Minor Pentatonic Scale Theory
Every guitarist’s favorite scale—the minor pentatonic. We all know any love the sounds it offers, but what’s the theory behind it?
The minor pentatonic scale consists of five notes (penta means ‘five’). Relative to the numbers we use to describe the major scale, the numbers of the minor pentatonic scale notes are: 1-b3-4-5-b7.
We say b3 because this note is a half step below the natural 3rd of its corresponding major scale. The corresponding major scale of the D minor pentatonic scale is D major.
We say b7 because this note is a half step below the natural 7th found in the major scale. As we can see, we talk about other scales’ intervals in terms of their relationship to major scale intervals. Just like we refer to all major scales with the numbers 1-2-3-4-5-6-7, we refer to all minor pentatonic scales with the numbers 1-b3-4-5-b7.
As you might guess, the natural D minor scale does contain all of the notes of the D minor pentatonic scale, plus a couple more. The D minor scale is expressed as: 1-2-b3-4-5-b6-b7.
So how do we go from the seven notes of the D minor scale to the 5 notes of the D minor pentatonic scale? We do it by eliminating the half step intervals found in the D minor scale. Between the 2 and b3 of the minor scale is a half step, so we eliminate the 2 and are left with a minor 3rd interval between the 1 and b3 of the scale. There’s also a half step between the 5 and b6 in the minor scale, so we eliminate the b6 to get another minor 3rd interval, this time between the 5 and the b7. This leaves us with the notes 1-b3-4-5-b7: a minor pentatonic scale.
We take a look at the minor pentatonic scale on each string in another lesson. If you’re interested in learning more music theory in Open D, check out the book Mastering the Fretboard in Open D, as well as the 3+ hour video course Mastering Open D Tuning.
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