What is a scale?

A series of notes. Think of it like notes going up a ladder, each one a little higher than the last.

What is an interval?

The distance in pitch between two notes. They might happen at the same time, they might happen one after the other, but if they’re a different pitch, there is an interval between them.

What is the major scale?

You already know this one. If you live in the Western world you’ve been listening to it all your life.

Here’s the C major scale:

What different kinds of interval are there?

C is the first note in the scale, D the second. So the interval from C to D is a major second. On a guitar that’s two frets.

E is the third note, so C to E is a major third (four frets)

F is the fourth note, so C to F is a perfect fourth.

Why ‘perfect’ and not ‘major’?

Because all these ‘major’ style intervals have a ‘minor’ version too, whereas there isn’t a minor fourth. In the C minor scale, you still get the perfect fourth C to F. There’s also the fifth and octave that are ‘perfect,’ and don’t change for the minor scale.

That should be enough to work out most of the rest, but let’s go through them any way:

C to G is our perfect fifth.

C to A is our major sixth.

C to B is our major seventh.

C to C is an octave.

That’s C major. You start on C, then have a second note a major second (two frets) up, a third note a major third up (four frets), a fourth note a major fourth up (five frets) etc etc.

What about D major?

The same thing, but you start on a D.

From D, up a major second is E. Up a major third is Fsharp etc.

That should clear up a few things about intervals. Still to come: intervals in the minor scale and how to make chords out of these intervals.

Related posts:

1. Basics – A few useful links