I love the way in which you break it down and gradually lower each scale degree in the modes of D major leading to D Lydian; it makes it so much easier to understand how modes differ from scales and keys.
My favorite thing about modes is how they connect to the circle of fifths. The order from bright to dark (Lydian > Ionian > ... > Locrian) is the same order as if you go down the circle of fifths, eg. F > C > G > D > A > E > B
Every line meticulously packed, not even space for imagine a breath. Then: "This bring us to a really important idea in scale theory * P A U S E * modes." What a dynamic!
Finally someone, who really explains this topic well i was always hanging there like "okay... these are basicly modes, but... where's the real difference to scales? i could just shift the root and then..." great job! helped me a lot!
I would like to add that the notation standard you mentioned in 4:17 is far from one. There's a lot of debate about which key signature we should use, but personally, I will notate the key signature which gives the fewest accidentals if the scale is very consistent.
HEHEHE I AM A SUPAHSTAR SAGA I think his way is better for composers and theorists, but yours is better for musicians. His tells you what the function is, yours what to actually play easier.
I go back and forth on this. Where I think 12-tone is absolutely correct (use one sharp in the key signature for E Dorian, then put a sharp in front of all the C#’s) is if you have an expectation for the musician to improvise. A musician sees a key signature with only F# and already thinks “this is either in some form of G major or E minor”. Depending on how the chords and melody work, he gets that it’s an e minor and not g Major modality quickly, then soon gets the Dorian part. But if on the other hand, the key signature has two sharps, he thinks “this is some kind of d Major or b minor” and that completely misses the mark.
HEHEHE I AM A SUPAHSTAR SAGA, where I do agree with you is if the scale is very consistent. In reality, very little that I write is 100% in the key, there’s an expectation that there will be accidentals and chords from outside the key, and so me writing something that’s “generally”, though not completely, in E Dorian, though having accidentals elsewhere, would have me have no problem using an E minor key signature and put a sharp next to every C#. BUT if I’m writing something that’s consistent, AND it’s through-composed and no call for improvisation, THEN I’d consider using two sharps in the key signature.
Once again, great video! The one thing that free'd me up the most as a soloist, is to let the background accompaniment create the mode, while I'm free'd up to noodle, arpeggiate, and riff around the parent scale...thereby getting the whole fretboard in my frame of mind, and using my ear for direction. That's how I broke out of feeling stuck in a box shape with a modal name. You can reverse think this and create your own modal backing track's, as well. And jam along to all the ones you can find on here.
I find Mixolydian common in Country and Funk music, where a song is essentailly Major, but the low 7 gets rid of the leading tone, and makes direction a little more ambiguois.
When I write in modes like Mixolydian and Phrygian (sometime Phrygian dominant), I like to use a lot of secondary dominants. It sounds nice and mysterious, especially in the latter.
So glad to see this video! I already knew the modes of the major scale but I had no idea what they sounded or felt like, you explained them perfectly! This also helped me understand why many musicians use a key signature, of, say, three sharps, but then just make the G# and C#'s natural but resolve the piece on A. I never understood that until now. (:
Your videos are superintelligent, full of your experience, wise details and cuteness)) I bet you have a great personality)) Thank you so much for the fun and professional approach, the joy you bring!
Great job! I think it's also worth noting that the modes' names come form ancient Greek (or Greek in general I suppose) and I've seen somewhere that the christian musicians that researched the old greek texts about their music theory made a translation mistake, and switched between the names of Dorian and Phrygian. So historically, Dorian was called Phrygian and vice versa :)
Yahliamir Oh boy, my dude, is it even more complicated than that. It's more like they moved all the names to the next mode down, skipping Locrian: Modern Aeolian is Ancient Greek Ionian, major is really Dorian, Dorian is Phrygian, Phrygian is Lydian, Lydian is Mixolydian, Mixolydian is Aeolian, Locrian is Hypodorian. The strangest thing is, Ancient Greek Locrian was probably an alternate name for a some particular variant on the modern Aeolian scale using an alternative genus of tetrachord, as there were actually a lot of those-for a particularly strange example with no modern analogue, look up Hypolydian in the enharmonic genus. To put it bluntly: That shit cray.
This is, by far, the best succinct explanation of modes I have watched on RU-vid...and I have watched many (too many, in fact). Congratulations, you are a wonderful teacher! If you ever feel so inclined, I would really appreciate a more in depth lesson on what makes a composition "modal", from the perspective of the guitar, if at all possible. Perhaps you already have something and could direct me to it. The reason I'm asking is because I am new to music in general and have only been playing the guitar for one year. Though I understand the distinction between tonality and modality, I am running up against a problem when trying to understand the practical applications, on the guitar. I mean, I have seen countless tutorials saying that a "modal progression" is simply using a different chord than the key's tonic as the first in a progression...a typical example being vi-IV-V rather than I-IV-V. According to this type of tutorial, that simple shift makes the progression "modal".I totally understand the distinction these tutorials typically make between "key" and "mode" as well as what makes a progression modal (shifting the "tonal" center away from the key's tonic or key center) but I can't help but feel that, fundamentally, "modality" implies that the ear shouldn't really hear a root progression as you would in music that is not modal but rather it should be firmly stuck on the chosen mode's tonic note as the bass note of every chord (ostensibly diatonic to the key) you weave in there and that chords should, whenever possible, have that mode's characteristic modal tone...For instance, dorian shares that minor 3rd with the other minor modes so wouldn't one want to have that major 6th very present (both harmonically and melodically) to distinguish it from Aeolian and properly establish the Dorian mode? That said, I am quite the novice and perhaps only have this feeling as I have spent countless hours learning the modes of the major scale using the mode's tonic as a drone when working out each mode melodically (intervals diatonic to the mode) or in the bass of each chord (through appropriate voicings) when working it out harmonically, with an eye towards harmonic rhythm as well as taking care to avoid cadences or sequences typical of the major scale...Do you have any thoughts on this as my approach is perhaps too unnecessarily convoluted and I there are perhaps more than one correct way to conceive of playing a modal progression?
Is there a reason to go through the modes in the order they appear in the major scale? I found going through them in the circle of fifths (Lydian, Ionian... locrian) much easier to explain because only one scale-degree changes from step to step.
I think both approaches are helpful. Going through the major scale helps you understand the relationship between them, gives you a shortcut to learning how to play them, and helps set up the general concept of modes for when you get to more advanced versions, like the modes of harmonic minor.
But when playing using chord scales over a chord progression it helps to know which mode corresponds to which chord's root via the chord's function. ii-V-I in Bb major? C Dorian, F Mixolydian, Bb Ionian. The circle of fifths doesn't really help figuring that out.
In some cases, understanding the circle of fifths helps you to understand cadences (or chord progressions). a vi-ii-V-I can be understood as moving the root counter-clockwise in the circle of fifths. (in C Major: A-D-G-C) It also teaches you how certain chords "pull" towards the tonal center. G7 pulls to C like Fm6 (or Dm7b5) does. (G and F are neighbors of C) It doesn't work with all progressions, but it teaches you alot more about the function of chromatic notes.
Don't forget about the most important approach. Comparing the modes to their parallel major and minor keys based on their third scale degree above the root.
HanBurritoz I don't think that you're using 'circle of fifths' correctly if talking about moving through modes in a single key signature. I say this because the step that brings us full circle (locrian to lydian) is a diminished fifth, not a perfect fifth.
I'm not so sure about the final point about key signatures. When writing pentatonic music, we were always instructed throughout university (undergraduate and masters) to base our key signatures on the actual tone set, hence G do pentatonic, F do pentatonic and C do pentatonic would all have no sharps or flats, D do pentatonic would have one sharp, A do pentatonic would have two and so on. I don't know if this applies to modes or not (or, for that matter, if there are different schools of thought on the issue).
Thank you for explaining modes in terms of feel! I don't like it when some teachers use every note as a starting point of each mode and stop explaining further. Then I'm just confused why they exist. It makes sense when your talking about the origion of them to explain it that way, but without context it's hard to tell why they stuck around.
I don't know if this has been commented before, but in some folk music transcriptions, such as in the Fiddler's Fake Book, modal rather than major/minor key signatures are used, with the mode indicated at the beginning. For example, if the tune is in D dorian, the key signature would be as C/Am instead of F/Dm with B-natural accidentals. I think it makes a lot more sense for that type of music, since Dorian is probably more common than Aeolian, and Mixolydian is also pretty common.
Since this is a video on modes, I think I'll ask for a video on a related concept. Can you do a video on the Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization, please. There is a huge lack of material on RU-vid concerning this topic.
I'll add that as someone who plays traditional irish music. Two sharps is prefered for E dorian, A mix etc. These are very common modes in this music (more common than minor). And using accidentals is confusing. It also confuses guitarists who might think the song is in minor and play wrong chords.
Ionian/Aeolian are obviously everywhere. Mixolydian is used in blues a fair bit...kinda. Lydian is all over jazz. Phrygian sounds very 'spanish' to a lot of people, so if you hear it it's often in spanish-inspired music, or deliberately 'sexy' music - two popular (though not spanish) phrygian examples are 'Sexyback' and 'Hot in Herre'. Dorian you can hear often in minor blues, and a lot of Santana's stuff; the first album is literally mostly dorian i-IV vamps. Locrian...I can't help you with!
I don't know why you say that writing in mixolydian is hard. A lot of Scottish music is written with it. I have written several songs in mixolydian. It's just like using the major scale, but the fifth chord is minor, and the seventh scale degree is flattened. I think the real reason someone would think it's hard is because they are thinking too complexly. I have noticed that this is a common quality of people who study music theory(myself included). Especially those who focus on jazz. I had to learn that some times we have to look at things simply instead of over complicating it. Just because we can look at something on a more complex level, doesn't always mean we should. I apologize if I am coming across as rude. Not my intention. Just trying to give some insight that has helped me
It feels to me as though the C# in B minor is a downward leading tone, still going to the tonic, just like in D major, just downwards instead of upwards. So if the penultimate note of a phrase in B minor is C#, I expect it to go to B. Of course it could go to any other note, even ones outside the key like for example D#, but it still feels like C# is the "minor leading tone" of B minor if you know what I mean.
Thanks for giving me a clearer idea what modes are and how to use them. I studied music theory by myself a few years ago, and modes were the one "basic" thing that was a mystery to me. This was really helpful!
@@Anonymous-df8it Super-locrian is not a mode of the major scale, though; it's the 7th mode of melodic minor. To encompass every mode of the major scale starting with Lydian (the brightest or most sharped), you can only lower each note once (4, 7, 3, 6, 2, 5 in that order)
@@anirudhsilai5790 Ok. Let's ignore the Major scale and it's modes. Let's start with Lydian. You lower the 4th, then the 7th, then the 3rd, then the 6th, then the 2nd and then the 5th, giving the modes of Major. But, let's do it again. Like I said, ignore the major scale and it's modes. We start with Locrian and then lower the 4th, 7th, 3rd, 6th, 2nd and 5th in that order, giving other things. Let's call the scale when everything is flattened again x1. Then we could do it again. Take x1 and then lower the fourth, seventh etc. Then take the 'everything's flattened' scale and call that x2. If we keep doing this, then what will happen?
Emphasize the notes that make the mode unique, while of course always resolving back to the root. (because if you don't you're not really in that mode) Like if you're in E Phrygian, to make it really sound "Phrygian", you could play around with the b2 and the root.
I'd like to see your argument for that but I don't argue with people I've never met in person on the internet. I have better things to do with my life.
Ahahahahaga Synster is same as Herman lee boring and fast but not top tier try listening to jeff loomis or chris broderick those guys have top notch tehnique
+Rory Dara Top notch argument. I really like synyster gates, but people are entitled not to, even if they are not as good as he is. I for instance don't really get anything out of Steve Vai's playing. Needless to say that he has a slightly better technique than me.
Wait, in locrian. You can still lower the 6th degree and then you have super-locrian or the altered scale wouldn't you. Cause the starting point really isn't lydian but ionian, right?
Not really - you would already have lowered the 4th 7th, 3rd, 6th, 2nd, and 5th in that order. Lowering any more notes after Locrian, other than the root itself, means you get scale that isn't a mode of the major scale. If you're measuring the modes of the major scale by how bright (or sharped) they are, Lydian is the highest.
What do you call it when the song is in D major, everyone plays it in D except the bass player. The bass player on a 4-string bass instead plays all the chord roots lower than the tonic. Has the bassist played in a different mode? Is it called something else? When is this appropriate?
Im guessing your talking about inversion or slash chords (eg Cmaj/F) works really well on the last chorus/verse of a song that you're looking to spice up.
Is there a definitive way to determine the comparative brightness of two modes or scales outside these? Say Dorian with Aeolian dominant (aka mixolydian b6) or Double Harmonic major (aka Byzantine). Please help!
Yes thanks! That (and his bonus video) got me started, but it only deals with the modes as they relate to Dorian and how they invert to each other. I'm trying to make sense of the other scales which invert to themselves (as Dorian does). There are ten of them and I just can't make sense of them. That's why the two example I gave are form those set of palindromic scales, you can't invert them as a clue to brightness.
Short answer: every symmetrical (or palindromic) scale has the same brightness as Dorian. Longer answer: Brightness, at least as Adam Neely defines it, is the quantity that increases by one if you add a sharp anywhere in the scale, and decreases by one if you add a flat anywhere in it. It should be relatively clear that you can get a quantity with this property by taking the number of semitones each note in the scale is away from the root and then summing that. For example, if we take the notes of F Lydian (F G A B C D E) and see how far each is from the root, we get 0 2 4 6 7 9 11. Summing those together we get 39. If we, for example, raised the sixth degree from D to D#, we would have 0 2 4 6 7 10 11, for a sum of 40, and if we lowered the B to a Bb we would have 0 2 4 5 7 9 11, for a sum of 38. This should demonstrate that adding a sharp anywhere increases the number, and adding a flat decreases it. A symmetric seven note scale has notes 0 x y z (12-z) (12-y) (12-x). This is because in order to be symmetric you have to have the same intervals going up or down the scale. C Dorian, for example, is C D Eb F G A Bb, or 0 2 3 5 7 9 10, or 0 2 3 5 (12-5) (12-3) (12-2). If we sum these numbers together, we get 36 for Dorian, and in fact 36 for any symmetrical scale, because x+y+z+(12-x)+(12-y)+(12-z)=12+12+12=36. Therefore, Mixolydian b6 has the same brightness as Dorian. (Hope that made sense)
Also, while that's one way in which to measure brightness, it's not my favorite, as it seems inelegant to have Dorian's brightness be 36, and it also doesn't give any good way to compare the brightness of scales with different numbers of notes. If you're interested in comparing the brightnesses of arbitrary scales, my suggestion would be to use this formula, which is my personal favorite: λ = -36 + 6*(sum of number of semitones each note is from the tonic)/(number of notes in the scale - 1) So for dorian, λ= -36+6*(36)/(7-1) = -36 + 36 = 0; for major, λ=2; for minor, λ=-1; for mixolydian b6, λ=0; for the six-note blues scale (e.g. C Eb F Gb G Bb == 0 3 5 6 7 10), λ=-36+6*(31)/(6-1)=1.2; for the whole-tone scale (like dorian and mix b6, a symmetric scale), λ=-36+6*(30)/(6-1)=0; for the major pentatonic scale (e.g. C D E G A == 0 2 4 7 9), λ=-36+6*(22)/(5-1)=-3. And so forth. Basically, brightness doesn't tell you all too much about a scale, but it is kinda interesting and fun and these were my musings on it and I hope I've been able to communicate them in a way that was amusing or interesting to you. Best.
Hey could do a vid on some yes songs im really interested to know if they have a specific meaning or tone set behind them and how it might change throughout the song
Alvs Notes I think it depends on how they are used. In a lot of folk music, the chords are built primarily on the first note of the mode and either the 7th or 2nd.
Wait... isn't the lydian mode supposed to have a tritone in its fourth degree in relation to its tonic (e.g. C lydian containing an F#)? I've always felt like lydian was a mode less bright than ionian... Well, live and learn.
Well, in the end it's all subjective, but from my perspective (and that of my theory teachers) the root is just so stable that having a note a tritone above it is less dissonant than having a note a half step above the 3rd.
I'd distinguish between brightness and consonance. Lydian would be brighter than Ionian because it's "sharper" but less consonant because of that tritone.
Great videos (amazing actually) but you keep using the word 'root' to refer to the tonic (the 1st scale degree, reference note, etc.), which could lead to confusing statements like 'the root triad is in root position'.
True, but it's a much more understandable term than "tonic". "Tonic" is the sort of word I'd have to define, whereas "Root" is an idea that people can relate to without me having to spell everything out. I generally try to avoid advanced vocabulary as much as possible 'cause not everyone has the formal background necessary to understand it, and "Tonic" is just a perhaps-unfortunate casualty of that. (Although I still use it in reference to chord functions. Just not scale degrees.) I don't tend to use "root" for chords, though, so that particular issue doesn't come up. I usually call the tonic triad the I chord.
I wish you would have just stuck to one key for the whole exercise. Like the C key or the D key. Cause when you talk about a C# scale I wouldn't be as familiar even with the basic notes in a C# scale, like I would be with a C scale or D scale.
Someone on the Banjo Hangouts forum posted this tune (I believe they wrote it out) asking about the key. The thread is trending right now, and I thought I might share it because the tune sounds nice (imo) and it's kind of a fun question to think about. www.banjohangout.org/myhangout/media-player/audio_player2.asp?musicid=41090&archived=
super locrian's a mode of the melodic minor scale - he's just talking about modes of the major scale here. maybe he'll shout out to those in a later building blocks video?
Very awesome video! I couldn't understand it on the first watch, had to rewind a few times, but then it clicked and so cooooooooooooooooool! Maybe in the future try to focus more on making the core concept clearer, for example in this video you could have stressed that all these scales are in the tone tone semitone tone tone tone semitone format! :) Thank you sooo much and please keep making videos! I want to support you on patreon as soon as I get a steady income!! Edit: ok they don't follow that tone spacing format from the root note, I did understand that, just didn't explain what I meant very well :)
It was already lowered. Though it would be interesting to repeat the process with Locrian instead of Lydian. Lowering the fourth, then the seventh etc.
"Writing in mixolydian is difficult". I have to disagree there. I think it's one of the most popular modes in modern music, and I'm including ionian and aeolian! Just take a look at the list of popular songs on the wikipedia page for the mixolydian mode.
