Chord Colors

A♯ Spanish Heptatonic scale

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About the A sharp Spanish Heptatonic scale

A sharp Spanish Heptatonic is used for flamenco and Spanish-flavored music. Think of it as the Spanish gypsy scale, a phrygian dominant filled out to eight notes. It is A Bebop Locrian with the fourth lowered.

Its notes are A, B, C, D, D, E, F, and G. The formula is H W H H W H W W. It is the third mode of F Bebop Major.

Also called Flamenco Scale and Spanish Eight-Tone.

In A Spanish Heptatonic, the open strings sound D and B. Down at the 1st fret of the A string lies the lowest A a guitar can play. Capo the first fret to play A Spanish Heptatonic with A-shape fingerings.

Positions

Playable shapes for this scale up the neck. Tap any note to hear it.

8-position system

8 four-fret boxes, one per scale degree, each a single hand position with almost no shifting. The jazz and classical way, from William Leavitt's Berklee method.

Position 1fr 1
Position 2fr 2
Position 3fr 4
Position 4fr 6
Position 5fr 7
Position 6fr 9
Position 7fr 10
Position 8fr 11

Notes and intervals

1A#A♯Root
2BBMinor 2nd
3C#C♯Minor 3rd
4DDMajor 3rd
5D#D♯Perfect 4th
6E#E♯Perfect 5th
7F#F♯Minor 6th
8G#G♯Minor 7th
StepsH W H H W H W W
Semitones1-2-1-1-2-1-2-2
Degrees1 2 3 3 4 5 6 7

Shapes

Chromatic

CC♯D♭DD♯E♭EFF♯G♭GG♯A♭AA♯B♭B

Circle of Fifths

CGDAEBF♯G♭C♯D♭G♯A♭D♯E♭A♯B♭F

Related scales

Spanish Heptatonic in other keys

Modes

The same notes, starting on a different note.

Embed this scale

Paste the snippet into a lesson page, a blog or a forum post. The card links back here.

Bb Spanish Heptatonic scale on guitar shown as colored note dots
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