F Harmonic Minor — Tenor Banjo

F Harmonic Minor is 7 notes to the octave (common family), drawn here across the Tenor Banjo's CGDA strings with every F marked, so home stays visible from anywhere in the pattern.

Dark and dramatic. The raised 7th pulls hard toward the tonic, and the wide step from the b6 up to it gives the scale an exotic, almost Middle-Eastern tension.

Heard in: Classical minor-key harmony, neoclassical metal (Yngwie Malmsteen), flamenco-tinged rock, klezmer, and Balkan melodies.

Fifths put seven semitones between neighbouring open strings, so a scale spreads three or four notes to a string and one fingering repeats across every pair — learned once, moved sideways.

Run it against a click at a tempo where every note gets the same weight. On a banjo an uneven scale is audible immediately — the instrument gives you no sustain to hide behind.