G Gypsy Minor Scale on Cavaquinho

Play the G Gypsy Minor scale on Cavaquinho with fretboard diagrams that map the pattern across the neck. The Gypsy Minor scale has 7 notes per octave and belongs to the world family.

G is available as an open string on Cavaquinho, and 2 of its 3 open strings are scale tones — D (the 5th), G (the root). The B string sits outside the scale. Open, the strings cover D4 to D5.

It is also known as the Hungarian Minor scale.

Harmonic minor with a raised 4th — two wide, yearning steps (b3 to #4, b6 to 7) give it a smoldering, theatrical intensity. Dark, exotic, and full of drama.

Heard in: Hungarian and Romani folk, Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsodies, gypsy jazz, klezmer, and neoclassical metal.

Cavaquinho is tuned D–G–B–D, with 15 frets to work with. Voicings are computed for this tuning by the shared voicing generator, not borrowed from another instrument; traditional technique may still use idiomatic shapes not charted here.

Each position shows the scale notes and their intervals from the root so you can connect the shape to its sound, hear it with audio playback, and practice it in any register. Movable patterns let you transpose the same fingering to other keys once it is learned.

Once a position is under your fingers, link the G Gypsy Minor scale to the chords it harmonizes and to progressions in the key of G to start improvising and writing with it. Working a scale alongside its chords is the fastest way to make it stick and to hear how it colors a progression.