Chord Colors

G♯ Locrian Major scale

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About the G sharp Locrian Major scale

G sharp Locrian Major is used for jazz solos and dissonant, unsettled passages. Think of it as a scale with a major third but a flat fifth, unstable and strange.

Its notes are G, A, B, C, D, E, and F. The formula is W W H H W W W. It is the fourth mode of D Leading Whole Tone.

Learn more about the G♯ Locrian Major scale

The mode shares E and D with the guitar's open strings. Down at the 4th fret of the low E string lies the lowest G a guitar can play. Capo the first fret to play G Locrian Major with G-shape fingerings.

Positions

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

CAGED

Five shapes, each anchored to a chord form you already know, the pop and rock default that ties your scales to your chords. The outlined notes are that chord, so you can see the C, A, G, E, and D shapes inside the scale.

G shapefr 1
E shapefr 3
D shapefr 5
C shapefr 8
A shapefr 10
3NPS

3NPS stands for 3 notes per string. It lays the scale out in seven even shapes for rock and metal lead, and favors speed because the picking pattern stays consistent across every string.

Shape 1open
Shape 2fr 2
Shape 3fr 4
Shape 4fr 5
Shape 5fr 7
Shape 6fr 9
Shape 7fr 10
7-position system

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

Notes and intervals

1G#G♯Root
2A#A♯Major 2nd
3B#B♯Major 3rd
4C#C♯Perfect 4th
5DDDiminished 5th
6EEMinor 6th
7F#F♯Minor 7th
StepsW W H H W W W
Semitones2-2-1-1-2-2-2
Degrees1 2 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

Locrian Major 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.

Ab Locrian Major scale on guitar shown as colored note dots
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