Why are pentatonic scales used for instrumental solos?

by Ari • 7 Nov 2018 — 1 minute read

A Quoran asked about pentatonic scales in instrumental solos, I answered.

It is a good question.

Did you, for example, know that the pentatonic scale is a slice right out of the cycle of fifths? Just stack four fifths on top of each other and there is your major pentatonic (well, you have to put them in order first!). But that is why pentatonics are so old – the fifth is an early overtone, so many instruments can produce these five notes quite easily.
Take any five notes from the cycle of fifths and line them up one note after another and you get a pentatonic scale.

And check out more below.

Read Ariane Cap’s answer to Why are pentatonic scales used for instrumental solos? on Quora.

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Hi. I'm Ari.

As a bassist, I have toured/played/recorded with a variety of rock, Jazz, and funk bands, I have worked with some incredible producers (Keith Olsen) and musicians (Paul Hanson, Muriel Anderson) and I toured Brazil with Stu Hamm as a duo.

As a bass teacher, I have taught at London Bass Day, Gerald Veasley’s Bass Boot Camp, SBL, Truefire, notreble… I even ran my own music school for a few years before gigs took me back on the road.

One thing to know about me is that I teach because I am absolutely fascinated with the learning process. And I am obsessed with helping others realize their musical potential.

When I started playing bass, I excelled very quickly because I had an amazing teacher who taught me using a powerful method. This method transformed my playing so quickly that I passed a bunch of high-level university auditions and even tested out of entire classes at university even though I had been playing for only a very short time.

That’s what, many years later turned into one of my books, co-written with Wolf Wein, called “The Pattern System for the Bass Player”. I created entire systems of learning based on some of these ideas and wrote books and created courses together with Wolf. Our bass books have sold over 30,000 copies and garnered rave reviews.

I started teaching online in 2009 and have embraced technology as a powerful learning tool since then, never losing sight of the importance of providing feedback and personalized guidance to learners.

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