Scales › bebop dominant

bebop dominant scale

bebop dominant, passing 7

bebop dominant on the guitar: the fretboard diagram

Here is the bebop dominant scale laid out across the whole neck, from fret 0 to fret 15. The guide tones (3rd and 7th) are highlighted — they're what makes the scale's color sing. Use the key selector above to shift the shape along the neck and find the positions in your key.

What color?

Mixolydian plus the major seventh as a passing tone: an 8-note scale that lines up the chord tones on the strong beats when you play eighth notes. The central melodic tool of bebop over a dominant.

Origin & history

The "bebop" scales were named and codified by jazz pedagogy (notably David Baker) to describe the playing of the boppers of the 1940s. A chromatic passing tone is added to the seven-note scale so that the chord tones fall on the strong beats.

Which chords to play it on?

The jazz consensus (Aebersold) recommends it on:

Try it in a real chart

Paste a chord chart into the tool: Pentania tells you, chord by chord, when this scale fits — and what other colors are open to you. Open the tool →