What are scales?

[Gazaridis]

I know they're a series of notes, but why are those notes there in the first place??? After learning a couple of solos that looked like they were scales (ie: most intervals of 2 and one of 1 fret), it seems to me that scales are not rules, but simply observations - the pentatonic scale, for example - did someone simply play those notes, found they gave gave a sorta bluesy sound, and call it a scale?? So what are they, rules or observations?

[StoneDragon]

IMHO music comes first.... always.

Theory is nothing more than people sitting around saying, "Gee... that sounds pretty good. Why?" And then they analyze the notes invovled and see if they can distill it down to patterns and formulas. On the other hand, you have those who might say, "I wonder what it would sound like if...."

After several hundreds of years doing this, you can pretty well bet that every possible combination of notes has already been tried and analyzed at one point or another. Certain combinations (like pentatonic scales and the major scale) are so common that they become "rules" that people use to judge "other" combinations by.

The only "real" rule of music is that certain combinations of notes are consonant (they blend well together) and certain combinations are dissonant (they clash with one another). This is an inescapable scientific phenomenon caused by vibrational frequencies. Everything else is a matter of personal preference.

Left to their own devices, people tend to gravitate toward consonant sounds or simple patterns. That's what distinguishes music from noise. 99.9% of the time, an "untrained" musician will default to the most commonly used notes (pentatonic or major/minor scales) even if they "think" they are doing something "unique". I've seen this time and time again with students who were reluctant to learn theory and "feel" players that I have known. I believe that this is where the most common "scales" came from in the first place.

My outlook on theory is that "somebody else" has already done all the work of analyzing and categorizing the note combinations. So why not take advantage of that.