Low E string: Gb, Ab, Bbb, Db, Ebb at frets 2, 4, 5, 9, 10
A string: Bbb, Db, Ebb, Gb, Ab, Bbb at frets 0, 4, 5, 9, 11, 12
D string: Ebb, Gb, Ab, Bbb, Db, Ebb at frets 0, 4, 6, 7, 11, 12
G string: Ab, Bbb, Db, Ebb, Gb at frets 1, 2, 6, 7, 11
B string: Db, Ebb, Gb, Ab, Bbb at frets 2, 3, 7, 9, 10
High E string: Gb, Ab, Bbb, Db, Ebb at frets 2, 4, 5, 9, 10
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
Gb 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 G♭ hirajoshi on guitar
Two frets of capo hand you E fingering, which lets a familiar box replace five flats. Open A and D fall in the key, at the minor third and minor sixth. Low E carries the deepest root at 2, and the box from there closes at 6, so the G string root at 11 lives in another position. Ab iwato takes this grip two semitones higher.
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