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Blues Scale

As its name suggests, the Blues Scale is common within the Blues genre. It is also used quite a bit in Jazz Improvisation. There are two types, Major Blues and minor Blues, but we already have everything that we need to know in order to make them. Let's look at them one at a time...

Major Blues

We saw that the Major Pentatonic Scales were formed from the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 6th Scale Degrees of the regular Diatonic Major Scales. We can turn these into the Major Blues Scales by adding the ♭3 Note (highlighted here in blue):

1 2 ♭3 3 5 6
C Major Blues
C
D
E♭
E
G
A
G Major Blues
G
A
B♭
B
D
E
D Major Blues
D
E
F
F♯
A
B
A Major Blues
A
B
C
C♯
E
F♯
E Major Blues
E
F♯
G
G♯
B
C♯
B Major Blues
B
C♯
D
D♯
F♯
G♯
F♯ Major Blues
F♯
G♯
A
A♯
C♯
D♯
C♯ Major Blues
C♯
D♯
E
E♯
G♯
A♯
F Major Blues
F
G
A♭
A
C
D
B♭ Major Blues
B♭
C
D♭
D
F
G
E♭ Major Blues
E♭
F
G♭
G
B♭
C
A♭ Major Blues
A♭
B♭
C♭(B)
C
E♭
F
D♭ Major Blues
D♭
E♭
F♭(E)
F
A♭
B♭
G♭ Major Blues
G♭
A♭
B♭♭(A)
B♭
D♭
E♭
C♭ Major Blues
C♭(B)
D♭
E♭♭(D)
E♭
G♭
A♭

minor Blues

Similar to the above, we saw that the minor Pentatonic Scales were formed from the 1st, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 7th Scale Degrees of the regular Natural minor Scales. We can turn these into the minor Blues Scales by adding the ♭5 Note (again, highlighted here in blue):

1 3 4 ♭5 5 7
A minor Blues
A
C
D
E♭
E
G
E minor Blues
E
G
A
B♭
B
D
B minor Blues
B
D
E
F
F♯
A
F♯ minor Blues
F♯
A
B
C
C♯
E
C♯ minor Blues
C♯
E
F♯
G
G♯
B
G♯ minor Blues
G♯
B
C♯
D
D♯
F♯
D♯ minor Blues
D♯
F♯
G♯
A
A♯
C♯
A♯ minor Blues
A♯
C♯
D♯
E
E♯
G♯
D minor Blues
D
F
G
A♭
A
C
G minor Blues
G
B♭
C
D♭
D
F
C minor Blues
C
E♭
F
G♭
G
B♭
F minor Blues
F
A♭
B♭
C♭(B)
C
E♭
B♭ minor Blues
B♭
D♭
E♭
F♭(E)
F
A♭
E♭ minor Blues
E♭
G♭
A♭
B♭♭(A)
B♭
D♭
A♭ minor Blues
A♭
C♭(B)
D♭
E♭♭(D)
E♭
G♭

If you look carefully at both lists, you might notice that the same Note is being added to both Scales. This is because Major and minor are Relative Keys! There is nothing extra to remember.