D# Half Whole Diminished Scale — Banjolele

The D# Half Whole Diminished scale has 8 notes per octave and belongs to the symmetric family. Here it is mapped onto the Banjolele's GCEA strings, position by position, with the root highlighted so the pattern anchors to D# wherever you play it.

Tense, symmetrical, and slightly sinister — alternating half and whole steps pack in the b9, #9, #11, and 13, so it sounds like a dominant chord stretched to breaking point. Edgy, jazzy, and restless.

Heard in: Jazz lines over 13b9 dominant chords, fusion, film-noir and horror scoring — the sound of a V chord that refuses to settle.

Reentrant tuning means the top string of the chart is not the lowest note — the maps below follow the Banjolele as it actually sounds, not a borrowed guitar chart.

Play each position slowly against the audio until the shape and the sound lock together, then take it to the progressions in D# to use it over real changes.