The major pentatonic scale is a guitarist’s go-to for creating solos that feel fresh, uplifting and bright. It’s the secret sauce behind some of the most memorable guitar solos in music history. You’ll find these solos in country music a lot of the time, but also in classic rock (The Eagles), folk (Hank Williams), blues (Freddy King, John Mayer) and pop music (The Beatles).

Major Pentatonic Scale vs Minor Pentatonic Scale

The major pentatonic scale (Formula: 1, 2, 3, 5, 6) and minor pentatonic scale ((Formula: 1, ♭3, 4, 5, ♭7)) have their differences. The minor pentatonic scale offers a more bluesy, darker feel and is ideal for minor keys or blues progressions. Although they share the same set of notes in their relative forms, the starting note and tonal center determine their distinct emotional impact.

The major pentatonic scale is derived from the major scale (Formula: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7), but with two notes removed: the 4th and 7th degrees. This makes the scale sound “open” and free of dissonance.

The formula for the major pentatonic scale can be expressed as:

• 1 (Root)
• 2 (Major 2nd)
• 3 (Major 3rd)
• 5 (Perfect 5th)
• 6 (Major 6th)

For example, in G major:

• G (Root)
• A (Major 2nd)
• E (Major 3rd)
• D (Perfect 5th)
• E (Major 6th)

How to Play the Major Pentatonic Scale

In the diagrams below you find the two most common major pentatonic scale shapes. Both scale shapes are G major pentatonic and contain the same notes but played in different positions on the fretboard.

Once you’ve got these two scale shapes under your belt, you can also practice all five major pentatonic scales to really know your way around the fretboard and understand all the major pentatonic solos to their full extend.

Songs with Major Pentatonic Scale Solos

In this post, we’ll dive into some iconic songs that have harnessed the power of the major pentatonic scale to craft beautiful guitar solos. Let’s explore how this five-note scale has shaped guitar history!

We’re starting with “Let it be” by The Beatles. George Harrison is playing a C major Pentatonic Solo.

• Take it easy – The Eagles ( G major pentatonic )

• Tennessee whiskey – Chris Stapleton ( A major pentatonic )

• Knocking on heavens door – Guns ‘n Roses ( G major pentatonic )

• Something like Olivia – John Mayer ( G major pentatonic )

• Let her cry – Hootie and the blowfish ( G major pentatonic )

• Everything I do – Bryan Adams ( C# major pentatonic )

• Jaleous again – Black Crowes ( D major pentatonic )

• Sweet home Alabama – Lynyrd Skynyrd ( G major pentatonic )

• Blue sky – Almann brothers ( E major pentatonic )

• People get ready – Jeff Beck / Rod Stewart ( D major pentatonic )

• Hard to handle – Black Crows( B major pentatonic )

• No woman, No Cry – Bob Marley ( C major pentatonic )

• Friends in low places – Garth Brooks ( A major pentatonic )

• Queen of California- John Mayer ( B major pentatonic )

If you have any questions or remarks leave them in the comment section below. I appreciate it. ~ Klaus Crow

It was the best thing ever. Unawarely I built my guitar vocabulary like that.

After a while fellow musicians, guitar teachers and guitar players from around town that I looked up to were advising me to develop my own style and learn to improvise. It was the obvious next step to becoming a better guitar player.

I practiced scales, sequences, licks, arpeggios, intervals, just about anything I could get my hands on and continued to work on my improvisation skills. Freedom on the fretboard at last.

Then I started playing in bands doing covers, creating and performing my own music. Playing some more and more and more. Time went by and I gained a lot of gigging experience, developed my own style, learned a lot of new things, but on the other side I also stopped building and expanding my guitar vocabulary.

Years later I got back into transcribing and practicing solos by other guitar heros that found my interest. It was refreshing, inspiring and opened up new worlds. It took my soloing to other places and improved my playing once again.

To gain input and keep educating yourself you got to keep practicing, studying and memorizing guitar solos regularly. It’s like reading a new book or watching a brilliant movie to fuel your inspiration.

Besides that there are also other important reasons and benefits to learning lead guitar solos.

Check them out:

Technique
Solos contain all the techniques that you need to acquire for lead playing like bend ups and downs, hammer-ons, pull offs, slides, tapping, vibrato, whammy, etc. These techniques are essential and will develop and improve with every new solo you learn. You also encounter new techniques or tricks every now and then that will keep you on top of your game.

Memorization
Learning solos will train your memorization skill which you need to store licks, scales, arpeggios and many more solos to create the awesome vocabulary you want to build and expand.

Inspiration
Solos are full of melody, nice licks and creative moves. The more solos you learn and memorize the bigger your vocabulary becomes. Your solo vocabulary is the source where you draw from. The bigger it becomes the more freedom you attain. Automatically you will adopt pieces and bits of all those different styles into your playing which will makes you a much more interesting guitar player to listen to.

Readiness
It feels great to have a bunch of solos up your sleeve that you can call upon whenever you need them. Whether it’s to have fun when your jamming with a band or when people come up to you and ask you to play something cool. It gives you confidence and peace of mind. Being ready is the attitude of a real pro.

Phrasing
As you try to copy the feel, emotion and aliveness of solos as accurate as possible you will also learn good what phrasing is, which is one of the most important skills for any guitar player.

Challenge
Lead solos can sometimes be quite challenging, but that’s when you grow in your skills. You’ve got to do the work, be focused, dedicated, passionate and practice daily to get that solo under your belt, but when you do you’ve taken your guitar chops to the next level. That’s your goal.

Fun
Learning new solos is also incredibly fun. The enjoyment of playing and mastering your favorite solos is absolutely gratifying. Let alone playing your favorite lead solo in a band, it’s the best thing ever!

Tips
– Learn solos from different guitar players.
– Try different styles and genres.
– Transcribe the solos yourself. Use music transcription software.
– Get tablature guitar books instead of the free crappy tabs online.
– Learn new solos regularly.
– Memorize your new learned solos thoroughly.
– Steel licks from solos, twist them around and incorporate them into your own soloing.
– Enjoy the process of learning and improving.

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Playing a bunch of notes within the pentatonic scale (or any scale in that matter) is one thing, but being able to really tell a story with those notes is a complete different thing.

Because that’s what phrasing is all about: “How you tell a story”.

If you’re telling a story you want to draw the audience’s attention. We’ve all come across those boring teachers in the classroom who can’t keep your attention for more than 30 seconds. They talk in the same low monotone voice on and on and on and on. It’s almost like they don’t even breath. They probably don’t. :)

The fact that they can’t keep your attention has nothing to do with the subject, but it has to do with how they present the subject, how they bring you the story. And they forget the most important thing. They have to bring the story to life!

To bring a story to life you want to hear and feel the passion. You can hear that in the way people speak. When people get excited about stuff they tend to raise their voice. If they want to tell you a secret or gossip they start to whisper. If something is really important we will emphasize particular words. When someone tells you a creepy story they’ll start to talk slower, fuel their voice by fire and when the story gets really exciting they’ll suddenly pause to get you to the edge of your seat and then relentlessly take you to the climax.

There are dozen ways to draw the listener’s ears and fortunately for a lot of people that goes without saying. Most people will talk passionately about their new bought car, their cool job or an attractive person of the opposite sex. The same applies to music. You want to hear the same excitement in your soloing. To do so you have to learn great phrasing.

Phrasing is not about what you play but how you play it!

Let’s see what you can do to improve your phrasing and make your playing come alive:

Note duration
One way to make things sound interesting is to vary with note lengths. You might want to hold on to a note, keep it singing to create tension and then play a couple of short notes afterwards. Experiment with different note lengths. Long – short – long – short – short -short – long. But make sure you keep time, stay in rhythm.

The notes are the words. In real life we use long words, short ones and we hold on to a word to emphasize a statement. Sometimes we say Noooooooo instead of no. Oooooh yeaaaaaah instead of oh yes or we say “Do you want this oooooor that” You get the point.

In other words play guitar like you would talk. Change the length of the notes according to how you feel what you’re playing.

Space
Let the music breath. Pause in your playing every now and then. If you pause after every couple of notes, you give meaning to those notes. The notes after the rest will be lifted because they draw more attention. Just like people breath, the music needs to breath.

Playing 16th note patterns the whole way through a song without spaces, without taking a breath is like that dude on a birthday party who likes to hear himself talk all the time but hasn’t got anything interesting to say. It’s exhausting for the listener and the attention will soon fade.

Whether you play fast or slow, many or few notes, the pauses make a statement.

A saying that is very popular in music is “It’s the notes you don’t play that make the difference.”

Dynamics
Playing with dynamics is probably the most obvious part of good phrasing but often neglected by beginners and even intermediate and advanced players. Dynamics refers to the volume of the notes, how loud or soft you play.

Listen to the best blues players like BB King and Albert King. Their songs are loaded with dynamics that keep your ears glued to the song. Dynamics creates and enhances the excitement, tension, drama, rage, but also a feeling of warmth, sensitivity and emotion throughout the song.

Inflections and articulation
Inflections are another way of spicing up your lead soloing. Bends, pull-offs, hammer-ons, slides and vibrato are all inflections and they contribute for a huge part to the expressive character of your tone and soloing.

Playing staccato (short note durations) and legato (notes that are played smoothly and connected) are ways of articulation that can also create a certain mood or vibe.

Jeff Beck is a great example of a guitar player who uses inflections extensively in the most beautiful ways and created it’s own individual style.

Rhythm
And then there’s rhythm which is probably the most important aspect of phrasing. Creating musical ideas by using different note values: whole notes, quarter notes, eight notes, sixteenth notes. (A note value indicates the duration of a note)

You can also experiment with triplets: quarter note triplets, eight note triplets and sixteenth note triplets.

Use the rhythm that you feel inside your body and hear inside your head. Create rhythmic ideas with the notes you are playing and stay in time. Dare to experiment!

Listen to the best
Study the best guitar players and listen how they use phrasing all in their own unique way. As I mentioned earlier BB king, Albert King are great examples but also guitar players like David Gilmour (Pink Floyd), Robben Ford, Joe Satriani and tons of other great players can be a source of inspiration.

There is so much to learn from really listening and also watching how they phrase. Study them and use it to your advantage!

I don’t need words, it’s all in the phrasing. ~ Louis Armstrong

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But fortunately we still do. :) We like to argue which is the best, most beautiful, wicked, coolest or melodic solo ever played, because it’s fun and we like to share our taste and passion for music.

So I created a list with 50 of the greatest, most beautiful, well known solos of all time in no particular order. Of course there are some personal favorites in there as well. Still I find it hard to say which one I like best if I had to choose only one. It’s comparing apples and oranges. One of my all time favorites which is not on the list by the way is the solo of Rest in peace by Nuno Bettencourt from the band Extreme. But then again what can beat Hotel California by the Eagles or… ah never mind, looking at the list below I can’t possibly stick to a top 3. And why should I?

That’s why it’s not a top 50 list. And as I said earlier “in no particular order”, although it could be :). Of course the list isn’t complete either, far from it.

So what is it then? Well it’s a list to inspire, to motivate and to enjoy. A list that makes you want to pick up your guitar and learn that awesome solo. To bring back memories and let your guitar playing be influenced by all those beautiful melodies and masterpieces.

Let’s take a look, have a listen and create some new ideas for your practice workout, adding some stunning guitar licks, new techniques or a complete solo to your repertoire.

All the songs are attached to a link which sends you straight to the solo part on youtube. Try to refresh the youtube page if doesn’t work straight away. In the worst case scenario skip to the solo part manually.

Note: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Enjoy and have fun!

1 – Hotel California – Don Felder, Joe Walsh (The Eagles) – Tabs

2 – Comfortably Numb – David Gilmour (Pink Floyd) – Tabs

3 – Texas Flood – Stevie Ray Vaughan – Tabs

4 – All along the watch tower – Jimi Hendrix – Tabs

5 – Cause We’ve Ended As Lovers – Jeff Beck – Tabs

6 – Bohemian Rhapsody – Brian May (Queen) – Tabs

7 – One – Kirk Hammet (Metallica) – Tabs

8 – Stairway to heaven – Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin) – Tabs

9 – November rain – Slash (Guns ‘n Roses) – Tabs

10 – Sweet child o mine – Guns ‘n roses (Slash) – Tabs

11 – Voodoo Child (Slight Return) – Jimi Hendrix – Tabs

12 – Johnny B. Goode – Chuck Berry – Tabs

13 – Eruption – Eddie van Halen – Tabs

14 – Always with you, always with me – Joe Satriani – Tabs

15 – Little Wing – Jimi Hendrix – Tabs

16 – Heartbreaker – Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin) – Tabs

17 – Layla – Eric Clapton, Duane Allman – Tabs

18 – Cliffs of Dover – Eric Johnson – Tabs

19 – Scar Tissue – John Frusciante (Red Hot Chili Peppers) – Tabs

20 – Guitar Boogie – Tommy Emmanuel – Tabs

21 – Free Bird – Allen Collins, Gary Rossington (Lynyrd Skynyrd) – Tabs

22 – Sultans of Swing – Mark Knopfler (Dire Straits) – Tabs

23 – Symphonie of Destruction – (Marty Friedman, Dave Mustaine (Megadeth) – Tabs

24 – Flight Of The Wounded Bumblebee – Nuno Bettencourt (Extreme) – Tabs

25 – Reelin’ in the Years – Elliott Randall (Steely Dan) – Tabs

26 – Highway 61 revisited – Johnny Winter – Tabs

27 – Pride and Joy – Stevie Ray Vaughan – Tabs

28 – For the love of god – Steve Vai – Tabs

29 – Surfing with the Alien – Joe Satriani – Tabs

30 – Asturias – John Williams (Isaac Albeniz)

31 – Blues deluxe – Joe Bonamassa – Tabs

32 – The Thrill is gone – B.B. King – Tabs

33 – Paranoid Android – Radiohead – Jonny Greenwood – Tabs

34 – Covered in rain – John Mayer – Tabs

35 – Mr. Crowley – Ozzy Osbourne (Randy Rhoads) – Tabs

36 – Black Star – Yngwie Malmsteen – Tabs

37 – Mediterranean sundance – Al Di Meola, Paco De Lucia, John McLaughlin

38 – Whole lotta love – Jimmy page (Led Zeppelin) – Tabs

39 – Satch Boogie – Joe Satriani – Tabs

40 – Get the funk out – Extreme (Nuno Bettencourt) – Tabs

41 – Beat It – Michael Jackson (Eddie van Halen) – Tabs

42 – Jerry’s Breakdown – Chet Atkins & Jerry Reed – Tabs

43 – Floods – Pantera (Dime Bag Darrel) – Tabs

44 – Alive – Pearl jam – Mike McCready – Tabs

45 – Minor swing – Django Reinhardt – Tabs

46 – Tender surrender – Steve Vai – Tabs

47 – Jessica – Dickey Betts – Tabs

48 – Sympathy for the Devil – Keith Richards (Rolling Stones) – Tabs

49 – No More Tears – Zakk Wylde (Ozzy Osbourne) – Tabs

50 – Know your enemy – Tom Morello (Rage Against the Machine) – Tabs

So what’s your favorite guitar solo?

Please share in the comments.

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