How to Practice Pentatonic Scales

This is part 2 of a series on the pentatonic scale. Part 1 can be found here.

When you first learn the pentatonic patterns it is fine to just start at the first note in the pattern, play until you reach the highest note and play back down the pattern. This is a logical way to practice and it makes sense to start out that way. However, this method of practicing has some limitations.

Limitation Number One
If you just play the scale in order over and over again your fingers will become used to playing it that way and they will want to play it that way everytime. This is called muscle memory and is actually very useful. You want your fingers to “know” the pattern all on their own. But you want them to know other ways of playing the pattern as well.

Otherwise when it comes time to compose or improvise with these scales, your fingers will begin to lead the way because they are so comfortable playing the scale in a certain order. All your melodies will start to sound the same

Limitation Number Two
When you practice these scales you are not only training your fingers to play the scales – you are also training your ear to hear the scales. Eventually you will begin hearing the notes in your head before you even play them. Again, this is a very good thing but unless you change the way you practice your scales, your ear will only be use to hearing the scale in order. This also limits your ability to easily and naturally compose and improvise.

Note: for more on ear training check out my ear training power course and the related articles on this site.

The Solution

So you need to practice your pentatonic scales in different ways. In addition to playing the scales ascending and descending you should try the following:

Exercise 1
First note of the pattern, third note | second note, fourth note | third note, fifth note | etc

For example if you were to do this exercise with pattern 1 in the key of A minor it would look like this:

|----------|----------|----------|----------|
|----------|----------|----------|----5----8|
|----------|----------|----5----7|-5----7---|
|----------|----5----7|-5----7---|----------|
|---5---7--|-5----7---|----------|----------|
|-5---8----|----------|----------|----------|

Exercise 2
First note, second, third | second, third, fourth | third, fourth, fifth | etc.

Exercise 3
First, second, third, fourth | second, third, fourth, fifth | third, fourth, fifth, sixth | etc.

Exercise 4
First, fourth | second, fifth | third, sixth | etc.

For each exercixe: once you reach the highest note you can reach in any given pattern you should play the entire exercise backwards until you are at the starting note again.

After practicing the pentatonic patterns this way for a while you will really have a good command of them. Also, your fingers and ears will be better equipped to play any lick that you throw at them.

Also, be sure to watch for opportunities to use the finger roll in these exercises.

The next step towards developing your scale knowledge and your ear is to learn a set of simple, standard licks based on these patterns. That will be the subject of the next article on pentatonic scales.