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Double Bass In the Mode

#41
Damon Rondeau said:
Just so the conversation doesn't seem quite so stilted to the reader who doesn't know what's going on or who may not know the players in this little dustup:

Ray Parker is well-known around here. You have to be a complete newbie not to be aware of Ray. If you've taken the trouble to get to know him through his contributions and through his playing, you'll know he's one of the most seasoned vets we have here, he's very willing to share his expertise, and he has a practical approach to things.

nothinggod is a question mark who turned up out of nowhere to say a bunch of stuff about modes.
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Sorry, just saw this thread. I'll add this...

While I agree with Damon's assessment of the situation, we can simplify even further and get to the heart of the matter, which is essentially this: on this board, we have people who post under their own names, people who post under anagrams of their own names but who freely admit who they are if asked (T-Bal, DZ, mpm, etc.), and then we have folks who post under anonymous screen names. Some of the anonymous folks fill in their profiles, some don't. That's all well and good for the most part, and I have no problem with that in general.

UNLESS one of those folks who chooses to remain anonymous decides to start arguing vehemently with, insulting, and/or flaming others on this board. When this happens, the anonymous person has ZERO credibility in my eyes, and will be treated exactly as his/her behavior warrants. The person who insults form behind an anonymous screen name is (in my opinion) the worst kind of coward, similar to a child throwing dog turds at cars from behind the safety of a tree at night...the difference is that the internet guy should know better if he/she is over about 12 or so.

NOTHINGGOODTOSAY - in short, you have three choices.

a) Remain anonymous, but refrain from arguing with/attacking other members in any way, shape, or form;

b) Reveal who you are, so that those with whom you disagree will have a point of reference to help in the assessment of whether the disagreement is from a reasonable source or not.

c) Remain anonymous and keep arguing and insulting people who are not hiding behind a screen name, in which case you will no longer be welcome here.

The rest is up to you. Think carefully.
 
#43
nothinggod said:
A scale can modulate from one register to another (like a raga for example)
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Your analogy is false. Ragas are not scales, they are precise melody forms. :rollno:

nothinggod said:
I would point out that any fretless instument is microtonal and as such can move beyond the constraints of a 12 tone chromatic system. I mean you can say that sitar was not developed to play western music. It doesn't mean it can't and hasn't been used in that context. And if you play a fretless electric bass the same applies.
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:rollno:
You've lost me there. Why bring up the sitar while discussing fretless instruments? The sitar is indeed fretted. Had you ever seen one or picked one up, you would know that. The sitar is a tempered instument, though not a fixed temperament as the fretts are tied to the instrument, making them movable.
 
#48
I've noticed in jazz message boards of late that Mozart seems be a kind of tonal music whipping boy of posters seeking to sow the seeds of new music -as if that could be achieved through banter and theory rather than serious musical apprenticeship through tonal music and beyond. And Nothinggod’s comments almost bordered on conspiracy theory as if Mozart were the devil and “twinkle, twinkle” was his apple corrupting generations of young musicians with his diatonic brainwashing. There might also be a correlation to geographic centre :eyebrow: with these types of ideas as well.

Another thing I notice is a a gainsaying argumentative streak ie "You're incorrect what I was saying was this. " "No what I was saying was this..." Each time making the supposition more vague to the point where there is nothing really substantial that can be argued. For example:

Your assumption is wrong. Actually I should ellaborate. It's really not whether Mozart himself was redundant, rather that the belief that the major scale and diatonic system is the centre of all music is redundant

After saying this:

Or do you just sit around and try to look ecclectic when you listen to Mozart's redundant excursions up and down the major scale and think that that is the be all and end all of tonal theory

Read the 2 posts carefully. The redundant scale passage refers to the music's composer. How could our belief of the diatonic system as the center of music be redundant. Redundant of what? Sit around trying to look eclectic?Completely nonsensical.
 
#50
This forum is nothing more than a bunch of idiotic jazz wankers all thinking they have a clue. The only person here that DOES seem to have a clue is Bass_means_low. I mean you morons only have to read what I say and THINK about it, which very few of you seem to have the capacity to do. As for who is insulting who here, it wasn't me that that resorted to making assumptions about what kind of education that idiot, Ray Parker has. You people are like every other online community, a lot of morons that band together to support each other's stupidity. Who I am is frankly none of your business.

As for how I look in the eyes of Chris Fitzgerald, why would I care at all when you are just as petty as these other retards? "NOTHINGGOODTOSAY". Yuck yuck, you are the apex of witty reparte. You have no credibility yourself given the fact you don't seem to be able to assess what I have said for its content. Now bare this in mind. The one person that actually made a thoughtful comment also has some referential information. While the rest of you dimwits all band together to support each other and try to discredit me. Pathetic.

But enough of you idiots I will persue this conversation with the one person that doesn't seem to be a complete intellectual cripple here.

Bass_means_low, thankyou for your thoughtful comments. I do want to address the last thing you said in your post though, which was: "The lydian dominant is just the melodic minor scale starting on the four."
While this is true that the 4th mode of Melodic Minor has the degrees {1, 2, 3, #4, 5, 6, b7} and is therefore enharmonic to Lydian Dominant, my whole assertion here is that one scale does not need to be subserviant to a parent scale just because we are more familiar with that particular scale. What I am saying is that either mode is a equally a function of the other. Most of what I am really talking about has to do with the way that nomenclature seems to take the place of actual mechanics though. I mean if we look at it in a pitch class sense you can see that the PC set will be {0,2,4,6,7,9,10} in either case. What I am saying though, is that this PC set represents both an autonomous scale and a modal permutation of another scale. In fact, of six other scales. However, when we look at it as a PC set there is no reason to asume which scale has heirachy.
This goes back to what I have been saying all along though. That scalar and tonal heirachy are basically resultant of conditioning and nomenclature.

To address Mike Barbar.

You are correct to say that a raga is not a scale, however what I was trying to illustrate was that a scale can move beyond a certain number of degrees in one particular octave. I used the example of a raga to illustrate how this works. My mistake.
As for your point about sitar, I never claimed it was a fretless instrument I was merely making the point that just because the bass was developed for the western tonal system, which I think is debatable given the use of various contrabass instruments in non western music, doesn't mean that it is bound to play only diatonic based music. I used the sitar as an example of cross cultural instrumentation.

Nypiano, you are definitly on to somethng there with Mozart and the apple. I wouldn't blame Mozart though he was just a 5 year old when he wrote twinkle twinkle. As for redundant, I suggest you get a concise dictionary and discover that it means more than just 'needless usage of words'. But was it really refering to the composer? I thought you said, or at least implied that you read the post carefully.

So much for the moderator's little tantrum and closing the forum though.

Keep digging, kids
 
#53
nothinggod said:
This forum is nothing more than a bunch of idiotic jazz wankers all thinking they have a clue. I mean you morons only have to read what I say and THINK about it, which very few of you seem to have the capacity to do.
Click to expand...

I take it you haven't figured out how to read profiles yet.

As for who is insulting who here, it wasn't me that that resorted to making assumptions....
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See above.

As for how I look in the eyes of Chris Fitzgerald, why would I care at all when you are just as petty as these other retards? "NOTHINGGOODTOSAY". Yuck yuck, you are the apex of witty reparte.
Click to expand...

Who was trying to be funny? I was just calling it as I saw it.

You have no credibility yourself given the fact you don't seem to be able to assess what I have said for its content. Now bare this in mind...
Click to expand...

I'm assessing your use of the word "bare" in the phrase, "bare this in mind", and my assessment is that it really belongs Here.

While the rest of you dimwits all band together to support each other and try to discredit me. Pathetic.
Click to expand...

It's a cliché, but you don't need us to discredit you - you've done a fine job of that yourself. I suppose that makes us all redundant...

But enough of you idiots I will persue this conversation with the one person that doesn't seem to be a complete intellectual cripple here.

Bass_means_low, thankyou for your thoughtful comments. I do want to address the last thing you said in your post though, which was: "The lydian dominant is just the melodic minor scale starting on the four."
While this is true that the 4th mode of Melodic Minor has the degrees {1, 2, 3, #4, 5, 6, b7} and is therefore enharmonic to Lydian Dominant, my whole assertion here is that one scale does not need to be subserviant to a parent scale just because we are more familiar with that particular scale. What I am saying is that either mode is a equally a function of the other. Most of what I am really talking about has to do with the way that nomenclature seems to take the place of actual mechanics though. I mean if we look at it in a pitch class sense you can see that the PC set will be {0,2,4,6,7,9,10} in either case. What I am saying though, is that this PC set represents both an autonomous scale and a modal permutation of another scale. In fact, of six other scales. However, when we look at it as a PC set there is no reason to asume which scale has heirachy.
Click to expand...

Not that it matters, but the prime form of that PC set would be [0,2,3,5,6,8,10]. And again you make an assumption by stating, "there's no reason to asume which scale has heirachy". Your assumption is that the composer of the piece of music using this collection had no intention of tonality. At best, this can only be determined on a situational and contextual basis. Also, if you are going to go around accusing others of being "idiots", it might behoove you to check the spelling in your diatribe.

This goes back to what I have been saying all along though. That scalar and tonal heirachy are basically resultant of conditioning and nomenclature.

To address Mike Barbar.
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See above.


Folks, our pompous and vitriolic friend has just been banned from the forum. He's likely to attempt a return visit, as trolls often do. Be on the lookout for misspelled pomposity, and please report its occurrence directly to Sam or myself when you run across it.

I'm going to reopen the thread tonight with the understanding that if Sam feels it is irrevocably screwed up by troll droppings, he can of course close it with my blessings. In the meantime, if anyone would like to continue to help the original poster better understand modes, please feel free to do so.
 
#55
iPlay15151515 said:
Ok,

I read many of the posts about modes and finally have a technical understanding of what they are and how to identify/derive them.

So, in the bluegrass genre, how do I use them? Please start with something very basic/simple.

Thanks
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It's sort of ironic that all that ponderous pontificating was in response to this original post, which asked for something simple that could be used in Bluegrass.....:hmm:

Never has a thread got so "Off Topic".... ;)
 
#60
iPlay15151515 said:
Not yet, but I'll try it later today or this evening and post the midi file.

C Dorian is based on Bb Major with C as the first degree of the C Dorian mode/scale?

The pattern would be whwwwhw? C,D,Eb,F,G,A,Bb,C?
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Correct.

The way I learned to distinguish modes was the "LIMDAP system" (I don't know if this is a real system, just what I nicknamed it. I extended it it to LIMDAPL -- rhymes with "Snapple" -- the reason for I will explain in a moment). This was from my theory class in college.

The LIMDAP refers to an order of modes: Lydian, Ionian, Mixolydian, Dorian, Aeolian, Phrygian (add Locrian for LIMDAPL).

The idea is a logical movement left-to-right (but we'll go up-down due to formating on the web) based on raising and lowering of degrees. Taking a parallel approach (all with C as tonic):

Lydian: C D E F# G A B C
Ionian: C D E F G A B C
Mixolydian: C D E F G A Bb C
Dorian: C D Eb F G A Bb C
Aeolian: C D Eb F G Ab Bb C
Phrygian: C Db Eb F G Ab Bb C​

and also
Locrian: C Db Eb F Gb Ab Bb C ​

The reason they left Locrian out was because, according to my teacher, Locrian can't be used because of its diminished 5th... it's too unstable, or some nonesense like that. Horse-hockey as far as I'm concerned.

But, do you notice a pattern? Notice the progression of raising and lowering degrees from mode to mode? Once I wrapped my head around that relation, I came to know modes like the back of my hand. ;)





Hey, where did that mole come from?!
 

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