Hey Friend,
Last time, I introduced you to the major scale. We looked at the intervals involved in creating a major scale, and I gave you a simple pattern to help you learn it quickly. Like I said before, learn your patterns well - so well that you don't even need to think about them anymore. Do this, and those patterns will serve you the rest of your life and have the ability to take you wherever you want to go.
I thought I wanted to start you off with learning a key that we'll see a lot in Rock music, something like G major or D major, but there is wisdom in simplicity. So I'm going to stick with the common approach of teaching from the key of C major. And hey, if you already know it, consider this a nice refresher. Repetition IS the mother of all learning, you know...
The key of C major is perfect for teaching the major scale because it is simple. All the notes in the key are natural - that's right, no accidentals (sharps or flats). What you see is what you get. Here is the C major scale:
C D E F G A B C
What's more, every common chord in the harmonic progression uses those same notes in their construction. Even though each chord is the root of a different key, the chords for the key of C use only the notes from the key of C major.
C Dm Em F G Am Bdim C
The pattern for creating each of these chords is easy. Just remember 1 3 5. Every chord above uses the same pattern to construct it - and they use the notes from the C major scale.
If you were to be working with a different key, the same rule applies. Each chord belonging to that key would use the notes from that key's scale.
Check it out. The C major chord uses the C, E and G notes. 1 3 5.
The E minor (Em) chord uses the notes E, G and B. If I start counting from one with the E note being 1, G is 3 and B is 5. 1 3 5.
Even the B diminished (Bdim) chord follows the same pattern. Starting with the B note as 1, D is 3 and F is 5.
The major scale not only defines the notes from the key, it also makes it very easy to learn the chord constructions for the base chords in the key. And it works like this for each key.
So yeah, 1 3 5. Learn it and love it, because this pattern is the base for triads. There are some considerations we'll need to be aware of, but we're going to come back to those later. Commit the pattern to memory. 1 3 5.
Doe zaftra, moy droozya (until tomorrow, my friends).
Peace~
Dave | 
