Lesson #2: How To Make Listeners Happy, Sad, And Everything Else With Intervals

Intervals are more than likely something you’ve at least heard of by now. 

But no one tells you how to use them! 

And the truth is that you already use intervals all the time. 

Whenever you put two notes together, either harmonically or melodically, you are creating a space between them. 

E to G or E to F is an interval. 

The powerchord you’ve been playing in Nirvana or Metallica riffs maybe so far have some of the most used intervals of all time…..

The perfect 5th: 

The perfect 4th: 

And the octave: 

The problem most of you have at this point is that you don’t understand how to solo with this information, but compare these tabs to the pentatonic box scale: 

See the 5ths? The 4ths? The octaves? 

All you do is play one note and then the note that makes that interval! 

Some other cool intervals to play include the major 6th for country solos: 

The minor 2nd for extremely dissonant eerie sounds: 

The diminished 5th for blues sounds and more dissonance: 

And then major 3rds and minor 6ths for happier sounds: 

However, these intervals will change the sound depending on what else is going on in the music. 

Playing a major 3rd over a minor chord will be different than playing a major 3rd over a major chord. 

We’ll explore this more in the next couple of lessons, but start thinking in intervals more than scales from here on out!