Changing to Major Pentatonic Scales

How to Play Major Pentatonic Scales

So far we have been using the Minor Pentatonic Scales to learn from. As you know they sound Bluesy, and are even good for Metal and Jazz and other styles.

Now we will learn how to change the Minor Pentatonic Scale to the Major Pentatonic Scale to sound more like Country or Folk music!

Let's stay with the Key of "E", like previously. Our song starts on an E7 Chord and Root Note is "E". Simple! Now you're catching on to how easy it is!

The animated picture below shows Box Pattern #1 placed on the fretboard chart with "E" Root Notes showing through the Red Root Note holes. It sits on the 4th to the 8th Fret. This is one area to play the E Minor Pentatonic Scale in a Blues kind of sound.

Now to change to the Major Pentatonic Scale, we move it three frets toward the nut. That's it! (Moving Box Pattern back toward Nut-animated gif)

Look at the picture below. We just moved the same Pentatonic Pattern #1 back three frets toward the nut, and now if you play it with the same song, (in the Key of "E") your solo will have a definite Country music sound! Even though the Root Note Changed to C Sharp, remember you're still playing in the Key of "E".

(Minor Pentatonic to Major Pentatonic Scale)

So that means that each Pentatonic Pattern can be used for either a Minor-Blues sound or a Major-Country music sound. Plus, as we learned earlier, they can also be used in any Key and can move anywhere on the fretboard, and they can connect to each other to cover more of the Fretboard! Not to bad for a few minutes of looking at this website!