Playing Changes in the Blues 101

Have you been a bedroom rockstar jamming on the blues for some years now? Are you tired of
resorting to the same standard blues scale “grip” for soloing over the blues? Those notes were once
enticing but you've probably too out of gas to be looking at them in interesting ways and are now
chomping at the bit to gain access to some new sounds. Gain some new sophistication and play the
blues with a bit more class by beginning to understand how playing through the changes works. This
sheet will outline the process for you.

What you'll need to know: Our standard root position minor pentatonic scale and a Major pentatonic
scale shape. See below for both: minor pentatonic is listed first then major pentatonic
e 3 6 e 3 5
b 3 6 b 3 5
g 3 5 g 2 4
D 35 D 2 5
A 3 5 A 2 5
E 3 6 E 3 5

You should also be familiar with a basic 12 bar blues form in the key of G:
/G7/G7/G7/G7/C7/C7/G7/G7/D7/C7/G7/D7/
*Other variations will work too!
Steps to Success:
1. Get both scales underneath your fingers. Don't rush into the steps below until you can do this
because it will just lead to undo frustration.
2. Within the blues form you are going to begin to apply these scales in systematic ways. First,
you will use quarter notes and start to connect the dots between scales over specific chords.
Basically, over every G7 chord you will play the G Major pentatonic scale and over all other
chords you will play the G minor pentatonic scale.
3. Do step 2 in quarter notes. Why? The time between notes will allow you time to think about
your next move, but more importantly to hear how each note sounds against each chord.
Hearing is the first essential step to truly being able to solo with this information.
4. Do step 2 in eighth notes. Don't rush this! If you can't do it in quarter notes don't try go here.
I'm telling you the extra time you spend on previous unmastered steps will save you loads of
headaches.
5. Once you can do step 4 try it at other speeds or try changing directions at random using step 4.
This helps further build dexterity between the two scales.
6. Improvise with simple question and answer type statements over chords using the information
above.
Why does this work?
We have to look at the notes in all the chords and the notes in the scales.
Primarily, we need to look at the I7 chord and the IV7 chord:
G7 aka the I7 contains: G B D F Notes in the G Major Pentatonic: G A B D E
1 3 5 b7 1 2 3 56
C7 aka the IV7 contains: C E G Bb Notes in the G minor Pentatonic: G Bb C D F
1 3 5 b7 Intervals relative to the key of C: 5 b7 1 2 4
The notes in bold are key to understanding how this works. In music there are what we call “guide
tones” in chords. These are basically the meat and potatoes of the chord and are core to making the
chord sound the way they are suppose to. We have dealt with the idea of “important” notes in chords
when we looked at basic barre chords. Remember what makes things major and minor? The third. Well,
when we look at dominant chords in a blues the meat and potatoes of their sound has to do with the 3
and the b7. Notice how the 3 in G7 is B? Look at the C7 chord and the the b7 note. It is Bb. That half
step move backwards on the fret board of that one note is key to making your lines sound like you are
playing through the chords. In solos emphasize these notes to really hear this in action.

* Please note this sheet is to serve the student as a means for lesson supplements and catalyst of
discussion.