Bass Guitar Scale – Major Scale

I use the major scale on bass guitar when I’m playing country and traditional music and also in some styles of pop music. I also use the major scale under major chords in any style of music. The major scale is the basic scale “do-re-mi-fa..”. This guitar/bass scale is comprised of 8 notes with the following intervals root note – whole step(2 frets) – whole step – half step – whole step – whole step – whole step – half step – root note again. In the key of C the bass guitar major scale would be C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C.

I generally play this bass guitar scale in two positions pictured below but there are many ways to pattern it across your fret board. After learning these two positions for this bass guitar scale play with these notes up and down your fretboard and you will easily find all the positions to play this scale.

First pattern to play the major guitar/bass scale

Here is another way to play that same guitar-bass scale:

Major Bass Guitar Scale position 2

And yet another , this time the root note, “X”, starts on the second string:

Bass Guitar Major Scale Root On 2nd String

The notes in the major scale also make up the same notes used for the guitar/bass scale in the relative minor. In otherword the C major scale is the same as an A minor scale, only with a different root note. To learn the Minor scale read this post: Guitar Bass Scale – Minor Scale