He could have mentioned "Pentatonic scale". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentatonic_scale

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For those musically inclined, sticking to the black keys only produces a pentatonic scale.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentatonic_scale#Five_black-key_pentatonic_scales_of_the_piano

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>> ^marinara:

this video is 2 minutes shorter how is this a dupe?


It's 32 seconds shorter & the entire video is contained within it, I think that qualifies.

>> ^Barseps:

Sorry about this dude, but it looks like a dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Bobby-McFerrin-plays-the-audience-as-an-instrument

I feel like this should be a point/counterpoint, so I'll argue that this is an abomination.

If you want to use alternate tunings, tune your guitar alternatively. There is much more to alternate tunings than being able to play a pleasant chord without your left hand. If you're learning an alt-tuned song, you're probably going to run into issues playing it if you insist on leaving your guitar EADGBE, like, for example, I don't know, BEING ABLE TO PLAY OTHER CHORDS. Are you kidding me? Congratulations on having an open C chord, now play a G. Oh, you can't because you don't have access to the bottom four frets. This is an absurd invention.

And beyond learning other songs, for creating, it encourages stagnation, both musically in the song you're writing and in your development as a player and musician. One, as I mentioned, you're gonna have a hell of a time switching chords, which will be fine for, oh, about as long as this guy played in one stretch. Then your harmony needs to move somewhere, but you're up shit's creek. Secondly, alternate tunings are fun precisely because they challenge your mind. Where do you fret a C on the 3rd string when you're in open Dm? Figure it out! As you play more, you get a firmer grasp not just of the guitar, but of musical theory. You can learn a pentatonic scale and play for days, but by moving those notes from their normal position on the fretboard, you get your mind out of muscle memory playing and into a more active state.

In conclusion, this is not useful for learning other alt-tuned songs, and it encourages stagnation as a player. That, my friend, is an abomination.>> ^KnivesOut:

I don't think it's an abomination. I like it. It's really just a quick way to use a non-standard tuning, which guitarists have been doing for decades.

The kid's good, but blues isn't the venue for virtuosity. It has very limited harmonic potential, what with those pentatonic scales and all. For instance, I've been playing blues for 35 years and this kid plays blues better than me. Whoa, that can only mean I really suck.

I admit that I am not as much of a musical scholar as I would like. However, listening to this with my eyes closed I had a thought that appears to work itself out on paper. Using only the black keys is simply a pentatonic scale in Gb major. Musically this is one of the most common scales that there is (it's the predominant scale mode used in blues and quite a bit of rock music)