I had an 'aha' moment.

[Herbal]

Now go out and learn pentatonic scales and modes. Those are IMO the most useful for everything from soloing to grooving.

I do know them, but I think I was playing them too much like scales and to me it always sounded too much like i was just playing scales.

 

[Bob_Ross]

post-tonal, atonal, or serial music is a different game.

Sadly, we don't seem to get a lot of questions about those on TB.

 

[jallenbass]

I do know them, but I think I was playing them too much like scales and to me it always sounded too much like i was just playing scales.

I always work on patterns and intervals with scales for that very reason. I find that playing scales in fourths is a great way to get away from just running scales when we should be playing music.

 

[SanDiegoHarry]

Arpeggios.

I have always been thinking in scales when I play and never really in arpeggios.
I got a book from a charity shop that shows how to play arpeggios through a key and it was like !this is what I'm missing.!

I used to tell students that arpeggios are nothing but repeated broken chords - and a chord is merely part of a scale. That always seem to help them understand.

 

[BAG]

Chord tones for the meat of the song and scale tones to connect those chords and add fills.