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The whole tone scale is a symmetrical scale made up completely of whole tones or major second intervals
This scale is used mainly for improvising over altered dominant chords because of the flat and sharp 5th’s contained in it.
If we were to make chords from this scale they would all be augmented triads, C+, E+, and so on
Only Two Scales
There are really only two of these scales, it repeats itself every major 2nd
The first one would contain half of the chromatic scale and the second one the rest of the chromatic scale.
You could start on C for the first one and then C♯ for the second one
You can play every other note on one string starting with an open note up to the 12th fret for a whole scale
Here is the whole tone scale compared to the chromatic scale
These are the only two scales. You just start on the note you want and every other note in the scale is two frets away or one whole tone
These are 6 note scales like the Blues scales
Chromatic Scale
C
C♯
D
D♯
E
F
F♯
G
G♯
A
A♯
B
C
Whole Tone One
Whole Tone Two
The whole tone scale is good for improvising over altered 5th dominant 7th chords like these. You may see the second two with a + sign C7+ this is the same chord.
The plus sign means augmented which usually refers to the 5th of a chord unless written like C7aug9. This means augment or raise the 9th one half step or in our case 1 fret
However you may see other ways of writing them because there really is no standard for the world. Different countries may do them differently.
C+9 would mean a ninth chord with a raised 5th. There are set standards for writing chord names but they aren’t always followed so you might have to try two chords to see which one sounds right.
Also there may be more than one way to write a chord. C+7, C7+ or C7♯5 can all mean the same chord.
Dominant 7th Altered 5th Chords
C Whole Tone
This scale is played against a C7♯5 chord.
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C whole tone played against a C7 augmented
This scale can be started from any tone in the chord. For the C7♯5 you could start on C, E, G♯ or B♭
These scales are all the same they just start at different points.