Music theory/modal arpeggios question

[Ewo]

The best thing for me (in tonal music) is to think of a major scale as an ordered collection of notes. You can start the scale anywhere in that collection, and go up to the next octave. Those are the modes.

And you can build chords on every scale step. Just skip every other one, and when you have four there's the seventh chord built on that step. Those are your arpeggios, in root position. If you play the _chord_ notes starting on any note other than the bottom (the one you built it from by skipping over notes), those are the inversions of that chord.

Hey, simple is good--for me at least. But srsly, I find that approach helps me see the modes and arpeggios on the fretboard.

 

[navijaz]

The modes are originally a collection of monophonic melodic material. They come from a "horizontal" way of thinking music, and were developed at a time when most intervals used today, including thirds, were considered impure.

Chords on the other hand are a "vertical" approach. Stacked intervals, in particular thirds. An arpeggio is a broken up chord.

So essentially the two come from a completely different musical concept, even though today we simplify by saying "mixolydian over dominant chord" and so on.

 

[IJBurns]

So a modal arpeggio isn't a thing? Is that what I'm understanding? So if I want to work on, again I'll use Lydian arpeggios, me playing a 1 3 5 7 9 #11 13 one note at a time all over the fingerboard in whatever key I'm working in, isn't me actually playing an arpeggio but playing...... ? What would it be called then? Man, I'm so confused now. I'm going to take a pic out of my Patitucci book once I dig it out of the pile because I got a lot of this info from there. Maybe I just misunderstood the information he was presenting. I have very little formal theory training so 98% of the little bit I do know is from sitting down with academic and less formal texts and trying to decipher and make sense of the information myself. I'm sure I got it all twisted somewhere down the line. Seriously. I have no intention of posting incorrect advise and definitely no desire to continue in ignorance.

 

[StatesideRambler]

Here's the DIY visual aid for the "ecclesiastical modes" also known as "church modes" which are based on the Major scales (plural). Draw a circle and write capital C at the top. Divide the circle into seven equal parts (don't be fancy, just ballpark it). Moving clockwise, write the remaining notes of the C Major scale, one alongside each segment, returning to C at the top.

Now, to use it: beginning and ending at C, step around the circle clockwise. That's the C-Ionian mode. When you begin/end at D it's D-Dorian, at E it's E-Phrygian, et al.

Next, draw another circle with A at the top and the notes of the A Major scale (A-B-C#-D-E-F#-G#) going around. A-Ionian begins/ends with A, B-Dorian begins/ends with B, C#-Phrygian begins/ends with C#, et al. If you like, you can do that for all the Major keys.

You see from this that the modes are tied NOT to the pitches, but to the degrees of the Major scale of the selected key.

Beyond that, I'll refer you to mambo4's most excellent post above.

 

[Reedt2000]

So a modal arpeggio isn't a thing? Is that what I'm understanding? So if I want to work on, again I'll use Lydian arpeggios, me playing a 1 3 5 7 9 #11 13 one note at a time all over the fingerboard in whatever key I'm working in, isn't me actually playing an arpeggio but playing...... ? What would it be called then? Man, I'm so confused now. I'm going to take a pic out of my Patitucci book once I dig it out of the pile because I got a lot of this info from there. Maybe I just misunderstood the information he was presenting. I have very little formal theory training so 98% of the little bit I do know is from sitting down with academic and less formal texts and trying to decipher and make sense of the information myself. I'm sure I got it all twisted somewhere down the line. Seriously. I have no intention of posting incorrect advise and definitely no desire to continue in ignorance.

That would be arpeggiating the lydian mode. Yes technically if you extend the arpeggio (series of every other note played from the mode) all the way to the 13th you have used all of the notes in the mode. I think this is just a question of confusing terminology. Arpeggio implies notes of a chord, mode implies a scaler sequence. In the long and short of things as long as the organs in your head find the vibrations your instrument makes in the air pleasing, it don't matter what any of us call them!

 

[StatesideRambler]

So a modal arpeggio isn't a thing?

Nope, it isn't. At least it isn't a thing among schooled musicians.

I had a teacher long ago who explained the use of modes in rock and popular music thusly: Songs identify with modes. e.g. Most of Santana's music lends itself to solos that use the fingering of the Dorian mode of the song's key. You can finger your solos however you like but using the Dorian mode makes it much easier and sounds smoother. Dylan's All Along the Watchtower is Aeolian in character.

Chord structure is built on the key, modes in most modern music are simply another way to view and play the key and scales.

 

[InhumanResource]

Thanks for the responses. I'm still a bit confused so just to clarify:

I'm doing an arpeggio exercise where you limit yourself to 5 frets of the fretboard and play arpeggios up and down but only using the notes available to you within those 5 frets. The idea is to play it from the lowest possible note to the highest so like with the above example Cmaj7, if using the first 5 frets you'd start from the low E and up to the high C.

So really what I'm asking is does that way of playing the Cmaj7 arpeggio have a name?

I always thought that modes can be applied to anything including chords?
I = Ionian/CDEFGAB
ii = Dorian/DEFGABC
iii = Phrygian/EFGABCD
and so on...

Like @Mushroo said, if you wanted to name it something you would just name it after the correct inversion, since you're just doing a cool melodic exercise based on chord inversions. Not everything has a name.

This is great exercise to train yourself to think about walking lines, btw.

 

[MalcolmAmos]

As always Mambo's posts makes it clear. Modes are moods of a scale.

Now chords are another animal and have another job to do. If you are playing tonal they resolve back to the tonic chord.

If you are playing modal the chord should call attention to the signature note of the mode. For example; have the # 4 note in its make up for Lydian, b7 for Mixolydian. and most importantly not resolve, but drone on through the use of a modal vamp, not a chord progression as we normally think of a progression. Tonal resolves, modal does not resolve. So here again two different animals.

Thus Mambo hits it on the head there are scales and modes and then there are chords. If you want to hear the modal mood give it a chordal vamp to be played over. A chord that has a #4 note droning as a vamp works for Lydian, etc.

They are different items with different jobs.

 

[Mushroo]

So a modal arpeggio isn't a thing? Is that what I'm understanding? So if I want to work on, again I'll use Lydian arpeggios, me playing a 1 3 5 7 9 #11 13 one note at a time all over the fingerboard in whatever key I'm working in, isn't me actually playing an arpeggio but playing...... ? What would it be called then?

I would say that you are "practicing scales." Instead of just running the notes of the scales up and down, you are adding a variation by breaking the scale into 3rds.

3rds are a highly musical interval to have in your muscle memory, so I don't see anything at all wrong with your exercise.

Your specific example works out to F, A, C, E, G, B, D, F if I'm not mistaken. I'd like to propose an alternate way of looking at that particular sequence of notes, that doesn't require the concept of "modes." What if, for example, you think of it as the chord progression FMaj7 - G7, in arpeggio form? Then instead of just learning scales, you are thinking, how can these notes function to create an arpeggiated chord progression and write a song? For example, FMaj7 - G7 could be IV - V in the key of C Major. Maybe that points you in the direction of writing the bridge section of your song in A Minor (the relative minor of C) and so forth.

 

[DrummerwStrings]

I think of modes as telling me where to put two semitones on an eight-note scale (thinking of a number line starting at the root, aka 1, with 7 intervals going to the octave, aka 8). The "church modes" circle in post #24 help visualize where to put the semitones for each mode (Ionian, Dorian, etc.) - which intervals get whole tones & semitones.

A Cmaj7 chord or arpeggio tells you to play 4 notes, and it tells you the spaces of the three intervals between the 4 notes - one tone for each interval.

So if you play a Cmaj7 chord in the C# Major scale, you play the 4 notes that make the chord, and the C# Major scale tells you to use some semitones in certain intervals. Same Cmaj7 chord, this time C# Lydian scale: the 4 notes that make the chord, & the chord's intervals, did not change; the Lydian scale will have semitones in different locations than the Major scale - different intervals in the Lydian scale will have semitones than in the Major scale.

I've been trying to think of some good, vivid analogies (I thought of hopscotch patterns, and counting using base 10, base 2 or binary, & base 16 or hexadecimal) but they're problems with comparing them to modes & chords. I'll try to come up with better examples.

 

[Tommyc]

Inversion became a way for classical composers to resolve in close harmony i.e. moving in the smallest steps. If you're in c major for example egc or 1st inversion, it would be notated in the figured bass method as I 6. The six would be small as written. Six because e to c creates a sixth. If one were to further invert that one chord and spell it gce it would be notated in figured bass as a six four chord with little numbers again to the right. Six four because g to e is a sixth and g to c is a fourth. In close harmony the different inversions have different options for resolution too. A six four chord though it may be a 1 major chord has been made to be, through inversion, in a dissonant condition and wants to move (cadence) to the dominant V and can do so in half steps (close harmony)
Inversion itself becomes a cool learning tool as, invert a major interval and it becomes a minor interval . Seconds become 7ths 3rds become 6ths , 4ths inverted become 5ths. Tritones stay tritones. Ha, so much for diabolus in musica.

 

[Norwegian Bass]

CMaj7 - Dmin7 - Emin7 - FMaj7 - G7 - Amin7 - Bmin7b5 - CMaj7

Hey, that's the thing Jaco plays in Modern Electric Bass (from 3:25)


Although he says" G7(add9) without the G in it".

 

[dreamadream99]

Start a scale in a different spot: you get a mode
Start a chord or arpeggio on a different note: you get an inversion (not a mode.)

There you have it.

 

[IJBurns]

I like the scale in thirds explanation. Years ago when I was learning all of my scales and modes: Major, Harmonic minor and Melodic minor, I vaguely remember going through Ed Friedland's Jazz Vocab and John Pattitucci's Scale/Etude book and I remember doing these exercises outlining each mode of the scales and learning to connect each mode to the other by playing up the mode, outlining, in thirds and connecting each one by a half step. I guess the KEY word there is OUTLINING the mode and NOT "ARPEGGIATING" like I've been misusing and misunderstanding for the last five years. Thanks for clearing that up! Man, words are a funny thing! Outlining chords is not arpeggiation. Got it!

 

[groooooove]

it's C maj7

depending on the context you could label it over E or not.

 

[Reedt2000]

it's C maj7

depending on the context you could label it over E or not.

Context certainly can make a big difference in the label you use to describe it.

Against a C chord
E G B D can be thought of as the Cmaj9 arpeggio starting at the 3rd
Against an Em chord
E G B D is the Emin7 arpeggio in root position

 

[Rhythmman535]

I'm a bit new to modes and have not really looked at modal arpeggios yet.

If I'm playing a Cmaj7 arpeggio starting from the low E instead of the C (E G B C E G B C), would that still be called a Cmaj7 arpeggio or could it be called a two octave E phrygian minor 6 arpeggio?

I'm a bit confused as by that logic a normal E phrygian arpeggio would be E G B D E but that's the same notes as E aeolian. Are they just they same or is there a common way that each mode is arpeggiated to outline its differences?

Hopefully this makes sense.

Wow!
In your example: E-G-B-D-E
You built the arpeggio off of the third degree of the C Major scale. You will find the exact same arpeggio built off of the second degree of the D Major scale and the sixth degree of the G Major scale. There are more but hopefully you get my point.
Plain and simply it is called "E minor 7"
It doesn't matter what context or scale, it is and always will be an E minor 7. Don't try to over complicate this and get yourself more confused.

 

[Ekulati]

Wow. So...back to square one here...you do realize that if "the chord" of the tune you're playing is e.g. Cmaj7, that that has little relevance to YOU, assuming you are in the traditional role of the BASS voice in the vertical (chord) structure being heard at any given moment?

That is...the EXTENSIONS of chords (maj7, sharp 9, flat 13...etc.) are achieved by voices in the texture OTHER than the bass. That is, the higher register instruments (guitar, keys, vocal, horns, whatever).

So if "the chord" is Cmaj7, and you play, for example, a B natural (the actual maj7) for any length of time, on a strong beat, then guess what: you have now completely obliterated the Cmaj7 chord. Or, if you play an E, then guess what: you have now changed "the chord," that is the aural phenomenon of what the listener perceives. It is no longer a Cmaj7 -- the ear will "hear" that as an Em chord, with an added #5/b6, provided that someone else is really nailing that C natural.

Now...this is how music theory works. Of course, you can "experiment" and play all kinds of patterns, arpeggios, etc. including the notes which constitute extensions, as a kind of creative exercise, or playing "out," or calling it "free jazz," but if you don't understand the basics of theory and the (traditional) role of the bass voice in any musical texture, then, you may end up reinventing a lot of wheels.

Maybe that's ok though...but I think it helps your creative endeavors in playing "out" if you first understand how to play "in."

 

[Mushroo]

So if "the chord" is Cmaj7, and you play, for example, a B natural (the actual maj7) for any length of time, on a strong beat, then guess what: you have now completely obliterated the Cmaj7 chord.

Bach didn't get the memo, I guess. Measure 8, Cmaj7 chord, 3rd inversion, B natural on the strong beat:

 

[Nickweissmusic]

I'm a bit new to modes and have not really looked at modal arpeggios yet.

If I'm playing a Cmaj7 arpeggio starting from the low E instead of the C (E G B C E G B C), would that still be called a Cmaj7 arpeggio or could it be called a two octave E phrygian minor 6 arpeggio?

I'm a bit confused as by that logic a normal E phrygian arpeggio would be E G B D E but that's the same notes as E aeolian. Are they just they same or is there a common way that each mode is arpeggiated to outline its differences?

Hopefully this makes sense.

There isn't one single convention for this. What's most important is that YOU have a way of organizing these thoughts that works for you. What you're describing re: Cmaj7 arpeggio is BOTH of those things... it's a first inversion C Maj7 arpeggio, AND an Emin 6 arpeggio. I wouldn't necessarily add the word "Phrygian" unless it contained the important "Phrygian tone (b2)", but again, that's just me and how my mind organizes things. If you look at an arpeggio concretely, as just a group of notes, there is no "Phrygian" connotation. If you are looking at it as the third mode in a major key, then there is a Phrygian connotation. Both answers are right if you can justify them!

I think it's good to be able to see the forest for the trees, and understand the fact that a single group of notes can I have more than one function. In practice, I do think it is good to have one "pat answer" for a given exercise, with the understanding it can function in other ways too. Which one you choose as your pat answer is up to you, and I would need more context to help make a definitive suggestion, but it seems that since you are starting by relating everything to C major seventh, C major terminology would make the most sense in this case.

FWIW, I practice "modal arpeggios" by fully arpeggiating each mode up to the 15th, if you will. R, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15 (which is of course the double octave). It's quite easy to play them with a two notes per string approach, I will post examples when I get a chance.