Thursday, March 17, 2011

Learn Guitar Scales : Exploring The Exotic Phrygian Mode For Soloing

By Nick Dillon


When you are learning to play the guitar it's important to learn guitar scales in order to advance your playing. You don't want to be stuck in the blues box forever, nor do you want to just play it by ear. Understanding music theory deepens your ability to play solos and compose music. When you learn guitar scales, you learn some of the most important aspects of music theory. And, when you learn guitar scales, you want to learn modes, too. One of these modes is the Phrygian Mode.

To put it simply, the Phrygian Mode is played when you take the notes of a certain key and make the first note as well as the final note played within your solo the third note in that key's scale. Imagine that that you're playing music in the key of G. To play your solo in the Phrygian Mode, you would begin and end your solo on the B note. This doesn't need to be th exact same B-note; that is, you can begin the solo with a high-B note and end the solo on low-B note, if you think that "feels" best.

As your guitar playing progresses with practice, you'll want to have an understanding of the Phrygian Mode's intervals because that gives you a more profound understanding of the notes that together create the Phrygian Mode. In music, the greater your technical understanding the more creative you can become.

The Phrygian Mode intervallically goes like this Root, flatted 2nd , flatted 3rd ,4th ,5th , flatted 6th , flatted 7th . So to play B Phrygian, you would use B-C-D-E-F-G-A-B'. Notice that B Phrygian Mode is actually in the key of G. Thus you are playing the G major scale, however you're emphasizing the individual notes in a way that kind of disguises this fact.

The Phrygian Mode is used to give an "Egyptian" or Middle Eastern feel to a solo, lead break, etc. It is a favorite mode of "Neo-classical rock" guitar players and advanced instrumental hard rock guitar players like Steve Vai and Joe Satriani.

If you were doing some progressive rock or metal music the lyrics were about something mystical or even "demonic", then soloing with the Phrygian Mode could be a great idea. It could be especially expressive if you incorporated the vocals' melody line into the solo.

When you learn guitar scales, you learn how to be a more advanced, more expressive guitar player. Don't forget to include mastery of modes when you learn guitar scales, and don't neglect to learn the Phrygian Mode.




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