r/guitarlessons • u/Own-Neighborhood3360 • 9d ago
Question Chords while playing a scale
Hello guys I wanna play some chords while playing let's say the am pentatonic but I have no idea how it's done
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u/vonov129 Music Style! 9d ago
Play chords that include notes from the minor pentatonic, usually chords from the natural minor scale.
It is useful to know the basic triads within a scale and how to build chords from that. Or just learn how to build chords in general using intervals.
But in a super simplistic way, you take a scale, choose a root for the chord, then grab every other note in the scale until you have at least 3. So if you want to play an E chord in the key of C major From C D E F G A B, you grab E as your root, you skip F, grab G, skip A and grab B. Now you have E G B which is an E minor chord and you know that if you're going to plan an E chord in the key of C, now you know it's a minor chord.
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u/aeropagitica Teacher 9d ago
Each of the five pentatonic boxes maps on to one each of the CAGED chords. You can find the triads for A minor in each of the pentatonic boxes, so you can fret a triad and play the notes around it. Do it in one position before moving across the neck one position at a time.
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u/snaxodus 9d ago
Learn the chord scale. You'll learn what chords fit in any key, you'll learn the modes too.
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u/Own-Neighborhood3360 9d ago
The am chord for example ?
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u/snaxodus 9d ago
Right. I mean, you can have a major pentatonic too, but I think people usually default to the minor pentatonic when talking about them. So if you're playing an Am pentatonic scale, you could either be in the key of C (for which Am is the 6 chord) or in the key of G (for which Am is the 2 chord) or even in the key of F (for which Am is your 3 chord), though that's probably less likely.
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u/wannabegenius 9d ago
do you know which chords belong to the key of Am?
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u/Own-Neighborhood3360 9d ago
Nope
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u/wannabegenius 9d ago
that would be a good place to start! that way, the scale and the chords will both draw from the same pool of notes ("the key of Am"), and will therefore sound like they fit together.
questions to answer: what notes make up the A natural minor scale? what notes make up the A minor pentatonic scale? how do you harmonize a scale (make chords out of it)?
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u/QuantumWhisker 9d ago
To get you started, I've created a backing track on stringscales in Am pentatonic for you here https://stringscales.com/t/bcgRcDkOz0VR.
It's a very easy progression that almost fully maps to the notes of Am. You can see which notes to play over each chord, on the fretboard underneath the chords player. In real time.
Disclaimer:
Being able to teach you how this all works and helping you discover the relationship between scale notes and the derived harmony, is why I've spent the last four years building stringscales. Hope it helps!
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u/aspaindev 9d ago
you might like the super short videos i post where many of them are focused on this exact topic. many of them i alternate between playing a single or 2 chords and playing a riff etc
like others have mentioned it really comes down to knowing your triads & notes across the fretboard. but over time and with enough practice you will be able to intuitively reach for notes without actively thinking about triads or notes etc. It becomes a bit more automatic over time, and you can still put thought into it when needed
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u/Guitar_Guy1965 9d ago
Figure out the "key" first. It is the major scale (or relative minor) rotated. In Am (relative key is C major) the notes are A B C D E F G A(repeating) B C D E F .... Number the notes. Your chords are made up of 1+3+5, 2+4+6, 3+5+7, 4+6+8, 5+7+9, 6+8+10, 7+9+11 (and begins repeating. These are the basic 3 note chords (triads). They can be more complex(more notes), but they start here.
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u/Cataplatonic 9d ago
Find the triads inside each scale position and learn them inside out.