Understanding Modes Part 5 Mixolydian Video Lecture - The Ultimate Guitar

okay we've made it mode number five the
mixolydian mode an awesome word if
you're trying to sound smart in front of
other people but more importantly than
that it's a very very commonly used
musical mode because it occurs on the
fifth note in any key and in music this
is a very very strong relationship
between the root note and the fifth note
now we're doing all this in the key of C
so C is one c d e f g g is five that's
why basically in every song that has a C
major chord in it there's gonna be a G
major chord in it at some point or
another and we're gonna kind of go over
why that is and why it sounds so good
right so let's jump right into it the G
mixolydian mode I'm starting out a GU
we're proving it's a major class mode so
we're thinking of the major scale right
here G a B C D E G so G major would be g
a b c d e f sharp g we're taking that
seventh note one two three four five six
seven and flattening it so the
mixolydian mode is the major scale with
a flat seven G a-b-c-d-e-f-g
middle thankee index middle pinky index
middle pinky
all right now one of the most commonly
used chords within this is actually a
seventh chord short for a dominant
seventh chord and that's just a major
chord with a flat seven in it right so
if we arpeggiate that we'll take the one
three five that'll give us a G major
chord of G of B and a D we're gonna add
that F to it right now this is really
interesting actually because so far our
other two major class modes the first
mode in the fourth mode had major seven
chords when you arpeggiate one two three
major seven this is the first one was
actually different it has what's called
a minor seven if you remember the minor
class mode we've done before that
seventh note was always right there that
interval so it's kind of like a major
chord and a minor chord combined into
one that gives you a seven chord a g7
chord you may have seen a voicing like
this I like this and blues music
especially they're used all the time
right they're really great chords so we
arpeggiate this it's gonna be a G a
d/f now that seven that flat seven is
what gives this modus flavor its sound
so let's learn it across two different
octaves right so every fret gets its own
finger we're starting with the middle
finger third fret middle pinky index
middle pinky index middle index ring
pinky middle pinky now this is gonna be
a little bit different slide farther to
get to that next one the flat 7 right
usually in major would go but since this
is a flat 7 there's a 7 we're gonna
flatten that so if some people play it
like that to get the de FG a but we're
gonna do this alright so let me do that
for the beginning again
slider
index ring which brings us to a G and a
s so backwards if you go backwards do
the same thing now another chord that is
kind of unique to this is a nine chord
of G nine chord right it's the exact
same thing for you two arpeggio we're
just taking the one three the five a
flat seven and then the nine right so
one two three four five six seven eight
nine in this shape is right here so we
can get to that arpeggio we can add that
to what we're playing over these chords
1 3 5 flat 7 9 and I'm gonna kind of
turn this into a little bit of a riff
just so you can kind of hear a
mixolydian type sounding thing now if we
just play these notes as a position is a
hand position and to a certain extent
how we've been learning all the modes so
far they're really just hand positions
to learn the notes in the major scale
the actual modal feel of all of this
kind of comes within context or
different music right and you kind of
need something like a backing track to
actually hear the mixolydian nature of
this but if we were to make a riff to
kind of inflex something you get a good
idea of how it would sound with a
backing track because we're creating an
atmosphere of mixolydian right so for
instance I'm just gonna do a riff that
kind of uses the things that make it
special right so now I'm just gonna use
two fingers right so I'm starting on the
third fret of the G
and then I'm gonna go to the major third
and a fourth so it is the seven and
there's the nine all right so if we
start combining those with a little bit
of a swing to it
so that's why I like you can get pretty
funky bluesy whatever you want with this
mode and let's also learn a dominant 7
voicing if we're just gonna Rudy here so
this is one I really like because we can
take it from the root position of this
mode where your middle finger is going
to be the root note okay so our middle
finger is playing the one we're gonna
skip all the way to the 7 1 2 3 4 5 6
flat 7 with our ring finger on the D
string and then our pinky right here is
gonna play an octave of the B the third
now you might notice that we're actually
leaving the 5th out which we technically
need to make but we're implying the 5th
in this 4th progression here this chord
voicing right here so that's gonna be
our g7 voicing that we can make from
notes of the mixolydian mode alright so
here's the first note 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 7
again there's no movable shape so even
if you're playing if you go outside the
mode and try to just play different
things this is a g7 g sharp 7 B flat so
just like the modes you can move shapes
back and forth this is a chord voicing
that you can use back and forth as well
so another thing we've been doing is
looking at these as pieces of a larger
puzzle and we're going to take the first
octave of this mixolydian mode and
inside that we're gonna see a shape that
we might be more familiar with which is
the C major scale right we did this when
you've routed it back on the C it
middle pinky index middle thinking index
ring thank you so inside this mode G ABC
right that 4th note of G is a seat so if
you do the whole hand shape
you'll notice that once you get to that
fourth note right starting here on the
SIA that's where the major scale is hit
so again this isn't all about just
learning the different modes on what
they can do is actually just learning
how to see the fretboard and being able
to kind of lock in on different pieces
of shapes that you already know and have
them repeat all around the fretboard and
that really increases your fretboard
awareness