Modes/scales

Yep :)

We're watching this thread from the Moderators' lounge. As Musenfreund's already asked, keep it clean, keep it straight; the intellectual debate that's going on is fascinating and we all want to see it debated to a logical conclusion.

Well alot of my findings have just come from playing and the way i could describe it in my head was to pretend eigmatic is a mode of the major cos it did share the major 3rd, for me it was easier to rememer that way other than knowing them individually... because eventually you realise all scales are linked by sharing notes, this was how i change scales/modes and so i applied that sharing notes stuff on the other scales + its modes, and saw it as modes having modes.

Though i will learn the ways you guys have mentioned, but most likely in my head i'll still think the way i taught myself because it's second nature to now :(

I should of had a teacher i guess but i only been learning music for 2 years. I accept defeat on this one. But loved this discussion, was really good reading !

it was confusing reading!

Just to clear up a few loose ends regarding the difference between mode and scale. (or fan the flames :lol: )

Although, to all intents and purposes, scales and modes are the same, they aren't exactly the same. The difference is hardly worth bothering about, but having nothing better to do on this rainy Sunday afternoon, I thought I'd mention some of the differences.

The word "scale" derives from the Latin word SCALA meaning step' (as in the word "escalator)".
"Mode" derives from the Greek (via Latin) MODUS, which refers to a method, means, way, state, condition, etc. as in "modus operandi", sleep mode, standby mode.

When applied to music, the difference is far more subtle than this. A musical mode is a collection of notes that are combined to produce music with certain characteristics resulting from their unique interval relationships. If you take those same notes and arrange them in order of pitch (in steps) above the mode's root note, you have a scale.

That's the essential difference. Scales are just the notes of a mode arranged in order of pitch. (although many scales are artificial constructions with no underlying mode, e.g., the chromatic scale).

Modes are like a rich and colourful dialect of a language. Scales are just the dictionary showing those words in alphabetical order.

You can play in a mode but you can't play in a scale. (You can play a scale but not IN one). If you take a scale and play its notes rearranged in a musical 'way' (always relating the notes to the scale root), then you're back to playing "in a mode", not "in a scale".

Major and minor are also modes.
The major mode has well known qualities of strength, stabilty, whatever - the major scale can't possibly have any such qualities. - it's just a boring scale.

There are three forms of the minor scale (natural, harmonic and melodic) but they represent just one mode, i.e., the minor mode.
(I'm excluding, the church modes with a minor third which are sometimes referred to as minor modes.)

By the way, the above meaning of modes is the traditional one which is in contrast to the modern (mis)understanding (almost exclusively among rock guitarists), that the church modes (Dorian, Lydian, etc) are just major scales that have been shifted up or down to begin on any degree other than the root.
This doesn't apply to the Jazz modes of the melodic and harmonic scales which, as far as I can tell, do seem to have been conceived around that concept of shifting. That's fine. At least they don't cause confusion with centuries old established practices.

Though i will learn the ways you guys have mentioned, but most likely in my head i'll still think the way i taught myself because it's second nature to now :(

I should of had a teacher i guess but i only been learning music for 2 years. I accept defeat on this one. But loved this discussion, was really good reading !

And this is an example of a real danger that is almost exclusive to guitarists trying to self-teach music theory off of the internet.

Most every other instrument has a more or less defined method around it that relates to standard music theory in a very structured way (even if it's not explicitely defined). But guitarists sort of pick and choose and mis-interpret things as they self-teach.

One of the wierd results of this has been the focus on modes among guitarists. It's extremely rare to find a guitarist who understands and uses modes in any way analogous to standard practice -- which means they have a very hard time talking to other musicians around the subject. Guitarists also find it very odd that other instrumentalists tend to not care about modes much at all.

Except for jazz horn players and baroque organists -- both of whom tend to not use modes in any way similar to how guitarists use them.

Fretsource, thanks for claryfing some ideas. I tried to follow the thread but I must admit I didn't understand it. It isn't a problem, I'm not in that level yet.

Just some simple questions. When we speak about "pentatonic" or "blues", we speak about scales, correct? And they admit also major and minor modes, no?

And a new one, does the chromatic scale admit modes? You are using all the twelve notes, thus it can not be arranged in different ways. Just a curiosity.

Finally, the words "scala" and "modus" are both Latin. Fretsource and Noteboat said that the concept of "mode" is Greek, correct?

Fretsource is right - but it's not quite so cut and dried, so I'm gonna disagree anyway :) . Like jazz musicians deriving scales by 'shifting', it depends on how you approach things.

Modes and scales really are two sides of the same coin. If you can't play in a scale, you can't play in C major - you can only play in C Ionian. But it's still going to have an identical sound. The only thing different is the label.

And by the same logic, if you play the ordered tones of C Dorian, you're not playing "in" the C Dorian mode, but you're producing a C Dorian scale. Or are you doing both? Again, there won't be a difference in sound... so I argue that the distinction between "Dorian mode" and "Dorian scale" doesn't matter.

To get philosophical about it, I think one of the defining factors of "art" is that you can't describe it precisely without invoking the art itself. You can describe it generally - you can say a painting has a blue sky, but you can't communicate the exact hue without using paint or crayons... something that communicates using the medium in question. Musical terms are like that too. Concepts like 'key', 'tonality', 'mode', etc. are really much more general than we sometimes imagine they are.

On top of that, the way we apply more specific terms changes over time. Dorian vs. Hypodorian were clearly distinguished 1000 years ago; today we don't bother with the difference. What was considered dissonant by Palestrina is consonant in today's counterpoint.

So the bottom line in defining artisitc terms is that you can only split hairs so far. "This is mode x / scale y" is pretty good over time, because we're talking in a general term like "green" - it's blue + yellow, or intervals in this order.

But a term like "hypo-" that attempts to refine things even more precisely may fade over time, because the term isn't the art - it's just a verbal approximation. Even if we create an exact label for the artistic expression, today's "seafoam green" may be tomorrow's "sun bleached iguana".

In my opinion, the difference between mode and scale is like that - it's semantic, rather than inherent.

You say po-ta-to, I say po-tah-to. :)

Nuno, yes, we talk about penatonic and blues scales. Like major or minor scales, that really defines the "resource set" of tones that are used.

And yes, they can be arranged on different tones - the same way a resource set of a major scale can produce six other modes. But like I said, that's really a coincidence; prior to Glareanus, the church modes were seen as distinct scales. And other cultures with historically pentatonic music (China, Japan, etc) tend to give different names to each of the five "modes" - they have five different, and unrelated, scales in their music theory.

The chromatic scale is interesting; it doesn't have "modes", because the sound doesn't change. But it does have two "forms" - you can have C-C#-D-D# etc., or you can have C-Db-D-Eb...

And yes, Latin uses 'modus'. But not until Late Latin - they incorporated the word from Greek. Just like we've done with Latin words such as 'onus' - it's an English word, but identical to the Latin one... we just stole it :)

Fretsource, thanks for claryfing some ideas. I tried to follow the thread but I must admit I didn't understand it. It isn't a problem, I'm not in that level yet.

Just some simple questions. When we speak about "pentatonic" or "blues", we speak about scales, correct? And they admit also major and minor modes, no?

And a new one, does the chromatic scale admit modes? You are using all the twelve notes, thus it can not be arranged in different ways. Just a curiosity.

Finally, the words "scala" and "modus" are both Latin. Fretsource and Noteboat said that the concept of "mode" is Greek, correct?

Hi Nuno
Yes, "scala" and "modus" are both Latin, but "modus" is derived from a Greek root. I don't know where "scala" is derived from.

When modes began to die out in the 17th century, musicians began to stop talking about them, apart from historians and theorists (there were no rock guitarists around at the time :lol: )

Gradually, the colourful (but harmonically unsuitable) church modes were replaced by the now completely transposable major and minor modes, which led to them being referred to as KEYS, (a concept that was impossible when the church modes ruled).
A key is a mode in which the tonal centre has been designated. So the key of G major, for example, actually means the major mode (formerly the Ionian mode) built around (and relating to) the note G.

In this regard, modes are closer in concept to keys than they are to scales, and we often use the two terms interchangeably. For example, if I say the song Twinkle Twinkle little star is in a major key, you know what I mean, but if you ask me which key, I can't give a useful answer - it's any key we like, depending on which note we choose as the key note. It would be more accurate, if I said Twinkle Twinkle is in the major mode. Then if you ask "which mode?" I'll say "I just told you - MAJOR"

The pentatonic scale (as a term) was first applied by theorists to the pitchwise arrangement of the notes used in pentatonic music. Pentatonic music crops up in just about every corner of the world, from Hanoi to the Hebrides. Pentatonic music is indeed modal in the sense that the unique interval patterns produce musical effects which form the basis of real compositions.
Scottish traditional music commonly uses several pentatonic modes - and, of course, every one of them has a corresponding pentatonic scale.

In modern rock music, pentatonic scales have a somewhat different role - they are used in a non pentatonic harmonic setting purely for their melodic appeal. The underlying mode - is basically diatonic, with optional chromatic decoration.

As for your other points, I don't know anything about the history of the blues scale, and I agree that the chromatic, which is an artificial construct, doesn't represent a chromatic mode, as I mentioned in my post above.

Ok!!! :D :D :D

One more time, thank you very much, NoteBoat and Fretsource! :D

PS. According to the official Spanish dictionary, it seems our word "escala" comes from the Latin word "scala", and this from the Greek "?????"/"scala" -it seems the system does not allow Greek symbols, please, use the link-. And "modo" comes from Latin word "modus", they do not mention the Greek root. I remember some Latin from by secondary school days but I forgot all the Greek, only I remember the symbols that I use in my mathematical "formulae"! :lol:

Hi NoteBoat. I don't think there's much to disagree on. As I said, they are the same "to all intents and purposes" and the difference, which I also said is hardly worth bothering about, is largely one of perception and usage.

We, and others, have often said on the forum that scales and modes are the same thing. But every time I say it, I'm aware that beginners struggling with these concepts are going to wonder "If they're the same then why are some called modes and others scales?", or "Can we use them interchangeably like, 'I'm practising the chromatic mode' instead of 'the chromatic scale'?"

The danger of leaving those questions unanswered is that when someone comes along saying that modes are just the major scale viewed from different starting points, suddenly, it fits and seems to make perfect sense, blinding them to the truth that that 'fact' is just a coincidence, and that looking at them that way misses the point of them completely.

So I felt that this was an opportune moment, (especially given the title of the thread) to clarify that there is indeed a correctly observed, subtle difference of usage, concept, and implication. Call it semantic if you will, but it's the creeping disregard of such proper usage that causes all the misinformation and misunderstanding in the first place.
By all means let's continue to treat them as synonymous (it would be silly to do otherwise) - but let's also keep an eye on 'both sides of the coin' at the same time.

You say Po- tah -to. Actually we say "tattie" round here. :lol:

Wow I need a music teacher lol. I have read through this regardless of my lack of knowledge on the whoe subject and found it very interesting. In all fairnes though I probably picked none of it up whatso ever though I do understand some of what was said.

I feel I just need to learn one thing at a time starting from the fretboard, as I think knowing where the notes are should help me somewhat! I'm also reletivly pleased that I am not at a level to absorb certain things I have read hopefully preventing me from learning things incorrectly. I always felt I would like to have been 'self-taught' though reading various things on the internet and what people have said withint this thread I have come to the conclusion it may not be the best way to learn an instrument.

Just like to thank everyone for there input and explinations though as I say I didn't much understand it lol.

Though i will learn the ways you guys have mentioned, but most likely in my head i'll still think the way i taught myself because it's second nature to now :(

I should of had a teacher i guess but i only been learning music for 2 years. I accept defeat on this one. But loved this discussion, was really good reading !

And this is an example of a real danger that is almost exclusive to guitarists trying to self-teach music theory off of the internet.

Most every other instrument has a more or less defined method around it that relates to standard music theory in a very structured way (even if it's not explicitely defined). But guitarists sort of pick and choose and mis-interpret things as they self-teach.

One of the wierd results of this has been the focus on modes among guitarists. It's extremely rare to find a guitarist who understands and uses modes in any way analogous to standard practice -- which means they have a very hard time talking to other musicians around the subject. Guitarists also find it very odd that other instrumentalists tend to not care about modes much at all.

Except for jazz horn players and baroque organists -- both of whom tend to not use modes in any way similar to how guitarists use them.

None of my findings have come from the internet thankgod! It all came down to playing songs by artists songs and working out what was going on. How ever once i worked out a formula of a scale i did refer to a book to get its name such as the Enigmatic II (satriani used this and that is how i came about learning it), but ive never once learnt off anything but myself. other than to check if i have a formula correct etc.
So even if i am learning it slightly wrong i feel hopefully my playing will be unique to me if you get me, cos thats what its all about if we all learnt the same, from the same people, and from the same inspirations we will all sound the same..similar to how if your all brought up in Scotland you all will develope a scottish accent, which in music you do not want, you gotta find your own voice in music. Thats my view on it to some degree, from learning satriani and hendrix i have picked up basically just satch in the long run cos satch has alot of hendrix inspiration in him anyway. So i decided to throw in an artist that is totally different in my eyes but i aint picked who i want to choose yet. Im thinking Eric Johnson though he has hendirx roots no doubt, he has a nice approach of chord playing which very few guitarists are into that are my age group especially.. alot are more inspired and interested in playing shredding over scales which is all the rage on youtube videos. But i can only learn so much in 2 years.