Scales, and the chords in them

A scale is not a run of notes to memorise. It is the chords of a key laid end to end: take every other note of the major scale and you get its seven chords, and the reason anybody learns C major is that it is the same notes as Dm7, G7 and Cmaj7 read in a different order. Every page here is built around that join — the scale on the neck, the chords it harmonises into, and which notes of the scale each chord takes.

17 scales on 12 roots: 204 pages.

The major scale

The one every other scale on this page is described as a change to.

The modes

The same seven notes started somewhere else. Which mode you are in is decided by the chord underneath, not by the notes.

The minor scales

Three answers to the same problem: a minor key has no dominant of its own unless you raise something.

Five and six notes

Scales defined by what they leave out. They are played over chords rather than built into them.

The symmetric scales

Built from one repeating step, so they have no home note and every degree builds the same chord.

By root

The major scale on each root. Every scale page carries the same key bar, so any root reaches any scale in one more click.

Looking for the chords rather than the scale? Every chord on the site is indexed by family and by root, and the key explorer adds what a key borrows from outside its own scale. Where the shapes and the theory come from is on the about page.

Midi Settings

7.5
Play Style
One pass of the pick from the lowest string up, everything left ringing.
Instrument
350
150

Style

Shows each chord the way this style would voice it, and marks which of its alternatives belong to the idiom.

Layout

Left Handed Mode