Minor Scales:
There are actually 3 minor scales, but for now I'll introduce you to two of them.
First you need to find the key signature for your minor key. To find the relative minor of a major key is easy. Find and play your Major scale of choice, let's take C (review the formula for finding major scales in this section), go to the 6th step of that C scale and you have an A. "A" is the starting note of your A minor scale! That also means the key of A minor and the key of C Major have the same key signature, no sharps or flats. A minor is called the relative minor to C Major. They are related through their keys signatures! Now you can start to form your new minor scale from that note and key you have found.
Harmonic Minor Scale
This very exotic sounding scale has many uses in jazz.
Here's the pattern:
Whole Step, Half Step, Whole Step, Whole Step, Half Step, Whole+Half Step, Half Step.
So this scale would be:
A-B-C-D-E-F-G#-A
Try this pattern from other scales: Here's the formula:
1.) Find the Major scale and the key signature
2.) Find the 6th step of that key
3.) Build a scale from the pattern for the Harmonic minor scale
Melodic Minor Scale
This scale is used most often because of it's more "pleasing" qualities. If you are improvising jazz and pop, however, you would only use the ascending form of this scale, which is sometimes called a "Jazz Minor"
Here's the form for the Melodic Minor (it is different ascending from descending!)
Ascending:
Whole Step, Half Step, Whole Step, Whole Step, Whole Step, Whole Step, Half Step
Descending: (from the top going down)
Whole Step,Whole Step, Half Step, Whole Step,Whole Step, Half Step, Whole Step
So if we were to build this scale from the starting note of A, the relative minor of C Major, then we would have:
A-B-C-D-E-F#-G#-A ascending, then: A-G-F-E-D-C-B-A descending.
Try this pattern from other scales: Here's the formula:
1.) Find the Major scale and the key signature
2.) Find the 6th step of that key
3.) Build a scale from the pattern for the Melodic minor scale
These scales may be tricky at first, so write a few of them out, learn them, add more until you've learned them all. Once your ear becomes "tuned in" to the sound of each scale, you will be able to play them faster since your ear will become used to the new intervals of these scales.
