Guitar Improvisation 201: guitar TABs of the Seven Modes of the Major Scale

This article is designed for guitar players who use TAB notation method. I’ve chosen to write down the tabs in the 4th position, but the same exercises can be executed in every other position as well.

Knowledge of scales are very important to any musician wishing to improvise over chord changes. Such knowledge will allow him to understand what scales to associate to different chords. This article focuses on the modes of the major scale, and how to use them. You can learn more in Mark Levine’s excellent manual entitled The Jazz Theory Book.

The modes of the major scale can be understood as the particular starting note of a given scale. Major scales have seven notes, therefore there are seven modes. For example, by playing the seven notes of the C (do) major scale, starting on the third note, E (mi), one would in fact be playing the C (do) major scale in its third mode, known as E (mi) Phrygian. The alterations are thoes of the C (do) major scale, but the starting note is in fact the third note of the scale. To learn more about the origin and history of modes, I recommend this excellent Wikipedia article.

Hence, there are seven different major scales for each note. Here is a diagram with the seven modes of the C (do) major scale and their corresponding chords (click here for an audio example):

Chart 1

The chords are created by assembling the tonic, third, fifth and seventh of each scale. Hence, when reading a B (si) half-diminished chord on a chart, for example, one may play the scale of B (si) Locrian (which corresponds to the scale of C [do]). More commonly, when reading a G7 (sol7) chord, one may play the scale of G (sol) Mixolydian (which also corresponds to the scale of C [do]).

In this way, there are seven modes for every note in the western chromatic scale. By learning how and when to play each of the seven modes for all twelve major scales, one will in fact have acquired a vocabulary of 84 major scales.Other modes, such as that of the melodic minor scale, also exist, but that will be the topic of another article.

A good exercise for one who wishes to learn all seven modes is to play all of them while starting on the same note. The following example features all seven modes starting on C (do), as well as the related major scale:

Chart 2