Silly Pentatonic Question

Hello, all,

Well, at the recommendation of the boards, I've been studying the pentatonic scale tutorial, and beginning to work on the shape of the pentatonic scale. But being the curious sort, I do have one silly question about it: Why?

Why are we taking a perfectly good, nice sounding, doe-a-dearing, traditional major scale and stripping away 2 perfectly good tones that have done nothing to offend anyone?? ;)

OK, I'm joking about how I phrased the question, but I am truly curious, why do we not just play the major scale, why do we need to cut it down to 5 tones. Not a huge concern, I'll do what I'm told :) , and it seems to be the component of a lot of solos, I'm just curious as to why that is. Thank you for any replies I may receive!!

Peace,
Tom

contrary to wat many people seem to assume. more notes is not necessarily better. the more notes the more formless a scale becomes. taken to extreme the 12 tone chromatic scale is not very dramatic compared to majour scale.

and majour scale has less feel than pentatonic. sayin this the majour scale can be used to create the pentatonic sound easily. and indeed switch between several pentatonics. ( pentatonic means 5 note scale).

personally i think it wuld be better to learn majour scale first. but it is easier to make decent soundin lead with pentatonic than diatonic (seven note ) scales eg majour.

so its up to u. if u are gonna go for the theory approach go for diatonic scale.

It just gives you a little different flavor. If you've been working with pentatonics I'm sure you have figured out that they sound a bit bluesy. A straight forward major scale isn't bluesy so much.

Like Majic says it gives a different flavor. Take all the exotic scales

http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=40
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=45
http://www.guitartricks.com/tutorial.php?input=41

They have a very unique sound. This sound come from the different Intervals used.

That's the cool thing about all those scales. Some you may like, some you may not :)

If you look in : Tequnique and Style on the Index page and the Em pentatonic scale pattern - there is a picture of Em pentatonic notes and where they appear on the neck

When looking at the Pentatonic scale, You'll notice that the notes associated with the Half step (or semi-tone) intervals in the Major scale are eliminated. In the Major Pentatonic scale, the 4th and 7th degrees from the Major scale are removed, leaving the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th and 6th intervals to create the scale. Removing the semi-tones allow the Pentatonic to become a more stable scale in relation to the chords played because the intervals don't lead toward being resolved. In other words, it's almost like any note in the Pentatonic scale can play the role of being the Tonic and will still sound good because the intervals don't require resolve for harmonic function with the root. They tend to hold their own, so to speak.
Every Major scale has a relative minor scale created from it's 6th interval pattern. So, the G Major scale is ; 1-2-3-4-5-6-7 (G-A-B-C-D-E-F#)
The 6th interval is (E) and is the relative minor (Natural) to G, when using the same notes in sequence starting from (E); 1-2-b3-4-5-b6-b7 (E-F#-G-A-B-C-D)
The G Major Pentatonic eliminates the 4th (C) and 7th (F#) intervals and uses; 1-2-3-5-6 (G-A-B-D-E). The last note in the Major Pentatonic scale (E) creates the relative minor scale;
The E minor Pentatonic eliminates the 2nd (F#) and b6th (C) intervals (the positions of semi-tones from E) and uses; 1-b3-4-5-b7 (E-G-A-B-D).
Since semi-tones form a degree of harmonic tension, they are removed from the Pentatonic to avoid the chance of landing on a hanging note.
Here's an example of harmonic tension; Strum a G Major chord while playing a C note along with it. It quickly becomes irritating if the C doesn't get resolved.
Since the Blues sound feeds off of tension and release to create it's feel, the Blues scale was introduced by adding in it's own version of interval alterations in the Pentatonic scale to somewhat weaken it's stability in order to bring back a degree of tension needed for the Blues signature.