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Modes and scales

#41
My whole point here is that there needs to be a chord(S) underneath these notes we are talking about...Otherwise, like you said, why not d dorian, a aeolian, etc.
With nothing there to play against, we can argue(discuss) all day long, right?
 
#42
Willplay4food,
I appreciate what you said, but look at what you told me to do. You told me to arpeggiate chords. Chords, not random notes from the c scale. Emin, Amin, Dmin is a 3-6-2 in C, and Dmin, G, C, is a 2-5-1 in C. I understand that they will sound different, because you are outlining chords from that key.
 
#43
spc..By that, if you are playing solo no chords are implied to your listener. I think it is acoustics or human nature or whatever (a different discussion) for the human ear to try to make sense of notes. Our brain makes choices about how we hear things, but these are often made on experience (other music we've heard). One of the exciting things about improvised music is to keep the ears and brain guessing. This often (but not always) come from the strategic use of not harmonic tones and unconventional shifts within a tonality. If you are improvising diatonically you are by default implying a tonality (dorian-min, lydian-major, mixolydian-dominant, etc). You are correct that without chords the scales/modes lack some definition but you are still hinting at chords.
 
#45
spc said:
My whole point here is that there needs to be a chord(S) underneath these notes we are talking about...Otherwise, like you said, why not d dorian, a aeolian, etc.
With nothing there to play against, we can argue(discuss) all day long, right?
Click to expand...

But again, what you say is not hanging together. If you need a chord to say what the notes are, then without a chord *you can't say they're C major either,* any more than you can say they're E phrygian, A aeolian, or whatever. And if you recall, your original assertion was that without a chord those notes somehow revert to being C major.

But in fact, as I explained, you don't need a chord. You just need to establish a tonal center. Play those two examples I gave you and tell me you don't hear a difference in where the tonal center sits. In the first one it's E, in the second one it's C.

Of course, when you add other instruments you can indeed change the perception of where the tonal center is. I won't get into that right now. But the key point is that establishing the basic tonality or modality of what you're doing is what tells you how to interpret the tones you're using--how they're functioning in the musical context. A B doesn't work the same way in C major that it does in, say, E phrygian.
 
#46
spc said:
Willplay4food,
I appreciate what you said, but look at what you told me to do. You told me to arpeggiate chords. Chords, not random notes from the c scale. Emin, Amin, Dmin is a 3-6-2 in C, and Dmin, G, C, is a 2-5-1 in C. I understand that they will sound different, because you are outlining chords from that key.
Click to expand...

But this is precisely the point--that how you *select from* and use the tones from the set EFGABCD that determines what the tonality/modality is.
 
#47
spc said:
My whole point here is that there needs to be a chord(S) underneath these notes we are talking about...
With nothing there to play against, we can argue(discuss) all day long, right?
Click to expand...
Wrong.

One well trained single note musician can play a single note line through a chord progression and perfectly outline the chord progression. With no reference notes or chords playing in the background.

We call this "playing through the changes".

Playing through the changes does not mean playing random notes of the C Major scale through a Dm7-G7-CM7 chord progression. No, it means carefully choosing notes from the chords to play on particular beats during the measure, connecting those chord tones with notes inside the C Major scale, or outside the C Major scale, as chosen by the musician to create tension and release or to lead to the next note.

It is a wonderful thing to hear. If an experienced single note musician plays a line through a chord progression, another experienced chord musician can pick up on the chords for that progression right away.

If you do not know this, then you lack training.

Check out "Connecting Chords with Linear Harmony" by Bert Ligon to get pretty deep into this stuff.

Good luck.

Tim99.
 
#48
spc said:
The modes are taught as c to c is ionian, d to d (following the c scale) is d dorian but check it out...
If the guitar player is playing dminor and you're playing defgabcd (d dorian) on your bass, that is what gives the mode it's "character", the chord, not the notes. If Mr. guitar player stops playing, and you are still playing those notes, you are now playing plain old c major . Many people here disagree, and say that it is where the whole and half steps fall, but those notes (defgabcd) by themselves in whatever order BY THEMSELVES are still a c scale. If Mr. guitar player is playing E minor, and you are playing the notes of a c scale (let's say efgabcde), you are playing e phrygian. If he stops, guess what, plain old c scale again.
Click to expand...
Wow. Very Very Good Stuff.

Ok, this description is just not what is happening in music. We have a measure with 4 beats to it. We are used to something important happening on one, something not quite so important happening on 3, and a little introduction as to what is coming next on the 4 or the and of four. If my chord progression is Dm7-G7-CM7, with one measure for each, with Dm7 in the first measure, G7 in the second measure, and CM7 in the third measure...then for the 1st beat of the first measure I play F#, for the 3rd beat I play a D or an A, the 1st beat of the second measure I play a B, the 3rd beat I play a G or a D, then for the 1st beat of the third measure I play an E, and the 3rd beat I play a C or a G. Ok inbetween those notes I play anything I want inside the C Major scale to connect those notes. I may add that going from the Dm7 to the G7 using C to B is typical and adds to the sound of the progression. Also going from the G7 to the CM7 by using F to E adds to the sound of the progression. That will outline that chord progression. That type of playing connects our ears and our expectaions with the great masters of music down through the ages.

The original point was that a string of single notes could not define a chord progression. I say it can. What sayest thou.

Tim99.
 
#49
This is why I get upset when someone teaches that you can look at a Dm7-G7-CM7 and identify that it is in the key of C Major and just play the C Major scale. Yes you can and yes you can get away with it, and yes it is "safe", but it is..."ambiguous" and "generic".

This thread has like become the reverse of that. Yes random playing up and down the C Major scale does not have any chord progression sound to it, but that is not music. That is not the context that our ears expect.

I submit that putting the chord tones in expected places in time will will bring out the same tonailty that playing the chords in the background do. It is astonishing, but true.

Tim99.
 
#52
SPC - you're trying to explain modes without a firm grasp on functional harmony, or even basic theory for that matter. Many others have explained this, and you refuse to listen to voices of experience. Tim99 posted some great stuff above, and deleted it for some reason. I'm going to repost it, and hope I'm not stepping on his toes.

As many others have said, playing random notes from the C scale doesn't mean you're playing in C - or any other key for that matter. You need to understand the impact of what happens when you put chord tones on strong/weak beats, how to resolve certain notes, etc.

Listen to what folks are telling you, understand that they are experienced and knowledgable, and most importantly try some of these things at a piano so you can hear what they sound like. This will prove most insightful.
 
#53
Tim99 - please forgive me, but I undeleted your posts. There's way too much good information in there to not share it!
 
#55
spc-also realize that we are just trying help. This should not be a argument but rather a place to trade and expand knowledge. Theory happens to be an area of personal interest to me and I know quite a bit about it. I am a teacher by day and player by night. Maybe it is my teacherly genes kicking in and trying to foster a better understanding of basic harmony.
 
#57
spc said:
Why is it wrong?...The sound and character of the mode comes from the chord(S) it is being played up against. By themselves, notes are just notes. Care to explain why this is wrong?
Click to expand...
No. It is wrong because notes are never by themselves. By definition "notes" are more than one note. And the human ear/brain combination somehow relates the sound/character/mood/feeling of a "series" of notes based on the first note heard. If you play a "first" note, and then play a series of "other" notes, their will be a specific and definable feeling of that "series" of notes. In music, we have measures where the first note of each measure restarts the reference value that the other notes in the measure are related to. It is the combination of the memory of the first note and memory or actual sound of the following notes that creates a mood/feeling.
spc said:
Me playing notes from the c scale in any order by myself is the c scale. Again, unless every time you play whatever scale, you play it starting on and ending on the same note.
Click to expand...
No. The sound of the C Major scale is C D E F G A B C. When you play those same notes in the exact same order but starting on a different starting note, you obtain a different sound/character/feeling. For example, when you play D E F G A B C D, you get the sound/feeling of D dorian, which is absolutely different than the sound of C Major.
spc said:
My whole point here is that there needs to be a chord(S) underneath these notes we are talking about...Otherwise, like you said, why not d dorian, a aeolian, etc.
Click to expand...
No. My whole point here is that there does not need to be any reference note or chord played along with a series of notes for the human ear to hear and the human brain to determine the character/feeling of that series of notes to be from a particular scale, mode, chord, or chord progression. If the person playing the series of notes is a trained musician, and the person hearing those notes is a trained musican, the person hearing the series of notes will be able to know and understand the framework that is being defined by the "series" of notes. This second person can start playing along with the first person, and there can be an understanding between those two people as to what the actual scales, modes, and chords are being outlined.

Tim99.
 
#60
tim99 said:
This is why I get upset when someone teaches that you can look at a Dm7-G7-CM7 and identify that it is in the key of C Major and just play the C Major scale. Yes you can and yes you can get away with it, and yes it is "safe", but it is..."ambiguous" and "generic".

This is C maj though, right? (2-5-1)

I submit that putting the chord tones in expected places in time will will bring out the same tonailty that playing the chords in the background do. It is astonishing, but true.

Tim99.
Click to expand...

I agree with that, I guess my original post should have been something along the lines of "There will most likely be more going on than running c to c, or d to d, such as voice leading, or another instrument playing chords,,,"
 

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