Major vs. Minor Scale?

[teleharmonium]

Just to clear up what you said there second, The Aeolian mode of G major is simply the same set of notes, only starting from C, so: C - D - E - F - G# - A - B - C. .

that's not right, there are no gaps that large(3 half steps, F to G#) in any mode of a major scale.

G has one sharp, F#, so that's the only sharp in any mode of a major scale based on a G root.

the aeolian mode in the key of G would be E F# G A B C D E

aeolian starting on a C root (key of Eb) would be C D Eb F G Ab Bb C

 

[rydin4lifebass]

]
Just to clear up what you said there second, The Aeolian mode of G major is simply the same set of notes, only starting from C, so: C - D - E - F - G# - A - B - C.

Thanks for the right on track comment!..wouldn't the Aeolian mode of G major be E Aeolian?


EDIT: teleharmonium beat me to it....

 

[Blue_Whistle88]

The fact that the modes can be derived by starting on each degree of the major scale was (is) simply a convenient way to generate different scales.

They really are separate scales, each with its own sonic identity. It is sometimes better to think of them in terms of alterations to the major scale, while keeping the tonic (root) constant. Then after that you can think about which major scale shares those same pitches.

For instance, instead of thinking C major has the same notes as D dorian, etc., think of the dorian scale as a major scale with a flat 3 and 7. C dorian ALSO happens to have the same notes as Bb major.

The Aeolian has a flat 3, 6 and 7. And C aeolian also has the same notes as Eb major.

I believe this way is theoretically more useful.

First of all, they're not total alterations to the major scale because every single note is the same, not just the tonic. They are the major scale played with different context. If you think in terms of them using different notes to the major scale then, as I mentioned before, you increase the chance of you not being able to jump between modes without having to go back to the major scale to find your point of reference.

They each have their own sonic identity for sure, but this comes from them having the same notes in different context rather than having different notes. Appreciating that they have the same notes allows you to properly appreciate the different intervals relative to the root, and analyse how those intervals are the things that truly affect expression rather than whether it's a G or an F (though individual notes do sound different so that does affect the sound).

From a compositional point of view I do agree with you, I like to pick different modes to start to get certain sounds and evoke certain emotions, and as I was saying before, it's good to learn the characteristic interval of each mode so you can pick out what makes each one sound the way it does. But don't limit yourself to only thinking that way, just so you can use modes more fluidly.

that's not right, there are no gaps that large(3 half steps, F to G#) in any mode of a major scale.

G has one sharp, F#, so that's the only sharp in any mode of a major scale based on a G root.

the aeolian mode in the key of G would be E F# G A B C D E

aeolian starting on a C root (key of Eb) would be C D Eb F G Ab Bb C

Cheers. Sorry, I'd converted that list of notes from A Locrian and had a feeling there was a typo in there.

 

[teleharmonium]

The fact that the modes can be derived by starting on each degree of the major scale was (is) simply a convenient way to generate different scales.

They really are separate scales, each with its own sonic identity. It is sometimes better to think of them in terms of alterations to the major scale, while keeping the tonic (root) constant. Then after that you can think about which major scale shares those same pitches.

Yes, absolutely. Thinking of them as a derivative of a major scale is a short cut that ends up slowing you down dramatically. You don't want to have to have an extra mental step of calculating back to the related major scale when you need to think of a different scale and use it.

Being able to think of a floating specific set of notes other than major, changing the set as needed is a crucial foundational tool for improvisation over changes with even a little bit of complexity to them. You may as well get started on that sooner than later.

One of the interesting things about this is that by thinking of each mode as the unique scale that it is while you are playing them, you tend to retain the sound of that scale while improvising. Whereas if you mentally relate them to major you tend to end up sounding major. This is no small point, and a lot of people have conceptual trouble with the idea that the same set of notes can take on all of these different flavors by emphasis and context. The intervals you choose and the notes you favor reveal your thinking.

 

[teleharmonium]

They each have their own sonic identity for sure, but this comes from them having the same notes in different context rather than having different notes. Appreciating that they have the same notes allows you to properly appreciate the different intervals relative to the root, and analyse how how those intervals are the things that truly affect expression rather than whether it's a G or an F.

Right. And that's an interesting way of putting it. It's the relationship of the root to each of those intervals, not the notes themselves. Sort of like changing the meaning of a sentence just by altering word order or punctuation.

 

[Blue_Whistle88]

Right. And that's an interesting way of putting it. It's the relationship of the root to each of those intervals, not the notes themselves. Sort of like changing the meaning of a sentence just by altering word order or punctuation.

Well yea. If you think of the notes of being different, then it's easy to say "it's the different notes that make different sound", especially seeing as the notes are what we actually hear. It's all about relativity, that's what creates character and actually makes one set of notes sound the way they do (as a note is simply one isolated, identifiable pitch). It's the journey between notes that predominantly evokes emotion, not the start and end points of the journey.

 

[Richard Lindsey]

Thinking of them as a derivative of a major scale is a short cut that ends up slowing you down dramatically. You don't want to have to have an extra mental step of calculating back to the related major scale when you need to think of a different scale and use it.

Being able to think of a floating specific set of notes other than major, changing the set as needed is a crucial foundational tool for improvisation over changes with even a little bit of complexity to them. You may as well get started on that sooner than later.

One of the interesting things about this is that by thinking of each mode as the unique scale that it is while you are playing them, you tend to retain the sound of that scale while improvising. Whereas if you mentally relate them to major you tend to end up sounding major. This is no small point, and a lot of people have conceptual trouble with the idea that the same set of notes can take on all of these different flavors by emphasis and context. The intervals you choose and the notes you favor reveal your thinking.

^^ Yes. The common insistence on tying modes permanently to the major scale can actually hinder understanding of what they are best used for IMO. It can do this in two ways.

1. First, it can overcomplicate standard diatonic harmony without adding any explanatory power at all. I see many cases of folks believing that when they play a standard unaltered diatonic progression in, say, C Am7 Dm7 G7 in C, they're actually cycling through four different modes. There's no real need for this. That's not the most useful or elegant or even correct way to think about it. Really, that kind of progression is just moving harmonically through a single key. Now, there do exist musical segments where you really are changing your harmonic space with virtually every chord, but the types of standard diatonic functional progressions usually cited as examples are not that kind of thing.

2. Second, it can hinder the recognition of when you actually are playing in a mode. Some music--eg, certain folk or ethnic music, as well as jazz--is probably better understood as based on modes rather than classic functional harmony. If we're convinced that, say, D dorian is inextricably linked to C major, we might think we're "really" playing in C major when we're actually playing in D dorian. This would probably be kind of counterproductive.

This is why I usually suggest that when it comes time to address modes, people learn them from the same starting note--C ionian, C dorian, C lydian, etc. IMO that's a better way of getting a sense of how the sounds of the modes differ.

 

[MalcolmAmos]

Tonal center - it's real simple

If the Song is in C major - the chords will revolve around the three major chords, i.e. C, F, G.

If the Song is in Am - the chords will revolve around the three minor chords, i.e. Am, Dm, Em.

In fact that is the only way you can tell as both the notes and the chord are the same, it's how they are used that tell what key is being used.

The V-I or v-i cadence is what gives it's tonal center. If you use major chords it's going to sound major and if you use minor chords it's going to sound minor.

End of story, period.

 

[rydin4lifebass]

This is all definitly helping...

Just to see what it would “look” like if I play a I-IV-V 12 bar blues in C, I’m looking at
C7-C7-C7-C7
F7-F7-C7-C7
G7-F7-C7-G7

A i-iv-v in A minor would be
A7-A7-A7-A7
D7-D7-A7-A7
E7-D7-A7-E7

The 12 bar progression in A MAJOR would still be A7-D7-E7, but my chords would be different in. For example, in A Major, my A chord would be A-C#-E-G# (I-Major), versus the A-C-E-G (i-minor) in A Minor.

Did I get that right?

 

[smeet]

First of all, they're not total alterations to the major scale because every single note is the same, not just the tonic.

I think you misunderstood my point. The C dorian is a C major scale with the 3 and 7 flatted. We are keeping the tonic constant in this view.

 

[Richard Lindsey]

This is all definitly helping...

Just to see what it would “look” like if I play a I-IV-V 12 bar blues in C, I’m looking at
C7-C7-C7-C7
F7-F7-C7-C7
G7-F7-C7-G7

A i-iv-v in A minor would be
A7-A7-A7-A7
D7-D7-A7-A7
E7-D7-A7-E7

The 12 bar progression in A MAJOR would still be A7-D7-E7, but my chords would be different in. For example, in A Major, my A chord would be A-C#-E-G# (I-Major), versus the A-C-E-G (i-minor) in A Minor.

Did I get that right?

Not exactly. First, it may be worthwhile to distinguish when you're talking about triads (3-note chords) and when you're talking about seventh chords (4-note chords). Thus, in C major, ii is Dm, but Dm7 is technically ii7; V is G, but G7 is V7. We often skip this step, with no harm to animals or small children, but it's probably useful to be precise when you think of it.

Second, a i-iv-v in A minor would be Am Dm Em. In practice, as you'll learn when you study minor keys more, that Em is often, if not usually, turned into an E or E7 (with a G# rather than a G natural). Thus, you tend to see i-iv-V(7) quite often.

Third, a chord with a specific given name ALWAYS contains the same notes, no matter what key you find it in or what it's actually doing there. Thus, an A7 is always A-C#-E-G. It's never A-C#-E-G# or A-C-E-G, because those are different chords with different names (Amaj7 and Am7, respectively).

 

[teleharmonium]

This is all definitly helping...

Just to see what it would “look” like if I play a I-IV-V 12 bar blues in C, I’m looking at
C7-C7-C7-C7
F7-F7-C7-C7
G7-F7-C7-G7

A i-iv-v in A minor would be
A7-A7-A7-A7
D7-D7-A7-A7
E7-D7-A7-E7

The 12 bar progression in A MAJOR would still be A7-D7-E7, but my chords would be different in. For example, in A Major, my A chord would be A-C#-E-G# (I-Major), versus the A-C-E-G (i-minor) in A Minor.

Did I get that right?

The first one in C is right.

A minor 12 bar blues would generally be represented like this (using | to signify repetitions of the previous chord):

Am |||
Dm|Am|
E7 Dm Am E7

maybe in some cases those minor triads could be indicated as minor seventh chords. It's not like the minor seventh interval is going to be alien sounding over them, and it will often occur at the same time, from a melody instrument at least. So the question becomes, is the purpose of the chord chart to show what a chordal instrument is playing, or to analyze what is heard by everyone playing on the song ?

The next thing to get into is the relationships of scales to those chords. Blues make heavy use of both the major and minor thirds, with the resulting clash being an important ingredient. The simplest way to think of this is that the chordal instruments play the major 3rd while the melody instruments use the minor third or both of them. This explains why the minor pentatonic is often used over blues changes and also over blues based rock/pop changes that have major 3rds in the chords.

Those changes are so familiar that they are practically indestructible, so you'll hear players sliding around using every note there is and some that are in between and making it all work.

But as a student you should understand minor pentatonic and see that it works over those changes despite the 3rd conflict, and then you should make sure you can hear a larger, semi chromatic scale for blues changes like 1 2 m3 3 4 b5 5 7 8. (2 3rds, 2 5ths, no 6th. ) That will sound authentic and serve as a bridge to more chromatic playing.

 

[baileyboy]

The point of Am being a I chord in Am and a VI chord in C major is that it will function differently harmonically in those two different, albeit related keys. In Am it will be the root, the tonic, the I chord- it will be "home", where all resolutions eventually want to go. In C major it is not the tonic, it won't be home for all resolutions, etc., it will function as the IV chord.

So although Am is always exactly Am, it's the other chords with it in the piece of music, the chords before and after it, that provide context for the harmonic function of Am in a particular piece of music.

This!

 

[rydin4lifebass]

The first one in C is right.

A minor 12 bar blues would generally be represented like this (using | to signify repetitions of the previous chord):

Am |||
Dm|Am|
E7 Dm Am E7

maybe in some cases those minor triads could be indicated as minor seventh chords. It's not like the minor seventh interval is going to be alien sounding over them, and it will often occur at the same time, from a melody instrument at least. So the question becomes, is the purpose of the chord chart to show what a chordal instrument is playing, or to analyze what is heard by everyone playing on the song ?
QUOTE]

I see....didn't mean to throw confusion by saying a 7th chord versus a triad.

I was trying to keep it simple and say this:

In A Major my I-IV-V chords are
A-C#-E
D-F#-A
E-G#-B

In A minor my i-iv-v chords are
A-C-E
D-F-A
E-G-B

What I was trying to get out of that (in basic terms) is that evne though the "1" is the same, they are different chords with different notes, different names, different structures, different sounds, and occur in different scales

 

[teleharmonium]

I see....didn't mean to throw confusion by saying a 7th chord versus a triad.

I was trying to keep it simple and say this:

In A Major my I-IV-V chords are
A-C#-E
D-F#-A
E-G#-B

In A minor my i-iv-v chords are
A-C-E
D-F-A
E-G-B

What I was trying to get out of that (in basic terms) is that evne though the "1" is the same, they are different chords with different notes, different names, different structures, different sounds, and occur in different scales

Right.

 

[rydin4lifebass]

Cool...MUCH APPRECIATED....same goes for my 4-tone chords by adding the 7th. the "1" note is the same but the function, structure, etc. is all different.

Is a 12 bar blues usually written with 4-tone (7th) chords?...in major and minor scales?

 

[Bassmickeyd]

Good for you. ..... And knowing is the key. ...... Call it what you need to, to learn and understand it but, when you get into composition then the difference is more important to understanding why they're called what they are. ......
I've always suggested to my students to look at it a degrees of the major scale, the relative minor is the sixth degree of the scale. ..... C,D,E,F,G,A,B,C. ..... A is the sixth degree in the key of C so it is a relative minor. ...... It has all the same notes but the E is the 3rd of the 1 and the 5th of the sixth. ......... Food for thought.

 

[teleharmonium]

Is a 12 bar blues usually written with 4-tone (7th) chords?...in major and minor scales?

the answer to that question is kind of awkward.

You understand that "seventh" can refer to an interval, or any type of chord that includes some form of seventh degree, or a dominant chord with a seventh included along with the triad ? This makes it confusing sometimes.

But as far as chords are concerned, more often than not if we just say "seventh chord" we mean a dominant chord, like E7 . E major seventh and minor seventh and alterations of those are other kinds of chords that you will come across if you do what is known as "harmonizing a scale into seventh chords" which is an important thing to practice for jazz players.

Anyway, a regular (non minor) 12 bar blues is written as 7th chords because they happen to all be 7th chords; not because it's a principle to include the seventh degree.

In minor blues, the minor chords (i and iv usually) can be notated as minor triads or as minor sevenths... if you play the chords as minor seventh chords, they sound more jazzy... but if you play the chords as triads, the melody is quite possibly going to include the seventh interval anyway, so it's part of the tonality whether or not you include that interval in the chords.

Likewise the V7 in a minor blues (which can also be a v in some songs) is written as a seventh because it is a seventh as a very important characteristic quality of that chord, not because it needs to be written with a seventh interval included as a general rule.

 

[PaulMacCnj]

I will try to help some more...

Remember that the "mother of all scales" is the C major (Ionian).

That gives us:
C - D - E - F - G - A - B - C

Remember that and you can figure out anything in the standard scales; Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian. Here's how...

From the C Ionian, we get the following interval pattern:
W W H W W W H (W=Whole Tone, H = Half Tone)

Knowing that if you start playing the same set of notes on the D, we get the D Dorian / first mode of C Ionian:
D - E - F - G - A - B - C - D

Note that the interval pattern has changed. It is now:
W H W W W H W

See how it shifted along with the shift in starting note? Part of that change in interval pattern is what makes the Ionian Major and the Dorian Minor. In Ionian, the third is 2 whole steps from the root. In Dorian, it's 1.5 whole steps from the root. See that the 7th has changed, too. In Ionian, it's a half step below the root (Maj7). In Dorian, it's a whole step below the root (Dom7).

A good exercise is to work through each shift / mode. As bass players, knowing the patterns is a huge help. You don't need to remember exact note names as you're playing, with the exception of the root. Given a root and a scale, you have a lot to work with.

 

[PaulMacCnj]

One more thing and it's about the Blues. If you're learning scales / modes and the Blues at once, it can be very confusing. That's because the Blues doesn't follow the modes. That's why it sound so "bad" and "dissonant" to people that are entirely used to strictly modal music.

There are at least two ways to use the modes. One is to dictate the chords in a progression. For example, if you play 1 4 - 5 modally, it would be Ionian - Lydian - Mixolydian. In Rock, 1 - 4 - 5 is commonly Mixolydian for each chord, not modal. A second way to use the modes is to expand the palette of note available to use for a given chord. Wouldn't it be boring if everytime you played along with a C major chord (based on Ionian) you played it at the same position on the neck? Apply the modes, and you can play in C all over the neck. This applies to all chords / patterns.