Playing scales
With
Mat Walklate
What's in the course
9 lessons (0h 54m) · 2 free
01. Getting familiar with your harmonica
Free lesson3:56
02. Simple chord rhythm, first blues solo
8:52
03. Learn a simple blues solo
7:04
04. Embouchure (lip shape)
4:51
05. When The Saints Go Marching In
12:37
06. Toungue blocking
8:03
07. Playing scales
You are here1:58
08. Simple boogie rhythm
5:25
09. BONUS: Learn to play The Beatles, Love Me Do
Free lesson1:59
Lesson transcript
Understanding Scales on the Diatonic Harmonica
Hello, my name is Matt, and today we're looking at scales on the diatonic harmonica.
The Major Scale
On the diatonic harmonica, we have a major scale. If you've seen the other lessons, you'll know that we have one full major scale between holes four and seven.
The Blues Scale
The scale we use for playing blues starts on hole number two or hole number three.
- When you breathe in hole number two and blow hole number three, you get the same note. The notes are doubled up.
Note Breakdown
- Hole 2 (Draw): G
- Hole 3 (Blow): G
- Hole 3 (Draw): B
- Hole 4 (Blow): C
- Hole 4 (Draw): D
- Hole 5 (Draw): F
- Hole 6 (Blow): G
So, on a C harmonica, we have a pentatonic blues scale in the key of G.
Sounding It Out
It sounds like this:
(Insert sound example here)
For reference, there is a PDF on the site containing a diagram that shows you all the notes on a diatonic harmonica with the blues scale highlighted.
The Blues Scale Progression
The blues scale on a diatonic harmonica goes from:
- Two Draw
- Three Draw
- Four Blow
- Four Draw
- Five Draw
- Six Blow
Happy playing!
9 lessons
0h 54m of structured video lessons
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Meet your guru
Meet your guru
Mat Walklate is a Manchester-based harmonica player and teacher working in blues and folk, who also plays flute, whistle and uilleann pipes and sings. He won the British Blues Harmonica Championship in 1992 and the All-Britain Fleadh Cheoil on harmonica in 1993, and is a Seydel-endorsed artist.
Over a thirty-year career he has toured Europe with bands including The Moochers and the Irish-music group The House Devils, recorded and mixed some fourteen albums between 2001 and 2021 - among them Sea of Blues and Traditional Harmonica - and now performs in a duo with singer-guitarist Alex Haynes and alongside blues scholar Dr Tom Attah. He teaches harmonica at Leeds Conservatoire and privately.
On MusicGurus his courses take you from your first notes on a C harmonica - embouchure, the cross-harp position, bending and your first improvisation - through to fluent blues playing, with vibrato, alternative positions and the phrasing that makes a solo sing.
