LEARN MESSIAEN MODE 3 - [Guitar TAB]

The Messian mode 3 is a symmetrical scale that transposes every major third interval. By juggling the notes around you can create some very interesting sounding lines. In this video I show you three guitar licks as inspiration to get you started. Sound-wise the scale sounds something in between a diminished and augmented scale due to its intervallic nature. I mainly use this scale to create a certain sense of tension and sound in my guitar solos. This scale was also commonly used by one of my favorite players: Allan Holdsworth. It was thanks to Allan’s REH guitar instructional video I first became familiar with the scale. Please refer to his songs “City nights“, Countdown and “The 16 men of tain“ for some great usage of the scale. Also try to find triads within the scale to explore some functional use of the mode. Allan used something called chord scales, meaning that he came up with unique chord voicing by stacking intervalls from the scale on top of each other.