The Major Sixth Diminished Scale - Jazz Guitar Lesson Around The Barry Harris Concept

By Stef Ramin On 2023-03-20 2

This guitar lesson is about a harmonic concept mapped out and developped by jazz musician Barry harris that can be found in the book "The Barry Harris Harmonic Method For Guitar" by Alan Kingstone.

This blog article details a little bit more in depth about what is the major 6 diminished scale and how to harmonize it with major 6 and diminished 7 chords.

FREE PDF AVAILABLE HERE ON THE GUMROAD STORE

Major Sixth Chords

First you need to know how to construct Major six chords.

They are built on the basis of a major triad : Root (1), major third (3), perfect fifth (5) with a major sixth (6) added on the top.

Notice that they can be written M6, Maj6 or simply 6 (CMaj6, CM6 or C6 for example).

C6	C	E	G	A
Intervals	1	3	5	6

Here are some drop 2 and drop 3 major 6 chords shapes (root position and three inversions).

Notice that they are all movable, find the root and play it anywhere on the guitar neck.

The Major Sixth Diminished Scale

The major 6 diminished scale is a little bit weird and unusual but also very interesting for composing and chord melody arrangements.

It is actually a combination of the two chords previously discussed, making it an eight note scale built of : 1 (tonic), second (2), major third (3), fourth (4), fifth (5), minor sixth (b6), major sixth (6) and major seventh (7). :

Major 6 (1, 3, 5, 6).

Diminished 7 (1, b3, b5, bb7).

For example, to build a C6° scale, just take a C6 chord (C-E-G-B) and a diminished chord built from its seventh (B), so a B diminished chord (B-D-F-Ab).

As you seen in the staff below, the notes of Bdim7 are inserted between each note of C6.

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Comments

1 Jean-Marie Le Bizec On 2023-03-23

Hello
First you need to know how to construct Major six chords.
I m sorry but i do not understand the interval that you show at the beginning of your lesson

" First you need to know how to construct Major six chords.
C6 C E G B
Intervals 1 3 5 7. "

thank you for all your very interesting material and the pedagogy of your website

jazz-guitar-licks On 2023-04-13

Typo corrected. Thanks for your comment.

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The Major Sixth Diminished Scale - Jazz Guitar Lesson Around The Barry Harris Concept

This guitar lesson is about a harmonic concept mapped out and developped by jazz musician Barry harris that can be found in the book "The Barry Harris Harmonic Method For Guitar" by Alan Kingstone.

This blog article details a little bit more in depth about what is the major 6 diminished scale and how to harmonize it with major 6 and diminished 7 chords.

FREE PDF AVAILABLE HERE ON THE GUMROAD STORE

SUMMARY

Major Sixth Chords

Diminished Seventh Chords

The Major Sixth Diminished Scale

Maj6 Diminished Scale Harmonization

Exercises

The Major Sixth Diminished Scale - Jazz Guitar Lesson Around The Barry Harris Concept

This guitar lesson is about a harmonic concept mapped out and developped by jazz musician Barry harris that can be found in the book "The Barry Harris Harmonic Method For Guitar" by Alan Kingstone.

This blog article details a little bit more in depth about what is the major 6 diminished scale and how to harmonize it with major 6 and diminished 7 chords.

FREE PDF AVAILABLE HERE ON THE GUMROAD STORE

SUMMARY

Major Sixth Chords

Diminished Seventh Chords

The Major Sixth Diminished Scale

Maj6 Diminished Scale Harmonization

Exercises

In this lesson, we explore Drop 2 and Drop 3 voicings for major 7 chords—two essential tools for creating richer, more professional-sounding harmony on the guitar.

In this lesson, we’ll explore 4 Levels of 2–5–1–6 Jazz Guitar Chords.

Whether you're a developing player building your jazz foundation or an intermediate guitarist looking to expand your chord vocabulary, these four levels will give you a structured path to stronger, more musical comping.

This lesson comes with a PDF (Give What You Want).

Barry Harris explained that the fully diminished seventh chord sits at the center of the system.

By making simple chromatic adjustments to its notes, it naturally resolves into dominant, minor 6, or major 6 chords.

Here is a structured guitar lesson focused on harmonized major scale arpeggios and chords in the key of C.

It is designed for intermediate students but can be adapted up or down depending on technique and theory background.

Rhythm changes are a cornerstone of the jazz repertoire, offering a compact yet harmonically rich framework for study and improvisation.

In this study, we focus on the A section, examining practical chord approaches that incorporate inversions and common substitutions.

The aim is to clarify the underlying harmony while expanding your comping vocabulary in a musical, idiomatic way.

This lesson is about one of the most useful and colorful substitution concepts in jazz harmony, which is to replace an altered dominant 7 chord (7b9) with a diminished 7 chord.

You'll find here 4 easy exercises and a YouTube short for playing it on guitar.

In this lesson, you will learn how to harmonize the major scale in sixth chords and 6add9 arpeggios to add a smooth, jazzy flavor to your playing.

Free PDF available here.

Welcome to this guitar lesson on exploring the arpeggios and chords of the harmonic minor scale—a rich and expressive sound widely used in classical, metal, jazz, and fusion genres

In this lesson, we'll dive into how this scale builds unique chords and arpeggios, including the diminished and augmented types you won’t find in major or natural minor harmony.

You'll learn how to visualize these shapes across the fretboard.

New PDF Method Available: