]

1:49 so true

[geoffstockton]

Yeah, it's definitely been used in commercials, sitcoms, etc. The trick to not making it cheesy is avoiding to many scale steps in a row.

[guitardude6262]

Great lesson

the whole tone scale reminds me of that one painkiller medication commercial i can't think of what it is.

[geoffstockton]

Haha, thanks man. I'll keep them coming, for sure.

[wqerww]

Finally!!!,someone teaching jazz who seems to actually know what hes on about!

keep the vids coming!