The 5 Pentatonic Shapes

How To Practice These Shapes

A lot of people practice these shapes from the lowest note to the highest note and back down. While that is good practice, it doesn't stress the root notes of the scale, which is important when learning to play and to hear scales.

Here is an exercise to practice and memorize these shapes. Play the scale in sequence beginning with the lowest root note, up to the highest note in that shape, back down to the lowest note in that shape and then back up to the lowest root note. The following are examples of this exercise using the 5 Pentatonic shapes in the Key of G Minor.

After some practice these fingerings will become more and more familiar to you. The next step is connecting them together. Its one thing to know and play individual scale shapes in individual parts of the neck, but what you really want is to connect these scales so it’s almost as if you have a big giant scale shape over the entire neck of the guitar. To do this, play all of the scales in sequence. If you haven't already noticed, the previous scale shapes have been presented to you in a sequential order beginning at the bottom of the neck, slowly working your way up the neck through each individual shape