The reason that this scale is so ground-breaking to me is that it gives me something
unique to do over the V chord in a blues
progression. I never had anything like that
before! I was just holding the gas pump of
straight pentatonic over the whole darn blues
progression without realizing there were
other possibilities over the individual chords.
This is a recent discovery for me. I have
just begun to digest the shapes, possibilities,
and challenges of this new idea. This is really the fun part. I’d like to share the beginning of my digestion process with you. I
hope it gets your fingers moving easier and
easier with this great sound.
To digest a new scale, I first remember
that I’m a guitar player. So I get out some
neck paper and write down all the possible
shapes all over the neck. It turns out I don’t
like all of them. Some are too hard to play.
Some are too hard to visualize. And some
lead my fingers to notes that I don’t want
to end on. So I discard those for now, and
focus on the remaining three shapes that I
love. You’ve already got the one we started
with, so I’ll give you my other two favorite
positions in Fig. 5 and Fig. 6. Remember,
these are all the same notes, just in different
positions on the neck.
1. Play a blues turnaround
2. Follow it with a Super-Hendrix Scale
phrase (one-bar in length)
3. End with the I chord (or a note that
fits over the I chord.)
Let me give you one more example that
follows this pattern. This time I’ll give you
a variation of the chord that we’ve been
using. It has a slightly different flavor from
the Super-Hendrix Chord because it doesn’t
contain a major 3rd (G#) in it. There are a
variety of ways that a music theorist might
name this chord, but in practice, it sounds
like an inversion of our Super-Hendrix
Chord to me, but not quite as “pointy.”
For easy reference, let’s call the chord in the
next example the Smooth-Hendrix Chord.
Fig. 8
44 & 3
oeoeoe oeoeoe
oeoeoe
oeoeoe oe oeoeoe oe oeoe oe oeoeoe oeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoeoe bn oeoeoeoeoeoeoe
oeoeoeoeoeoeoe oen oe oeoeoen oe oen oeoe
3
33
0
2
2
0
2
2
0
2
2
5
2
2
5
5
2
2
5
5
2
2
5
4
2
3
5
4
2
3
5
4
2
3
5
3
2
4
5
3
2
4
5
3
2
4
5
10 12 10
13
10
13 9
9139
9
12
12
12 9
˙
12
&oeoeoeoeoeoeoeoe# oeoeoeoeoeoe# oen oe
w
9129
9
12
12 10
10 12 10
10
11
11
11 10
0
12
Fig. 9
44 &
oen
oeoe oeoe oeoe oeoe oeoe b oeoe
oeoeoeoe
oeoeoeoeoeoe oe n oe n oe oeoeoe ˙
OE
oe
12
12
13
12
7 12
8 12
12 13
15
12
13
15 13 14
14
˙
0
4
7
4
7
5
7
5
7
6
7
6
7
