The Strangest Normal Scale
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- Опубликовано: 12 окт 2017
- Harmonic Major is really simple, except that it's not. It's just like the major scale except with a flat 6th degree, which seems straightforward enough, but the effect of lowering that one note changes pretty much everything, from creating all sorts of weird chords to adding bizarre intervals to its melodic structures. It's kind of in between major and minor, but there's plenty of other scales that are too, and most of them are a lot easier to use. So what's the point? Well...
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Harmonic Minor video: • The Problem With Minor...
Modes video: • Building Blocks: The M...
Augmented Triads video: • Augmented: The Rebel T...
Diminished 7ths video: • Diminished 7ths: Trito...
Script: docs.google.com/document/d/1y...
SOURCES:
www.academia.edu/6982638/The_H...
www.pluck-n-play.com/en/scale-...
ftp.labdoo.org/download/Public...
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The scale being encapsulated by the I-IV-V chords never crossed my path or occurred to me before. From a western, pop/rock tradition, that's a really quick, clever way of thinking about the sound of a scale.
Now I'm thinking about how that relates to modal interchange.
I've played around with Dorian 5b a lot in writing metal riffs, and it's really great for getting a super dark, menacing sound. It has a lot of similar qualities to more commonly used scales in the genre, but mixes them in a different way and the applications are different. It's a lot of fun and has a unique sound.
Thank you for this video! The way you showed how you can derive the scales from the I, IV and V chord was really helpful to see their similarities, differences and develop a better intuition for them.
The fall out n tranformer doodle tho... I think hes actually getting better at drawing from this hahaha
Love the channel. The usage of drawings is something I haven’t seen before, but it definitely helps visual learners. Keep it up!!!
Man you're channel is amazing, I've learned so much with you in the last few weeks, thank you so much, you're awesome!!
Greetings from Brazil!!!!
Twinkle, Twinkle, Harmonic Star:
C-C-G-G-Ab-Ab-G, F-F-E-E-D-D-C.
@misotanni "Happy Birthday" in the key of F harmonic major?
+misotanni I don't get it, what scale is C Db E F G A Bb c? Harmonic Major would be C D E F G Ab B c and your scale doesn't fit any greek mode.
+Friek555 It's F harmonic major ("Happy Birthday" starts on the fifth scale degree, similar to the "Bridal Chorus" (Here comes the bride...)).
Friek555 you could think of it as an altered scale, e.g.
C mixolydian b9
PlayTheMind that’s basically just Twinkle Twinkle Little Star but in Mixolydian flat-6.
Brilliant - what an amazing, colourful, unique scale. So much material.
The scale-tone7th chords especially - then the Aug becomes a Major7#5 - one of my favourites, but I never thought of it occurring elsewhere apart from III of the Harmonic or Jazz Melodic minors. Similar but quite different. Thanks for opening my mind to this gem.
I really like this scale: E F G# A B C D# E
Sounds really dark. Perfect for some dark oriental music or... metal
*It's the E Double Harmonic Scale
yeah, that's what's used in dick dale's misirlou
That's called The Double Harmonic Major, characterized by the flat 2 (F in key of E) and the flat 6 ( C in key of E). And yes, it's used a lot in dark music like metal and film scores.
Rick Beato has a cool vid on it, going through all the modes that stem from it.
In Arabic music are very similar scale but with some microtonal differences is referred to as "maqam hijaz". It's a very common scale in middle eastern music.
It's not dark
It's like phrygian dominant but harmonic, cool.
Harmonic Major is my favorite scale; thank you for making a video on it
thank you so much, i never thought the harmonic major would be so important, most of all - this video was published yesterday which is my birthday. best bday gift ever
Jazz: Notoriously adventurous in it's harmonic choices.
Listen to it today! :)
Listen to it everyday!
I cant listen to most jazz it sounds like a bunch of people playing different songs at the same time
Just because it's theoretically complicated doesn't mean i'll like it
I've been playing with scales built from thirds for a couple weeks now, and I'm now moving into using augmented and diminished thirds, which is getting crazy.
To get the 4 (actually 5) most normal scales, you look at all combinations of 3 major and 4 minor 3rds. (There are 7 notes in a scale {at least as I'll be looking at them, here}, and you have to get back to the octave, or else you're technically using another interval, which we aren't doing yet.)
These will outline root 13 chords, which condense into a scale. You can write that out in musical notation if you want, but that won't be useful for what we'll be doing next.
Pick as many scales as you can without any of them being modes of each other. It's easier to do this if you list them systematically.
Be mathematical about it. Notice how moving the last third in your scale to the beginning gives you a mode of that scale.
When all is done, you will end up with either 4 or 5 scales. If you have 4, it should be because you removed one of the scales already. That scale, or one of it's modes, includes an augmented 7th. Technically, it's still a 7-note scale, but, realistically, you've removed the 7th, making it a hexatonic scale.
The remaining 4 scales are 7-note scales (heptatonic is a fancy word for 7-note). No tricks. In the order I found them, they correspond to:
the 6th mode of harmonic major;
the 3rd mode of melodic minor (also the 6th mode of melodic major);
the 3rd mode of harmonic minor;
the 4th mode of natural major (known as Lydian).
To make modal, harmonic, and melodic analysis of scales easier, create a 12x12 grid, list the numbers 0-11 over the top and by the side of the grid. Consider the scales as parts of a chromatic scale. Thinking of just one of the modes, starting with the root, look at the numbers along the top. If a note in that scale (in just one of the modes, not all of them), is that many semitones from the root, then mark it in the top row, in the column corresponding to that number. (Perhaps with a check-mark, I prefer to use circles) This is a chromatic representation of that scale.
Now, for each empty square in the grid along that top row, make a diagonal line going down-left, ending at the side or bottom of the grid. If it ends on the left side, continue it one row down on the other side, still down and to the left. Each line will finally end at the bottom.
(This is analogous the the fact that a scale technically continues through all octaves.)
Wherever a diagonal line goes through the 0 column, draw a horizontal line through that row.
Now, mark all of the remaining empty squares. You should have 7 chromatic representations of scales. Those scales are modes of the scale you filled in in the top row.
If you would like, it's relatively easy to list each of the intervals from the root of these scales, as well as listing the root chord/mode symbol for each scale in the grid.
Doing this for those scales from earlier, you can see that the modes of harmonic major, melodic major/minor, and harmonic minor all have 2 diminished chords, and 1 augmented chord, making the modes of Natural Major the odd ones out.
If you want to know what this is like when you consider more scales than just those constructed from major and minor 3rds, here's where I've started:
I decided to start with the 4 basic scales from earlier: the 6th mode of harmonic major; the 3rd mode of melodic minor (also the 6th mode of melodic major); the 3rd mode of harmonic minor; the 4th mode of natural major (known as Lydian).
I made a 4x12 grid, listing a name for each scale along the top, and then a + or - followed by each interval in a scale other than the root. (3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13; for ease with 3rd based scale construction.)
For each square, I considered whether, in the scale it's in the column of, the interval it's in the row of can be moved up or down (corresponding to the + or -) while still having 7 notes. If there was a major 9 and minor 3, the 9 could move up (+), because that would be enharmonic to the minor 3 that's already in that scale.
Doing this throughout the grid, I got a list of the scales and there possible manipulations.
To reduce the list further, I don't want scales to be modes of each other, or of a scale I already have, because I can find those again using that 12x12 grid analysis, and I don't want to inflate this list of scales.
I listed each basic scale and their manipulations in consecutive 3rd form (That is, how you would write their construction out of major, minor, and now augmented and diminished, thirds.)
I removed the scales that were constructed without augmented or diminished 3rds, because they were accounted for as modes of the 4 basic scales.
I then listed those remaining scales, under their corresponding basic scale that they were a manipulation of, constructed out of 2nds, minor, major an augmented. I counted the numbers of each interval, and resorted them in that way. I also then constructed each scale just before some particular interval. That interval would be the one that there were the fewest of in that group of scales.
Because scales that are modes of each other have the same numbers of each type of interval, I only needed to consider scales within their group for being modes of each other.
Starting each scale on a mode that starts with the same interval as each other makes it easy to find duplicates, especially if there is only 1 of that interval in each scale in that group.
All whittled down, there were 20 scales, including the 4 basic scales I started with. I'm currently doing the analysis on those scales, which will result in a total of 70 different 7-note scales.
To go even further, those 20 modally unique 7-note scales are still not all possible 7-note scales in our chromatic musical system. Every scale starts on a root, and then 6 other notes are placed on 11 remaining chromatic positions. Mathematically, this is the same as 11 choose 6. Plug that into your calculator, (the nCr button) and you get 462.
Because this is all 7-note scales, and any 7-note scale has exactly 7 modes, you can pick 1 scale from each group of modes to get the modally unique scales. Just counting the scales, we divide 462 scales by 7 modes for each scale, and get exactly 66 scales.
Among those 66 will be a scale with one mode which is 6 consecutive minor seconds and and a 4th. This scale can be interpreted as having a minor 2nd, a diminished 3rd, a twice diminished 4th, a thrice diminished 5th, a thrice diminished 6th, and a frice diminished 7th. It's largest interval within an octave is enharmonic to a perfect 5th.
Not all scales are as useful as the others, but analyzing them is really fun.
It helps to be a perfectionist.
Just came here to say...Weegee....haven’t seen him in a while...
Thank you for this video. I had been calling thus scale melodic major for the longest time
Fantastic! Those harmonic major modes are just one of the craziest things I've seen in music so far.
Check out Rick Beato's video on the harmonic major scale, he breaks down all its weird modes and the chords that are built from them too, there's some really interesting stuff in there.
ruclips.net/video/YVj-hiy-jT8/видео.html
try the double harmonic major
Wow, thanks for the tip! So much to study!
This is my favourite scale! Avalanche by Justin Lavash is an awesome example of how it can drive music through darkness but come back to a resolution in the light.
You have a new sub, my friend. This was excellent
The Miles Davis AURA theme, composed by Palle Mikkelborg sets an english alphabet alongside an ascending chromatic scale. The letters of Miles’ name are extracted and this yields a 10 note melody. Among those notes are 7 different notes which yield a chord and a scale. This scale happens to be E harmonic major. Mikkelborg’s Aura composition has many interesting uses of this scale and it’s attendant harmony.
I mean it sounds so EMOTIONAL
I had so much trouble learning it on the bass
This sounds really cool. If I actually really knew how to use scales, I would definitely use this for something.
The scale has been used as a variation on the hicaz scale in the middle east for 500+ years. Makam based music works with combinations of 4 or 5 notes, so if hijaz is 1 b2 3 4, harmonic major is kind of 2x hijaz (hijaz zirgule)
Thank you for this 👍
the bit at 1:58 was especially eye opening for me as someone who's still sorta learning the basics
Video on Aeolian Dominant? Same scale that's called "Paradise" in Emmett Chapman's Offset Modal system, and a really intriguing sound.
I learned about harmonic major scales today in my concert band class!
1:22 it comes from the arabic maqam known as "hijaz" which is almost identical to phrygian dominant; exept hijaz can also have a major 6th, which means that the relative harmonic minor becomes major.
The 4th mode is like a minor lydian, one of my favorites!
Two things I've found in using this scale quite a bit is for one, the augmented second it creates gives it a sound similar to the gypsy scales, and two that harmonic major gives us all but one 7 chord. So theoretically if someone used it along major you can use more unique chords through a sort of modal interchange.
Also worth mentioning that there is a melodic major found in the 5th mode of jazz minor in which the 7is lowered to help smooth out the scale. There is no leading tone, but it offers a darker feel to a song rooted in major.
And finally some other names for those modes are SuperPhrygian on the three, and Lydian Diminished built from 4, no cool name for every mode, but who doesn't love the fact that there are super and ultra scales?
Best 12tone video ever 👌
I use harmonic major in a lot of my writing and tinkering, but I can't help but feel you left out a fairly important feature of the scale: the iv - I resolution. It is the equivalent of a V - I in negative harmony (look up Jacob Collier, there's an interview about negative harmony with him that's incredibly fascinating), but even looking at it outside of a new-age progressive theory sense, it functions basically like a plagal cadence in minor with a picardy third, which is a very unusual flavor in a major scale.
Very cool! I guess that slipped my mind 'cause I was more focused on how it still have the V-I available, but that's true, the relationship between I and IVmi is a huge feature of the scale!
Could you cover composition in some of these unusual scales? Like for example what are some good chord progressions / starting points for harmonic major?
One thing I love about harmonic major that you sort of allude to is the 7th chords in it. There are 7 7th chords: Augmented Major 7, Major 7, Dominant 7, Minor Major 7, minor 7, half diminished 7 (or min7b5), and diminished 7. If we look at the regular major scale, only 4 of these chords pop up, those being major, minor, dominant, and half diminished. But with the harmonic major scale, all 7 are used, each corresponding with a different scale degree. That's why I think it's so incredible, no other scale that I know of has all 7 7th chords just built in like this scale does.
Woah, that's awesome, I completely missed that! Didn't come up in my research at all, but it's really cool, thanks for pointing it out!
Great video, very interesting
Never thought of using a harmonic major
Just got a new subscriber looking forward to more videos
Hey 12t thanks for talking about my favourite scale! In jazz the harm maj is *way more useful (I find, personally) than the harm min, as there are no 'avoid notes' and every single mode is not just cool but practically useful. Especially the phrygian and mixolydian flavours, which are great alt dom and 13b9 scales.
I dunno if you read the comments, but a wee curio that I hope will get your attention, as I'd love your take on it: with the harm min in jazz, I find it's primarily often used as a V scale, an alt dom scale, and its role as a tonic minor scale (while occasionally useful) is less important. Take a C harm min, for example, which we'd use as a kind of G alt 7 scale, taking 7+5/ b9 flavour from its 'Phrygian w/ a maj 3rd' mode. However the C is an *avoid note in this situation. I used to find I'd automatically avoid it in just about *all modes of the harm min. But when you *do actually omit it - the results are pretty crazy. You get a kind of custom-built alt 7 scale based on a diminished 7 chord on B/D/F/Ab + an augmented triad on B/ Eb/G. The weird doubling of the B - being the leading note of C - seems to reinforce its function as a dominant scale, and treated as a hexatonic scale the chord tones are quite beautiful (on the guitar I might play 'em as GFBEb / AbGDF / BAbEbG / DBFAb / EbDGB / FEbAbD inversions, but the [identical] six-note chord built from all chord tones is pretty great ). The hexatonic approach to this scale seems to unveil its truer harmonic fiction, somehow. I won't bang on for fear of looking like a crank (there are some beautiful harmonic and melodic complexities that arise from the ascending inversions of aug triad rising a semitone more quickly than those of the dim7 chord, especially) - and apologies if I've merely rediscovered a massive cliche! But I've found this scale amazing useful in my playing and teaching recently. Anyway keep up the amazing and inspirational work.
I love you twelve tone
I explained this today in a lesson to my student. Kinda funny that it should be the first video in my feed.
Hey, it would be sweet if you made a video about the middle eastern maqam scales.
A cool rock song that's got it are the solos in Muse's Survival. It sounds epic af
great video!
The platypus he drew in the thumbnail is one of the cutest things I've ever seen
Thanks, needed a bit of a primer on harmonic major. It is rare, and hard to find stuff on. I really like weird scales too, and challenge myself to write in them. If you look at the enigmatic scale (I think you actually did a video about it), you get some *really* weird ones, like major with a lowered second and double-flat third, or a scale with everything sharp but the root and seventh as well as double sharps on 4 and 5. That is, if I worked it out correctly. Try writing in that!
maybe try out the double harmonic major! It's ionian b2 b6
Very interesting scale. I recently finished writing a piece that used this scale without really knowing it had a name. I treated it like harmonic minor with a sharp 3 rather than major with a flat 6, but I thought it was interesting, and ended up modulating (is that even the right word if the tonic doesn't change?) from G major, to G minor, to G harmonic major, and back to G major. It's interesting to find out there's a fair bit of theory behind something that I just kind of stumbled across because I thought it sounded good.
Strictly speaking, Phrygian b4 doesn't have two I chords, it only has a minor one.
The b4 functions as the third of the minor bII chord.
But you could use a major I chord as a passing chord between the minor I and the minor bII.
Double harmonic is even better ;) Nice Feynman diagram by the way
Yeah, I did a double take when I saw that. "Wait, is that a Feynman diagram?!"
This is my favourite scale by far.
Hey Man, Nice vid. Would like to hear this scale in practice hehe. Can you recommend any song or piece written using this scale (Preferably using that Dimished 7th chord)? Tried to come up with some little melodies using this scale but they all sounded like crap hehe. Thanks man.
Very nice.
Is it possible to explain Ravel - Forlane in a video? It is full of dissonance and key changes but it works so well! I was wondering if you could explain especially the first part of the song. Thanks!
Cory, I'm quite entertained by your choice to use two linked game boys at around the 4:31 mark. Also an interesting video. I love messing around with various modes whenever I get a chance
Gotta love half-diminished 2 to 1 chord resolution. Don’t even need a 5 chord!
Hey 12tone, love your video as always. Just a question:
Do you have a recommendation for a book on music theory?
F.e.: It's the first time I heard the explanation of a missing leading tone in the natural minor scale and therefore the consequence of the harmonic minor scale. Those information give meaning to the stuff we play. So I would gladly have a book in which music theory is explained with those little details.
Good question! Honestly, most of my work is based more on reading articles and talking to other theorists than it is on books: I tend to find most academic theory texts unnecessarily dense. If you're looking into theory textbooks, though, Harmony (Fifth Edition) by Walter Piston was the one that my college classes used, and it's pretty good. I've also heard good things about Hindemith and Tchaikovsky's books on harmony (amzn.to/2uyPwyc and amzn.to/2eOJ151 ) although I haven't read them personally. If you're just looking for reading, though, the journal of the Society for Music Theory (www.mtosmt.org ) is pretty excellent as well. It tends to be about more esoteric topics, so if you need to review the basics it's probably not the best place to start, but if you're looking for recreational music theory, it's one of my main sources.
Really, though, probably my biggest recommendation is to check out our Building Blocks series, which looks at music theory from the ground up: ruclips.net/p/PLMvVESrbjBWplAcg3pG0TesncGT7qvO06
About scales containing both dom7 and aug chords...
This has probably already been addressed, but any 7 note scale built on steps and half steps, without two half steps in a row, with one, and only one #2nd (min3rd w/ no tones in between) interval will have a dom7 and a aug chord.
As a piano player, I always wish the scale examples were in C, it makes it sooo much easier to understand quickly. Great videos though!
Matt Murphy - Everything is easy on the piano, you just push all the right keys at all the right times and all the right volumes. Simple, lol.
The fitness gram Pacer Test is a multistage aerobic capacity test that progressively gets more difficult as it continues. The 20 meter pacer test will begin in 30 seconds. Line up at the start. The running speed starts slowly, but gets faster each minute after you hear this signal. A single lap should be completed each time you hear this sound. Remember to run in a straight line, and run as long as possible. The second time you fail to complete a lap before the sound, your test is over. The test will begin on the word start. On your mark, get ready, start.
2:31 nice chord changes!
Damn, you make me want to go to music school. I always did, but never that much.
yo do some stuff on other countries classical systems! i've been checking out japanese traditional stuff and i'm obsessed with the hirajoshi scale
This video is integral to a well founded knowledge of music theory. I would say it's Riemann integral.
Do aqualung by Jethro Tull!
I would be interested in hearing your take on what's going on in Toby Driver's music, even though no one probably knows who he is. He released a new song on band camp called Glyph that toes the line between major and minor keys, often making dissonant or augmented chords feel like they belong whenever they are played rather than sticking out. He composes a vast array of music but this recent output is similar to a classical mindset while incorporating some of the oddities of progressive rock like complex time signatures, but at a slow pace in the song. I feel like there's a lot that can be learned from his style.
Toby Driver's awesome! His work with Kayo Dot and Maudlin of the Well really broadened my tastes.
Ｙｕｎｇ Ｖｕｌｐｉｘ lol nice, I was completely expecting my comment to go unnoticed. Have you heard the live album he just put out? Almost sounds like it was recorded in the studio.
Toby drivers music opened so many doors in my brain. All the way since the more accessible Maudlin of the Well stuff through the farthest out art music he made since then. It’s all amazing. ❤️
If 12 does a video on anything Toby Driver related I'd be incredibly happy.
Linus Sundström I actually just really think its awesome that I mention Toby here in the comments and at least 19 people up voted thr comment presumably because they're fans. I've never seen so many Kayo Dot fans congregated in one place that wasn't directly related to Kayo Dot so that's really cool to see.
Here for the platypus on the cover video. And because I'm curious about this weird scale !
Always loved minor 6th in a major context, for exemple in Jean Pierre by Miles Davis
Can you do something on constant structure progressions like Wayne Shorter tunes for example.
I am writing a song in A harmonic major. This video makes so much sense haha
Hey 12tone really interesting vid, just wondering how do you as a theorist describe a "normal scale"? Is it as simple as containing seven notes or is there something deeper? Really interested as to me this is a relatively weird scale
Well, I'm not sure there's a set definition, but in this case I think it feels "normal" because it's so similar to a couple other well-known scales. It sits in that in-between space of major and minor, and it's definitely the weirdest of the ones in that group.
Cool video
I don't understand any of what you're saying in your videos but I still like them.
Any recommendations on a relatively normal and popular song written in Harmonic Major? Really liked the sound of it based on the video.
Yeea, I feel like this is always missing in these videos, he gives all this cool analysis but doesn't show how it sounds in a pratical situation, kind of sad actually
I feel like there are some pop songs and film scores with harmonic major I-iv progressions but I can't remember any specifically.
Nick Hoad
But is that really harmonic major and not simply just modal mixture - borrowing the minor IV chord from the parallel minor (very similar to the I-bVI progression that borrows the bVI chord from the parallel minor)? I prefer a normal major/minor explanation over using some more "exotic" scales to explain stuff. I mean, do you need a new scale to explain something that can easily be explained with major and minor keys?
A good example of a I-iv progression that comes to my mind would be the beginning of "Thunderstruck". Another good example of using the b6 scale degree in a major key would be the intro of "Mamma Mia" by ABBA. The whole song "Take a Bow" by Muse is based on alternating between the tonic chord and another chord that has the b6 scale degree in it - sometimes an augmented chord, sometimes the minor IV (it modulates many times, but it uses the same chords pretty much all the time, just in different keys).
Sleepwalk by Santo and Johnny. A classic jazz tune.
Nick Hoad Oasis- Don't Look Back In Anger
I wish I could understand musical theory. I just can't, and it's a shame because I find videos like this fascinating.
I've read about a couple of those quirky scales in my travels and they remain fascinating. Nicely presented vid! :)
There's some death metal potential in those modes.
Stokes A #oldnews
Hey everybody! If you want to see an example in rock, listen to Muse's Survival: one of the solos is in that scale, the last one i believe
I made something in double harmonic major two years ago when I didn't know the notes so well. And know I'm struggling to harmonize it...HEEELP!
Can you explain the DOUBLE HARMONIC MAJOR? Pleeeease :)
My favorite scale is D minor! So good!
I'd argue this scale isn't that uncommon to use in a specific case. What we'd call borrowing from the minor for iv or iidim chord is more naturally borrowing from this scale. It resolves to a major I, not a minor i.
I didn't think about it until you mentioned it as a tool for interesting resolutions. And that's exactly what this is used for. It gives an additional bit of motion from the 6 to the 5. You often have 6, b6, 5 as part of the resolution.
Harmonic major mode 6 is:
Lydian aug #2
My fave scale
huh, i always thought it was made solely for the minor iv chord, similar to how harmonic minor was made solely for the major V. interesting
so anyways how can I figure out harmonic major for other keys?
0:18 ... Bb ?!! You makin' work for me?!! Thanks for making me transpose it up a step, before I know what the hell we're talkin' 'bout ... ... ;P
If you did books full of your drawings alone, I would buy them.
Anyone else feel like the harmonic major sounds like the music scale that is played at the end of casually explained’s videos?
You should listen to some music of The Balkans. Mix of Slavonic, Byzantine ,Ottoman, Gypsy and Sephardic scales, modes and rhythms (and feel above all)
I have a scale I've been using in a song I wrote, and I know it's the D melodic minor scale, but the key is in A. So it's an A major scale with a flat 6 and a flat 7. Any idea of what that would be called?
Can you maybe do a video on bebop scales, or instead of having two videos in a row that are about scales maybe talk about pivot chord modulation between scales that have no diatonic triads in common.
Since the 'major' chord built on the root of the phrygian b4 mode consists of root, diminished fourth, fifth, I wonder whether it would be more "accurate" to call it a sus b4?
I suppose so! I suspect you'd confuse a lot of people with that notation, though...
My brain hurts...
same
Its like smoking for the 1st time, u just gotta bear through it. Then later u will have an incredible addiction to music theory and won't ever be able to experience music the same way again. :)
One of the modes, phrygian with lowered 4th is common in music of middle east. It is called Saba Zamzam. Check this site, there are nice oud samples too. With a nice touch on second degree, you get what is called maqam Saba, the darkest of all for me. Lİsten this,
www.maqamworld.com/mp3/maqamat/oud/maqam_saba_form2_D.mp3
www.maqamworld.com/maqamat/saba.html#saba-zamzam
By the way, the song crumbling castle from the australian psych band king gizzard uses that mode too as an ascending riff as a western example.
Sounds about "Sleep" by My Chemical Romance to me!
This scale is truly a beautiful one.
Check the Indian Melakarta system for other unpopular in the west scales that are somewhat popular in Eastern Europe and Asia.
what about melodic major? (harmonic major but with that flat 7th, or major with flat 6 and 7) I think it's a pretty cool scale, though I need to look into it more and confess that I haven't the skill to really know what to do with it or really truly know what it means. It's the natural minor version of this one, though it doesn't have to cool third in it, it sounds more like a modal scale (which makes me think, are the modes of it good? I looked into them, and they looked super weird.
That's generally called Aeolian Dominant, because it has the chord tones of a dominant 7th (1, 3, 5, b7) but with the non-chord tones of Aeolian, or the natural minor scale. (2, 4, b6) It's actually one of the modes of melodic minor! (Specifically, the 5th mode.)
Major with flat 6 and flat 7 is a mode of the melodic minor (I have heard people referring to it as "Mixolydian b6" or "Aeolian dominant"), not really a completely unique scale like the harmonic major (that is not a mode of any of the "normal" scales, meaning major and natural/harmonic/melodic minor).
When it comes to new scales, my question is always, does it make sense to treat this as a separate scale or can it simply be explained with major and minor keys? In this case I would say it's just borrowing from the parallel minor. My point is, does it make sense to name every single different set of notes as a separate scale? I think it all comes down to harmony. If you are using the scale in a really unique way, then I guess it would make sense to call it something different. But at least to me it's harmony first, scales second. If the harmonies "make sense" (traditionally speaking, i.e., they can easily be explained with major and minor keys), then treating the added accidentals as a separate scale doesn't make much sense. It's kind of like calling the scale used in the beginning of the US National Anthem "Lydian" (which would technically be correct if we only took the notes used into account) when in fact we are talking about secondary dominants/secondary leading tones and the normal major scale. My point is, not every new accidental needs a separate scale, and usually they are easily explained when you look at harmonies.
My problem with focusing on scales too much is that many times it misses the point. As I said, most accidentals are the result of harmonies and don't need a separate scale to explain them.
So, what to do with this scale? I would say focus on harmony. You have a major tonic chord, diminished II, diminished III, minor IV, minor V, augmented bVI and major bVII chord. But sticking with just one scale may get boring after a while. I wouldn't limit myself to this scale. Again, I would focus on harmony - most of the harmonies that you get from this scale are easily explained with chord borrowing from the parallel minor. So I would suggest learning about that. Look up modal mixture. Some of the chords in this scale are useful whereas others are pretty weird (diminished III, and really the augmented bVI too if you only use the notes in this scale). Also, some of the chords go together much better with chords that are not included in this scale, for example the major bIII and bVI chords (both borrowed from the parallel minor).
ah, thanks for the replies!
I didn't realise it was a mode of melodic minor, I probably should have thought of that.
Having all those minors and diminisheds as well as an augmented could make it fun to play around with, although I understand using it exclusively could make tire it out, though that's true for everything. Though one thing I really like is major 1 to minor 4(instead of major 4) and back, it's actually super nice in arrangements (I understand that this it true for harmonic major too, but maybe you might want to avoid the 3 semitone step of harmonic minor/major or just want the flat 7th. Who knows?). Admittedly I haven't explored it, but think it could have some cool stuff.
I do need to learn about modal mixture and borrowing from parallel scales some time, thanks for the suggestions.
Are their octatonic scales that are just the harmonic scales but with an additional scale degree to smooth out the augmented second? You know, CDE(b)FGAbBbBC, for example?
I haven't encountered them, but that doesn't mean they don't work!
Yep. Diminished 7ths are the best of all time!
I like it.
So, anything interesting written with harmonic major? What did Rimsky-Korsakov do with it? Anything in popular music? Steely Dan? ;)
I love the Feynman diagrams
Has anyone watched a 12tone video, looked at the scribbles on the paper, and then ended up actually forgetting what was actually said? Like "... idk something about elephants and fish"?
Any chance you wanna do some Metallica in your Understanding series? Love your stuff
ChillyConquistador - They would probably sue him like they’ve sued everyone else.
I really like phrygian b4... and lyd b3