Learning jazz guitar can be intimidating and overwhelming for a beginning student. Unlike styles like rock, blues, and classical, jazz guitar demands that a musician master a wide variety of skills, including jazz guitar scales.
If you are absolutely fresh on jazz guitar, the first thing you've got to wrap your fingers around is the major scale and its modes. It's the reference against which all other scales are defined. Learn them in position as well as up and down single strings. It's also cool to practice them in one, two, and three octaves.
Once you've got those under your fingers and in your ears, it's time to start learning the melodic minor scale on guitar. The difference between a melodic minor scale and a major scale is only one note, the flat third. The melodic minor scale also has some really cool sounding modes, like lydian dominant which works over a 7#11 chord.
It's also important to learn your pentatonic scales. Most guitarists coming from a rock, blues, or country background are already familiar with the minor and major pentatonic scales, and if you aren't you have to check them out. The blues scale is also useful.
A common trap that students of jazz guitar fall into is only practicing scales up and down. Of course, it's important and is the first step to mastering jazz guitar scales. But if you're at a point where it's comfortable to play ascending and descending scales and you feel comfortable with the notes, the next step is to start practicing intervals and sequences. Also, try to vary the rhythm in your scale practice.
Learning jazz guitar scales is an essential part of mastering jazz guitar.
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