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Music vocabulary · Music Theory and Harmony

Pentatonic

Meaning in music, with examples

adjectiveCommon term

In music, pentatonic means: Describing a scale with five different notes per octave, or music built mainly from such a scale.

In Turkish: pentatonik, beş sesli

How it is used

Common in improvisation and music teaching. Major and minor pentatonic scales are useful patterns, but other five-note scales also exist.

Example sentences

  1. Build a short solo from the A minor pentatonic scale before adding other notes.

    The player first limits the solo to a familiar five-note collection.

  2. The children answered the melody on instruments tuned to a pentatonic scale.

    The available instrument pitches give the class a shared five-note sound world.

Common collocations

  • pentatonic scale
  • minor pentatonic
  • pentatonic melody
  • scaleA set of notes played in order of pitch, going up or down, that follows a fixed pattern of steps. Scales are the building blocks of melodies and chords.
  • blues scaleA scale common in blues and related styles, usually built from the minor pentatonic with an added blue note for tension.
  • improviseTo create music in the moment while performing, without reading it from written notes, usually over a known chord progression or within a mode.

More terms: Music Theory and Harmony

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