Modal Burpees

×

Modal Burpees

The idea

Exploring a scale doesn’t have to mean playing it up and down. A mode is a 7-note sound with many facets and textures inside it: triads, triad arpeggios, pentatonics, 4-note chords and 4-note arpeggios. Each one is a subset of the same seven notes, and each has its own feel under the hand.

Practicing those textures in quick succession, one after another in the same key, keeps track of all of them at once. That gives you quick access to the whole sound when you’re playing, improvising, comping and composing.

The workout

Pick a root and a mode, then work down the seven steps. Every diagram is numbered from the root you chose, and the hollow dot is that root.

1. Scale — the seven positions, or the whole neck.
2. Triads — the chord built on the root, plus every other triad in the mode that has the root inside it.
3. Triad arpeggios — the same triads as lines, one per inversion.
4. Open triads — spread across three zones of the neck, or by CAGED shape.
5. Pentatonics — two five-note formulas fitted to the mode.
6. 4-note chord — any of the twenty four-note shapes, voiced six ways (closed, drop 2, drop 3, drop 2&3, drop 2&4, double drop 2 drop 3), one neck per inversion so each voicing sits inside its arpeggio from the next step. Each button carries its number from The 4-Note Universe.
7. 4-note arpeggio — the same four notes as a line from each chord tone, fingered in position.

Suggestions

Play each texture a few times, then move straight to the next. Stay in one key until the whole set feels like one sound rather than seven exercises, then change the root, or the mode, and go again.

Time yourself. The faster you can recall the shapes, the more available they are when you’re reading, learning and improvising.

The Flippening — the swirl beside the mode name inverts every interval about the root: C Ionian becomes C Phrygian, A Harmonic Minor becomes A Mixolydian ♭2. Every mode here has its mirror among the 35; Dorian, Mixolydian ♭6 and Double Harmonic Major are their own.

Share copies a link to exactly what’s on screen, so a workout can be sent to a student or saved for tomorrow.

— Noel