The minor pentatonic scale on guitar: the 5 positions
The scale behind most rock and blues solos: its five notes, its five positions on the neck, the chords it fits, and how to turn it into the blues scale.
Updated
If you only learn one scale on guitar, make it the minor pentatonic. Five notes, no "wrong" ones over most rock and blues, and the shape that half the guitar solos you know were played in. Here it is in A — the key it's most often learned in — but every shape moves: slide it up two frets and it's B minor pentatonic.
The five notes
A minor pentatonic is A, C, D, E and G. As degrees from the root: 1, ♭3, 4, 5, ♭7. It's the natural minor scale with the two notes most likely to clash taken out — the 2 and the ♭6 — which is exactly why it's so forgiving.
A minor pentatonic scale
5 notes
- A1
- Cb3
- D4
- E5
- Gb7
Use the position buttons under the fretboard to step through the shapes one at a time, and switch the labels to Degrees to see where the root (1) sits in each.
The five positions
The notes repeat across the whole neck in five overlapping boxes. Each box covers about four frets and links to the next one where its top notes become the next box's bottom notes.
- Position 1 is the one everyone learns first. In A, it starts on the 5th fret of the low E string: frets 5 and 8 on both E strings and the B string, 5 and 7 on the A, D and G strings. The root A is under your first finger on both E strings (5th fret) and under your third finger on the D string (7th fret).
- Positions 2 to 5 continue up the neck, each starting on the next note of the scale on the low E string (C, D, E, G), until position 5 brings you back to A at the 17th fret — position 1 again, an octave up.
Learn one position until you can play it up and down without thinking, saying "A" out loud every time you hit the root. Then learn the next one and practise the seam between the two. You don't need all five to play a good solo — plenty of great ones stay in position 1.
Which chords it fits
A minor pentatonic works over:
- Am and Am7 — every note of Am7 (A, C, E, G) is in the scale.
- A7, in a blues — the C of the scale rubs against the C# of the chord, and that rub is the blues. See how to solo over a 12-bar blues.
- Songs in A minor and in C major — C major's relative minor is A minor, so the same five notes work there too. In C, think of it as the C major pentatonic: same notes, different home.
From pentatonic to blues scale
Add one note — the ♭5, E♭ in A — and the minor pentatonic becomes the blues scale. Use the ♭5 as a passing note between the 4 and the 5, not a note to stop on: D, E♭, E is the classic move.
Make it sound like music
- Bend. The 4 bent up a whole step to the 5 (D to E, 7th fret of the G string) is one of the most-played bends in rock.
- Slide into notes from a fret below instead of fretting them cold.
- End phrases on the root or the 5. They sound finished; the ♭7 and ♭3 sound like a question.
Ready to use it on a real song? easyimprov finds a track's key and chords, and shows you on the neck which pentatonic fits the song — and when to switch.