NationStates Jolt Archive

After practicing with my new Stratocaster (P-90 pickups, not single coils) for around four hours straight earlier today, I got to thinking about which modes and scales I like the most.

I've found that I'm partial to the Mixolydian mode... There's just something about it that sounds so "natural". It's not low (like Minor scales) or high (like Major scales) --- it has a very nice middle ground that makes it perfect for rhythm runs.

As for scales, the Byzantine scale is very interesting. It's as follows (those who don't understand music theory need not apply).


1/2 - 11/2 - 1/2 - 1 - 1/2 - 11/2

This makes for a scale like this (key of C)...

----------------------------|-----------------------------|
------------------0--1------|1--0------------------------|
------------0--1------------|------1--0------------------|
------2--3------------------|------------3--2------------|
3--4------------------------|------------------4--3------|
----------------------------|-----------------------------|


I've yet to find much realistic use for it, though I really haven't been playing long enough to develop a sense of the scale itself. It's one of those that takes some getting used to.

Well, there's my rant for tonight. Fellow musicians of NS General, what say you? What are you favorite modes/scales?

I can't play guitar. But I know somewhat how to play the piano, though I have poor coordination. I like harmonic minor mostly. I don't really use scales much though.

Major minor pentatonic combinations are cool, as is mixing minor and blues scales (ala Randy Rhoads). The Byzantine mode sounds kinda cool when used to contrast a blues lick or play the 'Borat' theme.

Lydian.

I like the sound of octotonic, mode with sharpened 4th (i.e. on F all white notes, I don't remember the name), phrygian is good also. It's best to use a combination.

i quit taking music exams after grade 2 cuz then i was required to learn scales off by heart, which proved to be near impossible for me. so i don't actually know any scales, which makes improvising very difficult. sometimes i really hate my memory, at least i can read music i suppose.

I would say the pentatonic scale is my favorite, so pure and sweet sounding.

fish.

someone had to say it.

Major/minor, with a little Mixolydian thrown in. Honestly, I'm more interested by odd chord changes and key shifts and song structures than a particular mode or scale, but that wasn't the question asked.

fish.

someone had to say it.

Nah, snakes are better, IMO.

Major/minor, with a little Mixolydian thrown in. Honestly, I'm more interested by odd chord changes and key shifts and song structures than a particular mode or scale, but that wasn't the question asked.

Using a half diminished substitution in a regular cadence I created a chordal mobius strip in my final piece for music theory for a choral section. It sounded like it was constantly on the edge of resolution while it looped endlessly through all 12 major keys. (well, not endlessly, but it launched into a loop section that started life in lydian (told you) and ended up all over the place (each sax was given a repeated phrase of different lengths that they repeated over and over so that the phrases wound up in different places in relation to each other.) Other students just used mallets on the chords of the piano and the like...ha! (20th Century Harmonies class, obviously...))

Using a half diminished substitution in a regular cadence I created a chordal mobius strip in my final piece for music theory for a choral section. It sounded like it was constantly on the edge of resolution while it looped endlessly through all 12 major keys. (well, not endlessly, but it launched into a loop section that started life in lydian (told you) and ended up all over the place (each sax was given a repeated phrase of different lengths that they repeated over and over so that the phrases wound up in different places in relation to each other.) Other students just used mallets on the chords of the piano and the like...ha! (20th Century Harmonies class, obviously...))

You take pleasure in the suffering of others, don't you? :p

You take pleasure in the suffering of others, don't you? :p

Hey, I had to listen to their mallet/piano chord opus...

The closest the whole piece got to a resolution was that loop. It played underneath a recording of someone giving a reading and the instruction was to when it ended to play the phrase you were on out, well when it happened we all played our phrases out and stopped at the same time. Turns out that it the whole thing would do a complete loop at 60 bars and the recording was about 60 bars, so it ends where it started. The rest of it involved a tritone durge and a melody based on the whole tone scale. Oh, and it began with a cadenza written without any bars in (wait for it...) lydian. Ah, 20th Century Harmony, the class where you get to break all the rules you learned in the harmony classes you took leading up to it...

Mixolydian modes are good for playing good psychodellic music. Otherwise I like the simple but great blues scale.

I like the phyrigian mode, but mostly only because the name of it sounds so darned cool.

Really, what I remember of music theory is very little, since it was over 20 years ago, and I haven't used it much since. Mostly now if I am writing any music I am the lyricist and I have a composer do the musical stuff.

Chromatic.

Blues minor or harmonic minor.

Using a half diminished substitution in a regular cadence I created a chordal mobius strip in my final piece for music theory for a choral section. It sounded like it was constantly on the edge of resolution while it looped endlessly through all 12 major keys. (well, not endlessly, but it launched into a loop section that started life in lydian (told you) and ended up all over the place (each sax was given a repeated phrase of different lengths that they repeated over and over so that the phrases wound up in different places in relation to each other.) Other students just used mallets on the chords of the piano and the like...ha! (20th Century Harmonies class, obviously...))Oooh, good answer!!!
*bows*

mode - not sure, since modes all have their place ... locrian at times ... and apparently the dorian ...
as scales go, i suppose i'll go with hungarian minor
harmonic minor
Kumoi
Hirojoshi
and Composite II

I like the sound of octotonic, mode with sharpened 4th (i.e. on F all white notes, I don't remember the name), phrygian is good also. It's best to use a combination.

aka Lydian.

A scale is a melodic instance of a set of notes beginning and ending on the same pitch and spanning an octave. A mode is the chord structure/function of the chords which naturally occur as a result of the scale's contruction.

Therefore, regardless of which scale you play over a dominant seventh (I like harmonic minor whose tonic is a minor second above the root of the dominant in question), if the progression was I-vi-ii-V, the mode is major.

That was for anyone who came in and wondered what the frell we were going on about.

I can't say I have a favorite scale. As a vocalist, I weave scales however I need them to be, depending on the changes. And thank God for that, 'cause memorizing scales must suck the big one. I have to know them because i teach them, but having to have the muscle memory in my hands for each one, oy -- daunting as hell.

For the church modes? I like natural minor (Aolian) and Locrian, the most soul-crushing of them all. Dorian is okay, too.

For non-mode scales, I like Harmonic minor some, but also Hungarian Minor (not sure if that's the original name or not, but it's what I found it as) which goes

1
2 (normal)
3 (minor)
4 (augmented)
5 (perfect)
6 (minor)
7 (major)

If you start from A, in other words, you play A-B-C-D#-E-F-G#-A

Fn mixolydian. no particular reason. i just like the way it sounds.

i also like the automaticly harmoniousness of pentatonic,
and, ironicly by contrast, many of the microtonal permutations

=^^=
.../\...

For the church modes? I like natural minor (Aolian) and Locrian, the most soul-crushing of them all. Dorian is okay, too.

For non-mode scales, I like Harmonic minor some, but also Hungarian Minor (not sure if that's the original name or not, but it's what I found it as) which goes

1
2 (normal)
3 (minor)
4 (augmented)
5 (perfect)
6 (minor)
7 (major)

If you start from A, in other words, you play A-B-C-D#-E-F-G#-A

Harmonic minor with a raised 4th. Cool scale. Gets you a lot of Balkan & Middle Eastern chicks when you use it in solos. Try lowering the supertonic on both your Hungarian scale and the standard harmonic minor. Also very belly-dancy, especially if you make the mediant major.

Harmonic minor with a raised 4th. Cool scale. Gets you a lot of Balkan & Middle Eastern chicks when you use it in solos. Try lowering the supertonic on both your Hungarian scale and the standard harmonic minor. Also very belly-dancy, especially if you make the mediant major.

Ah, except I play bass, which means I don't get solos, lol.

Maybe after I get through the portion of theory/comp that's strict "Bach era rules only" I'll use it in something.

Ah, except I play bass, which means I don't get solos, lol.

Maybe after I get through the portion of theory/comp that's strict "Bach era rules only" I'll use it in something.

Bach's rules, which he broke mercilessly because he didn't write them, are part of the whole "common practice" era, which followed from the concept of harmony being not vertical, but horzontal. That is, voices are governed by these "rules" to keep the four lines (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) from interfering with one another and paralleling and all that stuff. They were "discovered" by later composers and codified by Jean Philippe Rameau. We teach them because...because...because dammit, WE had to learn them! Okay, okay, we teach them because one must know the "rules" before they can be broken with successful results. Even John Cage knew how to properly four-part a melody.

As for bassists getting solos, well, that depends on the bassist. Make your solos irrepressibly cool and you'll be given space...unless the bandleader's a jackass. Bass rocks, by the way.

Bach's rules, which he broke mercilessly because he didn't write them, are part of the whole "common practice" era, which followed from the concept of harmony being not vertical, but horzontal. That is, voices are governed by these "rules" to keep the four lines (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) from interfering with one another and paralleling and all that stuff. They were "discovered" by later composers and codified by Jean Philippe Rameau. We teach them because...because...because dammit, WE had to learn them! Okay, okay, we teach them because one must know the "rules" before they can be broken with successful results. Even John Cage knew how to properly four-part a melody.

As for bassists getting solos, well, that depends on the bassist. Make your solos irrepressibly cool and you'll be given space...unless the bandleader's a jackass. Bass rocks, by the way.

I know it's necessary to learn the Bach era rules, it's just frustrating sometimes when you write something and you think "Wow, that sounds really cool... except that damn, there's a dissonant leap there. Oh well." I'm just looking forward to after getting through all that really.

And yes, bass does rock, and I actually do get two short solos in one of my band's songs.

That was for anyone who came in and wondered what the frell we were going on about.

Holy shit, another Farscape fan? I thought I was the only one...

...Speaking of Farscape, I'm still trying to figure out what key that frelling (sorry, I had to) theme song is in.

Guh?