In the April 2015 issue of Guitar World, I showed you how to combine D major (D F# A) and E minor...
In the April 2015 issue of Guitar World, I showed you how to combine D major (D F# A) and E minor (E G B) triads to generate two appealing hexatonic (six-note) scales: the bright, joyous-sounding D major hexatonic (D E F# G A B) and the dark and serious E minor hexatonic (E F# G A B D).
As we saw, both scales are made up of the same notes, the only difference being their orientation around either a D or an E root. I’d now like to present a neat twist on this formula, one that yields two hauntingly beautiful hexatonics, both of which could serve as useful resources whenever you’re looking to create a mysterious, exotic musical mood.
The twist is, instead of combining E minor and D major triads, we’re now going to combine D minor (D F A) and E major (E G# B), as demonstrated in FIGURE 1 with two sets of chord inversions moving up the fretboard. In both cases, the notes on the highest of the three strings outline the scale and the notes on the two lower strings offer harmony.
You may recognize the sounds created by these two ascending chord-scales, as they’re nearly identical to those of the fourth and fifth modes of A harmonic minor (A B C D E F G#), what are known as D “gypsy” minor (or “Hungarian” or “Ukrainian” minor: D E F G# A B C) and E Phrygian-dominant (E F G# A B C D), a mode often associated with both classical music and metal and the virtuosic shredding of Yngwie Malmsteen.
The only difference between those seven-note modes and their hexatonic subsets shown in FIGURE 1, which we’ll refer