Bb Rock and roll
B flat "Rock and roll" scale for guitar.
This is no formal scale and it can be seen as a nine-notes hybrid between the Pentatonic Major and the Blues scales. It is sometimes referred to as the F formation since it centers around notes arranged as an F chord (XX3211). It is labeled "Rock and roll" here since it is often used in rock and roll, rockabilly and country. The diagram shows a fingerboard with the involved notes in the key of Bb.
Bb
4-string shape
Notes: Bb - C - Db - D - Eb - E - F - G - Ab
Intervals: 2 - 1 - 1 - 1 - 1 - 1 - 2 - 1 - 2
Type: Hybrid
The scale and its scale degrees.
| Formula | Notes |
|---|---|
| 1 | Bb |
| 3 | C |
| b3 | Db |
| 3 | D |
| 4 | Eb |
| b5 | E |
| 5 | F |
| 6 | G |
| b7 | Ab |
The notes in the scale can be described as steps, written as whole, half, half, half, half, half, whole, half, whole from the first note to the same in the next octave.
This is no proper scale, but a merge of the Bb Pentatonic Major and Bb Blues. It could also be seen as an F chord-based shape mixed with notes from the corresponding Major and Blues scales.
In the rockabilly style of guitar, so-called double stops are often used besides single-note phrases. In the key of B flat and based on the scale pattern above, three examples (in shortened notation) would be XXX66X, XXX88X and XXXX66.