Phrygian scale on guitar

Its formula is R b2 b3 4 5 b6 b7, the same in every key: learn it once and you can build the Phrygian scale on any root. Players often use it for riffs in metal and flamenco.

A root on a black key goes by one name here: C# Phrygian, never Db Phrygian. To find each note on the neck on its own, see every note on the fretboard.

E Phrygian is E Natural Minor with the 2 lowered by a half step.

F is the note that makes the difference; on the neck above it wears a ring.

Nobody learns the whole neck at once. The Phrygian scale comes in seven boxes with three notes on each string: position 1 starts on your low string with the root, E at fret 0, and each next box starts on the next note of the scale.

Learn one box, then the next, and play across both: together they cover the neck. Where the neck has room, a box comes back twelve frets higher. These are three-notes-per-string shapes, not CAGED.

In E, these are the chords that live in the Phrygian scale: a triad and a seventh chord on each note of the scale, so you know what to play under your solo.

Click a chord to see how to play it.

Same notes, same frets, another home note: know the Phrygian scale on the neck and you already have these under your fingers.

• C Ionian (Major)
• D Dorian
• F Lydian
• G Mixolydian
• A Aeolian (Natural Minor)
• B Locrian

All seven modes side by side: guitar modes.

Tune down and the Phrygian scale stays the same scale, it just sits on other frets. In Drop D only your low string changes, so every shape on the other five strings stays put. Drop C and Drop B take every string down, so the whole scale shifts, and DADGAD lowers three strings. Here is where its root E sits on the low string in each.