Low E string: Fb, Ab, Bbb, Db, Eb, Fb at frets 0, 4, 5, 9, 11, 12
A string: Bbb, Db, Eb, Fb, Ab, Bbb at frets 0, 4, 6, 7, 11, 12
D string: Eb, Fb, Ab, Bbb, Db at frets 1, 2, 6, 7, 11
G string: Ab, Bbb, Db, Eb, Fb at frets 1, 2, 6, 8, 9
B string: Db, Eb, Fb, Ab, Bbb at frets 2, 4, 5, 9, 10
High E string: Fb, Ab, Bbb, Db, Eb, Fb at frets 0, 4, 5, 9, 11, 12
The hirajoshi scale is the best known Japanese pentatonic: root, 2nd, flat 3rd, 5th, flat 6th. Each half step resolves downward (b3 to 2, b6 to 5), which creates its elegant, melancholy motion. It has long since escaped traditional koto music: metal and fusion players from Marty Friedman onward mine it for exotic riffs that still sit over a plain minor chord.
it consists of these notes and degrees:
I
II
bIII
V
bVI
Same notes, different mode
Db hirajoshi uses the same notes as the scales below. Start from a different note and you get a new mode built on the very same note set.
How to play D♭ hirajoshi on guitar
One fret of capo turns this into C fingering, so five flats become someone else's problem. Both E strings ring a minor third above the root when open, with the A string a minor sixth. Fret 9 gives the deepest root, and the first shape quits at 13, so the D string root at 11 stays inside. Eb iwato needs the same grip two semitones up.
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