Few strategies are there to build various patterns:

1. Start on the E string on any note of the scale. Keep this fret in your mind . Move up that string playing notes from the scale until the next note would be more than 4 frets from home position (count the home position as fret 1), and place that next note on a higher string. Continue it until you run out of strings.

With this approach you can find regular scale boxes – boxes are great because they help you to hold your hand in the same position throughout the scale.

2. Start on the E string on any note of the scale. For each string, add notes until you have played precisely 3 notes on that string and after that change strings.

You can find 3 notes per string scales with the help of this approach – this is great because they have an even number of notes on each string which actually helps with speed runs.

You can get 2 note per string scales by altering the number from 3 to 2 or 4, or even 4 notes per string scales (possible, but really difficult to play, a favorite of Alan Holdsworth I believe). 2 notes per string are especially suitable for pentatonic.

3. Whole neck approach – in this approach we play entire number of scales by moving up 1 string and handle every string in isolation. Understand that there will be great overlap between strings, and figure out all the practicable means of playing an individual note or run on all strings (very challenging to do in practice but this is how actually top notch performers find out things)

That’s all what the patterns actually are – and as far as a point of terminology is concerned, I would call boxes a special case of patterns that are constructed by applying rule 1, patterns is a more general term that refers to all possible ways to map a scale to the guitar neck.

E Walker is contributes regular to guitar publications worldwide. He is the founder of Planet of Rock. See how guitar backing tracks makes guitar practice more enjoyable! Jam to over 1000 professional tracks including 100s of backing tracks

This short article presents a woolly description as well as a more technical one to make you familiar with Relative Minors.

A relative minor is a musical scale that is “related” to a major scale. As they work together harmonically, thus they can be regarded as being in the same family. Relative minors provide a remarkable mode to move from a major to a minor key without too much of a jump or use of multiplex chord sequences and so they are considered as a well-set tool in songwriting.

Here is a more technical description:

The relative minor of a certain major scale is a scale that starts 6 intervals up and after that shares all of the same notes. Firstly, what is an interval? It is not easy to answer it exactly but you can say that an interval is a note in a scale. You can understand all this with the help of an example. Let’s look at the scale of C ??” it is liked by most of the people because it has no sharps or flats. It comprises of followingnotes

C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C

We find that A is the relative minor of C by moving up 6 notes, (C-D-E-F-G-A). Therefore the possible notes we will use for A minor are A-B-C-D-E-F-G-A.

Although we start on the note of A, all of the notes also exist in the C major scale.

Taking it a step further, looking at the scale in terms of half and whole notes, as in the Major Scale 101 lesson, for a relative minor we would apply the pattern:

W H W W H W W, or

2 1 2 2 1 2 2

You can practice this formula to figure out the relative minor scale for any major scale by starting at the 6th note and applying it.

Now, to conclude, a short note of a couple of fascinating facts about Relative Minors is given. Firstly, three various minor scales are there in western music ??” with a slight divergence in their formula. The scale above is in reality a “Natural Minor” or “Pure Minor” scale – two names for the same thing while the other two are called “Harmonic” and “Melodic”. As their formulas differ from each other, so they do not share the same notes as the associated relative major scale and are harmonically speaking not such a right match as the Natural Minor.

And eventually, the Natural Minor (or Relative Minor) scale of a certain major scale is also known as the “Aeolian Mode”. Modes are a concept that we will discuss later, but for now, you can say confidently that you have correct understanding of Relative Minors, Pure Minors, Natural Minors, and the Aeolian mode.

E Walker is the founder of Planet of Rock Music Studios. Listen to samples of backing tracks. Find out how these guitar backing track will bring your skills to the next level. You are just One Click Away!