stanadon

im practicing to take the Registory of guitar tutors grade 6 exam, has anyone got any advice on what to practice and what are the hardest parts? a main section of the exam is lead playing, the hardest part of this is identifying what scale to play when it can be dorian or mixolydian major or natural minor etc, could someone give me a good way of practicing identifying the scales to play?

Deadds

Identifying by ear or on paper?

stanadon

paper, you get the chord progression that the examiner will play

Deadds

Dorian scales can be used over any minor triad or minor7th chord.

Mixolydian scales can be used over Dominant chords while taking extensions and alterations in mind.

But that's modal stuff, are you sure you know what they're asking for?

Are they asking you what scale or key you need to use for those chords?

Dominant Chords are the V(Five) chord of it's key and Dorian scales are used over ii (minor 2) chords.

example:

D Minor = D dorian (which is basically C major starting from D)
D Dominant = D Mixolydian(which is basically G major starting from D)

but that only works when you know in what key you're in. If Dminor is not the ii chord then you need to analyze the progression and figure out what it is.

stanadon

there are no key changes its just what scale, ive heard something like the scale can be identified by the first two chords like if its a ii to v then its a certain scale?

Deadds

You've heard? o_O

It looks like you don't have a basic understanding of theory. Take a college music theory course or buy the book they use and study on your own.

it's just too much of a problem to answer.

Go here http://www.musictheory.net/ and go to the "Diatonic Chord" section. take your time with it.

mdc

You're taking grade 6 and you still don't know what scale fits over a diatonic chord progression?

Actually, since I mentioned diatonic in the above sentence, do you even know what THAT means?

What you say is the hardest part, is actually the easiest part.

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MaggaraMarine

You need to look at the overall chord progression and find the key = tonic chord. That way you will know what scale to use (it's the same as the tonic chord, for example if the progression was C-F-G, the tonic chord would be C and the scale would be C major).

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GoldenGuitar

I wish the exams I had to do were as easy as yours.

stanadon

i've doen preliminary grade to grade 5, my music hteory does lack but i've gotten away with it up untill now, this grade is really theory based and belive me it's not easy, rgt is the gold standard in united kingdom and grade 6 gets you points to university