How to Riff with the Major Scale Video Lecture - Guitar Become a Pro (English)

all right today we're gonna talk about
riffing with the major scale which you
should never ever do trust me never do
it but we're gonna learn how to do it
because it's an excellent foil for
learning how to roof with the minor
scale and just kind of getting better to
know your intervals so if you didn't see
the minor scale video at it in this
first check that in the description I'll
put a link but essentially what it is is
we're gonna play the entire E major
scale on one string so we're gonna get a
good idea of what the E major scale
sounds like in a riff situation okay
without and the reason we're doing out
on one string is because we make the
tonal center E so you don't accidentally
just slip into its its minor scale and
just riff away it because it's with
minor scales for we're just gonna get
you in a second but essentially the
major scale on one string it is really
easy it's open two four five seven nine
eleven okay so in intervals of
all right so we're gonna get really
familiar with this if you don't know how
to do this on one string already really
just drill it because it's not you hard
especially if you break it into kind of
halves the first one and then from there
just go to the next maybe dot I'm
Himalayan and your guitar open two four
five then go a whole step from there
kind of symmetrical right open two frets
higher two frets higher one for higher
higher higher
[Music]
now to riff it as one does we're gonna
put a lot of easy notes in between the
notes that we're going for
okay now the reason that I don't think
this really sounds great is because it
ends up sounding too happy a lot of
people say that major scale sounds
really happier and the thing they kind
of make it different from the minor
scale specifically is gonna be
especially in a riff contacts I think is
really gonna be the third in the seventh
okay so the third be that fourth fret on
the low E string okay and we jump right
to there it already sounds like we have
a major chord 1 e major chord even with
like you know crappy distortion on this
am
that doesn't make me feel terror in my
soul it almost makes me feel hopeful
and then the major7 from here is gonna
be the octave both front and back caster
okay so if you tried to riff using these
very signature major things it gotta add
something like
[Music]
yeah so it's not really it I mean you
cannot make it sound heavy even if you
put this to like a Mesa triple rack and
you're like
it's never really gonna sound that heavy
because that major third and then major
seven
I'm making it so major it just makes you
want to kind of Daffy you know but super
important still because it tells you
what you're looking for in a riff and
kind of how these intervals relate to
each other alright so again if you just
take a hat like half at a time I guess
I do think this is kind of excellent an
excellent tool to have if maybe you're
like writing a theme for like a game
show or something that's kind of silly
also if you just want to like annoy
somebody with a riff riffing in the
major scale is a perfect thing like
let's just take the first four notes
I think you just ripped that all day and
all night
and it would really get on peoples
nerves I think my favorite example of
this is uh is any song by Andrew W K if
you don't know he is a legendary party
starter there's a riff and I think it's
party hard is the name of that song that
is straight up the the E major scale but
it's a higher octave I think in Siberia
like
[Music]
okay so it kind of has you might already
be hearing the sound of what a major
scale riff is it which definitely has
displacement I'm just kind of like you
know kidding for the most part but super
important to know and learning it on one
string really helps you kind of identify
the tonal center of it because we're
kind of chugging this low e-string a lot
there for the E major Ness is just
permeating through anything that we
could ever do because again there's a
minor scale in here like if we take the
Octavia and go back and refracts right
here nice try
I'm low e-string c-sharp
Minor is where the minor scale would be
but having this almost kind of pedal
tone or droning of an e stops us from
slipping into there so it's a really
good just kind of example of the
difference that a major third or a major
seven will make in the context of maybe
single notes things or even off of like
boys
a sister root note is major third and
it's major seventh now if we were to
make those minor all we have to do is
flatten each of those that so instead of
opening four and eleven and twelve
we'd have open hand read
and tenant wah and already it sounds
more like a tool song just by it using a
minor and a minor 7 ok so what's good is
to do an example of some just really
super basic riff in major and then
change it to minor so maybe it's like
just going like down down up major third
down down up major 7
now let's make a minor
so I think you can tell that one of
those is way more is way better than the
other again it totally my opinion riff
out rock out on the major scale as much
as you want but learning those intervals
and being able to kind of like hear the
differences between those can really
help you kind of take a song in whatever
direction you want if you want maybe
part of a song to be more uplifting or
whatever start using those major scale
intervals and you start driving home
maybe kind of like a pedal tone or a
droning of the root note of the major
key that you understand or if you want
to completely avoid that now we know how
to avoid that and it's all by knowing
your intervals whether it's major thirds
minor thirds and major 7th minor 7th the
other ones that are in those scales and
valuable stuff to know and it will only
help you in your rocking and riffing for
years to come so hope you enjoy the
video if you have any questions or
comments hit me up in the comments
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I'll talk to y'all soon
thanks a lot