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What Is the Major Scale?

What Is the Major Scale?

The major scale is the seven-note scale built by the step pattern W–W–H–W–W–W–H (whole-whole-half-whole-whole-whole-half). Start it on C and you get C-D-E-F-G-A-B — all the natural notes. It's the "do re mi" sound: bright, complete, home.

Why it's the reference scale

Nearly everything in theory is measured against the major scale:

  • Intervals are named by their position in it (the "major third" is the third note of the major scale).
  • Chord formulas are spelled from it — a minor triad is "1, ♭3, 5," where the numbers mean major-scale degrees.
  • Modes are the major scale started from its other degrees.
  • Key signatures encode which major scale a piece lives in.

Learn this one scale deeply and the rest of theory becomes bookkeeping.

On the guitar

The major scale makes a handful of movable patterns across the neck; the practical fingerings, with the scale degrees marked inside each shape, are in The Major Scale on Guitar. Its diatonic chords — the famous I–ii–iii–IV–V–vi–vii° family — are why so many songs share the same four chords.

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