Demystifying the modes on guitar: It doesn't get any simpler than this

This was the 7th Fret Science YouTube video, originally published on March 9, 2023. Along with the next video in the sequence, it was meant to replace and expand on the original "Smokin' Fast Modes" video. As of December 2025, this one has been viewed 82k times, making it my 12th most popular video.

Original video description: What are the major scale modes? How do they relate to the pentatonic scale? What on earth is "brightness ordering"? All this and more are explained herein! [Note to subscribers: this is an expanded and remastered version of an earlier video]

Errata: at around 5:42, the diagram at the top of the screen is showing a natural 5th rather than a flat 4th, and at around 8:00, the Aeolian scale is built on the 6th scale degree, not the 3rd

The modes on guitar…explained clearly

The major scale is made up of a fixed set of whole- (W) and half- (H) step intervals: WWHWWWH. A mode is any seven-note stretch of this repeating sequence. There are seven of them, each starting from a different scale degree of the major scale, and they are known by Greek names.

Rearranged into brightness order, we can see that each mode differs from its neighbors by shifting one note by one semitone. Lydian is the brightest mode, and Locrian is the darkest. The three major modes contain the major pentatonic scale, and the three minor modes contain the minor pentatonic scale. The Locrian mode is not based on a minor or major pentatonic scale.

Another way to think about this is that the major scale contains six different pentatonic scales, three major and three minor. There are major pentatonic scales built off of the first, fourth, and fifth scale degrees, and there are minor pentatonic scales built off of the second, third, and sixth.