It’s no secret that learning to play any instrument one of the first things you will naturally learn are scales.  This is no different with guitar scales.  If you get a good guitar scales chart and begin learning each scale you will find that you will begin learning the notes on the fret board more easily.  This also sets you up in a good position to be able to play a lot of lead guitar riffs.  By knowing how to play each scale and how the scales can be used for improvised solos, you will greatly broaden the range of your guitar playing skills.

Guitar Scales to Learn First

There is no wrong place to start when it comes to learning guitar scales but I personally prefer to start with the major scales.  The major scale is named after the root note in the scale and always follows the same pattern relative to that note.  One whole step is equal to moving two frets up the neck on the guitar and a half step would be one fret.  The pattern for the major guitar scale is:

Whole-Whole-Half-Whole-Whole-Whole-Half

You can follow this pattern from any root note in order to play all the major scales.  To get you started with guitar scales today I have provided the tablature for each major scale A through G below.  These are great patterns to practice on your guitar to improve speed and dexterity in your fingers.  If you need help reading these, check out my post on how to read guitar tablature.

These are just the first position guitar scales for each key but they should get you going and give you something to work on for a while during your practice sessions.  There are plenty of other places on the neck that you can play each guitar scale and there are also other types of scales such as minor scales and pentatonic guitar scales.  As you continue on your journey to learn guitar you will begin to learn all of these as well and how they all fit together in music theory.

That’s it for this tutorial but keep checking back for more useful lessons that I will be publishing on a weekly basis.  There will certainly be a few more on guitar scales and also a few on other interesting topics.