Labelled ‘the thinking man’s blues player’, Robben Ford has an original twist on the minor pentatonic. He replaces the customary b7 with the brighter major 6, a note present in the major pentatonic. For this solo study I plumped for Ford’s hybrid pentatonic for all A7 chords.

Solo Four: The Minor 6 Pentatonic / Lydian Dominant Mode

Over the D7 and E7 however I selected a far more slippery beast, the Lydian Dominant, the fourth mode from melodic minor scale. It’s essentially the same as mixolydian, but with the distinction of a raised 4th degree. This time the #4 takes on a funky, stressed vibe rather than the stepping-stone like passing #4 of Blues scale.

The final move between E7 and A7 has taken on a much more dramatic quality, due to the addition of some ‘altered’ notes, the #5 and b9. These alterations create a heightened sense of suspense to be resolved by our destination A7. Our scale of choice here is the E ‘Superlocrian’, which very neatly contains all the essential notes of E7 plus all the possible tensions (R, b2, #2, 3, b5, #5, b7).

Download backing track for Solo 4

Download PDF tab for Solo 4

A Lydian Dominant scale

Check out previous articles:

http://www.live4guitar.com/article/nailing-the-changes-through-blues-guitar-solos-part-3

http://www.live4guitar.com/article/nailing-the-changes-through-blues-guitar-solos-part-2

http://www.live4guitar.com/article/nailing-the-changes-through-blues-guitar-solos-part-1