Tag: major scale

Modal Harmony: An In-Depth How-To Guide

How to write and play with modal harmony? That’s a good question! Once we grasp the sounds of the modes, how do we actually use them in our compositions and improvisations?

Over certain chords in a functional, tonal chord progression? Sure, that works. “The Dorian mode goes over the ii chord and the Mixolydian mode goes over the V7 chord.”

But we can tap into a mode’s true sound by playing modally or playing within modal harmony. This article is an in-depth How To Guide to writing and playing with modal harmony!

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Diatonic Thinking when Composing and Producing

When learning music theory, the term diatonic will undoubtedly come up. Let’s discuss what it means and how was can think about it when composing and producing our music!

What does diatonic mean exactly? When I was first told about diatonic playing, I thought it meant picking a scale and playing only the notes from that scale. Which it does, but you can only pick one scale when you’re playing diatonically. The diatonic scale.

The diatonic scale is defined as a heptatonic scale (having 7 notes) with 5 whole tone intervals and 2 halftone intervals, in which the halftone intervals are spaced as far apart as possible (three whole tones and two whole tones separated by half tones) . This doesn’t give us much choice in creating diatonic scales… We are left with only one scale with the following intervals:

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The Only Musical Scale You Need To Know

Learning every musical scale is a daunting and tedious task. Learning the notes; what chords they form; and how they sound are all part of the process. Learning to play those notes in all octaves is another challenge for the producers among us who play instruments.

But what if there was a single scale you could learn that you could then build all the other scales around?

Well, it turns out there is, and chances are you already know of it!

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5 Effective Ways To Think About The Modes Of The Major Scale

The modes of the Major Scale can be intimating to learn. There’s a certain cloud of confusion surrounding the modes. I know I had a difficult time grasping their function in music. It’s one thing to know what they are, and another to put them to use in writing. This article will look at 5 different ways to understand the concept of modes so that we can better use them in our music!

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