Importances of learning scale forms

[EmmanuelFolo]

hey can some one explain to me where the importances of learning scales forms? is that how runs are created?

[EmmanuelFolo]

whoops i meant what*

[Dood]

> moving topic....

[The Burpster]

I guess theres a few famous players out there who have never learnt scales, but learning them sure makes using your fingers properly a lot easier.....

you may not subscribe to one finger per fret mode of teaching, but if you do, after all the pain and aching suddenly you'll find one day, your reach is increased, you can pick up notes much quicker, and using all four fretting fingers independantly just works.....

IMHO yes its worth the pain and boredom.

[WalMan]

I should, but I never really have. The benefit of scales is it gets you used to the positions for runs and can teach you the fretboard as well

[Bilbo]

I struggle to see how you can progress without it.

If you learn the scales (as scales then in thirds, fourths, fifths, sixths and sevenths) you can pretty much play anything. You can also HEAR stuff better so your lines open up a LOT. The 'play by instinct' concept is a dead end!

[Adam.M]

You're playing music, presumably, so it stands to reason that you need to learn music.

Scales keep you in key and in theme of the music (major or minor or neutral feel) and thus, make you sound musical.

Basic chord triad's patterns are a must (and very very easy to learn) the major and minor's and the pentatonic and blues scales are a must.

It can be tough to be creative when you've just learnt scales for the first time but eventually it opens up, and it's a great 'oh yeah!' moment.

This of course assumes you'd want to do at least a bit more than following the root note.

The best bit, once you know how to be a musician and know music or 'music theory' it's exactly the same 'music theory' on say guitar or piano and it's only the physical way that the instrument is played and the style of expression is.

At least learn minor pentatonic, and slowly expand from there. You can do pretty much everything in rock music with minor pentatonic.

[Krysbass]

Back when I first picked up bass in the early 1980's, I learned to play specific songs by ear and avoided any sort of scales or music theory. It was before t'internet and I couldn't find any bass-related books to learn that sort of stuff from in any bookshops I tried. Problem was that I could play the songs I had learned but my fretboard knowledge was lousy and I couldn't improvise much if things went off-script.

As a sort of "born-again bassist" a year or 2 ago, I used t'internet to get hold of a few good bass books. Since going through these and regularly practicing scales, modes etc as warm-up exercises I can only say that my playing has improved massively.

[urb]

That's like saying "What's the importance of learning words and grammar if I want to learn to speak?" - music is a language and learning scales will create the means by which you can join things together, and 'say' things that make sense. It may seem overwhelming at first but learning major, minor and diminished scales will get you on the right track - get a book on them (I haven't used one for ages but I'm sure some people here can suggest some great ones) or have a look around the web. Learning the modes is also a very good thing to do - the more of a vocbulary you have, the more ways you can express yourself, the easier you will communicate with other musicians.

Cheers

Mike

[charic]

Scales have their place for me. I know how to work them out and such (having a grade 5 theory) but if i start to think that way in a band situation I usually end up stuck for stuff i like. Personally the play by instinct with a bit of common sense seems to work atm.

Saying this each to their own and if you want to learn HOW scales work take up piano as its probably the easiest instrument to relate to EVERY other. Whereas if you learn it JUST on bass you may find yourself a little stuck in a band situation i reckon until having done it for a fair bit longer. I find if you know the notes in a chord then that usually is all you need (for most things im no prog or jazz bass god... not even a bass god yet )

My £0.02

[GM10]

[quote name='The Burpster' post='88541' date='Nov 14 2007, 05:28 PM']I guess theres a few famous players out there who have never learnt scales, but learning them sure makes using your fingers properly a lot easier.....

you may not subscribe to one finger per fret mode of teaching, but if you do, after all the pain and aching suddenly you'll find one day, your reach is increased, you can pick up notes much quicker, and using all four fretting fingers independantly just works.....

IMHO yes its worth the pain and boredom.[/quote]


Might not be reading this right but you don't need to use the one finger per fret rule to play a scale. Just move around the fretboard differently using 124. Is the point your making is that it's easier?

[Ba55me15ter]

[quote name='urb' post='88913' date='Nov 15 2007, 01:09 PM']That's like saying "What's the importance of learning words and grammar if I want to learn to speak?" - music is a language and learning scales will create the means by which you can join things together, and 'say' things that make sense.[/quote]

Hmm, bit of a lousy metaphor. Millions of people can speak and communicate perfectly well having never formally studied their own language.

In fact in this country the opposite is often true - innit like!

[jakenewmanbass]

to me the biggest benefit of learning scales is muscle memory, if your fingers/brain have done it before they will be able to do it again (within reason, no stupid anomolous occurance examples please) the further ingrained a process is the better access you have to it, once it is fully absorbed it then becomes a renewed boundary to your ability, and humans by their very nature (evolution) tend to push at their boundaries
jake

Edited January 4, 2008 by jakesbass

[mcgraham]

I wouldn't say the metaphor is lousy, whether or not you study it seriously will certainly have an effect on how quickly you learn and how wide your vocabulary is. However whether or not you apply what you learn will determine how 'eloquent' your speech is.

I prefer to avoid metaphors as they can come across quite pretentious unless they are clear and obvious. I found that learning scales, practicing them, and listening to them [i]in context[/i] really unlocked my ear, my technique and the neck in general. That's how you get the most benefit out of them. By doing this you start to discern what the function of chords, scales, intervals, the modes etc all are over any key. Eventually they stop becoming what could be seen as restrictive patterns and slowly the various note choices that are available are revealed to you.

By the way, what I mean by available note choices is that you are able to choose what you want to play, you can play any note you want, you just need to justify it in your playing.

Mark

[cris the man]

Agh scales
as you progress through bass they are the most annoying thing
however... as time goes on , you'll begin to love them , trust me

its just something you need to learn really

Great stuff for riff writing and solos
sometimes in jazz , you'd just get a set of chords and using the scales you would have to create your own walking bass line or something like that

[6stringbassist]

I learned them years ago, I know them now without actually thinking about it, I can just sort of visualize the placement of notes on the neck, which is great for playing chords and that, just knowing where the 9th lies or something.

I found the best way to learn scales was to make the learning 'musical', that's what you do, you play music. So come up with riffs and ideas using ALL of the notes of a scale, and 'think' the name and number in your head as you play it, it sounds weird, but it'll become 2nd nature pretty fast, and isn't as slow as it seems