November 22, 2024 • 30 mins
All About Minor Scales – A Complete Guide to Minor Scales in Music Theory
Welcome to this deep dive into minor scales! In this episode, we explore everything you need to know about minor scales in music theory. Whether you're a musician, music educator, or guitar player, understanding the minor scale is essential for mastering music theory and improving your musical creativity.
We start by covering the basics, including the structure and formula of the natural minor scale, as well as the differences between harmonic minor and melodic minor scales. You'll learn how to build and recognize minor scale patterns on various instruments, especially the guitar, and how to use these scales in your compositions, solos, and improvisation.
This episode is perfect for anyone interested in music education, music theory breakdowns, and gaining a deeper understanding of how minor scales shape musical expression. We also provide practical examples to help you incorporate minor scales into your playing and expand your musical vocabulary.
#MusicTheory #MusicEducation #MusicCommentary #MusicHistory
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
UNKNOWN (00:00):
Thank you.
SPEAKER_01 (00:30):
Hello Theory Nerds and welcome back to the
Harmonious Blacksmith.
This is episode 7 of my seriesand I'm your host Kevin Patrick
Fleming and yes I do play my ownguitar tracks on my podcast.
Oh that's nice.
(00:51):
Yeah don't worry I've got fiveor six pens for autographs.
No no no take it easy.
Get in line.
Don't for everybody.
Thanks again for tuning in,everybody.
I do appreciate you being here,and I'm excited about today's
episode.
If this is your first timestumbling upon my podcast, first
(01:13):
of all, welcome, and we arehappy you're here.
Second of all, this is a linearand cumulative podcast, which
means every idea that I'm layingout in each episode is building
on previous ideas.
So if this is the first episodeyou've stumbled upon, my record
is to go back all the way to thebeginning and go through the
(01:35):
sequence of episodes and catchup with us when you can.
You will understand a lot moreif you do.
So just to catch you up onthings, our previous episode,
number six, was dispelling themystery between major and
minors.
which led us down the rabbithole and took us all the way to
(01:56):
terms like parallel keys andrelative keys.
We learned the conspiracy theorythat minor is only different by
scale degrees 3, 6, and 7.
Turns out it's true.
Turns out it's true.
I also introduced you to theunderground secret society of
(02:17):
Greek modes.
They were Ionian, Dorian,Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian,
Aeolian, and Locrian people, youheard it here first.
So if you feel like you'rerunning into a lot of fake music
theory news on the internet, youknow where to turn to.
Right here on the HarmoniousBlacksmith.
(02:39):
Today's episode is all aboutminor.
So minor scales, minor keys, andthe chord progressions that
naturally come out within theminor key.
I realized I had been talkingmostly about major up till this
point, and that's relevantbecause major is the predominant
(03:01):
tonality that is used in Westernharmony, but I had also promised
y'all things like minorprogressions and things like
that I remember in my previousepisodes and just ran out of
time because there was so muchto talk about, so let's talk
about minor today.
So what do we know and recallabout minor so far as opposed to
(03:23):
major.
Well, in a broad stroke orgeneral view, we know that minor
sounds a little darker, a littlemore mysterious, possibly more
emotional.
Some of my students describe itas sounding lower or droopier,
but really this overalloverarching thing of sadness I
think works really well.
(03:44):
So where does that sad, darkkind of sound come from?
Well, it comes from, of course,a scale formula.
And if you recall, the formulafor a minor scale is whole,
half, whole, whole, half, whole,whole.
And an A minor scale would soundlike this.
And do any of y'all rememberwhich of the seven Greek modes
(04:15):
that a minor scale is?
It's called Aeolian, and it'sthe sixth Greek mode.
And again, I'm going to have anentire episode dedicated to
Greek modes coming up, and I'mvery excited about that.
But just know that minor isAeolian, and Aeolian has another
(04:36):
common term that we call it,which is natural minor.
And natural minor is just theAeolian mode, but the reason we
give it a name like naturalminor and not just minor is
because it's what comes outquote unquote naturally based on
(04:57):
the formula I gave you already.
The whole, half, whole, whole,half, whole, whole.
That creates what we call anatural minor scale.
And so that must also imply thatthere's such thing as an
unnatural minor scale.
Turns out that's true.
There are multiple of them andthey are quote unquote altered
(05:17):
minor scales.
And this This is why I waited awhile to get to minor because it
gets a little complicated inminor really quickly.
So you might be asking why?
Okay, there's this natural minorcalled Aeolian and yet there's
these multiple altered minorscales, but why?
Because it turns out withinnatural minor keys or Aeolian
(05:41):
keys, the musical tension in thechord progressions is very weak
as far as having a tension andresolution.
Now, we already talked aboutmusical tension in previous
episodes, but I'm going to upthe ante here on that with a new
term that we call a cadence.
(06:04):
A cadence is a series of two ormore chords that comes at the
end of a musical sentence oreven a musical piece that gives
a feeling of tension and full orpartial resolution of that
tension within the chordprogression.
The most common cadence type inour Western system is a five
(06:26):
chord to a one chord.
So recall your Roman numeralsand how we could build a triad
off of each scale degree.
Therefore, there's seven triadsfrom which we can build more
chords, right?
So in order to explain why minorchord progressions can be weak
in natural minor, I'm going todouble back to May and let you
(06:50):
hear a 5-1 cadence in major.
So let's start with good old Gmajor.
So if we take the I chord in thekey, which is just a G major
chord, and the V chord in thekey, which will be a D major
(07:15):
chord, We can set up our cadenceor our musical tension and
release from there.
So let's establish the key inour ear first so you can
understand that.
That, of course, is a 1-4-5-1.
(07:36):
But now, if you hear 1 as thehome base...
Notice if I stop on that fivechord, you can hear some
tension.
I can turn it into a dominantseven by adding another third on
top of the triad.
Listen to that tension.
(07:58):
It needs to go somewhere.
It needs to be resolved backto...
The I chord.
Ah, feel the refreshment of therelease of musical tension.
And for example's sake, let's doone other key.
So I'm going to now do A major,which sounds like this.
(08:24):
Your I, IV, V would be A, D, andE.
E.
And therefore, your 5-1 cadencewould just be E-2-A.
So you hear the tension andrelease.
I'll turn the V chord into adominant 7 by adding another
(08:46):
note on top of the triad again.
Screaming for release.
Ah, there it is.
So the cadence gives us thetension, which is therefore
partially or fully resolved.
And now that you know what itsounds like in major, let's
compare that to natural minor,which again, I'm going to remind
(09:10):
you, is weaker sounding in itscadences.
So therefore, the musicaltension and release just is not
as effective within the chordprogression.
So let's establish a minor,again, sounds like this.
UNKNOWN (09:27):
So
SPEAKER_01 (09:31):
Now 1-4-5 in A minor would be A minor is 1, D minor
is 4, E minor is 5, and thenback to A minor again.
So 1-4-5 in minor would soundlike this.
(09:55):
Now listen to the five, onecadence, just like the major
key.
And just notice that it doesn'thave nearly as much tension.
Then I'll compare them back toback with major.
Listen to this.
This is five.
One.
Again, five.
One.
UNKNOWN (10:15):
Two.
SPEAKER_01 (10:18):
doesn't really have the same tension.
Now listen to five, one in majoragain.
Here's the five in major.
One.
Five.
Tension, tension, one.
Minor.
Five.
One.
(10:40):
The minor is clearly weaker andyou can hear it.
And there's a reason for thatthat we're going to go into.
And it involves having to learnone more new term called a
leading tone.
A leading tone is a note whichresolves or leads the ear to
(11:01):
another note, which is exactlyone half step higher or lower.
Typically in our system, we arereferring to the seventh scale
degree of a major scale, whichis a half step away from the
octave or the root of that scaleagain.
So let's demonstrate.
So back to G major todemonstrate a leading tone,
(11:23):
which is the seventh scaledegree of the scale.
G major again sounds like this.
UNKNOWN (11:32):
So
SPEAKER_01 (11:32):
And the seventh scale degree in G major is F
sharp.
First of all, just listen.
If I play the scale all the wayup and stop on the leading tone,
the leading tone will lead yourear to where it's supposed to go
to next.
You will actually even hear thenote in your head screaming
(11:53):
because it wants to go to it sobad.
Listen up.
UNKNOWN (11:58):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (12:01):
can't stop there, right?
You can hear where it wants togo.
One more time.
And then we finally get thenote.
And they are a half step awayfrom each other, as you remember
from the major formula.
And that creates a very powerfultension and release between the
(12:24):
seventh scale degree of a majorscale and its octave.
And that is the power of theleading tone.
And it turns out this magicalleading tone that creates
tension and resolution and acadence is built into to the V
chord in a major key.
(12:45):
So what I mean by built-in isit's naturally the middle note
of the triad.
Remember, triads have threenotes, and in a V chord, it's
going to be scale degrees V,VII, and II.
So remember, the seventh scaledegree in major is the leading
tone.
So it's built-in in major tohave this amazing leading tone
(13:07):
tension within the V chord, andconsequently, it is not built in
in minor, which is why it soundsweaker.
The minor scale degree seven isa whole step away from the
octave or the root note.
So let's go to some audiocomparisons.
(13:27):
So again, I'm going to back upto G major right quick, which
sounds like this.
UNKNOWN (13:32):
So
SPEAKER_01 (13:41):
And remember, triads are built on the skipping
method.
One, three, five.
The second chord is two, four,six.
Third chord is three, five,seven, and so on.
Until I get to the five chord,which is going to be five,
seven, and two.
Right?
And so that chord...
(14:02):
has the leading tone built intoit that gives us the tension in
the key.
It's right there buried in themiddle of the chord.
So when I'm in G, that chordscreams to go back up to G
because of that leading tone.
But in minor, we don't have thesame thing.
(14:24):
So let's say I'm in G minor now.
Just to give a parallelism.
Remember parallel keys.
So G minor would sound likethis.
Let's go ahead and take a secondto fill out the triads in minor
two.
I promised I would do that, andI don't want to forget.
(14:46):
So let's go ahead and fill themout.
So remember, we're in G minornow.
So, my I chord, basically,here's what you need to know
about the Roman numerals.
Remember the Roman numerals thatwe studied previously?
In major, I, IV, and V are majorchords, II, III, and VI are
(15:07):
minor chords, and the VII chordis diminished.
In minor, one, four, and fiveare minor chords.
Three, six, and seven are majorchords.
And two is diminished.
So between major and minor, theyboth have three major chords,
(15:27):
three minor chords, and onediminished chord.
They're very balanced.
It's just the chords are in adifferent place.
They're in a different order.
So let's go through them in Gminor.
Here's the one chord, which is Gminor.
The two chord is going to bediminished.
The three chord is going to be amajor chord, which in this case
(15:50):
is going to be B flat.
The four chord is going to be aC minor.
The five chord is a D minor.
The six chord is going to be Eflat major.
The seven chord is going to be Fmajor.
(16:10):
And then I'm back to G minoragain, which is the one chord.
So now for the sequence of minorchords in Aeolian or natural
minor in a row.
The one chord is G minor.
Two is A diminished.
Three is B flat major.
Four is C minor.
Five is D minor.
(16:31):
Six is E flat major.
Seven is F major.
And then we're back to one.
So again, remember, 1-4-5 is themain predominant force in chord
progressions.
So if I play a 1-4-5 in minor,it'll be the G minor.
(16:51):
C minor.
D minor.
D minor.
back to G minor there's just nota ton of tension there's a
little bit of tension there butjust not a ton like in major and
songwriters and composers caughtwind of this early on and
realized you know what I don'thave the same weight or tension
(17:13):
just like in the major key andremember a lot of that's just
because the major key has aleading tone so what ended up
happening is that people whowrite music composers alike
ended up altering the five chordin minor to create a leading
(17:34):
tone.
One way to think of it for ussongwriters is that we're
borrowing the leading tone fromthe major key or even borrowing
the five chord.
Because what really has tohappen in order for us to create
a leading tone with a five chordin minor, we have to raise the
minor seventh a half step up towhere it would be in the major
(17:58):
key and this creates a whole newscale that is called harmonic
minor harmonic minor is a scalethat is slightly altered from
the natural minor scale where weare raising the seventh scale
degree a half step to create aleading tone sound in minor
(18:19):
therefore giving us more tensionwithin melodies and within the
chord progression So let'sdouble back to the key of A
minor to demonstrate this.
So if you recall, in the key ofA minor, A minor is the I chord,
D minor is the IV chord, E minoris the V chord, and A minor is
(18:42):
I.
So our I, IV, V is A minor, Dminor, E minor, A minor.
But based on this harmonic minorprinciple that I just taught
you, we're going to raise the7th scale degree in A minor to
create a little extra tension inthe chord progression.
So first of all, how does thatmake the scale sound?
(19:03):
Well, here's your natural minorscale.
Now let's raise the seventh andcreate the harmonic minor sound.
UNKNOWN (19:21):
So
SPEAKER_01 (19:23):
So interesting.
It yields an interesting sound,and my students describe it as
all kinds of different things.
I'm going to leave thatcreativity to your mind based on
the way it sounds.
But more importantly, why are weraising that seventh to create
that leading tone?
UNKNOWN (19:44):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (19:45):
You can tell it creates that tension pull that
pulls that last note up.
And again, that's gonna affectwhat our five chord is because
it's gonna raise the middle noteof the five triad, which in this
case is E minor.
Before it had a G natural, nowit's going to have a G sharp, so
(20:08):
it's going to be an E major now.
And then we're going to resolveto A minor.
So listen to a 1-4-5 usingharmonic minor.
It's going to start with A minoras 1, D minor as 4, E major as
5, and then A minor as 1 again.
(20:30):
So again, you just get moretension.
There's the leading tone withinthe chord, which screams to go
up to one.
So again, leading tone, back toone.
(20:52):
And when we're in regularnatural minor, that leading
tone's not there.
The five chord would have a Gnatural instead of a G sharp.
tell it's just a more benignchord progression that way to be
(21:16):
clear harmonic minor is not oneof the greek modes right we
already laid out the seven greekmodes last episode and harmonic
minor is not one of them it isliterally just an alteration of
the aeolian mode by raising thatone scale degree seven to make
it a leading tone now why is itcalled harmonic minor it's
(21:40):
because we are altering thatseventh scale degree to give a
harmonic change in the chordprogressions.
Remember, harmony being two ormore notes being played together
simultaneously.
But in the bigger picture ofharmony, we're talking about
triads.
We're talking about chords,chords that harmonize with our
(22:00):
melodies and things like that.
So we call it harmonic minorbecause we're literally altering
that seventh scale degree tochange the strength of the chord
progressions.
or the harmony within the scale.
It's much, much less to do withthe melodic output.
(22:21):
So in summary, think aboutharmonic minor as taking the
natural minor or aeolian, ifyou're thinking of Greek modes,
and raising the seventh scaledegree only a half step to
create a leading tone, whichmakes our five chord a major
(22:41):
chord or a stronger sound fortension and resolution in the
chord progressions.
So if harmonic minor is alteredbased on making chord
progressions stronger, whatabout melodies?
Composers and songwriters alikealong the way realized that
minor melodies also don't have alot of tension in them based on
(23:04):
the scale.
And because of that, theycreated yet another alteration
of the minor scale, which iscalled melodic minor.
Melodic minor is anotheralteration of the natural minor
scale, but in this time we'regoing to raise scale degrees 6
(23:25):
and 7 on the way up and lowerthem back down on the way down.
SPEAKER_00 (23:31):
What in the world are you talking about, Kevin?
My God, I followed you so welluntil now.
You better explain this onegood, boy.
SPEAKER_01 (23:39):
Okay, okay, I understand It seems a little
squirrely.
I promise I'm going to explain.
So here we go.
So this one's called melodicminor as opposed to the previous
one, which was called harmonicminor.
Why is this one called melodicminor?
Because we are altering thepitches in order to get a better
(24:02):
melody result in minor.
Again, this is something thatjust evolved over time with
songwriters and composers wherethey started altering the minor
scale to get different melodicresults that they felt were
better.
I mean, it really comes down tosubjectivity in the end.
So it must sound really strangeat this point, since this is the
(24:24):
first time we've altered a scalewhere I said raise scale degrees
sixth and seventh on the way upand lower them back down on the
way down.
Let's listen to it and thenwe'll talk about explanation.
So I'm going to actually do abased on natural minor first.
(24:44):
So, let's establish A minor inyour ear again.
Now, let's raise the 6th and 7thon the way up and lower them
back down on the way down toyield the melodic minor sound.
UNKNOWN (25:10):
Now,
SPEAKER_01 (25:11):
I'm going to do that one more time because I know
it's strange.
And you might be asking, why inthe world would we want to do
that and how do we use it?
An explanation in my own wordsis this.
(25:32):
When you raise the sixth andseventh scale degree on the way
up, it has this way of creatingthis tension pull that really
pulls you up to the root.
And then we alter them again onthe way down.
They get lowered because theydroop.
(25:53):
Droop is the word I use.
They droop back down towards theroot.
that they're working towards.
So this is an interesting scalebecause it has a different
tendency as you rise up to theoctave and a different tendency
when you go back down to thelowered root.
So again, when we go up in Aminor, six, seven, one.
(26:17):
So you can hear how it reallypulls up to that octave.
And then when I lower them onthe way down, they droop.
back down towards the root.
Did you hear that?
Can't you hear that droop?
That's the word I use, but youmight be able to think of
(26:38):
something a little morecreative, but that's really
what's going on.
So again, one, two, three, four,five, raise six, raise seven,
one, two, Tension pulling up,and then now we lower them back
down.
Lowered 7.
Lowered 6.
UNKNOWN (26:58):
Lowered 7.
SPEAKER_01 (26:59):
drooping and pulling you back down to the natural
minor.
To further demonstrate how thisis used, I'm going to go full
circle on my episode.
Remember that piece I openedwith today that was unique?
That is a beret in E minor byJohann Sebastian Bach from a
lute suite in A minor, which Iactually played in its entirety
(27:23):
as an undergraduate in school,but it is a perfect
demonstration of melodic minorand how Listen to a little piece
of it again real quick.
(27:47):
So I'm just going to break downthe melody to show you that this
is a beautiful illustration ofmelodic minor.
So it's in E minor and it startson tonic, which is E.
I'm just going to play themelody.
It goes one, two, three.
2, 1, raised 7th.
It's almost like harmonic minorthere, actually.
(28:08):
But then it goes 1, 2, 5, raised6th, raised 7, 1.
And then the very next thingdoes the droopy lowered 6 and 7
on the way down.
Lowered 7, lowered 6, back to 5.
(28:30):
So again, it goes one, two,three.
I actually urge you to Googlemelodic minor tunes like on
(28:52):
YouTube or just a Google searchin general and see what you can
find so that you can attach thesound to your ear.
It's a little elusive.
It takes a while to really getused to what it sounds like but
you just have to do a littleresearch and get it in your ear
to solidify it and now it's timefor breakdown so We had a great
(29:20):
episode on minor today.
I started with the fullexplanation of natural minor and
how it's the same as Aeolian.
We even broke down the Romannumerals for the chords that
happen from the triads.
We learned things like what acadence is at the end of a chord
(29:43):
progression, a tension andrelease.
We learned what a leading toneis, a seventh scale degree
that's a half step away thatpulls you back up to the octave.
Then, of course, we learned thatthat leading tone helps us
create what's called harmonicminor, which is really just a
(30:06):
natural minor scale with analtered seventh at the top to
create stronger chordprogressions.
And finally, we learned melodicminor, which has a raised 6th
and 7th scale degree on the wayup, and they droop back down to
flat 6 and 7 on the way down.
(30:30):
Thanks again for tuning in toThe Harmonious Blacksmith.
Until next time, I will lookforward to...
Continuing this music theoryexploration with all of you.
Thank you.
SPEAKER_01 (00:30):
Hello Theory Nerds and welcome back to the
Harmonious Blacksmith.
This is episode 7 of my seriesand I'm your host Kevin Patrick
Fleming and yes I do play my ownguitar tracks on my podcast.
Oh that's nice.
(00:51):
Yeah don't worry I've got fiveor six pens for autographs.
No no no take it easy.
Get in line.
Don't for everybody.
Thanks again for tuning in,everybody.
I do appreciate you being here,and I'm excited about today's
episode.
If this is your first timestumbling upon my podcast, first
(01:13):
of all, welcome, and we arehappy you're here.
Second of all, this is a linearand cumulative podcast, which
means every idea that I'm layingout in each episode is building
on previous ideas.
So if this is the first episodeyou've stumbled upon, my record
is to go back all the way to thebeginning and go through the
(01:35):
sequence of episodes and catchup with us when you can.
You will understand a lot moreif you do.
So just to catch you up onthings, our previous episode,
number six, was dispelling themystery between major and
minors.
which led us down the rabbithole and took us all the way to
(01:56):
terms like parallel keys andrelative keys.
We learned the conspiracy theorythat minor is only different by
scale degrees 3, 6, and 7.
Turns out it's true.
Turns out it's true.
I also introduced you to theunderground secret society of
(02:17):
Greek modes.
They were Ionian, Dorian,Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian,
Aeolian, and Locrian people, youheard it here first.
So if you feel like you'rerunning into a lot of fake music
theory news on the internet, youknow where to turn to.
Right here on the HarmoniousBlacksmith.
(02:39):
Today's episode is all aboutminor.
So minor scales, minor keys, andthe chord progressions that
naturally come out within theminor key.
I realized I had been talkingmostly about major up till this
point, and that's relevantbecause major is the predominant
(03:01):
tonality that is used in Westernharmony, but I had also promised
y'all things like minorprogressions and things like
that I remember in my previousepisodes and just ran out of
time because there was so muchto talk about, so let's talk
about minor today.
So what do we know and recallabout minor so far as opposed to
(03:23):
major.
Well, in a broad stroke orgeneral view, we know that minor
sounds a little darker, a littlemore mysterious, possibly more
emotional.
Some of my students describe itas sounding lower or droopier,
but really this overalloverarching thing of sadness I
think works really well.
(03:44):
So where does that sad, darkkind of sound come from?
Well, it comes from, of course,a scale formula.
And if you recall, the formulafor a minor scale is whole,
half, whole, whole, half, whole,whole.
And an A minor scale would soundlike this.
And do any of y'all rememberwhich of the seven Greek modes
(04:15):
that a minor scale is?
It's called Aeolian, and it'sthe sixth Greek mode.
And again, I'm going to have anentire episode dedicated to
Greek modes coming up, and I'mvery excited about that.
But just know that minor isAeolian, and Aeolian has another
(04:36):
common term that we call it,which is natural minor.
And natural minor is just theAeolian mode, but the reason we
give it a name like naturalminor and not just minor is
because it's what comes outquote unquote naturally based on
(04:57):
the formula I gave you already.
The whole, half, whole, whole,half, whole, whole.
That creates what we call anatural minor scale.
And so that must also imply thatthere's such thing as an
unnatural minor scale.
Turns out that's true.
There are multiple of them andthey are quote unquote altered
(05:17):
minor scales.
And this This is why I waited awhile to get to minor because it
gets a little complicated inminor really quickly.
So you might be asking why?
Okay, there's this natural minorcalled Aeolian and yet there's
these multiple altered minorscales, but why?
Because it turns out withinnatural minor keys or Aeolian
(05:41):
keys, the musical tension in thechord progressions is very weak
as far as having a tension andresolution.
Now, we already talked aboutmusical tension in previous
episodes, but I'm going to upthe ante here on that with a new
term that we call a cadence.
(06:04):
A cadence is a series of two ormore chords that comes at the
end of a musical sentence oreven a musical piece that gives
a feeling of tension and full orpartial resolution of that
tension within the chordprogression.
The most common cadence type inour Western system is a five
(06:26):
chord to a one chord.
So recall your Roman numeralsand how we could build a triad
off of each scale degree.
Therefore, there's seven triadsfrom which we can build more
chords, right?
So in order to explain why minorchord progressions can be weak
in natural minor, I'm going todouble back to May and let you
(06:50):
hear a 5-1 cadence in major.
So let's start with good old Gmajor.
So if we take the I chord in thekey, which is just a G major
chord, and the V chord in thekey, which will be a D major
(07:15):
chord, We can set up our cadenceor our musical tension and
release from there.
So let's establish the key inour ear first so you can
understand that.
That, of course, is a 1-4-5-1.
(07:36):
But now, if you hear 1 as thehome base...
Notice if I stop on that fivechord, you can hear some
tension.
I can turn it into a dominantseven by adding another third on
top of the triad.
Listen to that tension.
(07:58):
It needs to go somewhere.
It needs to be resolved backto...
The I chord.
Ah, feel the refreshment of therelease of musical tension.
And for example's sake, let's doone other key.
So I'm going to now do A major,which sounds like this.
(08:24):
Your I, IV, V would be A, D, andE.
E.
And therefore, your 5-1 cadencewould just be E-2-A.
So you hear the tension andrelease.
I'll turn the V chord into adominant 7 by adding another
(08:46):
note on top of the triad again.
Screaming for release.
Ah, there it is.
So the cadence gives us thetension, which is therefore
partially or fully resolved.
And now that you know what itsounds like in major, let's
compare that to natural minor,which again, I'm going to remind
(09:10):
you, is weaker sounding in itscadences.
So therefore, the musicaltension and release just is not
as effective within the chordprogression.
So let's establish a minor,again, sounds like this.
UNKNOWN (09:27):
So
SPEAKER_01 (09:31):
Now 1-4-5 in A minor would be A minor is 1, D minor
is 4, E minor is 5, and thenback to A minor again.
So 1-4-5 in minor would soundlike this.
(09:55):
Now listen to the five, onecadence, just like the major
key.
And just notice that it doesn'thave nearly as much tension.
Then I'll compare them back toback with major.
Listen to this.
This is five.
One.
Again, five.
One.
UNKNOWN (10:15):
Two.
SPEAKER_01 (10:18):
doesn't really have the same tension.
Now listen to five, one in majoragain.
Here's the five in major.
One.
Five.
Tension, tension, one.
Minor.
Five.
One.
(10:40):
The minor is clearly weaker andyou can hear it.
And there's a reason for thatthat we're going to go into.
And it involves having to learnone more new term called a
leading tone.
A leading tone is a note whichresolves or leads the ear to
(11:01):
another note, which is exactlyone half step higher or lower.
Typically in our system, we arereferring to the seventh scale
degree of a major scale, whichis a half step away from the
octave or the root of that scaleagain.
So let's demonstrate.
So back to G major todemonstrate a leading tone,
(11:23):
which is the seventh scaledegree of the scale.
G major again sounds like this.
UNKNOWN (11:32):
So
SPEAKER_01 (11:32):
And the seventh scale degree in G major is F
sharp.
First of all, just listen.
If I play the scale all the wayup and stop on the leading tone,
the leading tone will lead yourear to where it's supposed to go
to next.
You will actually even hear thenote in your head screaming
(11:53):
because it wants to go to it sobad.
Listen up.
UNKNOWN (11:58):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (12:01):
can't stop there, right?
You can hear where it wants togo.
One more time.
And then we finally get thenote.
And they are a half step awayfrom each other, as you remember
from the major formula.
And that creates a very powerfultension and release between the
(12:24):
seventh scale degree of a majorscale and its octave.
And that is the power of theleading tone.
And it turns out this magicalleading tone that creates
tension and resolution and acadence is built into to the V
chord in a major key.
(12:45):
So what I mean by built-in isit's naturally the middle note
of the triad.
Remember, triads have threenotes, and in a V chord, it's
going to be scale degrees V,VII, and II.
So remember, the seventh scaledegree in major is the leading
tone.
So it's built-in in major tohave this amazing leading tone
(13:07):
tension within the V chord, andconsequently, it is not built in
in minor, which is why it soundsweaker.
The minor scale degree seven isa whole step away from the
octave or the root note.
So let's go to some audiocomparisons.
(13:27):
So again, I'm going to back upto G major right quick, which
sounds like this.
UNKNOWN (13:32):
So
SPEAKER_01 (13:41):
And remember, triads are built on the skipping
method.
One, three, five.
The second chord is two, four,six.
Third chord is three, five,seven, and so on.
Until I get to the five chord,which is going to be five,
seven, and two.
Right?
And so that chord...
(14:02):
has the leading tone built intoit that gives us the tension in
the key.
It's right there buried in themiddle of the chord.
So when I'm in G, that chordscreams to go back up to G
because of that leading tone.
But in minor, we don't have thesame thing.
(14:24):
So let's say I'm in G minor now.
Just to give a parallelism.
Remember parallel keys.
So G minor would sound likethis.
Let's go ahead and take a secondto fill out the triads in minor
two.
I promised I would do that, andI don't want to forget.
(14:46):
So let's go ahead and fill themout.
So remember, we're in G minornow.
So, my I chord, basically,here's what you need to know
about the Roman numerals.
Remember the Roman numerals thatwe studied previously?
In major, I, IV, and V are majorchords, II, III, and VI are
(15:07):
minor chords, and the VII chordis diminished.
In minor, one, four, and fiveare minor chords.
Three, six, and seven are majorchords.
And two is diminished.
So between major and minor, theyboth have three major chords,
(15:27):
three minor chords, and onediminished chord.
They're very balanced.
It's just the chords are in adifferent place.
They're in a different order.
So let's go through them in Gminor.
Here's the one chord, which is Gminor.
The two chord is going to bediminished.
The three chord is going to be amajor chord, which in this case
(15:50):
is going to be B flat.
The four chord is going to be aC minor.
The five chord is a D minor.
The six chord is going to be Eflat major.
The seven chord is going to be Fmajor.
(16:10):
And then I'm back to G minoragain, which is the one chord.
So now for the sequence of minorchords in Aeolian or natural
minor in a row.
The one chord is G minor.
Two is A diminished.
Three is B flat major.
Four is C minor.
Five is D minor.
(16:31):
Six is E flat major.
Seven is F major.
And then we're back to one.
So again, remember, 1-4-5 is themain predominant force in chord
progressions.
So if I play a 1-4-5 in minor,it'll be the G minor.
(16:51):
C minor.
D minor.
D minor.
back to G minor there's just nota ton of tension there's a
little bit of tension there butjust not a ton like in major and
songwriters and composers caughtwind of this early on and
realized you know what I don'thave the same weight or tension
(17:13):
just like in the major key andremember a lot of that's just
because the major key has aleading tone so what ended up
happening is that people whowrite music composers alike
ended up altering the five chordin minor to create a leading
(17:34):
tone.
One way to think of it for ussongwriters is that we're
borrowing the leading tone fromthe major key or even borrowing
the five chord.
Because what really has tohappen in order for us to create
a leading tone with a five chordin minor, we have to raise the
minor seventh a half step up towhere it would be in the major
(17:58):
key and this creates a whole newscale that is called harmonic
minor harmonic minor is a scalethat is slightly altered from
the natural minor scale where weare raising the seventh scale
degree a half step to create aleading tone sound in minor
(18:19):
therefore giving us more tensionwithin melodies and within the
chord progression So let'sdouble back to the key of A
minor to demonstrate this.
So if you recall, in the key ofA minor, A minor is the I chord,
D minor is the IV chord, E minoris the V chord, and A minor is
(18:42):
I.
So our I, IV, V is A minor, Dminor, E minor, A minor.
But based on this harmonic minorprinciple that I just taught
you, we're going to raise the7th scale degree in A minor to
create a little extra tension inthe chord progression.
So first of all, how does thatmake the scale sound?
(19:03):
Well, here's your natural minorscale.
Now let's raise the seventh andcreate the harmonic minor sound.
UNKNOWN (19:21):
So
SPEAKER_01 (19:23):
So interesting.
It yields an interesting sound,and my students describe it as
all kinds of different things.
I'm going to leave thatcreativity to your mind based on
the way it sounds.
But more importantly, why are weraising that seventh to create
that leading tone?
UNKNOWN (19:44):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (19:45):
You can tell it creates that tension pull that
pulls that last note up.
And again, that's gonna affectwhat our five chord is because
it's gonna raise the middle noteof the five triad, which in this
case is E minor.
Before it had a G natural, nowit's going to have a G sharp, so
(20:08):
it's going to be an E major now.
And then we're going to resolveto A minor.
So listen to a 1-4-5 usingharmonic minor.
It's going to start with A minoras 1, D minor as 4, E major as
5, and then A minor as 1 again.
(20:30):
So again, you just get moretension.
There's the leading tone withinthe chord, which screams to go
up to one.
So again, leading tone, back toone.
(20:52):
And when we're in regularnatural minor, that leading
tone's not there.
The five chord would have a Gnatural instead of a G sharp.
tell it's just a more benignchord progression that way to be
(21:16):
clear harmonic minor is not oneof the greek modes right we
already laid out the seven greekmodes last episode and harmonic
minor is not one of them it isliterally just an alteration of
the aeolian mode by raising thatone scale degree seven to make
it a leading tone now why is itcalled harmonic minor it's
(21:40):
because we are altering thatseventh scale degree to give a
harmonic change in the chordprogressions.
Remember, harmony being two ormore notes being played together
simultaneously.
But in the bigger picture ofharmony, we're talking about
triads.
We're talking about chords,chords that harmonize with our
(22:00):
melodies and things like that.
So we call it harmonic minorbecause we're literally altering
that seventh scale degree tochange the strength of the chord
progressions.
or the harmony within the scale.
It's much, much less to do withthe melodic output.
(22:21):
So in summary, think aboutharmonic minor as taking the
natural minor or aeolian, ifyou're thinking of Greek modes,
and raising the seventh scaledegree only a half step to
create a leading tone, whichmakes our five chord a major
(22:41):
chord or a stronger sound fortension and resolution in the
chord progressions.
So if harmonic minor is alteredbased on making chord
progressions stronger, whatabout melodies?
Composers and songwriters alikealong the way realized that
minor melodies also don't have alot of tension in them based on
(23:04):
the scale.
And because of that, theycreated yet another alteration
of the minor scale, which iscalled melodic minor.
Melodic minor is anotheralteration of the natural minor
scale, but in this time we'regoing to raise scale degrees 6
(23:25):
and 7 on the way up and lowerthem back down on the way down.
SPEAKER_00 (23:31):
What in the world are you talking about, Kevin?
My God, I followed you so welluntil now.
You better explain this onegood, boy.
SPEAKER_01 (23:39):
Okay, okay, I understand It seems a little
squirrely.
I promise I'm going to explain.
So here we go.
So this one's called melodicminor as opposed to the previous
one, which was called harmonicminor.
Why is this one called melodicminor?
Because we are altering thepitches in order to get a better
(24:02):
melody result in minor.
Again, this is something thatjust evolved over time with
songwriters and composers wherethey started altering the minor
scale to get different melodicresults that they felt were
better.
I mean, it really comes down tosubjectivity in the end.
So it must sound really strangeat this point, since this is the
(24:24):
first time we've altered a scalewhere I said raise scale degrees
sixth and seventh on the way upand lower them back down on the
way down.
Let's listen to it and thenwe'll talk about explanation.
So I'm going to actually do abased on natural minor first.
(24:44):
So, let's establish A minor inyour ear again.
Now, let's raise the 6th and 7thon the way up and lower them
back down on the way down toyield the melodic minor sound.
UNKNOWN (25:10):
Now,
SPEAKER_01 (25:11):
I'm going to do that one more time because I know
it's strange.
And you might be asking, why inthe world would we want to do
that and how do we use it?
An explanation in my own wordsis this.
(25:32):
When you raise the sixth andseventh scale degree on the way
up, it has this way of creatingthis tension pull that really
pulls you up to the root.
And then we alter them again onthe way down.
They get lowered because theydroop.
(25:53):
Droop is the word I use.
They droop back down towards theroot.
that they're working towards.
So this is an interesting scalebecause it has a different
tendency as you rise up to theoctave and a different tendency
when you go back down to thelowered root.
So again, when we go up in Aminor, six, seven, one.
(26:17):
So you can hear how it reallypulls up to that octave.
And then when I lower them onthe way down, they droop.
back down towards the root.
Did you hear that?
Can't you hear that droop?
That's the word I use, but youmight be able to think of
(26:38):
something a little morecreative, but that's really
what's going on.
So again, one, two, three, four,five, raise six, raise seven,
one, two, Tension pulling up,and then now we lower them back
down.
Lowered 7.
Lowered 6.
UNKNOWN (26:58):
Lowered 7.
SPEAKER_01 (26:59):
drooping and pulling you back down to the natural
minor.
To further demonstrate how thisis used, I'm going to go full
circle on my episode.
Remember that piece I openedwith today that was unique?
That is a beret in E minor byJohann Sebastian Bach from a
lute suite in A minor, which Iactually played in its entirety
(27:23):
as an undergraduate in school,but it is a perfect
demonstration of melodic minorand how Listen to a little piece
of it again real quick.
(27:47):
So I'm just going to break downthe melody to show you that this
is a beautiful illustration ofmelodic minor.
So it's in E minor and it startson tonic, which is E.
I'm just going to play themelody.
It goes one, two, three.
2, 1, raised 7th.
It's almost like harmonic minorthere, actually.
(28:08):
But then it goes 1, 2, 5, raised6th, raised 7, 1.
And then the very next thingdoes the droopy lowered 6 and 7
on the way down.
Lowered 7, lowered 6, back to 5.
(28:30):
So again, it goes one, two,three.
I actually urge you to Googlemelodic minor tunes like on
(28:52):
YouTube or just a Google searchin general and see what you can
find so that you can attach thesound to your ear.
It's a little elusive.
It takes a while to really getused to what it sounds like but
you just have to do a littleresearch and get it in your ear
to solidify it and now it's timefor breakdown so We had a great
(29:20):
episode on minor today.
I started with the fullexplanation of natural minor and
how it's the same as Aeolian.
We even broke down the Romannumerals for the chords that
happen from the triads.
We learned things like what acadence is at the end of a chord
(29:43):
progression, a tension andrelease.
We learned what a leading toneis, a seventh scale degree
that's a half step away thatpulls you back up to the octave.
Then, of course, we learned thatthat leading tone helps us
create what's called harmonicminor, which is really just a
(30:06):
natural minor scale with analtered seventh at the top to
create stronger chordprogressions.
And finally, we learned melodicminor, which has a raised 6th
and 7th scale degree on the wayup, and they droop back down to
flat 6 and 7 on the way down.
(30:30):
Thanks again for tuning in toThe Harmonious Blacksmith.
Until next time, I will lookforward to...
Continuing this music theoryexploration with all of you.
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