Pentatonic Variations with John Wheatcroft

 Hi, it’s John Wheatcroft here and welcome to the second in a series of video lessons filmed exclusively for Alloutguitar here at Guitar X in London. Over the forthcoming months I’ll be showing you a range of techniques and concepts that I employ as part of my personal take on guitar playing. I’ll break each down and show you the component parts. Then I’ll give you some guidance on how to develop each approach, whether it by physical, conceptual or a combination of both and show you how you can then begin to integrate them into your own personal guitar style.

This second video lesson dips its toe into the wide reaching subject of ‘hybrid’ pentatonic scales. Most guitarists are extremely comfortable with the minor pentatonic scale. Its two-note-per-string fingering and intervallic nature make it both easy to play and easy on the ear. I’ll show you how it’s possible to modify the intervallic formula whilst still retaining an identical string-to-string note dispersal pattern, allowing you to easily re-harmonize all your favorite pentatonic lines to fit perfectly in more harmonically sophisticated surroundings.

Hope you enjoy this lesson and that you find them useful and perhaps even inspire you to develop some exercises, concept or playing approaches of your own…JW

All content John Wheatcroft 2008.