Electric Guitar: The Scriabin Scale with Licks & Exercises

Alexander Scriabin was a brilliant Russian pianist and composer who lived from 1872 to 1915. He was an innovative musical genius with a touch of the mystic about him (he composed works with such titles as, Prometheus: Poem of Fire, and The Poem of Ecstasy). He was also a devoted follower of the philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche, and regularly attempted to represent Nietzsche's ideas in his music (particularly the concept of the ubermensch, or "overman").

Scriabin died under strange circumstances. In one of Henry Miller's books he stated that Scriabin "died of a pimple," but what actually happened is that Scriabin either cut himself shaving and a serious infection set in, or he developed a boil on his mouth that became severely infected, resulting in his death.

Experts suspect that Scriabin had a condition known as synesthesia, in which a certain blending of the senses takes place. For example, when a person with synesthesia hears music, they might also see various displays of color and images in their mind as the pitches and rhythms of the music change.

Enough about Scriabin the man. Now on to some exercises for the guitar using a wonderful scale that Scriabin invented, which we now simply call the Scriabin scale. Here it is in the key of C, with a chord at the end built from the scale tones:

Low E string: {-8-9-12-} A string: {-10-12-} D string: {-10-11-14-} G string: {-12-14-} B string: {-13-14-17-} E string: {-15-17-} chord: { 8 10 11 x 8 8 }

(Forgive the strange tablature, I don't have the ability to use a fixed-width font as in normal guitar tablature for this article.)

Play the scale above in a 1-2-4, 3-4 fingering combination per every two stings, shifting between them as needed. That is, think of the strings as being in sets of two: E-A is a pair, D-G is a pair, etc, then follow the 1-2-4, 3-4 fingering combination for each set. It's easy to see that the wide intervals of the scale make it a fairly challenging exercise on its own when layed out on the fret board. Also, choosing one set of strings and going up and back in the scale can make for a fairly challenging fingering and picking exercise as well. For example, try this pattern:

D string: {-10-11-14-} G string: {-12-14-12-} D string: {--14-11-10-11-14-} G string: {-12-14-12-} D string: {-14-11-} Repeat pattern.

Maintain the 1-2-4, 3-4 fingering pattern for this exercise. If you start with an upstroke, as I do, you can use strict alternate picking (up-down-up-down) and in my opinion the entire phrase flows better than if one starts with a downstroke.

With the exercise above, your fretting hand will surely get tired after only a short span of time, so shake your hand out regularly to loosen it up and get some blood flowing.

Finger-tapping using the Scriabin scale is also fun and can sound quite exotic. The wide intervals in the scale can be reached even easier with tapping and also if you incorporate an open string, like so:

Everything is played on the high E string: |-15(t)-9-8-0-8-9-15(t)-9-8-0-| (repeating as long as you like, then continuing on high E): |-17(t)-9-8-0-8-9-17(t)-9-8-0--|

Repeat the tapping phrase above as many times as you can take hearing the mystical tones and intervals. All of the notes above are either hammered-on, finger tapped (indicated by the t's), or pulled-off to, even though that isn't expressly indicated in the tablature above, since it would make it more difficult to read.

So there you have the Scriabin scale and some licks and exercises based around it. Use the Scriabin scale to generate more otherworldy solos and compositions as the great composer would have enjoyed.