Tips and insights
Different scale families. Mixolydian b6 is the 5th mode of Melodic Minor while Mixolydian is the 5th mode of the Major scale.
This means a lot of things but one of them is that one and the same guitar pattern cannot be used to play both of these two scales, no matter what note you start it from—they will always be different by at least one note and that's what puts them into different families by definition.
By contrast, that's not the case for scales that belong to one scale family, all of which are relative modes of one another. To give you an example, consider Dorian and the Natural Minor scale which are 2 modes of the Major scale—if you know any Dorian guitar pattern or any Minor scale pattern, you can use just that single pattern to play both of these 2 scales just by changing the note you start playing it from. That's a useful feature of relative modes. Make no mistake though, that doesn't make them any "better" ;).
The point is, these 2 scales do have an unavoidable difference (which is also, neither good nor bad, it just is), and you'll need to learn the new pattern in any case, even if the change is only one note.
I'll omit any further details because this is not the focus of this particular reference chart, but I just wanted to mention it here as well. The reason I give such additional bits of information where I feel it's relevant is with the intention that it helps complete the puzzle you might be "solving" in your mind, create an "aha" moment, and if it did, then that's all that matters. And even if not, then you'll start asking the right questions and eventually get the whole picture :)
Alternative scale names
Mixolydian b6 is a common and popular name for the scale, but it has a couple of other aliases:
- Aeolian #3
- Aeolian Dominant
- Melodic Major
- Major-Minor
0 Comments