OK so we have looked at the Chromatic Scale, and we have talked about tones and semitones (or whole-steps and half-steps, depending where you live ;-) ). In this post I'll use T for tone (and whole-step) and S for semitone (and half step).

Now I'm going to talk about the major scale, which is pretty much the basis of all the music we generally listen to, and is the base scale to which all other scales are generally referred.

The Chromatic Scale has a formula. OK it's really simple and obvious, but it's a formula nontheless. Its formula is SSSSSSSSSSSS. Easy peasy.

The Ts and Ss I will now talk about come from the Chromatic Scale.

The major scale has its own formula too. It doesn't matter what key you're in, what chords you're playing, how fast you're playing your arpeggios, what you had for breakfast, what colour your underwear is, the major scale has its own formula and it never changes.

Here it is, nice and easy:

TTSTTTS

Yep. That's it. Nothing more, nothing less.

Let's give some examples....

So you want to know what notes make up the major scale with a root of C... in other words you want to learn C major...

just take your root note (C in this case) and then apply the formula to it...

C = root note = note 1 = C
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = D
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = E
next note is a semitone higher = one fret = F
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = G
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = A
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = B
next note is a semitone higher = one fret = C

so the C major scale has the notes C D E F G A B C, and they are found /created by the formula TTSTTTS. Let's try G

major:

G = root note = note 1 = G
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = A
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = B
next note is a semitone higher = one fret = C
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = D
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = E
next note is a tone higher = two semitones = two frets = F#
next note is a semitone higher = one fret = G
so the G Major scale has the notes G A B C D E F# G, and they are found /created by the formula TTSTTTS.

You see the pattern?

Every major scale is built the same way, whatever the root note is.

If you think of the numbered notes in the scale (they're called the degrees of the scale) they are all the same "distance" (in terms of semitones) from the root note. They are all unique in their relation to the root note.

Remember, the distance from, say, A to C in a C Major scale is the same (in frets / semitones) as the distance from E to G in a G Major scale. Obviously they're not the same notes, but the distance between them is the same.

Similarly it follows that the distance between ANY degree of ANY major scale to ANY OTHER degree of the same scale is the same, because each major scale is created using the same formula of TTSTTTS.

These relationships are called intervals.

So by now you should be able to construct any major scale for any root you so desire. Just remember:

• pick your root note
• use the TTSTTTS formula
• take the notes from the chromatic scale

I think I'll keep this post short and check the discussion thread... I don't want anybody who's reading this to get confused, fall behind, whatever just because of my descriptions... please talk, guys, and definitely ask if you have a question!

This is basic stuff to many but very new to some! Let's take it slowly... :)