Low E string: 5th fret, 8th Fret
A String: 5, 7
D String: 5, 7
G String: 5, 7
B String: 5, 8
High E: 5, 8

Now, for another position. Notice that all of the positions contain only five notes, from different octaves. Hence, pentatonic.

Low E: 3, 5
A: 3, 5
D: 2, 5
G: 2, 5
B: 3, 5
High E: 3, 5

Next position:

Low E: 8, 10
A: 7, 10
D: 7, 10
G: 7, 9
B: 8, 10
High E: 8, 10

Next:

Low E: 10, 12
A: 10, 12
D: 10, 12
G: 9, 12
B: 10, 13
High E: 10, 12

And finally:

Low E: 12, 15
A: 12, 15
D: 12, 14
G: 12, 14
B: 13, 15
High E: 12, 15

Keep practicing!

Now, if you haven’t already read the intro post about the pentatonic scale, I suggest you do so. After that, feel free to read this post. In the other post, we used the A minor pentatonic scale, but for this post, we’ll work with the E minor. (Why? Because it’s important to learn to transpose the scales to different keys from the outset, and it’s also relatively easy to play the E minor, since the home position is on the open strings and on the 12th fret.) So let’s get started:

Low E string: Open, 3rd fret

A string: Open, 2nd fret

D string: Open, 2nd fret

G string: Open, 2nd fret

B string: Open, 3rd fret

High E: Open, 3rd fret

Play this pattern. Now move it up and play the same pattern an octave higher, starting on the twelfth fret instead of the open E string. Notice anything? It’s the exact same pattern as the A minor pentatonic scale! Imagine that! As a matter of fact, this pattern can be applied to any key, as long as that first note you play (in this case, open or 12th fret on the E string) is the note in which key you are playing. So, for the E minor pentatonic, we can start on either the open E string or the 12th fret, one octave higher. Also, with the A minor pentatonic, we start with the fifth fret, or the “A” note. (Hint: If you haven’t learned where the different notes are yet, read the post.)

Okay, so we have the same position as last time. What about the other ones? Actually, once you learn where the notes are, it just becomes a matter of time before you can find the other notes. That’s because the pentatonic scale is only composed of 5 different notes spanning different octaves. So for that E minor scale we played, those notes were E, G, A, B, D. Go on, try it out. You will find all five of those notes within the scale. Now, if you go around the rest of the fretboard and find all five of those notes up and down the frets, you will find the other five positions of the pentatonic scale. After you do that, you can transpose any of those positions to play the minor pentatonic in any key!

In part 2, we’ll do that. Otherwise, you can be bold (which is what I recommend) and try to find them all on your own.

–Try to stay balanced.Sometimes it’s hard to keep up with schoolwork when you’re a budding student guitarist (or vice versa.) If you find yourself leaning too far towards one or the other, you’re unbalanced. Take a moment, step back, and evaluate how you spend the bulk of your day. You might spend only 2 hours on homework every day and twice that much playing guitar. If you’re a high school student, that might be fine. If you’re a college student, that might not be the balance you’re looking for.

–Take advantage of your resources. College campuses and high schools provide guitarists with a plethora of new people to meet and mingle with. Some of these people will be musicians themselves. As a student, it is a good idea to network with these fellow students in order to create a band, find people to jam with, or just some friends to discuss your music with.

–Learn as much as you can. As a student, you’re surrounded by a learning community. This may be fellow musicians, teachers, other students, or anyone from whom you can learn something. Remember that it’s important to continue learning even when you aren’t in class or doing homework.

Playing basic guitar solos with the pentatonic scale isn’t hard. That’s why they’re so popular! But after a while, you will probably need something else to get you inspired to start playing some truly awesome solos. Here are a few tips to do that:

1. Don’t play the same old, straightforward beat:Once you’ve mastered basic soloing (aka- the pentatonic scale,) it’s time to mix up your rhythm strategy. If you normally play everything in 4/4 time with straight quarter-and-eighth notes, try using a different time, like 3/4. While this doesn’t sound totally wild (3/4 is still pretty common in many musical styles,) it will force you to change your soloing strategy a little bit and get creative.

Another way to  mix it up is to try adding in some different-length notes. If you play exactly one note on every beat, your solos get old very quickly. Instead, try playing long half-and-whole notes that you can really bend soulfully, interspersed with maybe some rapid, exciting sixteenth-notes. (For those who don’t know, that means long notes and really short, quick ones.) For examples of this type of playing, listen to most blues guitarists (Stevie Ray Vaughan is a great example,) plus some of the more soulful rock players, like John Frusciante.

2. Experiment with hammer-ons, pull-offs, and tremolo:Hammer-ons and pull-offs are two great ways to play 2 or more notes in rapid succession while making them kind of blend together. To do a hammer-on, pluck any note, then hammeronto a higher note within reach on the same string without picking again. This creates a very fluid sound. A pull-off is basically the opposite of a hammer-on: Pick a note with your pinkie, ring, or middle finger, and than literally pull it off to allow a lower note on the same string to sound. To make the second note really stand out, it helps to pull off the string sideways on the fretboard instead of just straight off. This is kind of like picking with your left hand.

A tremolo is one way to get a very soulful sound in the style of B.B. King and Eric Clapton. To do this, just play a note and bend the string back and very. This can be done as quickly or as slowly as desired.

3. It doesn’t have to be just single notes: To really give your guitar solo some extra oomph, try mixing in some chords (in the right key, of course,) and double-stops into your solo. This is a technique that can lead to some very cool, expressive solos.

1. Decide which key you’ll play in (for simplicity’s sake, we’ll start with A)

2. Figure out the I, IV, and V: These roman numerals (1, 4, 5) simply describe a note in relation to the key we’re playing in. So, A would be I. To find IV, we just count up from A: one, two, three, four; A, B, C, D. So D is our IV chord. That would mean that V is E. Note: You can do this in any key. If we play in E, the I, IV, V is E, A, and B, respectively.

3. Learn the progression: Now that we know the chord relationship, we can get to the meat-and-potatoes. Usually in 4/4 time, the progression goes like this (with each “/” mark denoting the end of one measure)

I/I/I/I/IV/IV/I/I/V/IV/I/I/

Get all that?

4. Play it in your key: In the key of A, this progression translates to:

4 measures of A

2 measures of D

2 measures of A

1 measure of E

1 measure of D

2 measures of A

And then start all over again! See how easy it is to play! Also, if you count how many measures we have total, you will find that it’s… 12. Make sense? That’s why they call it 12-bar blues.

1. Start with the pentatonic scale: The pentatonic scale is a great way to get started with guitar soloing. It’s easy to learn, and can be applied to any style of music. The great thing about it is that it’s only really necessary to know the home position; with that, you can transpose it to any key you want and can just focus on letting the notes come to you as they may. That sounds strange, but the great thing about the pentatonic scale is that it’s only five notes (penta = five), but from several octaves, so every note sounds good if it’s in the right key to begin with! The scale can be utilised in such a way to range from low, heavy riffs to high-pitched, squealing licks. If you haven’t yet learned the pentatonic scale, click here.

Hint: To play bluesy or metal-oriented riffs, play the minor pentatonic. For a more twangy, country feel, use the major scale.

2. Feel the rhythm: It’s impossible to play a guitar solo if you can’t get the rhythm of a song down. This may be because the song has a strange, off-beat rhythm, or it could simply be that it’s just too fast. Whatever the case, I recommend starting with a fairly straightforward beat with a moderate tempo for your first solo, such as those found in rock and blues. That’s why these musical styles are so popular for guitarists in the first place!

If you’re still having trouble getting the exact rhythm, try tapping your foot to the beat for at least a few measures before you begin your solo. That way, it will be easier to come in on the right count and stay with the rhythm.

3. Know when to end it:While long, Led Zeppelin-style solos may be cool, they can get on the nerves of your bandmates or the people you’re jamming with. A good solo (in most musical styles) should be like a good book: with a beginning, middle, and end. Nobody likes a run-on sentence, and the same can be said for guitar solos. It’s infinitely better to make something amazing in just a few measures than to keep a mediocre solo going forever.

Each string, when played without fretting anything, is a note. (Duh!) Starting from the lowest-sounding string to the highest, here is the order of the notes: EADGBE. Simple enough, right? In other words, if you play the lowest note on your guitar on the lowest string (in the default tuning,) that note will be an E. If you move to the next string, that note will be an A. Also note that two strings are E: a high E and a low E.

Now, in our musical scale, there are 12 notes. These notes are: A, A#, B, C, C#, D, D#, E, F, F#, G, G#. Note: The “#” symbol is read as “sharp.” So, the 12 notes range from A to G, with “sharps” in between. Notice that there is no B# or E#.

The “sharps” of a note are also the “flats” (denoted by the symbol “b”) of the next highest note. In other words, A# could also be called Bb; they’re the same thing. Similarly, C# is the same as Db, D# the same as Eb, etc. When going through the notes, after going past G#/Ab, the scale returns to A again. So, if you start at A and play every note until you return all the way to A, you are now one octave higher than the first A you played.

To apply this to guitar, we can merely count up the strings, since each fret is one note. So if we play a note on the guitar, for example G, and then move it up one fret and play the string again, we will be playing G#/Ab. We’ll start with the low E string, with the numbers denoting the frets.

Open: E

1: F

2: F#/Gb

3: G

4: G#/Ab

5: A

6: A#/Bb

7: B

8: C

9: C#/Db

10: D

11: D#/Eb

12: E

Notice that on the twelfth fret, we return to the note E, only this E is one octave higher than playing the string without fretting anything. You will notice that this works for every string. Go on, try it!

Practice counting through every note in an octave on every string. This will help you tremendously in the future.

What’s the best way to go about learning it? Well, for those just beginning to learn pentatonics, I recommend starting with the minor scale. This may seem counter-intuitive, but the home position of the A minor pentatonic scale is one of the easiest things to learn and master. If you can just learn the home position on the fifth fret of the A minor scale, you can solo to about half (if not more) of popular music through transposing it to various keys.

What if your song isn’t in the key of A? Simple: Play the same pattern as the A minor scale, but instead of playing it starting on the fifth fret of the E string (the A note,) start it on whichever note you’re supposed to be playing in. Example: To play in B minor, simply slide the home position of A minor up two frets, to the seventh fret. This note on the E string is… B! Now you can play the exact same position as you did on the A minor pentatonic, but in B minor! This works with every other key: E (open or 12th fret,) C (8th fret,) D (10th fret,) F# (2nd fret,) etc.

In some cases, though, it will be necessary to play in a major key. To do this, you simply start at whichever fret will cause the second note you play on the E string (which will be 3 frets higher than the first) to be the note of the major key. Sounds confusing, but it’s really not. Example: To play C major, we need the the note we play with our pinky on the E string to be a C. This note is on the 8th fret of the E string. If we start by putting our pinky there, our index finger will land on the 5th fret. This is exactly the same as the A minor position! Therefore, A minor and C major correspond with one another on the pentatonic scale. This is always true: every minor key has a corresponding major key. For another example, when we play an E minor pentatonic, our pinky lands on the note G on the E string (3rd or 15th fret.)

So how do you play the pentatonic scale? To do this, you must practice on your guitar, up and down until you no longer have to look at these instructions (you can find diagrams in guitar books too.) Here we go for the A minor and C major pentatonic (remember, they’re the same thing):

On the low E string: 5th fret and 8th fret

A String: 5th fret, 7th fret

D string: 5th, 7th

G string: 5th, 7th

B string: 5th, 8th

High E string: 5th, 8th

There you go! Now you can play an A minor/C major pentatonic scale! Again, to transpose it to different keys, simply use the instructions above. Note: This is only one of five main positions for the pentatonic scale, so start with this one, then learn the rest.

2. Find a Mentor: It is infinitely important that you seek out someone who is already a good guitarist to play with. It doesn’t matter what style they play or how long they’ve been playing, as long as they’re better than you. However, it is preferable that they’ve been playing seriously for at least a year. Why should you do this? First of all, the quickest way to get better at something is to play with someone who has been doing it for a while. They will have great advice for you, and seeing how good they are may provide some inspiration. If you have friends or relatives who play the guitar, call them up! Secondly, playing with someone better than you will give you confidence in yourself. You have nothing to fear. Realize that all great guitarists were beginners at some point, and chances are, they will remember the struggles they went through when they were just starting out.

Also: Even if you just started playing, it is still a good idea to find at least one mentor right from the start. Here’s how you play with an experienced guitarist: Using Tip #1 (Practice,) learn the most common major and minor open chords. These include G, D, Am, C, E, and Em. If you can master these basic chords, and can switch between them without having to stop strumming, you can play rhythm! With that, you can play a chord progression with another person, and they can maybe solo if they so choose. Now you’re jamming!

3. Learn As Much As Possible: This means picking up guitar books and publications (like Guitar Player.) Learning more about the guitar will give you new ideas and insights, as well as make you sound a lot smarter when talking with your mentor (see Tip #2.)

4. Get Inspired:It’s hard to practice every day without a goal in mind. Therefore, it’s imperative that you listen to great guitar players. If you have a specific genre that you really are interested in, then pick some heroes from that genre. Of course, it’s also a good idea to listen to other genres as well, as it will expand your horizons and enrich your playing style. But for now, if you’re interested in playing the blues, listen to guys like Stevie Ray Vaughan and Buddy Guy. If you want to play rock, listen to Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page and John Frusciante (the Red Hot Chili Peppers.) If you like folk music, it doesn’t get much better than Doc Watson. These are just a few examples, and you can pick whomever you like from your favorite styles of music.

5. Have Fun!: This is the most important part of playing any instrument. You must enjoy it, or else you’ll quit. Remember all those piano lessons your parents forced you to take when you were a kid? The point is, the whole reason you started playing guitar is to have fun, express yourself, and get more out of life. Therefore, don’t ever forget this key point.