# Help with the 7 modes



## WhoThenNow7 (May 11, 2013)

First off, I would like to clarify that I know each major scale pattern and am proficient with them playing in different keys... 

I have been looking on different sites all over, and the 7 modes is just confusing me. I know I'm playing major scale patterns the whole time, but whenever I look at different patterns for different modes, a lot of them are identical to just plain major scale patterns. I know they are just different ways of playing major scales, but I guess I'm just kinda wanting to get a better understanding of it.

I've been on The Guitarist's Online Survival Kit (GOSK) (guitarists online survival kit), it's a pretty good site. They show all patterns for each mode on it, but then I'll go to another website and it shows some patterns are different. Anybody have any useful sites on each pattern?


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## Osorio (May 11, 2013)

Someone will probably come with a stellar explanation on all of this (probably SW), so I'm just going to give some quick advice: Your first step should be to break the modes down to 3 categories: Major (Lydian, Ionian and Mixolydian), Minor (Dorian, Aeolian and Phrygian) and Locrian (which is diminished).
Get a blues backtrack and use the Major modes. Then use the minor modes... Ear how they sound against the harmony and in comparison with each other.

I have been recently going over this with my guitar teacher, as a refresh, and he taught me something I thought was pretty cool: You can do the Minor or Major pentatonic shape and just use the notes that are "particular" to that mode as add-ons to the pentatonic. For example, in Lydian, try to put some emphasis on the 4#; on Dorian, you can emphasize the Major 6th; in Phrygian you can do the 2b.

(About Locrian: I recall seeing a Govan video where he said: "There are 6 modes and one aberration". Locrian is a mathematical development. It makes sense, but has some very restricted uses. I vaguely remember something about Diminished modes and arpeggios sounding disgustingly pretty over a iiº chord [Dº of C Minor, for example], but that only seems to work on very particular situations -or I can't use it right).


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 11, 2013)

Here's a general idea on the topic of modes. Take chords of a key signature, like G Major as an example. The chords would be I, ii, iii, IV, V, vi, vii0, or G, am, bm, C, D, em, f#dim. 

Play the G major scale over G, that's Ionian.
Play the G major scale over am, that's Dorian.
Play the G major scale over bm, that's Phrygian.
Play the G major scale over C, that's Lydian.
Play the G major scale over D, that's Mixolydian.
Play the G major scale over em, that's Aeolian.
Play the G major scale over f#dim, that's Locrian.

But wait! What if someone says we're going to jam in G mixolydian? Let's see, if G is the mixolydian and the mixolydian is V, the key is C. If we go C=I (Ionian), dm=ii (Dorian), em=iii (Phrygian), F=IV (Lydian) and G=V (Mixolydian). The scale is C but our root is G. The jam should be in G and you'll be playing the C major scale wth the root in G. 

Play along with this example of a G Mixolydian jam track to get a better idea. 
You'll be soloing to this with the C major scale, keeping G as the root.

The next step would be to learn the mode patterns of the major scale.


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## WhoThenNow7 (May 12, 2013)

Thanks for the responses guys that really helped out a lot. Especially breaking them down into majors, minors, locrian, and that jam video, really gave me a better understanding as to why some mode's patterns were the way they were. I'll keep looking into it to better understand it.


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## celticelk (May 12, 2013)

I don't know who came up with the idea that the best way to explain the modes to guitarists is to think of them as somehow "the same" as the major scale, but I'd really like to punch them. First, it obscures the fact that the perception of a particular mode is *harmonic* - you can think you're playing in G Mixolydian all day long, but if the chord in the background is Cmaj7, that's coming across as C Ionian whether you like it or not. Second, it encourages an idiotic tendency to just run major scale box patterns against different chords and think that you're now "playing modally".

You're much better off in the long run thinking of each mode as a distinct entity, with its transposability into other modes as an interesting coincidence. Learn each mode as a collection of intervals against the root (Dorian, for example, is 1 2 b3 4 5 6 b7), learn to harmonize each scale degree as triads and 7th chords (and quartal chords, if you want to be really hip), and get familiar with the way that, for example, Dorian sounds different from Phrygian over a m7 chord. Practice over a harmonic accompaniment, even if it's just a drone of the root note. Learning to process scales in this way will also serve you well when you start learning scales that are not diatonic modes of the major scale, like the harmonic and melodic minor modes or the limited-transposition scales (whole-tone, octatonic, etc).


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 13, 2013)

celticelk said:


> I don't know who came up with the idea that the best way to explain the modes to guitarists is to think of them as somehow "the same" as the major scale, but I'd really like to punch them.


The topic is a basic introduction to modes, not a dissertation. Playing a C major scale with the root in G over a G chord is mixolydian no matter how doth thou protest. This is simply an example.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 13, 2013)

I am splitting this post up into two parts, because I want to take a while to dispel a bad habit that is all too prevalent.



Elliott Jeffries said:


> Here's a general idea on the topic of modes. Take chords of a key signature, like G Major as an example. The chords would be I, ii, iii, IV, V, vi, vii0, or G, am, bm, C, D, em, f#dim.
> 
> Play the G major scale over G, that's Ionian.
> Play the G major scale over am, that's Dorian.
> ...





venneer said:


> (About Locrian: I recall seeing a Govan video where he said: "There are 6 modes and one aberration". Locrian is a mathematical development. It makes sense, but has some very restricted uses. I vaguely remember something about Diminished modes and arpeggios sounding disgustingly pretty over a iiº chord [Dº of C Minor, for example], but that only seems to work on very particular situations -or I can't use it right).





Elliott Jeffries said:


> The topic is a basic introduction to modes, not a dissertation. Playing a C major scale with the root in G over a G chord is mixolydian no matter how doth thou protest. This is simply an example.



This is an approach I would advise you to avoid. It's not modality, no matter how much the internet wants you to think.

You need to understand two concepts: tonality and modality. Tonality is the pitch upon which a passage is centered, where the "key" is. We call that pitch the "tonic". If the tonic is G, then the tonic is G, no ifs ands or buts. Modality is the relationship of other pitches to the tonic, the color or mood of the passage. The confusion comes from this situation: the textbooks say "key of G major", which makes us think, "Okay, G major is a key." Nope. G is the key, because G is the tonic, and major is the mode because major denotes a relationship of pitches to that tonic.

Tonality depends on modality, simply because pitch relationships give us a basis for comparison. In order to decide if one pitch is more important than another, you need at least two pitches to choose between, after all. What we end up doing is assigning one pitch as "#1 best pitch ever" (the tonic) and designing our melodies and harmonies to make the tonic's importance more readily apparent. There is a complex explanation of how exactly we do that, but I'm going to skip it for now. Suffice it to say that if we're calling the tonic 1, then the other pitches in whatever scale (modality) we're working with will follow in the order of their appearance. So, in G major, G is 1, A is 2, B is 3, C is 4, D is 5, E is 6, and F# is 7.

G A B C D E F# = 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

If this were another key, the pitches will change but their relationship will remain the same.

C major: C D E F G A B = 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
E&#9837; major: E&#9837; F G A&#9837; B&#9837; C D = 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Makes it easy to keep track of the tonic: just look for 1. If the modality (scale) is different, then we still use the same numbering conventions, but add alterations to the numbers where appropriate to indicate the new intervallic relationship.

G major: G A B C D E F# = 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
G lydian: G A B C# D E F# = 1 2 3 #4 5 6 7
G mixolydian: G A B C D E F = 1 2 3 4 5 6 &#9837;7


===========================================


As you may be aware, scales are only part of the picture. We also have these chord things to worry about. We can organize the diatonic scales into a set of seven distinct chords by using pitches within the scale. So, back to G major:

G A B C D E F#

If we wanted to build a triad with G as a root, we'd skip every other letter to get G B D. That's a G major triad (notated 'G'). Going to A, we perform the same process, yielding A C E. This one is different from the first one, because it's a minor triad. You'll see that the major scale contains a myriad of different chord types, because our goal is to say that one pitch (and one chord) is better than all the rest, and if they are all exactly the same, we can't do that. So, that A minor triad will be notated "Am". Next, we go to B. Do the requisite skip, and we get B D F#. The F# is in the key, so it is therefore in the chord. This is another minor triad, Bm. This continues:

G Am Bm C D Em F#° (° means diminished)

Remember that 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 thing from earlier? Turn those into Roman numerals...

I II III IV V VI VII

... and then change the letter case to reflect the major/minor/diminished quality of each chord.

I ii iii IV V vi vii°

Cool. We have now organized our scale into chords. The tonic still remains: if G is 1, then G is I, and if the rest of the scale is 2 3 4 5 6 7 and ii iii IV V vii°, then the modality is major. THIS is where I disagree with "Play A dorian over ii." You can't play A dorian over ii, because A would have to be 1 for it to be A dorian, and A is not 1 &#8211; G is 1! All the 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 and I ii iii IV V vi vii° works to support G major, and as soon as you start talking about "modes of G major", you are no longer talking about G major. I have seen countless articles that say "in a ii V I progression in G, play A dorian over Am, D mixolydian over D, and G ionian over G." Doesn't exist. The entire thing is G major, because all of the pitches in each of those chords is in G major and has a function to point toward the tonic of G using a major modality.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 13, 2013)

Part II!

How should you look at modes, then? My answer: don't treat them relative to each other. Remember, "modes of G major" does not exist. Next, we tend to think of modes/scales in a linear fashion. We start at point A and end at point B. To a heck of a lot of people, this is what B phrygian looks like: B C D E F# G A B. And they add the extra B on top and call it "8" because they missed the point of calling it "1". Anybody who knows anything about composition will tell you that having a straight scale going up and down and including all pitches is a shitty way to write a melody. Your aim should always be to break the material down into chunks, to organize it. Modal music is very old, older in fact than chords and numeral analysis, back when there was melody and not much else, so we're going to look at how these things play out in melody rather than hammer out a list of letters and numbers, which is something that is more from the era of harmony.

For 413 years (roughly), we have had two main modal flavors: major and minor. There was a fight with all the modes, and major and minor won. Because of that, for about 300 years Western civilization didn't practice the other modes very much, so we are now dealing with a language and culture that is extremely developed with major/minor modality and trying to get its chops back with dorian/phrygian/lydian/mixolydian/aeolian (Not the same as minor, as you will soon see)/locrian. To go back 414 years or more, we need to talk about tetrachords. Sounds like chord, right? Wrong. Chords are those things that you get from skipping every other tone in the scale, what we call "stacking thirds". Tetrachords, on the other hand, are little scale fragments consisting of four notes. Let's do this with the major scale.

G major: G A B C D E F#

If we count four notes in, we get G A B C. That is our first tetrachord. Then, we start where the last one left off: D E F# and G, because the entire thing repeats at G. We are going to call "G A B C" the lower tetrachord, because it contains the lower four notes of the scale, and "D E F# G" the upper tetrachord, because it contains the upper four notes of the scale. Now, instead of dealing with 7 or 8 notes at a time, we're going to deal with 4. I am going to make a couple of short melodies that utilize these tetrachords. If you click on the images, you should get a download link for the corresponding audio file.





Real simple. I start at the tonic, go up the lower tetrachord, back down the lower tetrachord, get back to the tonic, then start at the same tonic, go down the upper tetrachord, go back up it, and get to the tonic again. Listen to how the G sounds like where the thing should end. I'm writing a melody that utilizes tetrachords in order to approach and leave the tonic note.

Here's the same thing, with minor:





Notice anything? In the upper tetrachord, we have some extra notes. On the way down, I'm using F and E&#9837;, but going back up those become E&#9838; and F#. This is how the minor mode was treated following the tonal period. F and E&#9837; (&#9837;7 and &#9837;6, respectively) are colors more endemic of the minor mode, but E and F# (6 and 7) are better for approaching the tonic. So, to get the best of both worlds, we incorporated the practice of "melodic minor", giving us the minor color when we descend down from 1 to 5, and providing a stronger tonal push when ascending from 5 to 1. What you'll find about tonality is that it strongly favors that half step between scale degrees 7 and 1, what could be called the leading tone to tonic relationship. Modal music requires that we reject that half step sometimes. We still like it, but in order to utilize those other modes, we can't always have the leading tone there.

This is what that same minor scale looks like without those alterations. We call this the aeolian mode, or natural minor. This one is untouched. Notice the whole step between degree &#9837;7 and 1.





There is a reason for Western musical culture ditching the other diatonic modes: if you're running up and down a scale that has the same pitches as six other scales, there is a strong likelihood that you will get lost somewhere in there. Take this example:





Starts with the same G minor lower tetrachord thing that we just heard, right? We're going, going&#8230; uh oh, sounds like B&#9837; major at the end. I suppose it could be both, but where did the modulation occur? Can you point to any one note and say "this is where it pivots from G aeolian to B&#9837; major"? What if the entire thing is B&#9837; major and the melody simply starts on G? Maybe it's still G aeolian at the end, and the B&#9837; is just the third of the tonic chord. Maybe it's some other mode that contains those exact same notes. A lot of ambiguity there. That was taken care of with the harmonic and melodic treatment of the minor scale, which put that leading tone in to indicate the tonic. If there are only two colors to choose from (major and minor) and each one is distinct, then no confusion arises.

Anyhow, you can look at the other modes as similar to their major and minor counterparts. You group them according to the tonic triad quality, as has already been mentioned. You can look at the other modes as brighter or darker versions of their nearest equivalent. For example, dorian is like a brighter version of aeolian. It's brighter because the sixth degree is raised when you compare it to natural minor.





Phrygian is like a darker version of aeolian, because the second degree is lowered in comparison.





The same thing works for the major modes, too. Lydian is like a brighter major scale, because of the #4.





Lydian actually doesn't like this tetrachord thing too much - it works better with pentachords, because that C# is heard more as an accessory to D. Gotta be careful with that, though: this could become D major if not handled properly.





And mixolydian is darker because of that &#9837;7.





Locrian is the odd one out, because of the diminished triad thing, but I find that it is manageable if you don't try to outline the triad. Our tetrachord approach works well, because you hear what sounds similar to a phrygian tetrachord in the lower part, and the &#9837;5 comes in after we've already substantiated the tonality. Trying to put 1, &#9837;3 and &#9837;5 together in the same phrase is asking to sacrifice the locrian feel, since it's going to want to pull to the relative major key as soon as the tritone is apparent. The tetrachord is good for avoiding such mishaps.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 13, 2013)

Apples and oranges. It's funny how music theory intellectuals forget that when someone asks for an explanation it's not necessarily a request for an exhaustively researched answer to end all further questions. My explanation basically said the same thing as the thesis posted by SchecterWhore. He'll deny this, of course and he is right about learning the fundamentals, but I'm all about shortcuts and learning things easily. Bad advice you say? The end result is I can still play in mixolydian in the jam I posted. And so can you!


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 13, 2013)

The difference is that you're not describing modal music. You're looking at chord changes and saying that there's all this modal stuff happening in there. It's not. Do you think that backing track you posted switches between G mixolydian and F lydian every bar? Why isn't it called "G Mixolydian Mode Backing Track And Also F Lydian Mode Backing Track As Well - Grooovy!!"? Maybe because the guy that put up the video understands that you need chord progression to establish mode and tonic. The scale does not change every time you have a chord change.


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## celticelk (May 13, 2013)

Elliott Jeffries said:


> The topic is a basic introduction to modes, not a dissertation. Playing a C major scale with the root in G over a G chord is mixolydian no matter how doth thou protest. This is simply an example.



My post *was* pitched as an intro. SW's posts are the dissertation. =)

And you're right - playing the pitches of C major over a G major chord will tend to imply G Mixolydian. That actually goes along with my point that the prevailing tonality is essential in interpreting a particular group of pitches as a specific mode. Try this experiment: with no accompaniment whatsoever - no chords, drones, anything - play a G Mixolydian line that resolves to a G7 chord tone (G, B, D, or F), and then play a C note immediately after that resolution. I'll bet you a shiny penny that the C will sound like a strong resolution, rather than the suspension that you'd expect from playing the 4th degree of the scale.

More to the point, what do you gain from the "playing C major over G = G Mixolydian" approach that's actually *useful* for understanding the music? Does it tell you why those notes should be thought of as G Mixolydian? Or why you'd choose to play C major instead of G major or D major over that G chord? Or why you'd choose those pitches rather than an altered scale or an octatonic scale over G7? If not, why would you bother with this approach, except for the shallow reason of not playing any "wrong notes" when you think you should be "playing modally"?


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## Osorio (May 13, 2013)

I don't know how anyone can be against understanding... I was seriously hoping SW would come in and explain all this in his usual detail (I said so on my first post). I know this stuff pretty well, but I damn sure don't know ALL of it and I'm definitely sure I can learn more and become a better musician for it.
Being all about shortcuts is cool. Some of our answers definitely fell on that approach. But if you want to learn more, hey, now we have got an answer for that too.


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## tripguitar (May 13, 2013)

Elliott Jeffries said:


> Apples and oranges. It's funny how music theory intellectuals forget that when someone asks for an explanation it's not necessarily a request for an exhaustively researched answer to end all further questions. My explanation basically said the same thing as the thesis posted by SchecterWhore. He'll deny this, of course and he is right about learning the fundamentals, but I'm all about shortcuts and learning things easily. Bad advice you say? The end result is I can still play in mixolydian in the jam I posted. And so can you!


 
No disrespect here, but I don&#8217;t think SW meant his post to be an end all answer, nor a one up on your answer. He&#8217;s just a knowledgeable dude kind enough to share his wisdom with those of us trying to understand theory on a deeper level.

I for one appreciate the in depth answer provided by SW. I don&#8217;t want a cookie cutter solution, I can find those with the help of google. Give me the tools to build my own cookie!

Give a man a fish, teach a man to fish&#8230;.


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## Konfyouzd (May 13, 2013)

venneer said:


> I don't know how anyone can be against understanding... I was seriously hoping SW would come in and explain all this in his usual detail (I said so on my first post). I know this stuff pretty well, but I damn sure don't know ALL of it and I'm definitely sure I can learn more and become a better musician for it.
> Being all about shortcuts is cool. Some of our answers definitely fell on that approach. But if you want to learn more, hey, now we have got an answer for that too.



Cuz learnin' makes mah head hurt! 


No one needs to know anything beyond full barre chords... Folks like SchecterWhore are just overly pedantic and have nothing of real value to share with us...


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## Solodini (May 13, 2013)

CelticElk and SW hit it on the head, especially with the instruction to become used to hearing the harmonic differences. Guitarists very easily fall into playing motions and shapes, not sounds. Spend some time with a tonic note pedalling and play the variety of harmony over it. They all have different characters. Many people describe major as sounding happy and minor as sounding sad. If you win a box of chocolates in a raffle are you the same kind of happy as if your aunt tells you she's having a baby? If you find out you've been rejected from a university course, are you the same kind of sad as if your dog dies? One is disappointment, one is grief. If you find out that you have been accepted to your second choice university or that the dog barked and was able to warn your little brother to jump out of the way of the car which hit it then there's another element to the emotion which tinged it with more positivity. These sorts of variety exist in music and the characters of different modes can help to express this so use your ears to learn how they sound and you may start to be able to use them. They might not all be to your tastes and that's fine use what you think sounds good. As someone else said, next time you jam over a minor backing track, chuck in a b2 or #6 and see how that sounds. It might sound off but that might just be because you haven't learned to lead into it and compliment it's character. 

TLDR: Ears are your friends.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 13, 2013)

I've got another exercise for you. This is a Dorian jam in the key of Bb. Play the Bb major scale with C as the root or simply play the Dorian pattern starting on C. 

Or do the math to figure out the notes.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 13, 2013)

You sure it's not in the key of C? I mean, it says "C Dorian" in big letters on it. Key is something that happens with our ear, you know. Calling C dorian B&#9837; major is paper music. Your ear says "C is the tonic" (not root, roots are for chords), and then you fill in the rest of the information as you hear it. If it was B&#9837; major, then why wouldn't the jam track be "B&#9837; Major Funk Backing Track"? Why even deal with C dorian if that were the case?

What you're saying works from a pitch level, because these are all relative keys, but it tells us nothing of the interpretation. If I see "F minor", then I already know something about the music without ever hearing a note. If I see "A&#9837; major", then that tells me something different and just as valuable about the music. If I'm supposed to look at "F minor" and think "A&#9837; major", then where are we? It makes no sense. The A&#9837; major information is completely arbitrary. It could just as easily be G locrian. Do you see how ridiculous this is? If you're adding in information that is selected arbitrarily when a perfectly concrete answer is right in front of you, then you can save yourself a step and just not deal with the conversion.

The same thing happens with rhythm: newbies think that 6/8 and 3/4 are the same thing, because they contain the same number of eighth notes. Know what all the music fundamentals books do in the first chapter on rhythm? Talk about how 6/8 and 3/4 aren't the same thing, despite the fact that they have the same capacity of eighth notes. You have an idea of what modes are on a pitch level, but not really the difference between them.

I don't think I'm going to convert you to my way of thinking while we are posting in this thread. I'm not interested in that kind of thing, though you might remember this confrontation later and take my points into consideration, as I will yours (Honestly, I've heard this argument a thousand times before.). I appreciate that we are having this discussion, because it gives me a chance to further elaborate upon the issue I was combating in my first post. Not to be cocky, but I know that the information that I am presenting is accurate; I've been looking at it for a long time and have had education and external criticism from people who are better versed than I am to back it up, not to mention the fact that I have a pretty solid concept of my pedagogical methods. I welcome it when people disprove me, I'm not trying to be the music theory overlord, but know that I put a lot of thought into what and how I post. I really try to avoid empty words.


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## trickae (May 13, 2013)

I agree with everything stated above, however it falls short when you want to apply modes in your guitar playing. 

The biggest mistake most guitar sites, instructional videos and even guitar teachers make when teaching modes is to teach by patterns, and not by analysis and examples. A poor example I can give is the terrible lick library series of modes which is a waste of money - it turns into pattern mashing.

I'm going to put forward a tangent to the common ways of teaching modes. 

*Background:*
Just a bit of background for everyone reading this thread who may not know what scales or modes are. 

A whole tone (w) will have 2 frets between notes
A Semitone (s) will have 1 fret between notes
Every Major scale will follow the same pattern. 
w-w-s-w-w-w-s
C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C
Note that the C major scale is basis of western music and the musical notes are ordered in the way I've shown above, where a whole tone is between every note except for E,F and B,C which differ by a semitone.

Modes should be seen as different melodic flavors that exist within every major scale. 

A good introduction to modes is vinnie moors melodic solo writting lesson on youtube 



Here he states that if you play any of the white keys on a piano, avoiding the black keys, one would be playing in the C major scale. However the feeling sounds different if you start and end on a different 'root note'. So if you started from A and ended in A, you'll get the A minor scale that exists in the C major scale. 

So lets now focus on the C major scale, which goes 
C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C

```
e-------------------------------------------5--7--8----
b----------------------------------5--6--8------------
g--------------------4--5----5--7-----------------------
d-----------3--5--7------------------------------------
a-3--5--7----------------------------------------------
E-------------------------------------------------------
--C--D--E---F--G--A--B--C- --C--D--E--F--G--A--B--C
```
If we start and end at a different note, we have a different feel to the major scale. 

Ionian (natural Major scale)
C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C
Dorian (tension building, dark, think cowboy westerns)
D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D
Phrygian (Arabian middle-eastern sounding, heavily used in metal by metalica, Paul Gilbert, etc)
E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E
Lydian (Dream/fantasy like - vai, satriani, John Petrucci use this mode heavily)
F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F
Mixolydian ( Victorious sounding - think Queen - good for resolving scales)
G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G
Aeolian (natural Minor scale, raising the 7th gives us the harmonic minor scale )
A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A
Locrian ( dimished / haphazard sounding)
B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B

So whats does this sound like? Try to play the modes above by playing them in the pattern I showed above and then work out if you can play them all on one string. Work up to playing them in two octaves, then try to play them in every position on the neck.

*Harmonizing the major scale with modes.*
When playing the above you may have noticed that the modes vary between being major or minor sounding. That means that a mode may sound better either over a major chord or a minor chord. 


Then the Major scale can be harmonized as follows:

```
e---3------5------7-------8------10------12-----------15---
b---5------6------8-------9------11------13-----15----17---
g---5------7------9------10------12------14-----14----17---
d---5------7------9------10------12------14-----13----17---
a---3------5------7-------8------10------12-----14----15---
E---------------------------------------------------------
--Cmaj---Dmin---Emin-----Fmaj--Gmaj-----Amin---Bdim--Cmaj--
```

While playing the chords above, break down the notes. You'll see you're not hitting any accidentals (or Flats(b) [down a half step] or sharps(#)[up a half step]) that exist between wholetones; or a semitone between A,B ; C,D; D,E; F,G; G,A;

Now the next exercise is to do the above for other scales. Grab two scales, say G or E and repeat the above. Make sure to right it all out. 

As i'm in the office it's hard to do with people looking over my shoulder - but I'll make a new post regarding breaking down songs and seeing where the modes change and why it fits.

Here are the rest of the scales for reference.
http://www.howmusicworks.org/Image/major5

*Lesson plan (notes to myself):*

Lesson 1: Identifying modes
- Racer X/Paul Gilbert - Technical Difficulties (level 1)
- Steve Vai - Die to Live (Level 2)
- Steve Vai - Building the Church (level 3)
- Yngwie Malmsteen - Icarus Suite - Identifying modes in arppegiated chords) 

Lesson 2: Identifying mode changes 
- Joe Satriani- Always with me, Always with you (Level 1)
- Opeth - To rid the disease solo (Level 2)

Lesson 3: Pitch Axis Theory 1
- Joe Satriani Introduction to Pitch Axis theory Lesson
- Exclude the lesson by Guthrie Govan, 
- 

*Lesson 1 - Identifying modes:*
Now that you have some familiarization with scales and modes, we need to approach the use of modes in the following manner.

1. Exclude rote memorization of patterns
2. Stop being confined by using the same mode or scale every time you hear a certain a chord.

Now that we know roughly what modes are - lets try to identify them in some poplar songs:

Our method will be:
1. Identify what key (scale) the riff is in. We look for the notes being played and identify the accidentals(Sharps(#)/flats(b)) being used. 
2. We note the chord the riff is being played over and the arrangement of the notes being played. 

Lets start with an example and then analyse it.

1. Technical Difficulties - Racer X / Paul Gilbert

```
Intro: drums      Riff A:                                                                      B Phrygian                                                              
|-----|---|---|--||----------------------------------|-----------------------------------------|
|----------------||----------------------------------|-----------------------------------------|
|----------------||o---------------------------------|-----------------------------------------|
|----------------||o-5-----4-----5-----4-----4-5-----|--5-----4-----5-----4~-------------------|
|----------------||----3-3---3-3---3-3---3-3-----3-3-|----3-3---3-3---3-3-----------7-9-10-----|
|----------------||----------------------------------|-----------------------7-8-10------------|

|-----------------------------------|-------------------------------------|--------------------|
|-----------------------------------|-------------------------------------|--------------------|
|-----------------------------------|-------------------------------------|-repeat 1st 2 meas.-|
|-10-----9-----10-----9-----7-9-----|-10-----9-----10-----9~--------------|--------------------|
|----7-7---7-7----7-7---7-7-----7-7-|----7-7---7-7----7-7----------3-5-7--|--------------------|
|-----------------------------------|------------------------3-5-7--------|--------------------|
```

Chords being played
C Power chord 
E Power Chord

Accidentals used: F#
Mode: B Phrygian
Scale(Key): G major

In a meeting for the next 2 hours, I'll try to continue the rest shortly.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 14, 2013)

trickae said:


> The biggest mistake most guitar sites, instructional videos and even guitar teachers make when teaching modes is to teach by patterns, and not by analysis and examples. A poor example I can give is the terrible lick library series of modes which is a waste of money - it turns into pattern mashing.


I disagree with what you say about learning by patterns. Patterns are very useful for people like myself who understand visuals better than words. Don't discount something because it doesn't present all the information you feel is needed. I'm not necessarily directing this at you, more to some of the people who overshot this topic by posting overly complicated responses.

Thank you for the posting the Vinnie Moore videos, they are very helpful.


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## wespaul (May 14, 2013)

Check out Chris Buono's "Modes that Matter" from TrueFire's site - Guitar Lessons - Modes That Matter - Chris Buono

And if you _really_ want to get involved, you could sign up for his Modal workshop series, which offers one-on-one lessons (for an awesome price, too) - Modal Mother Lode | Alpha - Chris Buono - TrueFire Online Workshops


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## ferret (May 16, 2013)

I appreciate the "overly complicated" responses. They've helped my understanding of modes considerably.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 16, 2013)

I don't appreciate overly complicated responses. I'm more impressed with simple solutions that are based on higher forms of thinking. I'm not talking about band aids or quick fixes, but the less is more approach is better for clear explanations. When a question arises, we can go there at that time, instead of being there already but not knowing where we are.


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## wespaul (May 16, 2013)

and here we go...


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## sage (May 16, 2013)

This excerpt from Trickae's post is how I think of modes:

Ionian (natural Major scale)
C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C
Dorian (tension building, dark, think cowboy westerns)
D, E, F, G, A, B, C, D
Phrygian (Arabian middle-eastern sounding, heavily used in metal by metalica, Paul Gilbert, etc)
E, F, G, A, B, C, D, E
Lydian (Dream/fantasy like - vai, satriani, John Petrucci use this mode heavily)
F, G, A, B, C, D, E, F
Mixolydian ( Victorious sounding - think Queen - good for resolving scales)
G, A, B, C, D, E, F, G
Aeolian (natural Minor scale, raising the 7th gives us the harmonic minor scale )
A, B, C, D, E, F, G, A
Locrian ( dimished / haphazard sounding)
B, C, D, E, F, G, A, B

But, as an added bonus, because I'm not super duper smart or incredibly well trained (or even disciplined enough to train myself), if I want to play a certain mode in a certain key, I pretend the first note is the first note of the mode in it's natural scale. For example, if I wanted to play something in A Dorian, I would find an A and pretend it's a D and the rest of the scale kind of appears before me because I know that the B>C interval is a half and the E>F interval is a half. I don't really know where the flats or sharps are in A Dorian, but I don't really need to know that anyway. I just pretend that the A is a D and go at it from there. Granted, this requires a fairly decent command of the shapes of the scales and locations of your primary notes, but it doesn't require me to memorize 84 different permutations of the natural modes. Just which natural mode is associated with each note. If I wanna play F# Locrain, I grab an F#, pretend it's a B, and commence party. 

It might not work for everybody and it sure as shit is not going to help you attain your PhD in music, but it's worked for me since I sorted it out in 1993 and I've been called a very good guitarist by more than just my mom.


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## Spooky_tom (May 17, 2013)

Elliott Jeffries said:


> I disagree with what you say about learning by patterns. Patterns are very useful for people like myself who understand visuals better than words. Don't discount something because it doesn't present all the information you feel is needed. I'm not necessarily directing this at you, more to some of the people who overshot this topic by posting overly complicated responses.
> 
> Thank you for the posting the Vinnie Moore videos, they are very helpful.


 
The problem with that way of thinking in regards to modes is that modes are sounds dictated by the underlying harmony . Not scales and patterns.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 17, 2013)

Spooky_tom said:


> The problem with that way of thinking in regards to modes is that modes are sounds dictated by the underlying harmony . Not scales and patterns.


So where's the problem if I play C major scale pattern over a G chord? Sounds mixolydian to me. I just don't get the part about it being a problem. I'm starting to believe some people refuse to accept anything except complicated solutions. And they say I have a problem with my thinking?


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## All_¥our_Bass (May 17, 2013)

^No, because you do see that the underlying harmony is more important.

Like you said, playing what would be *on its own* a C major scale over a G7 is going to sound like G mixolydian.

The problem is that there are people who think playing what would be *on its own* a G mixolydian scale over a Cmaj chord makes it G mixolydian.


A better way to hear the differences is to play the modes not as the same notes in a different order, but to play them all on the same tonic (ex: C lydian, C dorian, C locrian, C mixolydia) over a drone.


Backing harmony is more important when both melody and harmony are present.

To demonstrate this, play a blatantly C major melody by itself, then try it over all the C major chords.


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## djyngwie (May 17, 2013)

There's no problem as such if you think that it is easier to figure out a fingering that way (I personally don't). The potential problem is with using every mode like a major scale. Modes is more about knowing what the "important" notes are. IMO this is much less transparant in the derivative approach, that's all.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 18, 2013)

Make your modal understandings as convoluted as you want. Underlying harmony or whatever. The rest of us are going to play major scale patterns of one chord over another chord. You'll say it's wrong for reasons you can't explain coherently. It's the same result in the end.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 18, 2013)

The thing you're missing is that the fact that ionian/dorian/phrygian/mixolydian/aeolian/locrian can share the same notes is more of a coincidence than a system of composition. Like I said, C D E F G A B C = D E F G A B C D is paper music. When you put it in order like that, you can say that one is a mode of the other. But music does not occur as a single ascending scale. Harmony exists. Chords exist. Chord progression exists. Tonality exists. You can't ask us to dismiss these truths just because _you_ think it's overly complicated. Not without furnishing convincing proof, anyway.


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## All_¥our_Bass (May 18, 2013)

Also, depending on the chord, different notes will have varying degress of consonance and dissonance.

Ex:
F would sound consonant over an F, Dm, and G7, but be a dissonance over Am, Em and C

So playing an identical 'C Ionian' melody over the different chords won't always work how you want it to.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 19, 2013)

I agree with the Vinnie Moore videos on modes posted by trickae. Vinnie says the same thing I'm saying. Play the same major scale pattern over different chords in the same key, using root notes of the chord you're playing over. There is nothing to prove, it just is.


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## Grimbold (May 19, 2013)

Elliott Jeffries said:


> I disagree with what you say about learning by patterns. Patterns are very useful for people like myself who understand visuals better than words. Don't discount something because it doesn't present all the information you feel is needed. I'm not necessarily directing this at you, more to some of the people who overshot this topic by posting overly complicated responses.



for a very long time i was like you, i thought modes were just patterns that you could sweep around the neck. What i failed to realize was that in fact modes are a lot more than that, and if you know how to manipulate them across the neck and exploit their unique feels then your playing become a lot more interesting. I had to see guthrie govan live to understand this issue i was having, ever since that night, February 15 2012 my playing has been revolutionized. My guitar teacher has also helped me come to understand this. Sometimes its not something you can be explained through text, you need a physical musician in front of you proving it to you with every note

otherwise; great thread! keep the responses coming!


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## celticelk (May 19, 2013)

Elliott Jeffries said:


> I agree with the Vinnie Moore videos on modes posted by trickae. Vinnie says the same thing I'm saying. Play the same major scale pattern over different chords in the same key, using root notes of the chord you're playing over. There is nothing to prove, it just is.



Say you're playing over an extended Em vamp. That triad occurs in three different major scales: C, D, and G. Which one do you play?


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## All_¥our_Bass (May 20, 2013)

ALL OF THEM!! 

It also occurs in various other scales, which you could also play.


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## Yo_Wattup (May 20, 2013)

Everything everyone has said in this thread has blown my mind off of this planet, Like every discussion about modes. Can _no-one_ explain modes in simpler terms?


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 20, 2013)

I'm afraid that between Elliot Jeffries and myself, the two principle explanations for this stuff have been laid out from the ground up. Perhaps you are missing a piece of prerequisite information. Do you know the names of the notes? What # (sharp) and &#9837; (flat) mean? Do you know what the major scale is? What a scale is in general? What chords are?

There is a lot of jargon involved, but that's the nature of the beast. It is required that we resort to technical language, just as it would be in any other hobby or profession. Since there is only so much that can be shown through text, and since the internet is largely not made for spontaneity where music is concerned, there is a lot of limitation that we have to deal with. If you've never taken a music class or did lessons with a teacher (one that knows what they're doing), then it can be difficult to translate written word into music. I believe that one needs somebody to show them this stuff and answer questions about things as they happen in order to make the initial connections.


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## stuglue (May 20, 2013)

With my students I had an exercise that we would work on. I would ask them to give me three chords, we kept it simple just major and minor triads. 
I would then show them what modes they could experiment with over the chords. A lot of them would try and stump me by giving chords which weren't diatonic. This was great as I could really get them to hear the modal sound when played in a progression that was quirky. 
One student gave me Cmaj - Eb maj- Amaj
Totally unrelated but brilliant to tackle and because there's no 7th degree we could really experiment. 
If you want to know some ideas for this progression reply to the thread.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 20, 2013)

celticelk said:


> Say you're playing over an extended Em vamp. That triad occurs in three different major scales: C, D, and G. Which one do you play?



Whichever sounds the best.


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## celticelk (May 20, 2013)

Elliott Jeffries said:


> Whichever sounds the best.



And using your approach, that's as much understanding of the music as you'll get. If you're OK with that, fine. I happen to think that it's a rubbish way to approach your musical development. YMMV.


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 20, 2013)

celticelk said:


> And using your approach, that's as much understanding of the music as you'll get. If you're OK with that, fine. I happen to think that it's a rubbish way to approach your musical development. YMMV.


I like the question because it's specific and it got me thinking. Would I know what scale to play over Em? Then you threw in common chords. It really depends on what else is happening in the music. I think most people would be OK with figuring out what sounds best is not a rubbish approach.


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## Solodini (May 20, 2013)

Why spend the time having to work out from scratch or from a very vague idea when you can have a more detailed and specific understanding, though? Obviously you would still trust your ear but if you refine your musical vocabulary with each observation then your expression should come much more quickly.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 20, 2013)

celticelk said:


> Say you're playing over an extended Em vamp. That triad occurs in three different major scales: C, D, and G. Which one do you play?





Elliott Jeffries said:


> Whichever sounds the best.





Elliott Jeffries said:


> I like the question because it's specific and it got me thinking. Would I know what scale to play over Em? Then you threw in common chords. It really depends on what else is happening in the music. I think most people would be OK with figuring out what sounds best is not a rubbish approach.



I agree with Elliot on this. Firstly, you need context for that Em to make a decision on it. Secondly, there are a million other considerations to make, such as style. And if it's going on for a long time, you might use the opportunity to visit different areas related to Em. I also don't like the idea of staying on a single chord for more than four measures, but that's not the case here.

But like I've been saying, the relative major scale thing will work, note-wise, because if you're playing the notes you're supposed to be playing, then you're in the clear for the most part. I think that this affects the understanding of the pitch material, though, particularly when dealing with tonicization and modulation. For example, the move from minor to relative major is made much less meaningful if they are both conceived of as the same major key. It's kind of crap for melodic writing, too, because you really need to have an idea of cadences. Also, it's a complete pain in the ass to be thinking "ionian dorian phrygian..." for every single chord. Am D7 G has never meant A dorian D mixolydian G ionian, it's a ii V I in G. It's difficult to relate that on an internet forum because that's just something that occurs in the music. And that's a progression from tonal music, so it makes no sense to even bring modes into the mix. True modal music requires that we have the same sense of tonic, but with different intervallic relationships. If I give you two scales, G major and C major, it's not immediately clear what I'm getting at (or maybe you see the dominant-tonic relationship, if you're savvy to that kind of thing). But if I reveal that I'm thinking of E aeolian and E phrygian, then you say, "Oh, yeah, they both have something to do with E". The relative major scale thing does not quite communicate the same relationships. And, once again, if I say "A minor", it has a different set of connotations and expectations than "C major". To say that both are C major removes a lot of that nuance, or at least introduces an extra step that obscures the path to realizing the music. If you've never done ear training, this is perhaps something that you would have no appreciation before.


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## Yo_Wattup (May 21, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Perhaps you are missing a piece of prerequisite information. Do you know the names of the notes? What # (sharp) and &#9837; (flat) mean? Do you know what the major scale is? What a scale is in general? What chords are?



Yes. Yes. Yes, and minor, harmonic and melodic minor, the blues scales, and a few others. And yes, I know a lot of chords, and how to determine the names of them, should I encounter/create new chords. 

You are correct that I have never been professionally taught, I've only researched on the internet. I appreciate your effort, dont get me wrong. My main gripe is why do I need to know modes? Say if I'm going through a I IV III II progression in minor, I can play any and all notes from the scale over any of the chords, and it sounds fine.


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## Solodini (May 21, 2013)

The modes have different characters to them, as I mentioned previously. The fact that they share notes should be considered coincidental. View them as variations on major and minor and you'll start to understand them better. Try playing C Major, C Dorian, C Phrygian et c. over a pedal tone and you'll start to hear the characteristic differences. You don't need to know anything of theory, if you don't want to, but it helps you to develop your understanding of the musical language and how to make use of it to express yourself aurally.


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## stuglue (May 21, 2013)

The modes all have a certain distinct vibe. Phrygian sounds totally different to Lydian. What you may encounter when you are playing over a non diatonic progression is that the one scale that worked over the previous chords suddenly doesn't fit. Knowing the sound of the modes is a great way to be able to aim for a certain feel. 
To sound original I believe you have to deviate from the norm. I think a knowledge of voice leading and semi tonal movement through chords is crucial to being able to dip in and out of the modes.


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## chopeth (May 21, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Part II!
> 
> How should you look at modes, then? My answer: don't treat them relative to each other. Remember, "modes of G major" does not exist. Next, we tend to think of modes/scales in a linear fashion. We start at point A and end at point B. To a heck of a lot of people, this is what B phrygian looks like: B C D E F# G A B. And they add the extra B on top and call it "8" because they missed the point of calling it "1". Anybody who knows anything about composition will tell you that having a straight scale going up and down and including all pitches is a shitty way to write a melody. Your aim should always be to break the material down into chunks, to organize it. Modal music is very old, older in fact than chords and numeral analysis, back when there was melody and not much else, so we're going to look at how these things play out in melody rather than hammer out a list of letters and numbers, which is something that is more from the era of harmony.
> 
> ...



Absolutely ilustrative explanation, you are a real theory god, SchecterWhore. I wish I understood something there and I'd love you to show it to us with a guitar in a youtube vid


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## Elliott Jeffries (May 21, 2013)

stuglue said:


> With my students I had an exercise that we would work on. I would ask them to give me three chords, we kept it simple just major and minor triads.
> I would then show them what modes they could experiment with over the chords. A lot of them would try and stump me by giving chords which weren't diatonic. This was great as I could really get them to hear the modal sound when played in a progression that was quirky.
> One student gave me Cmaj - Eb maj- Amaj
> Totally unrelated but brilliant to tackle and because there's no 7th degree we could really experiment.
> If you want to know some ideas for this progression reply to the thread.


Yes, give an idea for this. I think we need more examples and less rhetoric. I'll do my best to restrain myself!


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## Basti (May 21, 2013)

I like to pop into these threads and marvel at how little I know. Well, off I go again.


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## Konfyouzd (May 21, 2013)

All_¥our_Bass;3560018 said:


> A better way to hear the differences is to play the modes not as the same notes in a different order, but to play them all on the same tonic (ex: C lydian, C dorian, C locrian, C mixolydia) over a drone.


 
+1

This is how it first made sense to me. A friend of my on Camfrog just played an A drone note from his computer or keyboard or something... Then he proceded to play A Ionian, A Dorian, A Phrygian, etc. 

When you do it like that it makes it painfull obvious that you're changing key moving from one to the next. Very easy to hear the mood they each create w/ respect to th drone.


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## celticelk (May 21, 2013)

For Cmaj-Ebmaj-Amaj, I'd probably play C major - Eb major - A Lydian or A Mixolydian. A Lydian voice-leads nicely from Eb major (Eb major's fourth mode is Ab Lydian), but A Mixolydian has a G instead of a G#, which along with E gives you two chord tones from Cmaj where A major and A Lydian have only one. For an outside approach, play C half-whole (C Db Eb E F# G A Bb), which has the chord tones of all three triads (C-E-G, Eb-G-Bb, A-C#-E) and lots of possibilities for superimposing other sounds (the minor or diminished versions of all three of those triads, or their 7th chords or various altered 7ths).


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## stuglue (May 21, 2013)

Ok, C major, C,E,G first chord, I'm actually playing G major over the top to get the C Lydian feel, the reason I'm using C Lydian and not C major is because I'm using the F# as an approach note in anticipation of the next chord, Eb major. The notes of the two chords are E,G,C - Eb,G,Bb, so targeting F#just before moving to Eb major is a great way to slide into that G note, the third. That's strong voice leading. Now that I'm in Eb C Lydian won't work, here I then play Ab major which over the Eb is Eb mixolydian. The notes are Eb,F,G,Ab,Bb,C,Db. Now I have a couple of approach notes from moving from the Eb chord to the A chord. Note wise we have
Bb, Eb, G and A,C#, E, so we have the movement of Bb, the fifth moving to A, the root, or Eb the root to E the fifth (not as strong). 
For the A chord I went straight A major, but I guess the fourth chord would colour that decision (if we had one).
I tend to not thing in terms of modes but of intervals and strong and wreak tonal relationships. The notes of the chord are the core sounds, all the others are extensions.
You'll notice that for these three chords that I'm actually playing the following scales over the top
G major, Ab major and A major.


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## viesczy (May 21, 2013)

A trillion and one different thoughts on modes. 

Mechanically if you can play the scale, you've gotten all modes DOWN.

Musically, each mode has its own flavor/mood/color/shape as it applies to the music in which you are playing. Once you are intimate with the flavor/mood/color/shape of a given mode, your ear will hear/apply that the "character" of said mode into the piece you're playing. 

As the guitar neck is all geometry, it isn't much to learn as all shapes are movable. Getting things "down" once is all you need as the rest of the keys/tones/modes/colors are just a position shift away. 

Don't over thing the mechanical at the expense of the musical. To many folks are all, "well I need to do X, Y & Z to equal this mode" and they're not playing music, they're playing math at the expense of expression and the emotion of the piece of music.

Now that said, don't eschew any sort of theory, just understand that knowing everything there is to know about theory doesn't mean you're going to be a great musician. 

How many folks with a language Phd or lit Phd are a great novelist? 

Knowing the why, whats, and how isn't only part of the journey of being a great musician. You need to be able to apply that knowledge by making memorable music to truly be a great musician. 

Derek


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## Solodini (May 22, 2013)

Agreed and I think the missing ingredient to being a great novelist or musician is having something to say. Being great and having theory certainly are not mutually exclusive. If you have a strong grasp of theory (understand the functions in the music of others and how that contributes to the character, not just naming modes and their notes and speedily playing them) but your own music is weak, you probably aren't actually trying to say anything so your music just comes across as the musical equivalent to a series of meaningless words.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 24, 2013)

viesczy said:


> A trillion and one different thoughts on modes.
> 
> Mechanically if you can play the scale, you've gotten all modes DOWN.
> 
> Musically, each mode has its own flavor/mood/color/shape as it applies to the music in which you are playing.





> Don't over thing the mechanical at the expense of the musical. To many folks are all, "well I need to do X, Y & Z to equal this mode" and they're not playing music, they're playing math at the expense of expression and the emotion of the piece of music.


Agreed, 100%.



> Once you are intimate with the flavor/mood/color/shape of a given mode, your ear will hear/apply that the "character" of said mode into the piece you're playing.
> 
> As the guitar neck is all geometry, it isn't much to learn as all shapes are movable. Getting things "down" once is all you need as the rest of the keys/tones/modes/colors are just a position shift away.


Maybe I don't agree so much here. There's this idea floating around that melody is somehow different from harmony, that you can have X chord progression and play modes A B and C "over" it. I mean, you can do that if you want to, but I think it's fundamental to reinforce the understanding of what's actually happening. Harmony always exists, despite this sentiment:



Elliott Jeffries said:


> Make your modal understandings as convoluted as you want. Underlying harmony or whatever.



As soon as you hear one note in the context of another note (either harmonically or melodically), there is harmony. That's simply how our ear works: we hear intervals, not individual notes, and certainly not melody independent of harmony.



viesczy said:


> Now that said, don't eschew any sort of theory, just understand that knowing everything there is to know about theory doesn't mean you're going to be a great musician.
> 
> How many folks with a language Phd or lit Phd are a great novelist?
> 
> ...



I am very much in line with you and Solodini on this one. If you have all the vocabulary in the world and nothing to say, then there's not really much point in putting words together. But on the other hand, if you have a message that you need to get out and don't have the language to do so, you're screwed. Aesthetics are funny like that.

The problem is that amateur musicians (in the sense of the modern industrialized world) largely equate the acquisition of that language to dribbling academia without considering all the factors and variables. They are scared that knowing what a triad is will dispossess them of their artistry rolleyes. You can find countless examples of people who stuff their brains with information and yet have no enjoyment for what they do, and who frankly don't get it (and even some of these guys are quite famous). But you can also find countless examples of people who really work hard to understand the workings of their medium and reap the satisfaction and artistry that good craft can create.

A PhD does not necessarily mean anything in art (it does not always go by that title in art, by the way), but you really have to be dedicated to go that far, particularly in visual and sound art, so I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss such degrees. I'd also point out the fact that in the United States, there is very little support for the arts, so many of us are forced to retreat to the academic world to even be able to exercise our art on a consistent basis. The Soviet Union, whether you agree with their politics or not, poured tons of money into an infrastructure for arts, and they turned out lots and lots of really super fantastic awesome performers and composers who completely changed the playing field. I am confident that there is a sea of failures and mediocre artists from the same system, but all that effort allowed some gems to shine through that would undoubtedly remain in obscurity or never develop at all if that kind of support and education did not exist.

In the US, nobody prods you to develop as an artist. It's all on your own dime (not that it wasn't in the USSR), it's a hell of a lot of work (again), and the essential skills are something that are not taught to an effective capacity. That last one is the real downer. You can buy your own gear, you can practice your ass off, but how much time will you spend not knowing if the way you're picking is going to ruin your tendons? how sound works and what harmonic, rhythmic, melodic, and formal possibilities are out there? how to approach phrasing? where you should go with your musicianship? We are terrible judges of our selves, and yet the unknown, the place where we need the most guidance, is precisely the place where we are left alone to waste our precious time and resources meandering around while trying to find solutions. For that reason, I will defend arts education in any form, so long as it is not replete with misinformation.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 24, 2013)

To get back on topic following my rant, I thought I'd pull out some dorian tunes to expand on the ideas in my first/second post.

The King's Singers - Greensleeves


(Dat bass!)

Gonna start with an oldie but a goldie. Remember how I was talking about the time before tonality? Well, this is it. Pure 16th century modal goodness. I don't know how historically accurate the interpretation in the video is, but whatever, you get the idea. They're singing in E&#9837; (or D#), but I don't want to deal with the accidentals that are required for that kind of thing, so I'll transcribe this in E instead:







Greensleeves is an interesting tune for our discussion. I know that you're looking at this and saying, "SchecterWhore, I thought this was a discussion on dorian mode. WTF?", and it is true that there are some non-dorian elements: the first two measures (plus anacrusis) look aeolian, then we get some melodic minor action in 3 & 4, then 5-8 are the same pattern. It's not until we get to the refrain at measure 9 that we get our dorian on: D followed by C#. Then a cadence with melodic minor. The melodic minor is always used to approach the finalis (the "tonal center" in modal music).

This gives us an idea of how "modes" are conceived of at this time. In the 21st century, a lot of us tend to think of modes as these blocky things that contain some specific notes and you can't stray from them or else it's no longer that mode. Nuh-uh. The 16th century treatment that we are examining shows what is basically the minor mode, with variable 6th and 7th degrees: sometimes it's &#9837;6 &#9837;7, sometimes it's 6 7, and sometimes it's 6 &#9837;7 (you'll also find &#9837;6 7 on occasion, but that's really more from the tonal period). The end result is a melody that has elements of natural minor, melodic minor, and dorian, without any barriers restricting one from flowing into the other.

Simon & Garfunkel - Scarborough Fair


Here's another 16th century ballad. You'll notice that this one doesn't fool around with all the different flavors of minor: it's all dorian.






Scarborough Fair would not have originally had any chords to it in this sense, but I'm writing them in anyway because of the version of the tune that I am providing and because it gives us a chance to look at harmony. One thing that I'd like to point out in this folk song is that there is only one pitch in the entire thing that puts it in the dorian category: the C# in measure 4. Whenever I read one of these threads on modes, there's always some advice saying that you need to emphasize the defining pitches of the mode (lydian would be the #4, dorian is the 6, phrygian is the &#9837;2, locrian is the &#9837;5, etc.), but that is plainly untrue. You're probably better off doing everything you can to avoid those pitches, actually, because those pitches are the members of the tritone that is present in any diatonic scale, and tritones create a need to resolve. That's all well and good, we like resolution, but if you're only working with a diatonic pitch set without any alterations, then that resolution is going to be to the tonic of the relative major key. You can get away with those distinctive modal scale degrees, you won't have modal music if you don't use them after all, but you might want to examine how you are choosing your pitches if you find the tonic straying to some relative pitch area.

Regarding the harmony, I'll point out that the chords *together* reinforce the dorian sound. It's not E dorian on Em, then D ionian on D, then E dorian on Em again, and G lydian on G. That's just silly. Listen to the song: the dorian-ness comes from what is basically a minor modality inflected with a raised sixth scale degree.

Koji Kondo - Serenade of Water







This composition is obviously more recent. Check out the treatment of scale degree 6 (B): You hear a lot more of it here than you do in Scarborough Fair. The reason that this holds together is that old Koji is hammering away on the tonic chord. The melody for the first four bars is literally a Dm triad followed by that B. The chord progression is very typical of the dorian mode, too: i IV i IV. Hearing those arpeggios heightens the harmonic importance of Dm (remember what I said on the first page: we want one note and one chord to be more important than the others) and using a limited tone palette keeps it from straying into a relative key. Measures 5-8 have some non-dorian elements, and there are actually a couple of things going on. First, let's talk about the final chord, D. We've been hearing a lot of Dm so far, so our expectation is that the last chord is going to be a minor triad. However, a composer may elect to use a major tonic chord at a cadence to give the music a different mood. We have a name for this technique: picardy third (or 'tierce de picardie' for the francophones out there). This does not really affect the way we perceive the modality, unless something else is done with that chord. However, it's the last thing you hear, so it's not going to suddenly negate the whole dorian thing we had going. Now let's back up a couple chords: the cadence is &#9837;VI &#9837;VII I. This is a twentieth century thing - you wouldn't be seeing this in the modal music of the Middle Ages. They preferred raising the sixth and seventh scale degrees when approaching the tonic, and they are lowered here. You could say that the B&#9837; is a borrowing from the natural minor scale. At any rate, this variable 6th and 7th degree thing is starting to play a part in a lot of this stuff. Food for thought.

Koichi Sugiyama - Unknown World







More video game music. I'm picking these because they're short and sweet. Stylistically, this is closer to the 16th century tunes that we looked at. Harmony is almost inappropriate here, because it is basically species counterpoint, but it's chordal enough that we can look at it in terms of chords. Look over the harmony really quickly and you'll see a couple i IV situations. There is also some instance of the variable 6 and 7 again: B&#9837; in measure 2 & 6, B in 1, 5, 6 & 8, C in 2, 3 & 5, and C# in 7 & 8. Hey, there's that &#9837;VI &#9837;VII I progression again in measures 2 and 3. The picardy third also makes a return, although in the middle of the piece. And, if you're paying attention, our melodic minor movement (6 7 1) is happening as we approach the tonic chord (on the repeat) in measure 8. Take note of how the raised sixth (B) is only played once in the flute line, and it is after the tonic (D) is established. That B is also approached by the same motif that started the melody, giving it melodic grounding. That's a good B - it's the money note, it has to be earned, and Mr. Sugiyama certainly earned it. You can zip up and down scales all day, but if you don't spend some time working for your good notes, then you're not making music.

Alex Lifeson - Broon's Bane


Score: Page 1, page 2.

This is the longest piece we'll look at today (form-wise; the other videos might be longer in time, but they are strophic, i.e. repeating forms), and it is also the most chromatic piece. I won't do a detailed analysis unless somebody requests it, but take a look at what's happening: there is a lot of Gm and a lot of E's. The chord progression is also good and functional, but what you need to know is that the tonic is being heard as G. Whatever else is happening around it, we always return to Gm, even after extended chromatic episodes, and that E is hanging out as a pedal point, so we have the prerequisites for dorian mode: 1 &#9837;3 5, and 6. This is a case where the E is being spammed all over the place, disregarding my advice to stay away from those modal color tones. But look at how many of those chords have E as a functional tone: exactly one - the E/G# (which is a V6/V in the key of D minor, which is where we are following a phrase modulation), and it's well away from Gm. So, if you're going to have 6 in the presence of the tonic triad in dorian mode, use it as a non-functional tone. Don't make it the root, third, or seventh of any chord, and you should be able to avoid that pesky relative key tendency.


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## Solodini (May 24, 2013)

The bass singer's voice on Greensleeves is great!


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## Dani2901 (May 25, 2013)

Has everyone understood the 7 modes, now?
In last couple of months I developed a very easy way to explain this stuff...
When you got it, it is pretty simple!


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 25, 2013)

Tell us!


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## fantom (May 26, 2013)

trickae said:


> Lets start with an example and then analyse it.
> 
> 1. Technical Difficulties - Racer X / Paul Gilbert
> 
> ...



Reviving an old comment in here... but *this is straight Em*, there's nothing B Phrygian about it. It's also not in the Key of G. It's just a VI-i-VI-i progression in Em. Straight up usage of the Aeolian mode.

If you really wanted to, you could try to argue it is C Lydian playing a I-iii-I-iii progression, but I've heard the rest of the song. It's Em...


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## Dani2901 (May 26, 2013)

fantom said:


> Reviving an old comment in here... but *this is straight Em*, there's nothing B Phrygian about it. It's also not in the Key of G. It's just a VI-i-VI-i progression in Em. Straight up usage of the Aeolian mode.
> 
> If you really wanted to, you could try to argue it is C Lydian playing a I-iii-I-iii progression, but I've heard the rest of the song. It's Em...



This is a good point for beginning to explain!!! 

fantom is 80% right with what he said. But there is no C-Lydian at all!
I think Paul Gilbert is changing the key from C-minor to E-minor.
The Lydian mode is always based on a major chord. And this is the point!!!

So lets stay in the key G-major:

You don't need any other notes for all 7 modes as the major scale.

7 notes --> 7 Chords --> 7 Modes

Here it is:

At first you have to build the chord of this scale!

1.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
---l_____l______l______l
=Gmaj7

2.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
------l______l_____l______l
=Amin7

3.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
----------l_____l_____l______l
=Bmin7

4.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
-------------l_____l______l_____l
=Cmaj7

5.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
----------------l_____l______l_____l
=Dmaj7

6.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
-------------------l______l_____l______l
=Emin7

7.-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#-G--A--B--C--D--E--F#
-----------------------l_____l______l_____l
=F#dim5/7

This is what you have to understand first!

So...

G-major scale played over G-major chord --> G Ionian Mode
G-major scale played over A-minor chord --> A Dorian Mode
G-major scale played over B-minor chord --> B Phrygian Mode
G-major scale played over C-major chord --> C Lydian Mode
G-major scale played over D-major chord --> D Mixolydian Mode
G-major scale played over E-minor chord --> E Aeolian Mode
G-major scale played over F#dim chord --> F# Locrian Mode

You can use maj7 chords aswell!

now you think: "soloing over just one chord all the time?!"
At first: YES

Chord progressions without changing the mode are possible, too! I can do this for you later, if you request.

The trick:

In every Mode you have two kinds of notes

1. Arppegio notes (single notes of the chord for example B-D-F#-A =Bmin7 -->Phrygian Mode)

2. tension notes [(colour notes) every other of the G-maj scale. In this case: G-C-E]

The trick is to pull the tension notes to the Arppegio notes.

This is one way you can do it!

There is another way but this is the best way to start it!

I hope i could help you


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## Osorio (May 26, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Koji Kondo - Serenade of Water
> 
> [...]First, let's talk about the final chord, D. We've been hearing a lot of Dm so far, so our expectation is that the last chord is going to be a minor triad. However, a composer may elect to use a major tonic chord at a cadence to give the music a different mood. We have a name for this technique: picardy third (or 'tierce de picardie' for the francophones out there). This does not really affect the way we perceive the modality, unless something else is done with that chord. However, it's the last thing you hear, so it's not going to suddenly negate the whole dorian thing we had going.



Remembering my time with Berklee, I had major problems with my ear training professor in this particular part of the subject of modes. She had a very rigid interpretation of "tension release". I used to argue that waiting for the song to finish to understand it was absurd. Our brains can interpret something as it happens... The final chord can be a B Diminished all day, if the harmony and melody tell me G Mixolydian, that is what it is saying to me. I had a very hard time with some assignments because of this...

(Also, mad props for videogame music).


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 26, 2013)

Dani2901 said:


> This is a good point for beginning to explain!!!
> 
> fantom is 80% right with what he said. But there is no C-Lydian at all!



fantom's not arguing for C lydian.



> I think Paul Gilbert is changing the key from C-minor to E-minor.
> The Lydian mode is always based on a major chord. And this is the point!!!


Where do you get C minor?



> So lets stay in the key G-major:
> 
> You don't need any other notes for all 7 modes as the major scale.
> 
> ...





> The trick:
> 
> In every Mode you have two kinds of notes
> 
> ...


For all you guys that keep bringing this up, let's see some proof of concept. This "I = ionian ii = dorian" approach is complete crap because it does not explain modal music, and it is a factually incorrect interpretation of tonal music. There is no discussion on pitch centricity, and you need pitch centricity for this kind of music (that's the definition of tonality, after all). I am sure that you are not talking about atonal music (and please don't try to), so let's get real.

We know how the diatonic modes are constructed a million times over, but how are you going to make music with them? For someone who is starting at zero, no chords or anything, how are they going to create phrases, sections, actual pieces? When you say ii = dorian, fine, if you play D dorian while somebody else is playing a Dm chord, then the notes will fit most of the time and you can rely on your ear to make decisions for you. But where do you go from there? Do you know how to construct a chord progression? How to make harmony have actual direction?

For the G mixolydian = C ionian crowd, you would not believe that approach if you ever did ear training. There is a simple reason for that: it is not how the ear works. G mixolydian is not C D E F G A B starting on G, it's 1 2 3 4 5 6 &#9837;7 where G is 1. Our ear hears intervallic relationships, not notes. When you isolate one chord and say that it is a representative of its own individual scale, you instantly discard the essential relationship of one chord to another and to all other chords to a tonal center.



> Chord progressions without changing the mode are possible, too! I can do this for you later, if you request.


Why don't you do this now? This is, after all, how it works 99.9999% of the time, and one chord = one scale is .0001%. Not only is it possible to have harmonic progression without changing the scale, it's the norm.


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## fantom (May 26, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> fantom's not arguing for C lydian.
> 
> Where do you get C minor?



Correct. I'm arguing the entire thing is in Em (Aoelian). There is no change to a minor or other mode. It's a progression in Em. For evidence, just listen to the next lick, it's just Em pentatonic... (A-G-E-A-G-E played as 5-3-0-0-5-3-0-0 on the E string).

Also, even though that first chord contains C-F#-G a bunch, it is heavily implied by context to be a C Major, not C minor. That is why I said C Lydian is a possibly valid interpretation. But it would be wrong for this piece.



SchecterWhore said:


> Why don't you do this now? This is, after all, how it works 99.9999% of the time, and one chord = one scale is .0001%. Not only is it possible to have harmonic progression without changing the scale, it's the norm.



^^^ Yes. That summarizes my thoughts. Most modern "rock" style music picks a key / mode and just does a progression within the mode. Thinking of chord changes as mode changes makes absolutely no sense to me. Yes, you want to articulate the backing harmony during melody, but there's no reason to think of it so "vertically".

One of the things I remember being told several times... guitar players think vertically all the time. "Vertically" can mean "harmonically", but I tend to view this comment as "short-sighted" in the sense that guitar players think of what the can play over the current chord and no further. This type of thinking makes it hard to create a fluid, "lyric", melody. In contrast, "horizontal" thinking implies how to make a line fluid throughout a section. I was told this by someone who played a wind instrument (which can only play one note at a time, so it makes sense). I bring this up because it is exactly what I see as the 2 different arguments in this post:

1) "chord = mode" arguments, which imply vertical thinking.
2) "mode dictated by sound within a section of music" arguments, which imply horizontal thinking.


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## Dani2901 (May 27, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Why don't you do this now? This is, after all, how it works 99.9999% of the time, and one chord = one scale is .0001%. Not only is it possible to have harmonic progression without changing the scale, it's the norm.



Hey SchecterWhore,

You have one big problem! You throw out all your knowings, what is for beginner like you are speaking chineese!! 
What I wrote down is a very good working basic for beginners. this stuff i learnd from a guitarplayer who has finished jazzguitar academy called "Bernd Kiltz".
Best way of learning is always step by step! 
And this is the reason why i don't write down chord progressions, yet. This would be to much input!
Trying out with one chord is enough to get the feeling and sound of every single mode!

Not every one can be such a "superbrain" like you!!  Have you learnd this all in one day or one lesson???? You are just one of these guys who wants to show the world his "endless knowledge"!

because of people like you there are so many questions about easy things like the 7 modes...

You call yourself "Theory God" here! may be you are! But you are very bad and terrible teacher!


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## trickae (May 27, 2013)

Sorry for the mistake guys, i got caught up at work. I wanted to sit down with my guitar and break down a bunch of songs which is how i think modes should be looked at.


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## Dani2901 (May 27, 2013)

John Petrucci soloing over just one note!!! LISTEN TO THE BASSPLAYER!


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 27, 2013)

Before launching into this, I want to share an article that I dug out of an old Guitar World magazine for anybody who wants more perspective: 
here

I don't agree with everything in the article, but the basic idea is good enough to take away.

And now...



Dani2901 said:


> Hey SchecterWhore,
> 
> You have one big problem! You throw out all your knowings, what is for beginner like you are speaking chineese!!



I am thorough, but I certainly do not throw everything out at once. In my time in this thread, I've discussed breaking modes up into four-note chunks, analyzed some simple music in the dorian mode, and prodded the "C ionian D dorian E phrygian" crowd for not offering any substantial information.

I'm sorry that this is too much for you to stomach. I write lengthy posts, no doubt, but I try to create as many visual landmarks as I can within them in order to keep them from becoming a wall of text. In my defense, my teaching is directed and I tackle one item at a time, and you cannot say that I do not offer depth in my responses.



> What I wrote down is a very good working basic for beginners. this stuff i learnd from a guitarplayer who has finished jazzguitar academy called "Bernd Kiltz".
> Best way of learning is always step by step!


Step by step is great, no argument there. It's the "by step" part that your camp seems to be having trouble with.



> And this is the reason why i don't write down chord progressions, yet. This would be to much input!
> Trying out with one chord is enough to get the feeling and sound of every single mode!




I am going to make an accusation that I have made before: saying that ii represents the dorian mode is factually incorrect. Likewise, iii = phrygian, IV = lydian, V = mixolydian, etc., are all fallacies. You have demonstrated a fundamental misunderstanding of tonal music. Go find Bernd Kiltz and get your money back, because he failed to teach you what a tonic is.



> Not every one can be such a "superbrain" like you!!  Have you learnd this all in one day or one lesson???? You are just one of these guys who wants to show the world his "endless knowledge"!


It took me a long time to learn what I know. It took an even longer time to wrap my head around it and turn that information into music. I have learned to approach music critically and have opinions that are the result of observation. When I teach, it is from experience and with the hope that I can help the student learn to be similarly critical, perhaps even bypassing the roadblocks that I have encountered along the way. You, on the other hand, could easily have learned your approach in one day.



> because of people like you there are so many questions about easy things like the 7 modes...


Modes are not easy. For that exact reason, I teach my private students functional harmony long before even mentioning modes. I think it is appalling that we have gotten to a place where musicians have no concept of what used to be considered fundamental knowledge, and take some vague idea of "modes" as a substitute.

I'll point out that you have so far restated the exact content of post #3 from the first page, and have gone no further. What more, this is something the OP already knows.



WhoThenNow7 said:


> First off, I would like to clarify that I know each major scale pattern and am proficient with them playing in different keys...
> 
> I have been looking on different sites all over, and the 7 modes is just confusing me. I know I'm playing major scale patterns the whole time, but whenever I look at different patterns for different modes, a lot of them are identical to just plain major scale patterns. I know they are just different ways of playing major scales, but I guess I'm just kinda wanting to get a better understanding of it.
> 
> I've been on The Guitarist's Online Survival Kit (GOSK) (guitarists online survival kit), it's a pretty good site. They show all patterns for each mode on it, but then I'll go to another website and it shows some patterns are different. Anybody have any useful sites on each pattern?



Check the website and tell me if you've expanded upon the explanations given there. Including your own explanation (and excluding the link in the OP), we have had four posts in this thread that detail how the diatonic modes may be related to a major scale, information that the OP is already aware of. I think we've stopped writing for the OP a long time ago, but still, gonna come up with anything new yet?



Dani2901 said:


> John Petrucci soloing over just one note!!! LISTEN TO THE BASSPLAYER!



The bassist is playing a pedal tone. This does not mean that the harmony is static; John's solo has functional harmony (i.e. chord progression) in it. J.S. Bach does the same thing in the first four bars of the first cello suite:









That's a simple I IV vii° I progression, but with G in the bass the entire time. The pedal tone helps to reinforce the tonic chord, and the pedal tone is a non-chord tone in one of those chords. As soon as he finishes the exposition, the pedal moves around and gradually disappears, and he does some neat stuff with that idea, but I'm sure that this analysis would be lost on you. Petrucci and Bach know how to handle harmony, big surprise.

Your example does not demonstrate John Petrucci playing a differently named scale for every chord he comes across. And you have also missed the point of my criticism. I am not saying that music does not exist where there is one chord and one chord only for the entire duration; I am saying that when you play D dorian over Dm7, G mixolydian over G7, and C ionian over C&#8710;, you can forget the D dorian/G mixolydian part and call the whole thing C major.

By the way, here's a piece of, er, music that stays on one chord the entire time:



Playing one scale over one chord is not a method of composition, nor should it ever be. You dismiss the facts when you say that, because functional harmony happens whether you like it or not.



> You call yourself "Theory God" here! may be you are! But you are very bad and terrible teacher!


We have an idiom in English: "Tongue in cheek."

As for my teaching, I will let the world be the judge. I may not be your cup of tea, but I get enough PM's here and elsewhere (and I have a lot of emails and a few letters, too) that suggest that I'm doing something right for somebody else.


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## wespaul (May 27, 2013)

I don't understand the complaints directed toward SchecterWhore. He gives insanely detailed explanations, and welcomes discussion. I'm a music major, and I feel grateful that I can read discussions outside the classroom of the very stuff I'm studying . Music theory is something that requires _a lot_ of reinforcing. 

If somebody thinks he's speaking Chinese, they're more than welcome to ask a question. I've never seen SW eschew a question, no matter how trivial. Let's be realistic, though: we're talking about modes, and the theory relating behind them. Not just how to play a major scale in different positions. If you _really_ want to get a better understanding of something, you'll put in the time required. Understanding modes takes time with both theory _and_ application. You can't have knowledge force-fed to you. Put in the work, and read a long post if you have to (and don't be surprised that you'll still need to learn more).


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 27, 2013)

wespaul said:


> I don't understand the complaints directed toward SchecterWhore.



Well, since my first post, I've been attacking the relative mode folks. Retaliation is expected, though I'd rather they respond by trying to support their arguments than resorting to personal attacks.



> He gives insanely detailed explanations, and welcomes discussion. I'm a music major, and I feel grateful that I can read discussions outside the classroom of the very stuff I'm studying . Music theory is something that requires _a lot_ of reinforcing.
> 
> If somebody thinks he's speaking Chinese, they're more than welcome to ask a question. I've never seen SW eschew a question, no matter how trivial.



Thanks for the backup and feedback. It's true, I do like to have some semblance of discussion, and despite my detailed answers, I'm not trying to push out other contributors. If you can show us all a way of thinking and bring up examples of your observations in action, then everybody learns, me included.



> Let's be realistic, though: we're talking about modes, and the theory relating behind them. Not just how to play a major scale in different positions. If you _really_ want to get a better understanding of something, you'll put in the time required. Understanding modes takes time with both theory _and_ application. You can't have knowledge force-fed to you. Put in the work, and read a long post if you have to (and don't be surprised that you'll still need to learn more).



This is the point. Modes are always relative to a tonic, not relative to each other.


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## wespaul (May 27, 2013)

I agree. I was actually introduced to the modes as a major or minor scale with changes. I think of the mixolydian mode as a major scale with a flat 7th. Or the dorian mode as a minor scale with a raised 6th. That's always worked for me.


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## ferret (May 27, 2013)

I haven't really understood the direction or tone of this thread. SW and a couple of others seem to directly respond to what the OP is looking for. Others seem to be against a deeper understanding of modes and theory and just want to go with the most basic on-paper method, the whole "play C major starting on X over chord Y" relation.... The OP seems to indicate in the first post that he already understands how the modes relate back to the major scale pattern though, and asked for a better understanding.

If playing C Major on "root" X over chord Y is enough for you to be happy in your playing, great. I don't understand why people seem against a fuller and deeper understanding of whats really going on, or why they seem to be offended that someone takes the time to explain it. 

I'm throwing an outright thanks to SW, because I've found each post enlightening.


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## Dani2901 (May 28, 2013)

without any words...

GUITAR THEORY: Phrygian Mode - Part 2 - Modal Progressions - YouTube


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## Hollowway (May 28, 2013)

Ok, so whenever I read these threads I feel like I'm learning a bunch right up until I have to apply them, and then I get confused. So here are my questions:

1) For that Paul Gilbert piece, why could it not be in G major, with a IV-vi-IV-vi progression (if we're only considering the notes shown in the excerpt)? Is it because you need that I tonic chord in there somewhere?
2) How can you determine what modes all those measures are in Greensleeves? And how do you know it's D Dorian for the whole piece if there are no chords to direct you?

If SW, CelticK, or one of you others could specifically tell me (especially that second one) by listing the step by step notes, rather than just saying "the harmony" that would be a huuuuge help!


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## Dani2901 (May 28, 2013)

wespaul said:


> I agree. I was actually introduced to the modes as a major or minor scale with changes. I think of the mixolydian mode as a major scale with a flat 7th. Or the dorian mode as a minor scale with a raised 6th. That's always worked for me.



OK! let's switch on our brains! Make the countercheck! Like you have done in Mathematics at school. 

write down any major scale INCLUDING its changes for any mode you want.

write it down in two octaves! If you have done you will always find another usual major scale in it.
And this way you will always get back to the model I showed you.


Try it. this works!


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## Osorio (May 28, 2013)

Dani2901 said:


> Try it. this works!



I don't see where you are aiming to get at with this. Music makes a lot of mathematical sense, so, yeah, sequences repeat themselves. You are abstracting the notion of TONIC that SW and others have tried to reinforce, and this is why people misunderstand this topic so damn much.
Thinking modes are all "equal" to a Major relative can only get you so far. I seriously can't understand why people think that playing C Ionian and D Dorian (etc) is a good practice routine. It does a piss poor job at showcasing what modes are about.

I remember back in the day, when I was learning modes for the first time, I could only make practical sense of it once the notion of "altered scales" settled in. I stopped seeing Dorian as a variant of the Major scale and started seeing it as a Minor Scale with a M6 and a b7 (as wespaul said). I wrote multiple pieces with varying modes of a same tonic to teach myself the different nuances. If you are playing D Dorian, G Mixolydian and C Ionian you might as well just be playing in C Major. It makes no difference (as it was already said). If, however, you are playing in C Dorian, C Mixolydian and C Ionian you will hear the difference IMMEDIATELY.

You cannot "abstract" the tonic. C Ionian is NOT the same thing as D Dorian. Not in any MUSICAL sense, at least. Sure, it makes a lot of mathematical sense, but that's just not how music works. It's not how the brain works in perceiving music. If you want to just stick to the basic shape-focused approach, that is all fine and good. A LOT of musicians get by without proper understanding of this stuff (I imagine a lot with above-par understanding don't get anywhere as well). If, however, you want to truly understand this stuff, there are people here trying to help.



Hollowway said:


> 2) How can you determine what modes all those measures are in Greensleeves? And how do you know it's D Dorian for the whole piece if there are no chords to direct you?



I'm going to take a stab at this. Apologize in advance if I miss the mark.

What is most important about modes is that they have specific interval relationships with the tonic. So, if you hear a Minor scale with a b7, but a M6, you are likely hearing dorian, even if there are no CHORDS, underlying harmony still exists. But like SW said, the piece is not stricly Dorian and I guess that was the whole point of the example. Dorian passages can coexist with other "variants" of the Key.
On the other hand, we had Scarborough Fair, which is an example of a straight through Dorian piece.


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## fantom (May 28, 2013)

Hollowway said:


> 1) For that Paul Gilbert piece, why could it not be in G major, with a IV-vi-IV-vi progression (if we're only considering the notes shown in the excerpt)? Is it because you need that I tonic chord in there somewhere?



I'll try to explain it and butcher terminology in the process!

So as it's been pointed out several times in this thread already. *It is all about the tonic, or the resolution*. If the piece wants to "pull" to a GMaj, than by all means it is a GMaj piece. But this song doesn't pull that way. Play the riff and some of the endings, then end on a G5. Sounds a bit... weird... do you hear it? Now do the same thing and play an E5 at the end. Ya, that sounds better, right? It's because the tonic is E. The notes being chosen up to the pentatonic riff are all E Aeolian. That is why I pointed out that the next section hammers the E as a pedal in an Em pentatonic lick.

The general rule of thumb, if you would "end" a section (or the song) on a given chord, that is the tonic. Most rock/metal stays in one key. Once you have the tonic, you can start trying to figure out the mode.

Pen and paper style, why E and not G? Let's rewind to function of chords... if this is confusing, please ask. I typically remember these as I-IV-V progressions with substitutions.

Tonic chords: I/iii/vi (major key) and i/III/VI (minor key)
Subdominant chords: IV/ii/vi (major key) and iv/ii*/VI (minor key, * is the half diminished)
Dominant chords: V,vii (major key) and V, VII (minor key)

Let's look at this in Em first, VI-i-VI-i. Notice that this is really the tonic and a substitution of the tonic. The use as a subdominant is possible, but I don't see reason to view it that way because it isn't pulling towards a dominant.

Let's look at this in G now, IV-vi-IV-vi. This would be subdominant and a subdominant substitution. It should pull to a D or F# diminished at some point to resolve to the G (or just try to resolve to G without the dominant), but it doesn't do either.

So what was the other option I mentioned? C Major using Lydian, aka I-iii-I-iii. In this case, it's the tonic and a tonic substitution. Ok, so why is the less valid than the Em case? In just this section, it could really go either way. The fact that the 3rds are left out of both chords makes it more ambiguous. But the resolution of the next section is a strong E. Hence my conclusion it is Em.


I want to bring up a better example (using almost the exact same riff). Dark Tranquillity's "Feast of Burden". (quick tabbing from memory... probably slightly off, and the guitar is detuned 1/2 step to Eb, but let's talk about it in standard tuning for simplicity).




```
"Part 1"
------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------------------(2-4)
-----5-----4-------5-----4------------5-----4-------5-----4---4-5-
-3-3---3-3---3-3-3---3-3---3-3-3--2-2---2-2---2-2-2---2-2---2-----
------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------------
-----5-----4-------5-----4------------7-----5-------7-----5---5-7-
-3-3---3-3---3-3-3---3-3---3-3-3--5-5---5-5---5-5-5---5-5---5-----
------------------------------------------------------------------



"Part 2"
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
-----9---10-------9---10---9---10--------9---10-------10---9---7---9---
-7-7---7----7-7-7---7----7---7----7--7-7---7----7-7-7----7---7---7---7-
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

-----------------------------------
-----------------------------------
-----------------------------------
-----7-------7---------------------
-5-5-5---5-5-5-......--------------
-----------------------------------
```

Before considering the part 1, look at how many Es are played in the part 2. Ok... good, now let's rewind.

Looking at the part 1, the progression is essentially C-B-C-D. Given context (notes played are B, C, F#, G, D, A), it's pretty safe to assume we have ABCDEF#G as our notes (the E is natural or we have a nonstandard mode... even if it wasn't in the part 2). Given just part 1, key of Em (E Aoelian) seems like a wild guess. I mean, they didn't even play an E note, right? *Well it is in Em*. Huh?

First let's address the big question: *Why is part 1 not C Lydian!?* It's a decent guess. 2 of the measures are pivoting on C. It seems natural. Does the riff pull to the C, yes! But why is this bad? Because context of the song! The whole progression is pulling to part 2! In C Lydian, this would be the progression: I-vii-I-ii (tonic, dominant, tonic subdominant). This is a bit strange. Possible? Yes, typical? No. Does C Lydian explain part 2, NOT AT ALL! Part 2 would hammer away at iii,II,iii,II.

Ok, so what about B Phrygian, I mean, part 1 spells B-C-D in the progression. Under B Phrygian, this would be the progression: II-i-II-III (subdominant, tonic, subdominant, tonic). Ok, this seems possible. Given just part 1, I could accept this if the song stayed on other B progressions. But notice part 2 again, it hammers on the E. And B is the dominant of E... so calling part 1 B Phrygian makes the E of part 2 awkward. Part 2 would be a subdominant in B Phrygian. It makes much more sense for the main chord of part 2 to be the tonic (in this case... due to context of the entire section of the song).

Which brings me to... when you hear hoofs, don't assume zebras... In other words, let's think horses, part 2 of the song is hammering away at an E5 chord for 2 bars straight. So let's consider E Aeolian! The part 1 progression would be VI, v, VI, VII in Em. That is subdominant, dominant, subdominant, dominant... Oh wow, that seems to want to resolve into a tonic, doesn't it? Well what is the next part? *Huge huge huge huge emphasis on E*, aka, the tonic. Ya at the end of the riff it hits a VII chord (D5) a bunch, but that riff screams, "I'm in Em".

Now similarly, it could be in G Major right? Well part 1 would be IV, iii, IV, V (subdominant, tonic, subdominant, dominant). Ok, this could easily resolve to G5. The Em explanation is "stronger" since the tonic doesn't appear in the middle of the subdominants, but G Major is a pretty good looking result if you don't consider part 2 of the song... *When you consider part 2 strongly hammering the E, G Major is a poor choice.*

This is where "horizontal thinking" really takes off. You stop thinking about one measure at a time and you start looking at how chords, parts, and even sections play a role in the song. In this case, part 1 is a typical iv, V lead into a tonic. It is blatantly forced in your face due to part 2 that the E5 is the tonic. And once you "see" this piece of the puzzle, the rest becomes clear:
*
Even though there is not a single E played in part 1, the entire part 1+2 section of this song is Em. There's no key change, no mode shift, no complex theory happening. It is VI,v,VI,VII,i,i,VII,i,i,VII in Em, broken into two parts of the song.*


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## Dani2901 (May 28, 2013)

venneer said:


> I don't see where you are aiming to get at with this. Music makes a lot of mathematical sense, so, yeah, sequences repeat themselves. You are abstracting the notion of TONIC that SW and others have tried to reinforce, and this is why people misunderstand this topic so damn much.
> Thinking modes are all "equal" to a Major relative can only get you so far. I seriously can't understand why people think that playing C Ionian and D Dorian (etc) is a good practice routine. It does a piss poor job at showcasing what modes are about.
> 
> I remember back in the day, when I was learning modes for the first time, I could only make practical sense of it once the notion of "altered scales" settled in. I stopped seeing Dorian as a variant of the Major scale and started seeing it as a Minor Scale with a M6 and a b7 (as wespaul said). I wrote multiple pieces with varying modes of a same tonic to teach myself the different nuances. If you are playing D Dorian, G Mixolydian and C Ionian you might as well just be playing in C Major. It makes no difference (as it was already said). If, however, you are playing in C Dorian, C Mixolydian and C Ionian you will hear the difference IMMEDIATELY.
> ...



Don't you recognize how often you contradicted yourself???




> If you are playing D Dorian, G Mixolydian and C Ionian you might as well just be playing in C Major. It makes no difference





> C Ionian is NOT the same thing as D Dorian.




C Ionian and D dorian are same notes!!! 

The chords make the difference.



> If, however, you are playing in C Dorian, C Mixolydian and C Ionian you will hear the difference IMMEDIATELY.



of course you do! I've never said anything different

C Dorian is minor based

C Mixolydian and C Ionian are major based!!!


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## stuglue (May 28, 2013)

May I offer some advice. If you have a keyboard then try soloing over some changes with that rather than the guitar. You'll find that you can't rely on patterns like with a guitar and you'll rely on your ear to tell you what fits and what sounds weak. I've been trying that approach and, whilst its been a bit of a train wreck its helped. That's the problem with the guitar in that the fingerings are the same, you just move them about for different keys. With the piano each key has a different fingering.

I think we need the OP to post what he's playing over so we can hear the track.


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## Osorio (May 28, 2013)

Dani2901 said:


> C Ionian and D dorian are same notes!!! The chords make the difference.



Both scales share the same pitch collection, sure, but they are hardly of the same quality.

I, personally, find the idea of thinking "D Dorian, G Mixolydian, C Ionian" to play over C Major COMPLETELY counter-intuitive, since you are attaching qualities where they don't belong. It's not like "that part over Dm" is going to sound slightly darker than the rest of the solo. You are not really using D Dorian in any capacity. You are merely displacing the notes of C Major and calling it a day.
In technical terms, there is nothing wrong with that, but it creates a fantastic clusterf*ck when people actually try to understand how modes work (as this thread has, no doubt, proved).

Music doesn't need chords to imply harmonic content. If you play a C, followed by a E, melodically, you are stating a Major 3rd relationship. Which implies a C Major quality. You don't have to like it, it's just how it goes.

You continued to describe and defend what SW very aptly called "paper music". If you think that C Ionian is the same thing as D Dorian, try it. Compose a song using C Ionian and one using D Dorian. I very much doubt they will sound the same, even thought they will be spelled with the exact same pitch collections.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 28, 2013)

venneer said:


> I'm going to take a stab at this. Apologize in advance if I miss the mark.
> 
> What is most important about modes is that they have specific interval relationships with the tonic. So, if you hear a Minor scale with a b7, but a M6, you are likely hearing dorian, even if there are no CHORDS, underlying harmony still exists. But like SW said, the piece is not stricly Dorian and I guess that was the whole point of the example. Dorian passages can coexist with other "variants" of the Key.
> On the other hand, we had Scarborough Fair, which is an example of a straight through Dorian piece.



That said, there is a way to know that you are listening to dorian and not some other relative modal area. After all, I've been saying that you can't just rely on the note names to tell you everything - you need to look at the relationship between one note and the next and the next and the next.



Hollowway said:


> Ok, so whenever I read these threads I feel like I'm learning a bunch right up until I have to apply them, and then I get confused. So here are my questions:
> 
> 1) For that Paul Gilbert piece, why could it not be in G major, with a IV-vi-IV-vi progression (if we're only considering the notes shown in the excerpt)? Is it because you need that I tonic chord in there somewhere?
> 2) How can you determine what modes all those measures are in Greensleeves? And how do you know it's D Dorian for the whole piece if there are no chords to direct you?
> ...



As I said back on the first page, we need to establish a tonic. The way that we do that is with cadences and by harmonic progression. The diatonic modes, unfortunately, make this difficult, so we'll go with the major scale for the moment.







As you may be aware, there are two half-steps in any major scale (or any other diatonic scale, for that matter): one between steps 3 and 4, and another between steps 7 and 1. As it turns out, those half steps are involved in important harmonic tendencies. 7, or the "leading tone" wants to ascend by half step to arrive at the tonic. 4, or the "subdominant" wants to descend by half step to arrive at 3, or the "mediant". If you put together the tendency tones (4 and 7) in a diatonic scale, their intervallic distance is a tritone, which is a dissonant interval. When these tendency tones go where they want to go (3 and 1), then the dissonance is resolved, leaving a consonance. And you can either spell that tritone as an augmented fourth (leading tone on top) which expands to a minor sixth, or as a diminished fifth (leading tone on bottom), which collapses to a major third.

You might notice that this resolution gives us what is basically the makings of a tonic triad (1 3 5), minus the fifth of the chord (1 3). This is why the major scale is quantitatively easier to deal with than the other diatonic modes: the tritone is already in there, pushing our ear toward the resolution to the tonic. Even if the tritone isn't so explicit, if you're running up and down any mode of the major scale, your ear is going to gravitate toward the relative major key area. It's the tritone's fault.

The tonic is always going to be our point of resolution, so in a single voice texture, things won't sound resolved until get to 1. Let's have a look at all the ways that we can approach 1 with diatonic intervals.






I've laid out approaches from above and below by second, third, fourth, and fifth. Sixths and sevenths are not included because they're too wide of an interval. You can try, but it doesn't sound right (even though Bach does it, but even he approaches it as an octave displacement). You see our friend the leading tone in the first measure. Stepwise motion is always good, and the half step resolution is all the nicer. The second measure is approaching from a second above. 2 is called the "supertonic", because it's above the tonic. Woo, Latin. Next is 5 1 from above - the dominant to tonic. This is a very harmonically stable interval, and our ear likes hearing it. We can also approach it from below, where the interval becomes a perfect fourth - 5 to 1 is still dominant to tonic, no matter how you flip it.

Let's take a moment to look at what we have so far - 5, 7, and 2, all going to 1. If you play 5, 7, and 2 at the same time, you get A C# E, which is a major triad. More specifically, it's V. You'll often hear about the dominant-tonic relationship, and you might know that V-I is the fundamental chord progression. Consider that V consists entirely of tones that want to go to the tonic, either because of stepwise motion or something to do with the overtone series, and that 7 is the strongest tendency in there.

Proceeding, we get to relationships that are not quite as strong as those found in the previous measures. We have 4 1, both from above and below, and that might be involved in a plagal cadence, but 4 3 is more natural, because of that tritone resolution thing. 3 1 works quite well actually, but those are both members of the same chord (in other words, no harmonic motion is happening in 3 1), so it doesn't possess the same urgency as one of the members of V proceeding to 1. The last one, approaching the tonic from a third below, is not a common approach, because 6 1 seems to outline a vi or IV triad more than anything else. Not an effective cadential figure.

When you add 4 (G) on top of 5, 7, and 2, (A C# E) you get V7 (A C# E G). The seventh chord is a lot more dissonant than the triad, because it possesses that tritone that so firmly defines tonality.

What we're looking for in order to establish tonality is the V I relationship, preferably with V7. But, there's a problem: the major mode is the only one that has this built in. One of the ways that we cope with this issue is by making temporary alterations to our pitch palette.






This is the most famous example of getting around the tritone's tendency to pull us into the relative major key. First, we start with the natural minor scale on D, D E F G A B&#9837; C D (or 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7, if you want key neutrality). There is a tritone in there, between E and B&#9837;. That's cool, but it's between 2 and &#9837;6. That's not going to get us to 1 and 3 very easily, we really need a tritone between 4 and 7. As it stands, that D minor scale risks becoming an F major scale. What we can do to fix this is raise that C (&#9837;7) to C# (7), which will give us that 4 7 tritone we wanted. This gives us the half step between the leading tone and tonic, but a whole step between 4 and &#9837;3. The &#9837;3 is something we can live with, because resolution to 1 is the more important part. If ever you wondered why harmonic minor is called harmonic minor, wonder no further: harmonic minor facilitates the harmonic progression of V7 i. In this way, you can get V7 in a mode that does not normally have it.

One thing that troubled the guys that were founding these practices was the augmented second interval between &#9837;6 and 7. When played in order, 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 7 1 sounds, to be blunt, Middle Eastern. Western music does not typically contain augmented seconds prior to 1900, and there were those Crusades things, so to further the distance between Christian Europe and the Muslim world, we dropped the augmented seconds. We still liked the leading tone that harmonic minor made for us, though, so raising the sixth degree of the minor scale to turn that augmented second into a major second was a good compromise. This gives us the melodic minor (1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 6 7 1). Melodic minor is used whenever you want scalar motion and have something going on between 7 and 6. 5 6 7 1 is common, as is 6 7 1, and 7 6 7 1 (where 6 is a neighbor tone), and so on. Also, rarely something like 1 7 6 5. In any case, the melodic minor is not meant to have harmonic implication. 6 is usually a melodic non-chord tone. Hence, you know, being melodic minor and not harmonic minor.

The next bit of information that you need to know is how chord progressions work. Our basic goal is to go from V to I, so we can abstract any functional progression as [whatever] -> V -> I. It gets more delicate than that, of course, but that's the gist of it. If you want a more methodical approach, it's subdominant functions (IV and ii) -> dominant functions (V and vii°) -> tonic functions (I, occasionally vi for deceptive cadences). Notice that I am using the numerals for the major mode. If you want to do minor or any other mode, different things are capitalized or lower case.

========

Excuse the long preamble. We have to have some idea of the problems we encounter in other modes before revisiting our analysis. But now that we've done that, look at what's going on here:






(I am extrapolating the chord progression by the notes that we hear, as well as what sounds correct to my ear. For the most part, the melody outlines a triad in every measure. The only ambiguous part was measures 9 and 13, where we might have Bm, but I decided that G sounded more correct.)

We know that this is somehow related to E minor, because we hear a very clear outline of the Em triad at the beginning, and we have harmonic reinforcement of Em as the tonic. The first two chords, Em D, do not give us a lot to go on, but as soon as we get to the end of the antecedent phrase, we have D# a couple of times, which is the leading tone of E. The last chord of this phrase is V, meaning that the antecedent ends in a half cadence. The consequent phrase starts the same as the antecedent, making the first eight measures a parallel period. Fancy words. For our purposes, this is reinforcement of the harmonic context, since it's the exact same thing that we just heard. Measures 7 and 8 are where we get a cadential figure in E minor. That i6,4 V pairing is the dead giveaway. We call that the "cadential 6/4". I6,4 (or i6,4, in our case) acts as a prolongation of the dominant harmony, and is a signal that we are approaching a cadence. You can hear a little more on that from this video. He uses "c" to indicate a second inversion triad. I prefer the figured bass symbol.

Look over the next phrase really quick. Do you notice that it, too, is a parallel period? Both measure 9 and 13 start the same way. The way that these phrases start suggest a visit to the key of G major, because we have what could be I V in G, but since there's no V I, it never takes off. Instead, we know that we are still in E minor because we get a few instances of V i in E. Also check out measures 3-4 & 11-12, then 7-8 & 15-16. Same thing, huh? Tight little tune.

To address the dorian parts of the song, notice that the sixth scale degree, whether it be 6 or &#9837;6, is never part of the functional harmony. We see C (&#9837;6) first as a neighbor tone to B in measure 1, and between that and the next measure, that suggests natural minor (1 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 in mm.1, 1 2 4 &#9837;7 in mm.2). We see C# (6) in measure 7 as a neighbor tone to D#, and C# D# E should spell out E melodic minor to you. We get C# again in measure 9, this time as a passing tone between D and B. The presence of D and C# is what gives us the E dorian feel.


Leading tones are great for establishing tonality, but we do not always want to use leading tones. In fact, that's the main problem we deal with in modal composition, so we have to find ways to cadence without tritone resolution.

Koji Kondo - Song Of Time







Another piece from Ocarina of Time. There are a number of dorian pieces from that game, owing to the compositional limitations that Koji Kondo had to conform to. Anyway, let's look at what's going on here. There is a lot of arpeggiated Dm, so much so that there is almost nothing else. We have to assume that D is the tonic by default. He does use that 5 1 relationship from the get go, so there is something resembling a V i progression. The dorian part comes in on the downbeat of measure 3. The modal color tones always come in after some amount of preparation. The cadence at the end is what we want now: C E D, no raised seventh, no half steps. What we do have is stepwise motion from both directions, surrounding the finalis.

A lot of what I see in these modal pieces is this pattern: use the tonic triad profusely at the beginning, have very simple harmony that primarily serves to expand the tonic, use the color tones as non-chord tones, rely on degrees 5, 7, and 2 (altered or unaltered) to approach the tonic at cadences. I've written a couple short melodies with this scheme, and it seems to work so far. This is probably better for short forms. As soon as you get to longer music, the ear yearns for harmonic variety. But, as they say, start small.


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## Dani2901 (May 28, 2013)

copied that from Wikipedia?!?!?!


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 28, 2013)

If I copied from Wikipedia, it might sound a bit like your posts.


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## Dani2901 (May 28, 2013)

venneer said:


> You continued to describe and defend what SW very aptly called "paper music". If you think that C Ionian is the same thing as D Dorian, try it. Compose a song using C Ionian and one using D Dorian. I very much doubt they will sound the same, even thought they will be spelled with the exact same pitch collections.



When did i say C Ionian an D dorian sound identical???

please quote!!!!! I never did 

I just said that it is the same collection of notes... and thats absolutely correct...
and why don't working with it that way???


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## Captain Butterscotch (May 28, 2013)

^ I seriously can't tell if you're trolling. 

Thanks everyone for this thread! Lots of good stuff in here to digest.


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 28, 2013)

Dani2901 said:


> When did i say C Ionian an D dorian sound identical???
> 
> please quote!!!!! I never did
> 
> ...



Everybody and their mom knows that. It was in the OP. We like new information here, so please get on to the next step or stop trolling.


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## Dani2901 (May 28, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Everybody and their mom knows that. It was in the OP. We like new information here, so please get on to the next step or stop trolling.



sounds like you're agreeing with my concept...

if you do we can get to the next stage, if you don't it wouldn't make any sense to go on here with new information!


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## Mr. Big Noodles (May 28, 2013)

I agree that G# locrian represents the same diatonic pitch collection as E mixolydian. I do not agree that either one may be treated as harmonically identical to the other, or that any understanding of those modes' workings may be deigned from pointing out their commonality of pitches.

Proceed.


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## Dani2901 (May 29, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> I agree that G# locrian represents the same diatonic pitch collection as E mixolydian. I do not agree that either one may be treated as harmonically identical to the other, or that any understanding of those modes' workings may be deigned from pointing out their commonality of pitches.
> 
> Proceed.



OK!!! Once again  !! I never said anything about that it is identical in the harmonical way!

If I did... please quote!

I'm not bad with you, but please don't be that deadlocked!!

What I do is showing up some kind of a bridge!! just another way for orientation!! This way it is easier to implement!

ok then I will come up with some chord progressions later... I've got to do some other work before


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## Hollowway (Jun 2, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> That said, there is a way to know that you are listening to dorian and not some other relative modal area. After all, I've been saying that you can't just rely on the note names to tell you everything - you need to look at the relationship between one note and the next and the next and the next.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




That was the winningest post ever! It took me over an hour to read,
And somewhat understand it. Thanks a MILLION for taking the time to map that all out. 
So now I have one more question: you said that in modal pieces you don't always want to use leading tones, and that makes it difficult to cadence (without being able to use the tritone). Why is that? Why would a modal piece be any different that a diatonic piece in using the tritone? Is it because it would pull it away from the mode because of the need to have that 7 a half step down from the 1? So it would make everything sound major or harmonic/melodic minor? Or am I totally missing the boat? (I'm just guessing here).


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## All_¥our_Bass (Jun 3, 2013)

There's also one more possible temporary alteration for minor, the b2 in place of the major 2.

It can be used in a phrygian cadence. Ex: Bb > Am

or using it to make a slightly stronger III i cadence. Ex: C7 > Am instead of C > Am


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## fantom (Jun 4, 2013)

All_¥our_Bass;3581873 said:


> There's also one more possible temporary alteration for minor, the b2 in place of the major 2.
> 
> It can be used in a phrygian cadence. Ex: Bb > Am
> 
> or using it to make a slightly stronger III i cadence. Ex: C7 > Am instead of C > Am



III7 -> i "cadence" is just a Phrygian progression...

However, the bII7 -> i/I cadence is not specific to Phrygian. It's just a substitution for a V7 -> i/I cadence. For example, in C Major:

V7 is G,B,D,F.
tonic notes: G,D (D resonates with G and is considered not important).
non-tonic chord tones: B,F (major 3rd and dominant 7th).

These are a diminished 5th away from each other. With the D, there is a tritone. As SW mentioned many times, it wants to resolve. But what if you make another chord with the B,F in the other order (dominant 7th, major 3rd)?

You get Db,F,Ab,B, which happens to be the bII7 chord. And if you have fancy memory to impress girls with big words, it is called a Neapolitan.

Everything said above works in Am using harmonic minor or melodic minor to create the V7 chord. You have E, G#, B, D. G, B are the 3rd/7th. Flip them, you end up with Bb, D, F, Ab (G#), which is still a bII7.


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## stuglue (Jun 4, 2013)

What you are describing there is a tritone substitution of G7 with Db7, as you state they both share the F and B notes because tritones are symmetrical in there shape. Flip them on there heads and physically they are the same shape on a guitar.


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## fantom (Jun 5, 2013)

stuglue said:


> What you are describing there is a tritone substitution of G7 with Db7, as you state they both share the F and B notes because tritones are symmetrical in there shape. Flip them on there heads and physically they are the same shape on a guitar.



Yes. You are right... this is just a tritone substitution. I obviously don't have the fancy memory to impress women


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## stuglue (Jun 5, 2013)

trickae said:


> 1. Technical Difficulties - Racer X / Paul Gilbert
> 
> ```
> Intro: drums      Riff A:                                                                      B Phrygian
> ...



Totally off topic, but i had a go at playing this. Cool riff. Now do you want a challenge? 

Try playing this riff AND count aloud 8th notes (1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &). The triplet accent will throw you. I guarantee it. Seems simple but is deceptive.

Im sure you can all play it without counting but just have a go. A real head mash.


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## dudeskin (Jun 5, 2013)

Sorry to bump off to the side a tad, but im getting my head around these a bit better now.

if i have a track in my band we havent managed to finish the ending too properly yet, its a simple idea, very simple. and i want to put something over the top of it (we arnt a chug on the open band, just this riff is haha)
so if this riff is basically B, repeated. what interesting mix of modes should i look at for making it more interesting to listen to. i was thinking semi- tapping idea over the same rhythm part but changing the feel of it by using mode changes.
sorry if im not explaining well enough.

any pointers of where to start? what modes are slightly more sinister and unusual and go well together etc. (i never understood how to change between them before)

thanks
joe


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## Solodini (Jun 5, 2013)

Phrygian and Locrian are considered to be the dark sounding modes of the major scales. Have a look at some modes of harmonic and melodic minor, as well, i.e. superlocrian.


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## stuglue (Jun 5, 2013)

It depends what comes after the low B stuff as to how you approach getting out of that part and into the next.

If you are riffing away on the low B then it depends on what vibe you are after, is it bluesy slightly uplifting but a little mean, then Dorian, if its a Spanish moody vibe its Phrygian.


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## dudeskin (Jun 5, 2013)

cool, cheers guys. i have an idea in my head just not got the guitar vocabulary to get it out.

if someone gave you freedom just to play some animals as leaders/vildhjarta inspired stuff over B coming from B Phrygian but not right next to it, what would you play till end? its the last riff of the track (so far atleast so i guess anything goes) .

im just interesting in whats possible kind of thing. i end up doing Phrygian to death a tad but i love it haha.

Joe


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## Mr. Big Noodles (Jun 5, 2013)

Hollowway said:


> That was the winningest post ever! It took me over an hour to read,
> And somewhat understand it. Thanks a MILLION for taking the time to map that all out.
> So now I have one more question: you said that in modal pieces you don't always want to use leading tones, and that makes it difficult to cadence (without being able to use the tritone). Why is that? Why would a modal piece be any different that a diatonic piece in using the tritone? Is it because it would pull it away from the mode because of the need to have that 7 a half step down from the 1? So it would make everything sound major or harmonic/melodic minor? Or am I totally missing the boat? (I'm just guessing here).



Careful - "modal" and "diatonic" are not exclusive terms. "Diatonic" encompasses major and minor scales, as well as the church modes. I generally use diatonic to mean anything that comes out of the major scale collection, which makes things easier when dealing with atonal music that is still diatonic. "Tonal" and "modal" form a dichotomy, however (even though there is some crossing over at points).

Tritones make it easy to have a convincing cadence, because all they want to do in harmony is resolve. Tritones have a natural pull, so they are going to influence any melody or harmony that you deal with. This means that our ear will tell us that a bunch of notes in a diatonic collection will naturally want to pull toward a tonic that will have the 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 organization (as opposed to 1 2 3 4 5 6 &#9837;7, or whatever). But what if we want 1 2 3 4 5 6 &#9837;7? We have to make the music melodically strong and convince the ear of a tonic in order to bypass that natural tendency to go toward the relative major. This is not as big of a deal for the ears of today as it was for the ears of the 1800's, because we are surrounded by music that uses a variety of modes, but we run into this issue on occasion where you desperately want something to sound like tonic and your ear won't have it.



dudeskin said:


> Sorry to bump off to the side a tad, but im getting my head around these a bit better now.
> 
> if i have a track in my band we havent managed to finish the ending too properly yet, its a simple idea, very simple. and i want to put something over the top of it (we arnt a chug on the open band, just this riff is haha)
> so if this riff is basically B, repeated. what interesting mix of modes should i look at for making it more interesting to listen to. i was thinking semi- tapping idea over the same rhythm part but changing the feel of it by using mode changes.
> ...



Do what sounds right. You need context for any decision, and "B" really isn't enough of a context for us to tell you anything. You know the song, so play around with it. If all you're working with is a B pedal tone, then your job is easy. Let this video be an inspiration:



He's calling out the names of the modes after he plays them, by the way. And, despite the cutoff sentence at the end, he's not changing the key. Key stays the same, the mode above it is changing. (B lydian, B phrygian, B dorian, all have the same key, despite the fact that they might have different key signatures; E lydian, G lydian, and F dorian all have different keys, because their tonic notes differ).



fantom said:


> III7 -> i "cadence" is just a Phrygian progression...



Yeah, I don't know how convincing III7 i is, either. I tried it, and by itself E&#9837;7 Cm sounds alright. However, I couldn't find a diatonic chord leading up to it that would make it sound right to my ear. Doesn't mean it can't be done, but I worry that the dominant quality of E&#9837;7 more strongly wants to go to A&#9837; or D, and that there are too many common tones between E&#9837;7 and Cm to be effective as a cadence. I can see it as a two-chord vamp.



> These are a diminished 5th away from each other. With the D, there is a tritone. As SW mentioned many times, it wants to resolve. But what if you make another chord with the B,F in the other order (dominant 7th, major 3rd)?
> 
> You get Db,F,Ab,B, which happens to be the bII7 chord. And if you have fancy memory to impress girls with big words, it is called a Neapolitan.


Neapolitan is a subdominant function chord, so it's a substitute for IV, not V. &#9837;II7 is most often called a "tritone substitution". You could also call the chord some sort of +6/i, provided you have the resolution of an augmented sixth interval to an octave.

Below: voice leading for the Neapolitan chord, tritone sub (note the parallel fifth) and a French augmented sixth chord (used to avoid the parallel fifth, and I think it sounds cooler than German or Italian).






Neapolitan chords tend to favor minor keys, because of the &#9837;6. The other two are not as picky, though I think that they sound better with a major tonic. Neapolitan chords are traditionally found in the first inversion in order to mimic the bass movement of a root position iv moving to V. The &#9837;2 in the Neapolitan chord is used to surround the tonic chromatically with the leading tone (&#9837;2 7 1). The same &#9837;2 is being used as part of a straight chromatic line in the tritone substitution (2 &#9837;2 1). It's a linear harmony. The augmented sixth chord uses the &#9837;2 in the same way, but it doesn't necessarily have to be part of a chromatic line. The important thing is really to create an +6 interval that will expand to an octave (&#9837;2-7 > 1-1)

Some tab for all y'alls. Notice the treatment of the note B in the &#9837;II7 I progression. It's held as a common tone to get the seventh in the tonic chord. Now check out what B does in the Fr+6/I I progression. It is like a leading tone. Together with the D&#9837; in the bass, there is a chromatic expansion to the tonic octave.






Brahms uses an It+6/I at the end of the B section of the B minor sarabande:








I don't see why something like that wouldn't be a good way to approach the tonic in the phrygian mode.


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## Hollowway (Jun 18, 2013)

SW, I hate to keep asking things of you, but would you mind writing out all of the modes (and other "scales" as you see fit) with key neutrality? Like how you did for a few of them as 1, 2, b3, 4, etc. For me that would be a HUGE help to both visualize and apply these different things, without just running different fretboard patterns over chords (which isn't getting me anywhere in terms of knowing what notes to hit to express what I want to express).


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## Mr. Big Noodles (Jun 19, 2013)

Sure thing.
*
The diatonic modes:*

Lydian - 1 2 3 #4 5 6 7
Major - 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Mixolydian - 1 2 3 4 5 6 &#9837;7

Dorian - 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 6 &#9837;7
Aeolian - 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7
Phrygian - 1 &#9837;2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7
Locrian - 1 &#9837;2 &#9837;3 4 &#9837;5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7

Harmonic minor - 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 7
Melodic minor - 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 6 7

Major pentatonic - 1 2 3 5 6 (the major scale, minus the notes that create a tritone, 4 & 7)
Minor pentatonic - 1 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;7 (the natural minor scale, minus the notes that create a tritone, 2 & &#9837;6)*

Common modes from the harmonic and melodic minor collections:*

Phrygian dominant - 1 &#9837;2 3 4 5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7
Lydian dominant (The Acoustic Scale, or lydian-mixolydian) - 1 2 3 #4 5 6 &#9837;7

*Some symmetrical scales:
*
Octatonic scale - 1 &#9837;2 &#9837;3 3 #4 5 6 &#9837;7 (maybe not the best way to look at this scale, but I find that this is how my brain organizes the intervals)
Whole tone scale - 1 2 3 #4 #5 &#9837;7 (also something that doesn't fit the mold of our heptatonic tonal system, so the numbers don't have much meaning)


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## fantom (Jun 19, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Dorian - 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 6 &#9837;7
> Aeolian - 1 2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7
> Phrygian - 1 &#9837;2 &#9837;3 4 5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7
> Locrian - 1 &#9837;2 &#9837;3 4 &#9837;5 &#9837;6 &#9837;7
> ...



For those of us who like to pretend that only minor keys exist...

Aeolian = minor
Dorian = minor with a sharp 6
Phrygian = minor with a flat 2
Locrian = minor with flat 2 and flat 5

Harmonic minor = minor with a sharp 7
Melodic minor = minor with a sharp 6 and sharp 7 (typically when ascending)

Minor pentatonic = minor without the 2 and 6
Hexatonic = minor without the 6

Phrygian dominant = Phrygian with major 3rd instead of minor 3rd
Lydian dominant = not very minor

Two more...
Hungarian = minor with sharp 4 and sharp 7 (and very )
Altered Dorian = minor with sharp 4 and sharp 6 metal: version of Dorian mode)

Or you can see both of those as...
Hungarian = Harmonic minor with sharp 4
Altered Dorian = Dorian with sharp 4
In both cases, you can abuse the sharp 4 as a diminished 5th.


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## mulgreaux (Jun 19, 2013)

SchecterWhore said:


> Sure thing.
> 
> *The diatonic modes:*
> 
> ...


 

You may also want to look at the Altered scale (mode 7 of melodic minor) to use on any altered dominant chord.

1 b2 #2 3 b5 #5 b7

Technically you could also write it 1 b2 b3 b4 b5 b6 b7, but it's more relevant to altered chord construction when written the first way. In context of the chords you'd see the b2/#2 as b9/#9


Also useful is the Locrian Natural 2 scale (melodic minor mode 6) as an alternative to the regular Locrian scale for use on half diminished/minor7b5 chords.

1 2 b3 4 b5 b6 b7


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