Superimposing Pentatonics

ladies and gentlemen, the minor pentatonic scale:

 
you've seen this before. if you haven't, well, now you have. in case you need to be reminded, the minor pentatonic scale has been the building block for the better amount of blues and rock solos for basically of the electric guitar's life, and likely beyond. the reason for its success is in its simplicity, i think. 2 notes per string, very easy to remember, and very easy to play with minimal practice time.  

it has one problem though - most players that get addicted to this scale tend to complain about being stuck 'in the box.' this shape is so memorable and so easy to learn, its often hard to break free from its grasp to find new sounds.

we're going to use this scale's simplicity to help us break from the cycle.

i just gave you an A minor pentatonic scale. let's have a look at all the notes that make this scale up...

i usually teach this scale first in my private lessons, and then when we move on to minor scales, i make mention that minor scales and minor pentatonics are interchangeable in real time. so, having said that, we can safely use A natural minor in place of its minor pentatonic relative. this makes sense, because the notes of A minor pentatonic are built into A natural minor...

A B C D E F G 

see them in bold? good. now let's expand on this idea even further.

it's easy to see these two scales contain the same notes, but on the subject of A minor, if you do some digging you'll notice there are actually two more pentatonic scales hidden in A natural minor... can you find them?

A B C D E F G - A Natural Minor
A     C D E    G - A Minor Pentatonic
A     C D   F  G - D Minor Pentatonic
A B     D E    G - E Minor Pentatonic


sneaky, right? do yourself a favor now - fire up a backing track in A minor, and give D minor pentatonic a shot. then try E minor pentatonic. you will find that all the notes work, but the riffs you are used to playing in A might sound a little odd. this is because although you're playing the correct notes, the notes are in different places under your fingers. this is a good thing - because now you can come up with new licks that sound entirely different from your usual riffs, all without learning any new scales!


furthermore, you'll also realize that in addition to having your same old A minor notes in different areas under your fingers, you'll also find that these scales inhabit different areas of the neck...

it would be smart to remember how far apart these scales are, so you can get to them easily while improvising. i highly recommend basing everything off of the pentatonic scale that is interchangeable with the natural minor (A), and thinking +/-5 and +/-7 frets up or down (its the same thing!).


now, with all that said, there's just one thing left to do - combine them all in realtime! 

i used multiple colors to show you where all the pentatonic scales fall. please note i also used the E minor pentatonic in two octaves, just to show the area you can cover. notice D and E minor pentatonic overlap each other a bit - that's ok. what's really important to notice here is that with these three scales, we can essentially cover the entire fretboard - how's that for breaking out of the box?

enjoy your newly rekindled relationship with the minor pentatonic scale.