Arpeggios Vs Scales

[WrapRough]

Just watched the video and no idea what the point of it was. Essentially he is saying modes are BS, just learn arpeggios. I don't understand that mentality at all. Learn both, and learn when to use them, no?

 

[Spin Doctor]

Just watched the video and no idea what the point of it was. Essentially he is saying modes are BS, just learn arpeggios. I don't understand that mentality at all. Learn both, and learn when to use them, no?

You would think it should be that simple wouldn't you... Apparently not LOL.

 

[WrapRough]

You would think it should be that simple wouldn't you... Apparently not LOL.

Seems like he didn't understand that simple concept and wasted years trying to find some holy grail. Fair enough, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater

 

[mambo4]

How do you know what most bass players are doing most of the time, such that you feel they usually need to play arpeggios?

What most bass player are doing most of the time is supporting the harmony,
for which arpeggio knowledge and practice is quite useful, arguably more so than modes
I don't believe I was advocating just "playing arpeggios" and nothing else
I wasn't even suggesting to NOT learn modes
that would be silly

sorry if I was unclear.

 

[mambo4]

Modes are for playing music. Arpeggios are for playing music. The whole idea that these two concepts are for different things is misguided.

Absolutely

 

[Spin Doctor]

What most bass player are doing most of the time is supporting the harmony,
for which arpeggio knowledge and practice is quite useful, arguably more so than modes
I don't believe I was advocating just "playing arpeggios" and nothing else
I wasn't even suggesting to NOT learn modes
that would be silly

sorry if I was unclear.

I get where you're going with this, but it honestly just depends on the song. The bassline for China Girl is about 50% scale stuff and 50% arpeggios. The bassline for Lowrider is all a minor pentatonic scale. So, I still don't buy that "one is more useful than the other" thing but you can feel however you want about it.

My perception is that people really get hung up on the word "mode" . If you pick any mode of a key, all the notes are exactly the same for every other mode so what difference could it possibly make what you call it? To me, it's all just one big ass scale.

 

[ics1974]

To me chord tones are primary but without a knowledge of scales it's very hard to know which passing tones to choose from if you want to get from one chord tone to another or to add some color. Yes you can use the chromatic scale but to me there are three degrees of choices. 1. chord tones 2. scale tones (from the key) and 3. chromatic tones (not from the key). With a knowledge of chord tones + scales/modes you can make better choices of what you want to play.

 

[wazzel]

My perception is that people really get hung up on the word "mode" . If you pick any mode of a key, all the notes are exactly the same for every other mode so what difference could it possibly make what you call it? To me, it's all just one big ass scale.

I was one of those people. When it clicked that they are just the major scale repositioned for the particular chord of the key it all fell into place.