@ its “the lick”. its a joke for musicians, particularly jazz musicians, that this lick appears in so many jazz tunes and people incorporate it into their solos and such. look it up, it’s funny
35:46 my go-to example of Locrian is “Dust to Dust” by John Kirkpatrick. ruclips.net/video/5-lJMalRMew/видео.htmlsi=UnYuDWNiybl9k6eH Seemingly written to intentionally use the Locrian mode, it certainly has a lyrical theme to match!
oooh that is DARK, and definitely the most locrian tune i've ever heard. I feel like tertian locrian harmony tends to break the mode for me so the tune staying mostly unison maintains the mode super well. and all diatonic to locrian!
Fun fact: For 8-bit Music Theory's video all about the Locrian mode, he was actually able to find an example of a Nintendo tune that's fully in Locrian, being the Samasa Desert theme from the Legend of Zelda Oracle games.
Cadence is undoubtedly aware of him, and I think probably intentionally avoids using examples he's already covered to avoid being called a copycat. I think her example is better anyway since it's more sophisticated and frankly, just a better piece. I do disagree with her though that it is impossible for there to be a Locrian tonality. This comment comes mostly from a modern "block chord" mentality imo. It's actually not difficult at all when you uphold good modal melodic standards (the b3 - b2 - 1 melodic formula is just as powerful in Locrian as it is Phrygian.) And that is where 8 Bit's example shines
"Scales normally span a single octave, therefore they start and end on the same note" Double-mode microtonal scales: **laugh quietly in the background**
That is actually why Locrian causes all the problems it does. Nothing is normally truly left over when the scale spans a true relation, including the minor ninth.
A better way to sort modes is from brightest to darkest you can evaluate by number of flats Lydian 1# Ionian 0 Mixolydian 1b Dorian 2b Aeolian 3b Phrygian 4b Locrian 5b … like in the circle of fifths
Definitely, and another property of this arrangement is that it puts similar scales next to each other. Each mode differs from the next by exactly one note or scale degree.
Yeah, I was gonna comment about light to dark. It's more nuanced then the usual "happy" vs. "sad" that one might intially assume, or even the major vs. minor typing. At the very least, Locrian's at the table this time! :P
0:35 More than 105 modal scales, and that doesn't cover Whole Tones, the land of Atonal, 12 Tones (Dodecaphony), church modes, echoi, and other cultures tuning systems that led to their own version of modes and scales. Music Theory and Music History lore is deep.
I'm sorry, but you just sound like someone trying to sound intelligent by bringing up tangential stuff just to show you Know Something. Like I'm not even going to quibble about a lot of it (e.g. as far as modern understanding goes, she *is* talking about the church modes, unless you're referring to the Hypo-modes or the allowances chromatically altered final degrees, which have essentially no bearing on contemporary musical practice), and just go straight to the meat of it: What possible reason could you have to mention dodecaphony on a pop music theory channel video about the diatonic modes, other than because you're vaguely insecure and felt the need to talk for the approval of strangers online?
@prepcoin_nl4362 We were talking about every weird scale. And as I am preparing for my 4th semester of my Music Major, I have been learning about all the insane things relating to music, and therefore all the kinds of scales snd modes that do exist. And as for talking in a weird way about these things, you might be right, but I'm not great at talking in a way that doesn't come off as desperate for attention. I'm still going through the crazy phase of being a music student, so I maybe making messages like an absolute crazy person. But modes as a concept, really interest me, so I might have geeked out. The desperation of getting things out of my head is probably what got me, because of the topic.
I find minor, harmonic minor, and melodic minor to be the 3 main scales all music uses for structure. All 3 have the same 5 starting notes with only different tail ends of the scales aka different resolutions. Diminished and whole tone are not scales but rather patterns because they have no set resolution and have no 5th, unless your doing W,hW,h diminished pattern. Chromatic is just every note so I'm not gonna count that. Pentatonic is inside minor and you alter that to make blues scale. There's other scales I suppose like I use something like the byzantine scale when I write metal riffs but it's not like I can make extensive chords on guitar using that note selection. Thinking like this has helped me learn difficult progressive songs by ear because it simplifies a lot of possible errors. Also with modes like Dorian I think about the root note D in the scale of a minor but with an emphasis on not using certain notes such as F.
@@S.B.C-Pixi I'm sorry. I was a little too harsh. I think I'm old and jaded enough about music theory that when I start to see digressions like this, I get a little overly annoyed about them. I think your understanding of music will grow when you stop thinking of scales as just collections of things to be memorized and start understanding them as a specific application of a broader principles: namely, the use of pitch cycles. Basically every commonly used scale in the Western canon is the result of some pitch cycle or another, maybe with one chromatically altered note (i.e. the diatonic parent collection results from stacking six fifths on top of each other, the pentatonic major from 4 fifths on top of each, the whole tone is just an endless sequence of whole steps, the octatonic scale is alternating half and whole steps, the melodic minor derives from the same parent fifths collection but with one note chromatically altered, etc.) The reason I make this distinction is because 1) it's undeniable that almost every scale in the tradition can be built from this procedure and 2) you see a lot of other things besides scales that pitch cycles also help explain. I'd recommend looking more into pitch cycle theory because it especially helps to explain a lot of the early 20th century in music once functional tonality stops being so useful in understanding everything. Best of luck with your education : )
Why not just make it 144 scales and cover every possibility? I think scales are typically defined by mood or region/culture which is what jazz’s blue note made such waves at the time for breaking the rules.
videos like this always help me appreciate nintendo music so much more, as if it wasn’t 90% of the video game music i listen to anyways 😅 i highly doubt a video like this would work for any other studio and i think that’s so cool
your mixed meter video inspired me to make a song in 18/8 (it switches between 7/8 and 11/8 every bar (7-eleven lmao)) and your videos got me more into music theory overall so thanks for that! we'll see if any new ideas come from this video
Narshe Mines from Final Fantasy 6 (the A section) is convincingly Locrian through 2 methods: sheer repetition, and making the one other chord it uses besides the tonic sound as dissonant and gross as possible. The tonic is almost always in the form of a B half-diminished chord, and the half-diminished chord on rare occasions can be pretty, even oddly bright (see Molgera's bridge for an example), meanwhile the one other chord is an F major seventh sharp eleventh with no fifth and the major seventh moved down so it rubs right against the F.
I have worked in music my whole life, avid listener and musician myself, always had a hard time with theory, this single video has been unlocking so many things for me since it appeals directly to my OCD obsessions; Nintendo and music! I see things visually when I hear and the visual aides in your videos are very impactful. Thank you :) I can’t say it enough :)
Excellent video as usual! Your analysis leads me to think some about the symmetries of modes. I don't know if you are familiar with it, but the pairs in that table at 33:45 are exactly the pairs of inverses we get using negative harmony. So your instinct is spot on. Interestingly, negative harmony also backs the claim that locrian (or any scale that lacks a perfect fifth) can not be a tonality. If you try to invert locrian, you get a scale with a sharp tonic, which makes little sense. If you treat that tonic as the regular tonic of a new scale, you get just another instance of locrian... (transposed up a half step) 35:22 You talk here about how locrian is like the opposite of lydian, since they can both be derived by stacking consecutive notes in the circle of fifths, but in different directions. I just thought I'd add that they are also opposites in another way. If you take the pattern of steps in lydian, WWWHWWH, and you reverse it, you get locrian: HWWHWWW. This is equivalent to a reflection using the tritone as the axis (related to, but not exactly identical to, negative harmony) Looking at the modes of major using this reflection about the tritone, the related pairs shift to: Lydian : Locrian Ionian : Phrygian Mixolydian : Aeolian Dorian : Dorian Yes, using this analysis, dorian is its own reflection. That's because it's the only mode of major for which the pattern of steps is palindromic: WHWWWHW
0:30 Don't get me wrong, 15 general scales per mode is a lot, but the alterations the jazz scene discovered opens up the world completely. That said, modes are a good foundation, since using the circle of 5ths or 4ths to find all 15 general scales for each allows you to find ways to find new ways to alter these 15 general scales in each mode. There are 7 modes by the way, so 105 basic scales. And that's all based of the Greek system, I could only imagine what the church modes and the echoi would have in store, if I ever wanted to take the plunge, or other cultures versions of modes and scales, based on their tuning systems, which were created for whatever instrument most pieces were written for, in time periods way back when.
the legend of zelda oracle of seasons, samasa desert theme is in locrian it outlines a E half diminished(sus4, flat9 chord) which is a very intresting sound also it uses the flat 7 in the bassline to resolve up to the root to ground the tonic i hope you will cover this song in part 2! thanks Cadence Hira, i love your videos
yes, and also i think that this phrygian variation that is more common in middle eastern and spanish music instead of the normal phrygian, at least in my knowledge, because of the arabic sound of the 1.5 tone interval of that scale
What your favorite musical scale says about you (based on that gurschach tiktok audio) Dorian: You're going with the safest option. Maybe a little overrated, but it's still a good one. Harmonic minor: Is this your favorite because it's good, or are you just really horny? Lydian: Alright, we get it! You like this one! Phrygian dominant: This might not be everyone's favorite, but it's yours, and you're totally chill about it. Melodic minor: You're into the classics. Aeolian: You're old. Ionian: You're really old. Minor pentatonic: Your social security number is 2. Lydian augmented: You are one pretentious hipster Hungarian minor: Officer, it's this one right here. Lydian dominant: Oh, you're cool, I like you. Aeolian dominant: No way, you actually know this one? Can we be friends? Altered scale: This one's just a phase, you'll grow out of it when you grow up. Major pentatonic: You will never grow up. Phrygian: Oh, you picked this one to be different, how clever. Locrian: If you chose this one, you are a liar. This is nobody's favorite. Mixolydian: If you chose this one, you are correct. This is the best one. And for all the people in the comments saying "Where's this one? Where's that one?" You're annoying. That's what that one says about you.
My favorite is Lydian submissive. 😏 Or if I'm feeling really saucy, I'll say "I'm a fan of Mixolydian dominant"...which is just Mixolydian with a completely redundant modifier.
I learned more about modes in 30mins of this video than I did having theory lessons for the past few months, where modes were the only focus. This is a crazy good video thank you!
I just finished my third semester in music school, and I always assumed aolian and ionian were synonyms for natural minor and major, so this video was actually really helpful!! Thank you!!
Unfortunately I never uploaded it to the internet but I wrote an unambiguously Locrian tune as an exercise at university. I omitted the fifth from the harmony so the tonic chord only had the root and third, but it was all over the melody and I made sure it never felt like anything else. I think the chord sequence was something like Bm(omit 5), G7, Em. There might’ve been a Cmaj7 in there as well.
hey guys so the best chord is the obviously the 2 3 6 turnaround of the major dominant G sus seventh chord, which is just an inversion of the augmented thirteenth of the Phrygian scale, integrated over the Poisson distribution of the 5 2 3 of 6.
As someone trying to make their own game and study music, your video topics and teaching style make music theory feel less daunting and even fun and full of wonder and mystery. Thank you!
CASTLE BLECK MENTIONED we're one step closer to an actual analysis... it's like you're teasing us besides that, i'm actually working on a "scale explorer" website, and this video is really helpful, thanks!
Glad to see Castle Bleck mentioned in this video after the absolute SLANDER the track received in the "6 Levels of Mixed Meter Time Signatures" video (All jokes aside, this is a really interesting video, and I really like the way you transcribe each piece yourself!)
I was the 1.1K like! I wanted to learn more about these modes (as I already know a but of music theory), and I love the way you explain them! Also keeping all the examples (mostly) in Cmaj/Cmin was nice to see to highlight the differences in the modes!
I like how at 5:14 you mention an "expectation of resolution" but as soon as I heard that D chord I expected to hear Unwavering Emotions from Pokemon BW instead
YES, I haven’t even watched the video yet but I’ve been waiting for this. It helps so much songwriting because I can link specific chords to feelings. Like if I know that cmaj9 in a specific voicing gives a feeling of lullaby and calmness, I can start my song from there and expand out. Thank you
The timing of this video is impeccable because i was actually going to look at the ice music theory video because i need to make ice-like music for a game jam lol
the section on Ionian is very interesting and really contextualises the minimalist and impressionist influences on videogame music and Ambient music to me. i really didn't think there was any difference with Ionian vs major
unrelated, but I just bought ADOFAI and was having a blast, and nearly jumped in joy and surprised seeing that you made the level 7 tune 😭 I legit did not know this before buying
Wow I learned something new, the composite minor. (Also maybe I can now use the modes more efficiently) Polytonality gives you so much freedom, but I can still call it just polytonality and not just random notes that sound good. Can't wait for part two, with the pentatonic and blues scales.
So I've got an engraving question. For the modal music, I noticed you used the key's "normal" key signature, and then added accidentals onto the mode-specific notes. Did you do this specifically to highlight those notes to make them easier to see, or is that the standard way of doing things? Because my intuition would be that, for example, G Mixolydian would use the same "blank" key signature as C Major/Ionian, rather than using G's single sharp and manually adding a natural onto all the F's that appear in the song. Edit: Sorry, I got another one. I was told that a mode's identifying notes were the _two_ notes that distinguish it from its neighbors on the circle of fifths progression - ie Ionian's two distinguishing notes are the 4th, lowered from Lydian, and the 7th, raised from Mixolydian - but in your explanations you mostly only identify _one_ distinguishing note for each mode. Is that just a different convention, or was I told wrong? (I have very little formal music theory education, can you tell? :V)
Good questions! When modes are used as tonalities I like to think of them as variations of the major/natural minor scale (whichever is applicable). As such, 1. I always prefer to notate key signature in modal music as it appears in this video. This is because it disambiguates the tonic note (rather than having to determine if you're in the mode or the relative major), but also, much of the time modal music does NOT entirely stay in that one mode. i.e. phrygian likes to go to phrygian dominant, or lydian likes to weave between lydian/functional major/lydian dominant. it's much easier to highlight the consistent root between these if the key signature ignores the parent major. 2. This may be true, but personally I think it's easier to think of modes as a tonality as just a 1 note chromatic alteration of major/minor (or two notes in the case of locrian). Makes it easier to categorize, understand, and internalize the modes imo. Ionian and Aeolian are baseline and the other 2 major/minor modes are variations.
Favorite example of Phrygian is the Lost Woods theme in Ocarina of Time, just such a cool theme and starting on that flatted 2 makes it feel kind of ethereal.
35:38 I think I hear Out of Tartarus from the hades soundtrack as consistently Locrian, however that might be cheating a little. It basically uses G Locrian for the main section in 21/16, but then it goes for G Phrygian for the more lyrical sections in 4/4, which retroactively legitimizes hearing it all in G.
One example of a song written in phrygian that I really like is the melty molten galaxy. The phrygian mode really gives it a sense of doom that a regular minor scale wouldn't be able to do.
I think this idea that there can't exist a diminished or augmented tonic and therefore, modes with these as their tonic triad aren't real modes comes from a modern "block chord" concept of tonality. Like yeah, it's pretty difficult to write out a simple chord formula in all root position triads and get the sense that a half-diminished seventh chord is the tonic. But what it ignores is horizontal/contrapuntal writing. And once you consider a tonic as being established not by a sequence of harmonies, but by a melodic sequence, it's really not hard to write a convincing Locrian piece. 8 Bit Music Theory gives a great example in a Zelda game that is wholly, convincingly Locrian just by the contrapuntal movement of two voices. Or if you want something more elaborate: ruclips.net/video/6qD98XhaSaM/видео.html& Starting at 0:24, you see a plainly Locrian ostinato start in the Viola and Cello in octaves. Yes, there are chromatic notes and yes, it is quite ugly (by design) but the sense that we're in A Locrian here is overwhelming (even when the voices hit an implied Bb Major chord, A *still* sounds like the tonic.) And this is accomplished principally by strong linear writing. Of course, some people would argue that they don't find any of this appealing and what's wrong with a block chords, lead chart approach to harmony anyway? Well, I still think Locrian is a viable option through modal interchange. For example, if you establish C as the tonic through a major or minor, it's not difficult to then us a C half-diminished as a form of modal interchange to the locrian scale. This is the default strategy when using common tone diminished i's, in fact, but that overall sound has fallen quite out of favor with modern audiences. Anyway, good video overall, of course. I hope you'll make one for the modes of the Lydian b7/#5 collection as well and maybe one-up 8 Bit by actually providing an example of all seven modes : )
There is a pentatonic scale called the Iwato scale, diatonic to Locrian There was some desert theme that 8 bit music theory used that he said it was locrian but it was all in the Iwato scale. Iwato is Locrian without the third and the sixth and it's surprising "stable". I searched it now and it's Samasa Desert, which can feel major at times, but i still like the Iwato scale
20:50 Cool Cave is interesting because my ears can’t decide what mode it is. She. I focus on the accompaniment, Bb does feel like the tonic, making it Lydian. But when I focus on the melody, I feel that it resolves/wants to resolve to F, making it Ionian. And I’m more naturally inclined to focus on melody, so intuitively it feels more like F to me. I think I feel this way about a lot of ostensibly Lydian tunes.
i actually know a good song thats in locrian.. for at least a good portion of it! “黒のマニキュア” by Opal Vessel. There’s no upload of the actual song, only the album that it’s on “私は何でもするだろう” (I Would do Anything), which is on Opal Vessel’s yt channel and Bandcamp. It’s one of their most popular albums so it shouldn’t be hard to find. It’s the 8th track on the album.
The F-Zero series has a few examples of modes. The first section of Sand Ocean (SNES) is Dorian, while White Land (SNES) is entirely Mixolydian except for the intro. Fire Field (GX) sounds ambiguous at first, then sounds Locrian, and the guitar solo even plays a non-diatonic natural sixth.
Floating Continent from Final Fantasy VI is in G Lydian with a section that raises G to G#, keeping the rest of the notes the same, giving it a G# Locrian feel
I recently learned about quartal and quintal harmony and have been really curious about whether Locrian could sound more palatable by using chords based on 4ths instead of 3rds, since then the tritone between the 1st and 5th would no longer be present in the I chord. Would love to see some kind of analysis on that question.
33:58 Huge missed opportunity to include the scene in Mother 3 where the six Magypsies have gathered (all of them, named after each scale) and Locria missing in the reunion.
As soon as the Magypsy theme from MOTHER 3 started playing during the "What are modes?" section of the video I unintentionally shouted YES at the top of my lungs
Not necessarily Nintendo, but I love Sandopolis Zone from S&K as a slightly more unconventional use of Harmonic Minor. Also worth mentioning is the sick Dorian riff on Golden Forest from 1080 Snowboarding
"every scale" but I'm curious if you'll go into any scales that have more than 12 notes per octave, or if it's gonna just be the western scales... Either way, I'm excited to watch the video!
WAHOOOO!!! MUSIC THEORY!!!!!!!!!!
Yes wahoo
You just made a grown man in rural Nevada read this comment in a reasonably convincing Mario voice.
You have powers beyond your wildest imagination.
Why i read this with Mario's voice
1:17 the lick goes crazy 💀💀💀💀
was about to comment this 💀
What was it a refrence to?
@ its “the lick”. its a joke for musicians, particularly jazz musicians, that this lick appears in so many jazz tunes and people incorporate it into their solos and such. look it up, it’s funny
@jaydenholt8439 and look up adam neely too if ur interested in more jazz related stuff
Look up “The lick on 92 instruments”, click the first video, and go to #42 which is 59 seconds in.
0:11 don't think you could sneak megalovania past me! I'd recognize that *thing* anywhere!
35:46 my go-to example of Locrian is “Dust to Dust” by John Kirkpatrick. ruclips.net/video/5-lJMalRMew/видео.htmlsi=UnYuDWNiybl9k6eH
Seemingly written to intentionally use the Locrian mode, it certainly has a lyrical theme to match!
Shostakovich also uses quite a bit of Locrian in his works.
Hey, I used to watch you!
@@SterbiusMcGurbius who? Me?
oooh that is DARK, and definitely the most locrian tune i've ever heard. I feel like tertian locrian harmony tends to break the mode for me so the tune staying mostly unison maintains the mode super well. and all diatonic to locrian!
hi david bennett my king
Fun fact: For 8-bit Music Theory's video all about the Locrian mode, he was actually able to find an example of a Nintendo tune that's fully in Locrian, being the Samasa Desert theme from the Legend of Zelda Oracle games.
Cadence is undoubtedly aware of him, and I think probably intentionally avoids using examples he's already covered to avoid being called a copycat. I think her example is better anyway since it's more sophisticated and frankly, just a better piece.
I do disagree with her though that it is impossible for there to be a Locrian tonality. This comment comes mostly from a modern "block chord" mentality imo. It's actually not difficult at all when you uphold good modal melodic standards (the b3 - b2 - 1 melodic formula is just as powerful in Locrian as it is Phrygian.) And that is where 8 Bit's example shines
@@prepcoin_nl4362 Fair point. Plus, Cadence's example and her take on the feeling Locrian gives off bring something new to the table.
"Scales normally span a single octave, therefore they start and end on the same note"
Double-mode microtonal scales: **laugh quietly in the background**
Bohlen-Pierce:
She said normally
omg i was just hoping anyone knew double modal theory, i love it so much so many chords!!!!
i kneel before 31-edo understanders
That is actually why Locrian causes all the problems it does. Nothing is normally truly left over when the scale spans a true relation, including the minor ninth.
gonna force nintendo to hire me so i can make the most locrian song possible
Same my immediate reaction is like "leave locrian alone! Locrian is just a girl in the world who is trying her best!"
A better way to sort modes is from brightest to darkest
you can evaluate by number of flats
Lydian 1#
Ionian 0
Mixolydian 1b
Dorian 2b
Aeolian 3b
Phrygian 4b
Locrian 5b
… like in the circle of fifths
Definitely, and another property of this arrangement is that it puts similar scales next to each other. Each mode differs from the next by exactly one note or scale degree.
Yeah, I was gonna comment about light to dark. It's more nuanced then the usual "happy" vs. "sad" that one might intially assume, or even the major vs. minor typing. At the very least, Locrian's at the table this time! :P
Lydian chromatic concept ?
0:35 More than 105 modal scales, and that doesn't cover Whole Tones, the land of Atonal, 12 Tones (Dodecaphony), church modes, echoi, and other cultures tuning systems that led to their own version of modes and scales. Music Theory and Music History lore is deep.
I'm sorry, but you just sound like someone trying to sound intelligent by bringing up tangential stuff just to show you Know Something.
Like I'm not even going to quibble about a lot of it (e.g. as far as modern understanding goes, she *is* talking about the church modes, unless you're referring to the Hypo-modes or the allowances chromatically altered final degrees, which have essentially no bearing on contemporary musical practice), and just go straight to the meat of it: What possible reason could you have to mention dodecaphony on a pop music theory channel video about the diatonic modes, other than because you're vaguely insecure and felt the need to talk for the approval of strangers online?
@prepcoin_nl4362 We were talking about every weird scale. And as I am preparing for my 4th semester of my Music Major, I have been learning about all the insane things relating to music, and therefore all the kinds of scales snd modes that do exist. And as for talking in a weird way about these things, you might be right, but I'm not great at talking in a way that doesn't come off as desperate for attention. I'm still going through the crazy phase of being a music student, so I maybe making messages like an absolute crazy person. But modes as a concept, really interest me, so I might have geeked out. The desperation of getting things out of my head is probably what got me, because of the topic.
I find minor, harmonic minor, and melodic minor to be the 3 main scales all music uses for structure. All 3 have the same 5 starting notes with only different tail ends of the scales aka different resolutions. Diminished and whole tone are not scales but rather patterns because they have no set resolution and have no 5th, unless your doing W,hW,h diminished pattern. Chromatic is just every note so I'm not gonna count that. Pentatonic is inside minor and you alter that to make blues scale. There's other scales I suppose like I use something like the byzantine scale when I write metal riffs but it's not like I can make extensive chords on guitar using that note selection. Thinking like this has helped me learn difficult progressive songs by ear because it simplifies a lot of possible errors. Also with modes like Dorian I think about the root note D in the scale of a minor but with an emphasis on not using certain notes such as F.
@@S.B.C-Pixi I'm sorry. I was a little too harsh. I think I'm old and jaded enough about music theory that when I start to see digressions like this, I get a little overly annoyed about them.
I think your understanding of music will grow when you stop thinking of scales as just collections of things to be memorized and start understanding them as a specific application of a broader principles: namely, the use of pitch cycles. Basically every commonly used scale in the Western canon is the result of some pitch cycle or another, maybe with one chromatically altered note (i.e. the diatonic parent collection results from stacking six fifths on top of each other, the pentatonic major from 4 fifths on top of each, the whole tone is just an endless sequence of whole steps, the octatonic scale is alternating half and whole steps, the melodic minor derives from the same parent fifths collection but with one note chromatically altered, etc.)
The reason I make this distinction is because 1) it's undeniable that almost every scale in the tradition can be built from this procedure and 2) you see a lot of other things besides scales that pitch cycles also help explain.
I'd recommend looking more into pitch cycle theory because it especially helps to explain a lot of the early 20th century in music once functional tonality stops being so useful in understanding everything.
Best of luck with your education : )
Why not just make it 144 scales and cover every possibility?
I think scales are typically defined by mood or region/culture which is what jazz’s blue note made such waves at the time for breaking the rules.
videos like this always help me appreciate nintendo music so much more, as if it wasn’t 90% of the video game music i listen to anyways 😅 i highly doubt a video like this would work for any other studio and i think that’s so cool
Sonic is a strong contender.
I always love learning about music theory from you. I've been inspired to compose my own song, despite that I barely understand music as a concept.
This is not Nintendo but Blooming Villain from Persona 5 is Locrian. It does go away for the Chorus but other than that, it's pretty convincing.
your mixed meter video inspired me to make a song in 18/8 (it switches between 7/8 and 11/8 every bar (7-eleven lmao)) and your videos got me more into music theory overall
so thanks for that! we'll see if any new ideas come from this video
Narshe Mines from Final Fantasy 6 (the A section) is convincingly Locrian through 2 methods: sheer repetition, and making the one other chord it uses besides the tonic sound as dissonant and gross as possible. The tonic is almost always in the form of a B half-diminished chord, and the half-diminished chord on rare occasions can be pretty, even oddly bright (see Molgera's bridge for an example), meanwhile the one other chord is an F major seventh sharp eleventh with no fifth and the major seventh moved down so it rubs right against the F.
I have worked in music my whole life, avid listener and musician myself, always had a hard time with theory, this single video has been unlocking so many things for me since it appeals directly to my OCD obsessions; Nintendo and music! I see things visually when I hear and the visual aides in your videos are very impactful. Thank you :) I can’t say it enough :)
Excellent video as usual!
Your analysis leads me to think some about the symmetries of modes.
I don't know if you are familiar with it, but the pairs in that table at 33:45 are exactly the pairs of inverses we get using negative harmony. So your instinct is spot on.
Interestingly, negative harmony also backs the claim that locrian (or any scale that lacks a perfect fifth) can not be a tonality. If you try to invert locrian, you get a scale with a sharp tonic, which makes little sense. If you treat that tonic as the regular tonic of a new scale, you get just another instance of locrian... (transposed up a half step)
35:22
You talk here about how locrian is like the opposite of lydian, since they can both be derived by stacking consecutive notes in the circle of fifths, but in different directions.
I just thought I'd add that they are also opposites in another way. If you take the pattern of steps in lydian, WWWHWWH, and you reverse it, you get locrian: HWWHWWW. This is equivalent to a reflection using the tritone as the axis (related to, but not exactly identical to, negative harmony)
Looking at the modes of major using this reflection about the tritone, the related pairs shift to:
Lydian : Locrian
Ionian : Phrygian
Mixolydian : Aeolian
Dorian : Dorian
Yes, using this analysis, dorian is its own reflection. That's because it's the only mode of major for which the pattern of steps is palindromic: WHWWWHW
How does every video you make go incredibly hard?!?
2:50 Major Scale
6:53 Natural Minor
7:52 Harmonic Minor
11:01 Ionian
13:33 Dorian
16:35 Phrygian
20:35 Lydian
25:21 Mixolydian
28:16 Aeolian
31:19 Locrian
36:18 Composite Minor
0:30 Don't get me wrong, 15 general scales per mode is a lot, but the alterations the jazz scene discovered opens up the world completely. That said, modes are a good foundation, since using the circle of 5ths or 4ths to find all 15 general scales for each allows you to find ways to find new ways to alter these 15 general scales in each mode. There are 7 modes by the way, so 105 basic scales. And that's all based of the Greek system, I could only imagine what the church modes and the echoi would have in store, if I ever wanted to take the plunge, or other cultures versions of modes and scales, based on their tuning systems, which were created for whatever instrument most pieces were written for, in time periods way back when.
the legend of zelda oracle of seasons, samasa desert theme is in locrian
it outlines a E half diminished(sus4, flat9 chord) which is a very intresting sound
also it uses the flat 7 in the bassline to resolve up to the root to ground the tonic
i hope you will cover this song in part 2!
thanks Cadence Hira, i love your videos
this is some real gang shit im ngl
17:09 Raise the third note, you get phrygian dominant, which in E phyrgian if you were to raise the third note G to a G sharp gives you egyptian vibe.
true! i'll talk about phrygian dominant in part 2 :D
yes, and also i think that this phrygian variation that is more common in middle eastern and spanish music instead of the normal phrygian, at least in my knowledge, because of the arabic sound of the 1.5 tone interval of that scale
@@CadenceHira I do hope you won't reject my "interests" in one particular. You are able to see the deleted comments, I presume?
Yayyy new cadence hira vid, love your content
9:53 with the magypsies theme playing in time with the animation was so smooth. I love it.
What your favorite musical scale says about you (based on that gurschach tiktok audio)
Dorian: You're going with the safest option. Maybe a little overrated, but it's still a good one.
Harmonic minor: Is this your favorite because it's good, or are you just really horny?
Lydian: Alright, we get it! You like this one!
Phrygian dominant: This might not be everyone's favorite, but it's yours, and you're totally chill about it.
Melodic minor: You're into the classics.
Aeolian: You're old.
Ionian: You're really old.
Minor pentatonic: Your social security number is 2.
Lydian augmented: You are one pretentious hipster
Hungarian minor: Officer, it's this one right here.
Lydian dominant: Oh, you're cool, I like you.
Aeolian dominant: No way, you actually know this one? Can we be friends?
Altered scale: This one's just a phase, you'll grow out of it when you grow up.
Major pentatonic: You will never grow up.
Phrygian: Oh, you picked this one to be different, how clever.
Locrian: If you chose this one, you are a liar. This is nobody's favorite.
Mixolydian: If you chose this one, you are correct. This is the best one.
And for all the people in the comments saying "Where's this one? Where's that one?" You're annoying. That's what that one says about you.
My favorite is Lydian submissive. 😏
Or if I'm feeling really saucy, I'll say "I'm a fan of Mixolydian dominant"...which is just Mixolydian with a completely redundant modifier.
what about double lydian?
RAGHHH I LOVE MIXOLYDIAN
Phrygian dominant best scale
@ mixolydian is for people who like major but wanted to be edgy
I learned more about modes in 30mins of this video than I did having theory lessons for the past few months, where modes were the only focus. This is a crazy good video thank you!
I just finished my third semester in music school, and I always assumed aolian and ionian were synonyms for natural minor and major, so this video was actually really helpful!! Thank you!!
I think of it like the words "sure" and "certain". literal synonyms with different implications
@ that’s a good way to think about it!
7:26 i can genuinely only hear KFC major here. Im not cooked, im deepfried.
i looked at this comment right when she said it and you ruined it for me 🥲
finally, someone describing music theory the way i think of it in my head
I've been trying to wrap my grey matter around Modes for a few years and I don't know that I've seen something that's clicked better than this
Unfortunately I never uploaded it to the internet but I wrote an unambiguously Locrian tune as an exercise at university. I omitted the fifth from the harmony so the tonic chord only had the root and third, but it was all over the melody and I made sure it never felt like anything else. I think the chord sequence was something like Bm(omit 5), G7, Em. There might’ve been a Cmaj7 in there as well.
Thanks for this, working on a jazz fusion album for my dissertation, I’ve always been a huge fan of Nintendo music. You’re getting referenced !
hey guys so the best chord is the obviously the 2 3 6 turnaround of the major dominant G sus seventh chord, which is just an inversion of the augmented thirteenth of the Phrygian scale, integrated over the Poisson distribution of the 5 2 3 of 6.
Mmm, the Fish distribution
Obviously.
But what about the add 9 diminished sus xbox 360
So we’re gonna pretend C# altered flat chilli dog doesn’t exist
Super Paper Mario has some of the coolest and wildest mysic theory I've ever heard and it is so exciting to see it finally analyzed! Love your work!
I can't believe no one has mentioned Splatoon's last minute theme, it's the most in-your-face example of Lydian!
28:06 am I crazy or does the music sound like Chocolate Rain?
👀
Holy crap it does
As someone trying to make their own game and study music, your video topics and teaching style make music theory feel less daunting and even fun and full of wonder and mystery. Thank you!
CASTLE BLECK MENTIONED
we're one step closer to an actual analysis... it's like you're teasing us
besides that, i'm actually working on a "scale explorer" website, and this video is really helpful, thanks!
Glad to see Castle Bleck mentioned in this video after the absolute SLANDER the track received in the "6 Levels of Mixed Meter Time Signatures" video (All jokes aside, this is a really interesting video, and I really like the way you transcribe each piece yourself!)
I was the 1.1K like! I wanted to learn more about these modes (as I already know a but of music theory), and I love the way you explain them! Also keeping all the examples (mostly) in Cmaj/Cmin was nice to see to highlight the differences in the modes!
I like how at 5:14 you mention an "expectation of resolution" but as soon as I heard that D chord I expected to hear Unwavering Emotions from Pokemon BW instead
Love to see it, Hira! Thank you for the phenomenal Music Theory video again! 😅
YES, I haven’t even watched the video yet but I’ve been waiting for this. It helps so much songwriting because I can link specific chords to feelings. Like if I know that cmaj9 in a specific voicing gives a feeling of lullaby and calmness, I can start my song from there and expand out. Thank you
I realize now this is more about scales than chords, but you get the idea 😅
This is so cool, thanks! I've been dabbling in writing video game music for a solo indie project, and it turns out everything I write uses Dorian lol
Thank you for the good content! Another banger upload
AHHH Love the mother 3 music while you reintroduce modes
Wait, is nobody gonna talk about these spongebob meme stages?
I love how consistent this channel's thumbnails are
thank you it's because i have a lack of imagination
The timing of this video is impeccable because i was actually going to look at the ice music theory video because i need to make ice-like music for a game jam lol
25:30 "At The Doom's Gate" from the Doom OST is almost in Locrian
The humor in these videos is it so straightforward and funny
Been watching for literal years and barely understood what you were on about until now lol
thanks for the music theory
the section on Ionian is very interesting and really contextualises the minimalist and impressionist influences on videogame music and Ambient music to me. i really didn't think there was any difference with Ionian vs major
thats such a great idea for a video. and im so glad SPM was the first game u talked about.
8 bit already covered it but one other Zelda theme commonly cited as being in Locrian is the Samasa Desert theme from Oracle of Seasons
Babe wake up Cadence Hira posted!!
1:45 Those last 2 measures are a melodic minor sequence.
What a nice, helpful video!
unrelated, but I just bought ADOFAI and was having a blast, and nearly jumped in joy and surprised seeing that you made the level 7 tune 😭
I legit did not know this before buying
dorians funky uncle murdered me, that is so funny
Same
Wow I learned something new, the composite minor. (Also maybe I can now use the modes more efficiently) Polytonality gives you so much freedom, but I can still call it just polytonality and not just random notes that sound good.
Can't wait for part two, with the pentatonic and blues scales.
Currently making a sub plan worksheet for this. Thanks for an awesome video.
So I've got an engraving question. For the modal music, I noticed you used the key's "normal" key signature, and then added accidentals onto the mode-specific notes. Did you do this specifically to highlight those notes to make them easier to see, or is that the standard way of doing things? Because my intuition would be that, for example, G Mixolydian would use the same "blank" key signature as C Major/Ionian, rather than using G's single sharp and manually adding a natural onto all the F's that appear in the song.
Edit: Sorry, I got another one. I was told that a mode's identifying notes were the _two_ notes that distinguish it from its neighbors on the circle of fifths progression - ie Ionian's two distinguishing notes are the 4th, lowered from Lydian, and the 7th, raised from Mixolydian - but in your explanations you mostly only identify _one_ distinguishing note for each mode. Is that just a different convention, or was I told wrong? (I have very little formal music theory education, can you tell? :V)
Good questions!
When modes are used as tonalities I like to think of them as variations of the major/natural minor scale (whichever is applicable). As such,
1. I always prefer to notate key signature in modal music as it appears in this video. This is because it disambiguates the tonic note (rather than having to determine if you're in the mode or the relative major), but also, much of the time modal music does NOT entirely stay in that one mode. i.e. phrygian likes to go to phrygian dominant, or lydian likes to weave between lydian/functional major/lydian dominant. it's much easier to highlight the consistent root between these if the key signature ignores the parent major.
2. This may be true, but personally I think it's easier to think of modes as a tonality as just a 1 note chromatic alteration of major/minor (or two notes in the case of locrian). Makes it easier to categorize, understand, and internalize the modes imo. Ionian and Aeolian are baseline and the other 2 major/minor modes are variations.
@@CadenceHira Those both make a lot of sense, thank you!
Favorite example of Phrygian is the Lost Woods theme in Ocarina of Time, just such a cool theme and starting on that flatted 2 makes it feel kind of ethereal.
35:38 I think I hear Out of Tartarus from the hades soundtrack as consistently Locrian, however that might be cheating a little. It basically uses G Locrian for the main section in 21/16, but then it goes for G Phrygian for the more lyrical sections in 4/4, which retroactively legitimizes hearing it all in G.
One example of a song written in phrygian that I really like is the melty molten galaxy. The phrygian mode really gives it a sense of doom that a regular minor scale wouldn't be able to do.
Gliese-710 by King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard is a pretty good example of a song fully in Locrian, that whole album is all about modes
looked for this recommendation and was not disappointed.
finally!!! someone who makes the distinction between Ionian and major
I think this idea that there can't exist a diminished or augmented tonic and therefore, modes with these as their tonic triad aren't real modes comes from a modern "block chord" concept of tonality. Like yeah, it's pretty difficult to write out a simple chord formula in all root position triads and get the sense that a half-diminished seventh chord is the tonic.
But what it ignores is horizontal/contrapuntal writing. And once you consider a tonic as being established not by a sequence of harmonies, but by a melodic sequence, it's really not hard to write a convincing Locrian piece. 8 Bit Music Theory gives a great example in a Zelda game that is wholly, convincingly Locrian just by the contrapuntal movement of two voices.
Or if you want something more elaborate: ruclips.net/video/6qD98XhaSaM/видео.html&
Starting at 0:24, you see a plainly Locrian ostinato start in the Viola and Cello in octaves. Yes, there are chromatic notes and yes, it is quite ugly (by design) but the sense that we're in A Locrian here is overwhelming (even when the voices hit an implied Bb Major chord, A *still* sounds like the tonic.) And this is accomplished principally by strong linear writing.
Of course, some people would argue that they don't find any of this appealing and what's wrong with a block chords, lead chart approach to harmony anyway? Well, I still think Locrian is a viable option through modal interchange.
For example, if you establish C as the tonic through a major or minor, it's not difficult to then us a C half-diminished as a form of modal interchange to the locrian scale. This is the default strategy when using common tone diminished i's, in fact, but that overall sound has fallen quite out of favor with modern audiences.
Anyway, good video overall, of course. I hope you'll make one for the modes of the Lydian b7/#5 collection as well and maybe one-up 8 Bit by actually providing an example of all seven modes : )
Good timing! I was wanting to learn more about scales.
There is a pentatonic scale called the Iwato scale, diatonic to Locrian
There was some desert theme that 8 bit music theory used that he said it was locrian but it was all in the Iwato scale.
Iwato is Locrian without the third and the sixth and it's surprising "stable".
I searched it now and it's Samasa Desert, which can feel major at times, but i still like the Iwato scale
20:50 Cool Cave is interesting because my ears can’t decide what mode it is. She. I focus on the accompaniment, Bb does feel like the tonic, making it Lydian. But when I focus on the melody, I feel that it resolves/wants to resolve to F, making it Ionian. And I’m more naturally inclined to focus on melody, so intuitively it feels more like F to me. I think I feel this way about a lot of ostensibly Lydian tunes.
Makes my day seeing your videos, truly great inspirations come for my own works!
25:00 i regret to inform you about math rock and midwest emo 😭 they use the lydian scale ALL THE TIME for a bittersweet and emotional feel
Oooo another music theory video! Hope I retain any sort of info from this!!
i actually know a good song thats in locrian.. for at least a good portion of it!
“黒のマニキュア” by Opal Vessel.
There’s no upload of the actual song, only the album that it’s on “私は何でもするだろう” (I Would do Anything), which is on Opal Vessel’s yt channel and Bandcamp. It’s one of their most popular albums so it shouldn’t be hard to find. It’s the 8th track on the album.
the trumpets at 4:12 ish sounds like the void trumpets from the digital circus, fun
3:35 i got so excited because i got the reference
The F-Zero series has a few examples of modes. The first section of Sand Ocean (SNES) is Dorian, while White Land (SNES) is entirely Mixolydian except for the intro. Fire Field (GX) sounds ambiguous at first, then sounds Locrian, and the guitar solo even plays a non-diatonic natural sixth.
If you were going to do another video like this, I'd love a focus on pentatonic modes and the minor mode relations to the blues scale :)
great video (as usual :3), would love something about metroid dread.
Floating Continent from Final Fantasy VI is in G Lydian with a section that raises G to G#, keeping the rest of the notes the same, giving it a G# Locrian feel
35:21 *literally plays the intro to phase 4 of Dancing Mad*
"Anyway let me know about any bangers you can hear in Locrian :)"
Hey Cadence? Can you upload a part 2 of every scale explained?
Ugh the best. Can you teach my last semester of music theory plz
Leave it to the Xenoblade series to have the most complex shit you’ve ever heard (MY GOAT)
Fire background gameplay
What website/spftware do you use to transcribe every melody into sheet music?
musescore!
I recently learned about quartal and quintal harmony and have been really curious about whether Locrian could sound more palatable by using chords based on 4ths instead of 3rds, since then the tritone between the 1st and 5th would no longer be present in the I chord. Would love to see some kind of analysis on that question.
Thank you for breaking down the difference between Major and Ionian! I get it now :3
33:58 Huge missed opportunity to include the scene in Mother 3 where the six Magypsies have gathered (all of them, named after each scale) and Locria missing in the reunion.
you need to talk about the octatonic scale its such a stable of the contemporary world and I would love to see some examples in videogame music
I have songs already for both WH diminished and HW diminished :) will be in part 2!
Yo new explained using Nintendo music video!
As soon as the Magypsy theme from MOTHER 3 started playing during the "What are modes?" section of the video I unintentionally shouted YES at the top of my lungs
Not necessarily Nintendo, but I love Sandopolis Zone from S&K as a slightly more unconventional use of Harmonic Minor.
Also worth mentioning is the sick Dorian riff on Golden Forest from 1080 Snowboarding
I think it’s hot how you know so much about music theory 🔥
1:17 heeeeey that’s not a scale 🤨🤨🤔🤨
"every scale" but I'm curious if you'll go into any scales that have more than 12 notes per octave, or if it's gonna just be the western scales...
Either way, I'm excited to watch the video!
Not related to the music theory, but why is no one talking about that forward aerial at 9:42?
The boss battle music in Illusion of Gaia is in locrian.