Using 3rds In The G Major Scale

Here’s a more advanced guitar lessons for those of you who are ready for it!

In this lesson Colin will give you some ideas on using 3rds from the G major scale. You’ll have to know your scales pretty well to follow this, as Colin moves around using the whole fretboard, though he’s also using the E pentatonic minor scale (open position) quite a bit as well.

That E pentatonic minor scale is relative to G major, so it works perfectly here.

Most of the examples in the video are coming off the 1st and 3rd strings, though you’ll see towards the end he also dives into the inverted thirds on the 2nd and 4th strings as well, just to change things up a bit.

You can find more lessons by Colin Daniel at RiffNinja.com – I highly recommend checking out his site as he’s got tons of top notch guitar lessons there.

If after watching this you realize that you need a brush up on your guitar scales, I recommend checking out my course on Guitar Scale Patterns!

Watch 3rds In The G Major Scale on Youtube


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    1. They’re inverted thirds… meaning the root note is the one with the higher pitch. Looked at the other way around, they would indeed be a 6th, but you always have to figure out where the root is, and work from there.

  1. nice, but why didn’t you explain
    the finger positions on those 3rds?
    or did i miss the explanation in a previous
    video?
    Dennis R

  2. Colin,
    This was great and it looks really easy unless you’re like me that doesn’t know jack about music theory. Thanks!
    Al

    1. simple theory G major is G A B C D E F# G ( any major scale is figured W W H W W W H) W- whole step, G to A or E to F#… H- half step F# to G for example) so knowing the G major scale is G A B C D E F# G . Give each letter a number G is 1 A is 2 B is 3….. a major chord is the 1,3,and 5 note for G major GBD makes the chord tones 1st and 3rd would be G and B what he is playing on the 1 and 2,3 strings. In a major scale the first note The I is always major ( G Major) the ii(2) chord is Am(inor)ACE. III B minor (BD F#). IV is always major in this case C major(CEG). V chord is D7(D F# A C). vi 6 chord E minor( EGB). The vii is rarely played. I IV V of a scale are the most used chords. On guitar a chord should have the 1,3,5 of the chord tones they can be repeated C major open x32010= 6 string muted or if open E, 5 str.C, 4 str E, 3 str open G, 2 str 1 fret is C, 1 str open is E (ECEGE) I hope that helps the theory it is really not that hard. If you have any questions Email me I’ve been playing for almost a year. I know my theory well, but my strumming needs work. Have fun Mark (smurfinmaui at hotmail.com

  3. Thank for this Colin. It may sound a little advance guitar lessons for some of those I am currently teaching but it feels nice to have another approach of teaching it from another mentor. Thanks again! 🙂

  4. Yeah, that’s the thing with Colin. He goes way too fast and doesn’t show you exactly what he’s doing. There were several licks I would have loved to learn from some of Colin’s previous lessons…

  5. Colin

    I have been struggling with 3rds, but your video here(Jonathan kindly directed me to) has opened the door for me.

    I was able to go to my major and Minor scales and work things out. Now I understand .

    I should be able to transpose into other keys

    Thanks again

    Denis McCourt
    Ireland

  6. Ninja , you are going way to fast with no explanation of which hand , or fingers are where , or why. As a teacher slow down , n explain better rather than just razzle dazzling us with  an entertaining  performance, where we have no idea what you just did or how you did it.

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