Help! I think I am in Harmonic Minor... Except for this one note in main riff!

[Junta]

Hey folks, help out this beginner figure out what scale he is in...

If I am really in harmonic minor like I think I am, what's with my starting (and then repeating) main riff (G to F) that has an 'illegal' 'F' in it? It does not sound 'out of place to my' poorly trained ears...

Using the tool below, I select the key of G, 'Dropped D' for both guitar and bass. I am playing all guitar and bass parts by the way, drums come from computer... This is my thing: record sweet nothing rock tunes all by myself...

Every other note in my bass parts and guitar parts (all notes in chords) are marked as 'in the scale' on the resulting chart the tool spits out as below... ALL but the F which I marked below myself:

Here you can hear the first three bars. I jacked up the volume of the bass so you can hear it. The F is right there in the starting bass riff, continuing in second and third bars in simplified form...

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]

What am I doing by adding this illegal F note? Is that putting me in another scale? If so, would that be what they call the double harmonic minor scale?

Thanks so much!

 

[J Wilson]

Don't get the cart before the horse.

Play what you think is right, then use theory to write it out.

Don't go before the Theory Court to get a ruling whether or not you can play it, if it fits that scale, etc.

 

[Junta]

Don't go before the Theory Court...

I heard scary stories about the Theory Court... Better not take a risk

 

[SteveCS]

figure out what key he is in...

If I am really in harmonic minor
...

Harmonic minor is not a key, it is a scale, just like natural and melodic. All three of them are diatonic, that is to say they 'belong to', the minor key. There are other similar threads active right now here:
ii-V-i confusion
and here:
Melodic Minor

 

[bikeplate]

You arent in a key. You are playing a scale.

 

[Junta]

Thanks folks. I am absolutely on shaky ground when I say anything about theory, but the key/scale confusion thing above was just not enough coffee to start the day. Corrected. Thanks.

@SteveCS, thank you - interesting and useful info in those threads.

 

[Chrisk-K]

You are in the key of G minor, playing the main bass riff in the G minor scale or G minor pentatonic scale.

 

[RG55]

That program, apparently, gives you the notes of the scale you choose, so -- why did you choose G Harmonic minor, instead of G Natural minor, or G Phrygian, or G Dorian? These 3 scales have the notes of a Gminor chord and an F.

 

[Papageno]

The G harmonic minor scale is: G A Bb C D Eb F#.
F does not belong to the G harmonic minor scale.

The programme you are using spells Gb instead of F#. While these 2 notes are enharmonic to each other (i.e., they sound the same pitch), they are not the same notes, by which I mean that they have very different harmonic implications, and using the correct spelling helps a lot identifying correctly what is going on harmonically when you read the music. To use an analogy, this is exactly similar to spelling and grammar is written text: using the proper spelling helps a lot with understanding the text, whereas incorrect or phonetic spelling may make the reading very hard.

In a similar way, using a key signature with Bb, Eb, and Gb, as the authors of the programme do, is a very very bad idea. Key signatures should really be used in the proper way unless you want to mislead and confuse readers. For G minor, the key signature comprises 2 flats (Bb and Eb, in this order), and the F# that appears in the harmonic minor should be written as an accidental.

 

[Koshchei]

Hey folks, help out this beginner figure out what scale he is in...

If I am really in harmonic minor like I think I am, what's with my starting (and then repeating) main riff (G to F) that has an 'illegal' 'F' in it? It does not sound 'out of place to my' poorly trained ears...

Using the tool below, I select the key of G, 'Dropped D' for both guitar and bass. I am playing all guitar and bass parts by the way, drums come from computer... This is my thing: record sweet nothing rock tunes all by myself...

Every other note in my bass parts and guitar parts (all notes in chords) are marked as 'in the scale' on the resulting chart the tool spits out as below... ALL but the F which I marked below myself:
View attachment 5104874

Here you can hear the first three bars. I jacked up the volume of the bass so you can hear it. The F is right there in the starting bass riff, continuing in second and third bars in simplified form...

[Invalid or Expired Link Removed]

What am I doing by adding this illegal F note? Is that putting me in another scale? If so, would that be what they call the double harmonic minor scale?

Thanks so much!

There are no illegal notes -- Having both a minor and major seventh in a minor scale makes it an octatonic bebop scale.