Like everything else, when practicing scales, make sure that you do not play them too quickly. For every note that you play, ask yourself;

• Am I in tune
• Am I fingering corectly, with a good hand and arm position
• Am I in time (you should always be using a metronome)
• Am I playing the correct note

When I practice scales, I picak a key and then practice the major scale, the monor scale, and the major, minor, major seventh and dominant seventh arpeggios.

The ‘Dominant Seventh‘ arpeggio is what we often refer to as ‘the 7th‘ chord – and has the flattened 7th note in it. It also sound like it wants to resolve to the key that is a 4th away – e.g. from C to F. If you follow the pattern above, which is described in more detail below, then you can move round the cycle of 5ths.

The following sections use examples from the C scales.

Major Scale

The above example shows C major scale, and uses each degree of the scale. When practicing, repeat the root note at the the start and finish – this keeps the scale in 4/4 time, and means that the scale becomes more musical.

Minor Scale

The monor scale is the same as the major scale, but with the 3rd and 6th notes dropped by a semi-tone. It should be noted that there are different types of minor scale – this is the harmonic minor.

Major and Minor Arpeggios

These are the 1st, 3rd, and 5th degrees of the respective scale. They are also the notes that make up the basic major and minor chords, but played separately, as shown below.

Seventh Chords

There are three main 7th chords – the Major 7th, Minor 7th and Dominant 7th. The last of these is usually just referred to as ‘the 7th’ chord – e.g. C7. The arpeggios are simply the chord notes played separately. They use notes 1, 3, 5 and 7 (or b7) of the relevant key.

The following image shows the major and dominant 7th arpeggios (C maj7 and C7). C min7 is simply the same as C maj 7, but with the b3.

For more Scale Exercise examples, please see the Bass Exercises.