Scales & Tales - Unlocking Exotic Scales

Here's the next episode of Scales & Tales with 'Unlocking Exotic Scales.'
I've had a lot of students in private lessons ask about exotic scales and modes over the years and I've noticed a number of requests to feature this topic and area of understanding some of these exotic scales and sounds.
I've featured various scales/modes in the Scales & Tales series, but it's always good to view scales differently and tackle them from as many angles and approaches as possible, which will give you a better understanding and hands-on working ability with these specific scales and elements of music.
This lesson targets four of the most common exotic scales/modes found in rock, hard rock, and metal music, but you can also catch these unique musical flavors hiding in flamenco, jazz, fusion, and even pop music (to name a few).
This episode begins by targeting the natural minor scale (a.k.a. Aeolian) and from there it mutates that basic scale into the four exotic scale varieties and mutations shared in this lesson. This is only the tip of the iceberg regarding scales and modes, as there are countless variations of major, minor, diminished, augmented, chromatic, altered scales, and so much more.
You can think of this lesson as sticking your toe into the vast ocean of scales, but it focuses on the most common varieties used by the legends of rock, hard rock, shred, metal, and more.
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[@chriscorral6365]

Mr. Brewster, you ARE the king!!! Hail!!!

[@rudiger1337]

You are the best teacher ever.. full stop.

[@kingbrutusxxvi]

I started as a classical player and quickly switched to metal when I heard Michael Schenker, George Lynch, etc. in the early '80s but it was Marty Friedman who got me interested in crazy scales and modes. His "Dragon's Kiss" album (cassette, haha) totally pulled me out of my Phrygian comfort zone. I've been figuring out scales from different instruments from African, Asian, the Middle East, etc. ever since. Such a worthwhile tool. The knowledge, I mean, not me. Great idea for a lesson. Stay safe everyone. Cheers from Florida.

[@PedroSilvaMusic]

Great content. The very best of KZbin. THANK YOU!!!!

[@Panchissimo3]

Dude I'm addicted to your lessons you're a great teacher. I love being on the Patreon page I printed out a notebook of all these lessons and work through them on the daily. Thanks a lot, you should have 1 million subscribers

[@TMoody]

Rust In Peace is a masterpiece and Marty Friedman is a MONSTER. Watching this right now and so far it might be my favorite LNL.... thanks buddy!

[@andyracksthecams]

Excellent lesson on essential scale knowledge. These tonalities are intriguing and Inspiring. They make you experiment. Thank you.

[@scoobystap3159]

You are a very talented guitarist and I love your presentation in these videos. Spread the word fellow guitarist, we need more subscribers for David’s channel.

[@damonb3939]

Great lesson, thanks Interested in the thinking behind figuring out the chord progressions attached to the scales.

[@steel3454]

My favorite is a 5 note scale that most of Friedman’s Dragons Kiss uses. It’s just the natural minor scale without a 4th or 7th.

[@voronOsphere]

Japanese Pentatonic....

[@tomhowarth6697]

I really love your lessons. They remind me of the lessons I received from Scott McGill (also a Guitar Player Magazine contributor) back in the late 80s/early 90s. All these years later, I still really enjoy goofing around with exotic scales (when I find time to play).

[@STAMPER-DESIGN]

Opened a door I've been trying to open for a while. THANK YOU!

[@patrickkish6662]

The antidote to chaos, Late Night Lessons

[@Gohanndes1]

This lesson came at a great timing! I'm studying "The Gates of Babylon". Thank you for your hard work.

[@em-dashman4404]

Aw, not the Boney M song then? 😉😂

[@voronOsphere]

I love that Rainbow song!!!

[@waynegram8907]

VIDEO LESSON REQUEST: Hexatonic scales because Allman Brothers and Derek & the Dominos used Hexatonic scales to build harmonized guitar parts and used triads apart to make hexatonic scales

[@iancrombie8862]

Easy for you to say!🎼🎵🎶🎶🎵🎼🤣🤣🤣

[@georgew.morrowiii118]

Excellent lesson...Phrygian has always interested me and Hungarian adds a different twist

[@ThrashRebel]

Around ‘91, I bought a book “Scales & Modes: The Beginning” The back pages of the book has exotic/foreign scales.

[@voronOsphere]

Awesome, David! I have that issue of GP, too! That will be a great companion piece to this lesson! As always- thanks!

[@obiem9319]

Awesome! I learned be the Japanese scale years ago.

[@zizimxD]

Awesome stuff as always, david!

[@ChaosxLordx]

Awesome vid, just started getting into these scales and realised every one of my 90's metal hero's were using the phyrigian dominant and harmonic minor scales in their leads to get that 'evil / makes your hair stand on end' sound.

[@fredericadda]

Very cool, I love this kind of lessons!

[@calansvc]

How come I'm just now finding your channel and discovering your playing? Excellent technique, instruction, and information. The short tips are fantastic for intermediate players. Thank you!

[@jeffdonaldson7036]

A tritone lesson would be very awesome. I've been trying to crack it for a couple years now. Other than that I refer to your lessons frequently. Thankyou so much.

[@janiterinadrum1627]

Thanks man... that's interesting it's simple but I've never even thought of it there's all kinds of stuff I can do with that

[@chogumchonsa]

Phenomenal lesson. Well done, sir.

[@erniemarable616]

Great lesson. Again!. You're awesome.. How about a Chord play of Kix?

[@brandonlinhart6925]

Great vid as always. Now time to throw a request out as usual-Marc Diglio!

[@janiterinadrum1627]

Good for the vocabulary

[@hatebreeder999]

Exotic pentatonic scales can be created from modes of major scale, modes of harmonic & melodic minors to. In India we use modal pentatonics a lot Try out hamsadwani scale. Its 1 2 3 5 7 of major Rag shaileja 1 3b 5 6 7 Lydian pentatonic 1 3 4# 5 7 Durga 1 2 4 5 6 Purvi scale 1 2 3 4# 5 6b 7 Todi 1 2b 3b 4b 5 6b 7 There are many more scales like these

[@sixstringer3783]

There was a wealth of information in this lesson definitely one of my faves have been captivated by the these scales for some time now love the minor modes thanks for the lesson David 🤘

[@tommartling2473]

Great lesson 👍👍👍

[@Snostrebla1]

Great lesson!!!

[@moss1transcendant]

really openned my eyes up this talk. really appreciated it. cheers!

[@patmcmacken1435]

Dave, great lesson. How about doing part 2.🎶

[@michaelnachvorne9250]

The D Hungarian Scale is in Germany often referred as the D Algerian Scale. In fact there is an Algerian Jazz componist and Oud player called Rabih Abou-Khalil who often uses it. He sometimes even prints the notation of his songs on his CD covers. Btw.: If you skip the 7th you get a nice 3-notes-per-string scale out of this one.

[@michaelnachvorne9250]

Check out for example the theme of the song Dog River from the album The Sultan's Picnic

[@andre.1984]

One of the most in-your-face Phrygian sounding songs I've ever heard is "Set the controls for the heart of the sun" by Pink Floyd. Your example immediately reminded me of that song.

[@enricosenno7767]

Hexatonic scale would be great Yes

[@sixstringswl]

There are thousands of scales. It’s fun to experiment with pathways and create flow charts between them.

[@voronOsphere]

According to the Encyclopedia of Scales there are 2048 different scales (including all chords & all 2 note intervals).

[@sixstringswl]

Yeah? I would’ve have guessed more with all the different types. That’s cool though. What got me interested was that in minor it’s 2&6 that are those changing tones and major is 4&7. So I reversed it. Ionian to harmonic major to Byzantine etc... then repeat until it comes back around again. There’s some funky combinations I ran across that way. Never could name them until I discovered a sight on line that just systematically goes through them. The sight talks about reducing scales to a binary number system and how to add them into the scale number and so one really intriguing to me. I want to tell people, but most people just don’t care and is here the place to do that? Somehow I doubt it bc I love this place too!!! Lol!!!

[@hadleymanmusic]

A new Realm

[@crisprtalk6963]

Dave I'm sending over a guy with a bag of cash... hand him the Les Paul! Please. Thanks.

[@leafamania1]

Nice shirt

[@leaharrington4472]

Was that Savatage around 8:10 when talking about phrygian?

[@mattstrat1]

Great lesson as always . Prefer your strat sound tbh ...

[@FrankSpeer66]

I wrote a song based on fridgey and dominant recently . I should send it to you in Facebook messenger

[@thetrippasnippingsasquatch6539]

You should do a lesson on king gizzard and the lizard wizard

[@Panchissimo3]

By the way is it at all possible for you to post 1 hand written chart on your Patreon page please?

[@st.fiacre6685]

The thing that is funny about this lesson is the Rush T shirt. Alex didnt do drop d tunings.If anything a little sharp to accommodate Geds voice...

[@toneconsultant]

Love your channel, but I will say this one was just too much for my head.

[@iancrombie8862]

Musical theory is soooooo complicated.No wonder i never improved much in 20 years!!😟😟😟

[@aylbdrmadison1051]

Only all the many names are at all complex, and then only because it's so convoluted by all the different names of the same exact same thing. Let me simplify it. If you learn nothing else, learn this (A minor/C Major): A, B, C, D, E, F, and G are also 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 The only thing even slightly difficult to remember are the steps of the scale: In C Major (or any major scale): start with the root and then take a whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, and a half step to the octave. In A minor (or any minor scale): start with the root then take a whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, and a last whole step to the octave. Note: whole step = 2 frets, and half step = one fret. Learn how to go up and down one string using these steps, then learn the scales in each position of C Major in all 7 positions. It's a good idea to say the notes out loud or in your head as you play them, and physically writing these down on blank fretboard graphs helps a lot too. i.pinimg.com/originals/38/c5/5c/38c55c5a189f0724ff6bd2266703de01.png The numbers on the left side just name the intervals (you can ignore those for now, it will become clear as you go, no worries), the numbers on the right side are the fingers you want to use: pointer finger = 1, index finger = 2, ring finger = 3, and pinky finger = 4. Remember the pinky finger is weakest so always needs the most work, so use it where it says 4 even if later you will find ways to use the ring finger instead, sometimes you need the pinky, so don't gimp it by not using it. This part takes a little time, but once you have these 7 shapes memorized, you have learned the entire fretboard and the rest of music theory becomes very simple really. Not only that but you then have the entire fretboard memorized and can easily just move those shapes to any key and play almost anything. After that it's just adding the spice of different exotic scales etc. Seriously, if you just learn those 7 shapes, the rest is a breeze because you can move them to any of the 12 keys and as a bonus, you will be learning the shapes of all 7 modes too, but don't worry about that for now, it's just more of the names that make music *seem* complex when it's really all just super simple math at worst. But *you have to learn this foundation* before anything else will make any sense at all.

[@bodragon4582]

I spent a decade attempting to make scales and modes make me sound like marty,lynch,yngwie,satch, etc...unfortunately it works,you can sound just like everyone else if you learn just like everyone else. For me personally I find the best method to be "original' is to not play at all.Put the damn guitar down and think the notes and phrases in your head first,then go find those notes to play, and you will sound like only you,also try learning vocal phrases, listen to your favorite singers and try to emulate their lines, like adele or chris cornell. It will be 100% more rewarding playing original lines in your own style,than learning to sound like every other dipshit in a guitar store.

[@aylbdrmadison1051]

Scales and modes are just loose frameworks that help people remember the shapes of sounds. What you describe doing is also a great help and where you want to end up. Some few people can end up there just playing by ear alone, but those people are very rare and most will need to learn at least the C Major scale across the fretboard. But as for sounding unique, that's the real trick as you know. But the more you know, the greater your chances of discovering unique combinations of notes. There is no logical reason to avoid learning different modes and or scales, chords, rhythms etc. *But,* most importantly to having a unique sound, it's all in how you apply/play/express each note or note combination, not the key or the mode you use, those are just there to help you relate to the chord structure. For anyone trying to find their own sound I highly suggest sticking to pentatonic box one at first and coming up with ideas using *only* those 5 notes at most. Even better, start by using just 1 - 3 of those notes. If you can't find a unique style by using just one note, you're never gonna sound unique just because you've complicated it with more notes. Check out any of the most unique players and you'll find they are using all of the same notes everyone else is.

[@voronOsphere]

Both approaches can also be utilized by a single player. I've also seen people who don't know any scales (and are damn proud of it) spend 5 minutes trying to figure out what's in their heads and it turns out to be part of a plain old major scale. It can be so hard doing spontaneous, in-key jams with those types of players.

[@voronOsphere]

Dipshits? Learning Theory and using it makes Dipshits?

[@voronOsphere]

@@aylbdrmadison1051 Yes! And like you said: Start nailing that C Major/A Natural Minor Scale and its chords all over the neck!