Essential Bb Major Scale Patterns for `Ukulele

After you mastering the six essentials scales below and start to explore more advanced styles of music, especially jazz. There are a few more scales that are needed to cover the broader harmonic palette that a typical jazz tune draws from.

Bb major or B-flat major is a major scale based on B-flat, consisting of the pitches Bb, C, D, Eb, F, G, and A. Its key signature has two flats, Bb and Eb.

Its relative minor is G minor, and its parallel minor is Bb minor.

B-flat major is a suitable key for most wind instruments, especially those for which it is their home key, such as clarinets, trumpets, tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone and flutes in B-flat.

The six essential scales are: Blues, Major Pentatonic, Mixolydian, Dorian, Aeolian, and Ionian. From the six essential scales, you can get through a wide variety of traditional and contemporary music.

A scale is simply a collection of pitches or notes, not really a "this is a Jazz scale", "this is a Blues" or "this is a Rock scale". It's how a scale is used that really matters not its name.

Most music starts with a scale. The melody, chords, licks and riffs all can be related back to a particular scale or scales.

Wikipedia defines Jazz as a musical art form which originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions. The style's West African pedigree is evident in its use of blue notes, improvisation, polyrhythms, syncopation, and the swung note.

The primary chords for any major key are the I, IV and V chords of its corresponding major scale. For Bb Major the primary chords are: Bb, Eb, F and F7

From the primary and secondary chords of a major key countless songs and chords progressions can be played.

The secondary chords for any major key are the II, III and VI chords of it’s corresponding major scale. For Bb Major the secondary chords are: Cm, Dm and Gm

From the primary and secondary chords of a major key countless songs and chords progressions can be played.

Common chord progressions for the key of Bb. Using the primary and seconday chords for the key explore these common chord progressions for the key of Bb.

The Ionian/Major scale is one of the six essential scales that every ukulele player should know. Here are the chords for all 15 Ionian/Major scales.

From the Ionian/Major scale all other diatonic and pentatonic scales can be derived.

The Ionian/Major scale formula is:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8.