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Page 1: Ukulele For Geeks: Secrets of the Pentatonic Scales (sxsw 2010)

ukulele for geeks

secrets of the pentatonic scales

sxsw 2010

christian crumlish@mediajunkie

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ukulele for geeks

#ukuleleforgeeks

or#uke4geeks

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An easy instrument to learn

• Just four strings!• Punk as hell• Enthusiasm beats expertise• Learn a few chords (not from me)• Learn a few fingering patterns (yay)• ???• Profit!!

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Pentatonic scales for the win

• Pentatonic means five tones

• The black keys on a piano are a pentatonic scale

• Every combination, even random ones, sounds good

• Pentatonic scales can be used to accompany any song

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Many songs use just 5 notes

• My Girl

• Under the Boardwalk*

• Suicide is Painless

• First There is a Mountain

_________

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Open strings

• The open strings on a guitar are in a pentatonic scale (Gmaj / Emin)

• The open strings on a uke are in an analogous scale (Cmaj / Amin), and are in many scales being just 4 strings

• Thus “accidentally” hitting open strings is usually fine

• The uke is basically “in C”

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C maj pentatonic

• C D E G A

• To make it bluesy add Eb (aka D#)

• C D (Eb) E G A

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C min pentatonic

• C Eb F G A

• To make it bluesy add Gb (aka F#)

• C Eb F (Gb) G A

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about that blue note...

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Forget the note names

• It’s all about the patterns, yo

• Little dippers, all in a row

• That one weird string interval

• Find the root or key and the patterns “just work”

• Make “big dippers” to go to big-boy scales

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Cowboy Scale (C maj)

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One-string scale (C maj)

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One-string scales (C maj)

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One-string scales (C maj)

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Little Dipper (C maj)

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Little Dippers (C maj)

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the “interface”

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Little Dippers (C maj)

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Little Blue Dippers (C maj)

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Cowboy Scale (C min)

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Blue Cowboy Scale (C min)

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Little Dipper (C min)

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Little Blue Dippers (C min)

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Little Blue Dippers (C min)

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The Key

• Dippers are movable

• Whatever key a song is in, just find the relative dippers

• You don’t need to know the key

• Just fiddle around till it “locks in,” then follow the pattern up and down the fretboard

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Big Dippers

• Five notes often not quite enough

• “Under the Boardwalk” is hexatonic

• Many songs are diatonic, etc.

• So learn how to extend the little dippers into big dippers to make larger sales

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Big Dipper (C maj)

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Big Dippers (C maj)

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Big Dippers (C maj blues)

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More on pentatonics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne6tB2KiZuk

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Here, let me...

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=pentatonic+scales

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Here, let me...

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=pentatonic+scales

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03/11/10

also, I’m signing my book tomorrow at 4:20

Christian CrumlishYahoo! Design Pattern Librarydesign.yahoo.com

Yahoo! Application Platformapps.yahoo.com

@mediajunkie


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