Get started on your piano journey here: www.betterpian... Follow me! Instagram: bit.ly/2WoR7W1 Twitter: bit.ly/2I02YAt Facebook: bit.ly/2K4rHq8 TikTok: bit.ly/2X7pnlN
hey it would be really cool if u reacted to some King Gizard and the lizard wizard songs (mainly their songs catching smoke and yours) and psychedelic popcorn crumpets (mainly lava lamp pisco and dread & butter)
Interesting point! Is it modal interchange between Phrygian dominant and phrygian? Or is is it Spanish phrygian? Is it both? Which is the correct description?
@@andyk3451 I feel like it's probably interchange since it's kinda separated between the chords, instead of playing it as one scale. Either works though, I guess, it's not like you need to express an entire singular scale over a single chord. Since Spanish Phrygian is apparently an already defined scale, I guess it makes a lot of sense to lump this into that too, though the other way around, I'd say there's cases where it's clearly played as one scale and wouldn't be called interchange. (If I play a chromatic scale, that's not modal interchange between literally all modes, as an extreme example)
I always thought the spanish phrgian is just another name for the phrigian dominant, which is what he's mentioning in this vid. The minor 3rd is a bit of spice that goes well with the major flat 2 chord. As you have a spanish sounding name, i suspect that you've been practicing this scale in a cool authentic way!
In greek/arabic music this sound is known as hicaz. There is a sensitivity when using the minor vs major 3rds and 7s almost like cadences in western music.
@@dreamcatcherismylifesuppor2348 im not super familiar with balkan music theory terminology but i would assume so, as these are all areas that were affected by Ottoman influence
@@SammysCruisers except I'd say it's not a different scale, but more like a "makam" which are kinda like scales of Arabic/Turkish/Greek music. Hicaz is also a makam
Never heard this song before, but the harmony is kind of interesting and reminded me a lot like and Arabic/Hispanic sound (The feeling reminds me of “Toreros”, “Flamenco” and the musical “Carmen”)
I felt the Arabic side too. I didn’t associate this with Spanish, but I only really think of flamenco when I think Spanish and I’m not familiar enough with that. I get that Carmen was a Spanish setting, but I assumed Bizet was French based on his name. I guess he knew how to evoke a Spanish vibe.
it's because the first two chords of the phrygian mode *i* and *IIb* are only a half-step apart, which sorta mirrors the Db_maj and D_maj in the video also being a half-step apart. the spanish-ness is your brain recognizing the phrygian-ness.
I think a good reason that it can sound Arabic and Hispanic is because of the Arabic rule over Spain up until a few hundred years ago. They probably influenced each other, but Arabic to Hispanic more.
Yes. Musicality is what makes you "want" to sing along. It isn't about being able to sing it, or it even being singable, or easy, or in a small range, or whatever, by most people. It can be insanely hard for the average person ( re: Hallelujah chorus ). I realized this when, on a single watch of Frozen, every 4 year old girl was trying to sing Let It Go even though it's basically impossible for them. But they want to, because it's catchy even though it's actually hard to do.
Yes thank you, I don't get why everyone says that melodies have to be singable to be catchy. If it weren't already catchy, you wouldn't be singing along in the first place, meaning that singability just can't be the origin of catchiness.
Amazing analysis. I’m not someone who believes that repetition = catchy. It’s a popular, reductive simplification to me (although repetition has some part in it). I think you’re right about the importance of a melody’s rhythm. The rhythmic units for this song are not simply repetitious-they’re intelligent, conversational modifications of expected rhythmic repetitions. It’s both predictability and interesting deviation from the predictable that explains, in part, why something feels catchy. Also, although the harmonic context is D and Db alternating I think a lot of the interest is in the way the melody differs from what we might expect to get in a major (or minor), diatonic context. Some of the lines surprise me in the way they return to major or imply a ‘minor’ scalar move. It keeps handing us back chromatically altered versions of what we expect that are (interestingly and intelligently,) “almost what we expected”.
@@rpavlik1 Adam’s cool. No doubt. “Repetition legitimizes” though is a statement with some truth and a pretty heavy dose of cynicism. I’m what you could call, like, a ‘moderate cynic’. Moderate. Sure! Something you listen to 18 times is more memorable after repetitious hearing than something you listened to once or twice. Makes sense to me… but that’s not the same as imagining melodic content to be like some kind of chump with a cornerstone-coffee-card hoping (via repetitions) to collect enough stamps to finally be awarded a free coffee: Legitimate at last! Some ideas just have a lot of, “innate legitimacy”, let’s say. They’re like _really good_ before they ever get a retweet. That happens. And this pseudo-neurological stuff of “the brain” ‘likes’ repetition, etc… the brain! The brain! I’m digressing. Look, I can remember (ish) hearing the Beatles song Yesterday for the first time. You get harmonically situated while Paul’s delivering that first reticent, wistful, reminiscent, brief word: Yesterday. Then he goes charging up (Bach-like) a totally different scale. Paul doesn’t have to wait in line to get his coffee card punched. It’s brilliant. All I’m saying is, there’s a felt, knowable, subjective difference between what’s “catchy” and something (like a phone number you repeat out loud not to lose) that’s just become “memorable” via repetition. Like I say, I’m moderate. I know there’s overlap between those categories but a musical person, even if they can’t explain it, knows what catchy is by experience and it’s not a shitty melody on frequent repeat that ‘the brain’ rubber stamps as good.
Heard this song on RU-vid first and instantly I liked it. It wasn't because it was played over and over. It's haunting and beautiful. I didn't know the lyrics but its musically gorgeous.
I think the repetition explanation can also be informed by studies that show that earworms come when a song is only partially remembered-not being able to finish it is key to getting it stuck in your head. So if the song can have an extremely memorable melody that gets reused in so many places that you DON'T have a single lyrical phrase to learn backwards and forwards, it's more likely to stick around
For some reason, your comment makes me think of hip hop samples eg Warren G and Nate Dogg sampling Michael McDonald’s ‘I Keep Forgettin’ (which happens to be the only the bit I like in the original) or Hilltop Hoods Nosebleed Section using ‘The People in the Front Row’. Hip hop artists in the 90s really knew their stuff - great jazz samples all over the place
What got me hooked to this song above all other tik tok overused tracks is the harmony in the choir. I don't have the music harmony chops to analyse it but there's something incredibly haunting and evocative.
I'm pretty sure the melodic line was lifted from a Middle-eastern folk song. I knew I heard it before this song came out, and has probably already been used in Arabian Pop or in film scores.
I was going to say this, this is also a reason I really love System of a Down, and a lot of other rock/metal bands "subtly" or very directly steal from Middle Eastern music. Just sooo incredibly beautiful and catchy. This song is definitely beautiful because of the arabic feel to it.
it's a super common chord progression, especially in kpop. it's a 1major 2 major phrygian/hispano-arabic scale. mayday (april), fire (exid), gratata (lapillus), and i could keep going. it's so overdone it hurts.
I have noticed, after listening to this song for a million times, that quite cleverly the melody right before the chorus has an interesting rhythm. It contrasts a 4:4 polyrhythm in one line with a 4:3 (in the “keep-your-bus-iness-clean” part). I don’t think it’s mind-blowing or revolutionary but I haven’t picked on it before (probably because there’s no other song I’ve heard so much lol)
I had to pause this video and come back to it, and lo and behold, despite having never heard this song before, I am finding myself whistling the tune. The pop gods are truly powerful.
I think it would be really interesting for you to breakdown the music theory behind electronic music. Specifically, one of my favorites (Aleksandir) has beautiful chord progressions and very interesting rhythms. He is classical trained on piano, and in my opinion you can totally hear that in his compositions. His songs "Lowdown" and "between summers" have some really pretty melodies and chords. Would love to see you breakdown music from this genre!
I was just looking at my music library and thought of something great that I think would be nice to break down. The version of Over the Rainbow that Pentatonix sang (from the album PTX, Vol. IV_ Classics) has some really great advanced cords the hole way through that really make it sound great.
There is a name for this scale, it’s called the Klezmer scale, with the 2nd note getting the flat treatment. E.g. Db, Ebb, F, Gb, Ab. Very common use for middle eastern music, since the instrument are focused towards the scale.
Charles talked about that scale throughout the video, it doesn't fit the melody because it has an Fb or E natural. It's not a single scale, but an example of modal interchange between phrygian and phrygian dominant.
D Flat Phrygian Dominant sounds very close to mayamalavagowla ragam in South Indian Carnatic music except for the flat Ni/B note. This is the basic ragam/scale that everyone starts learning, and that’s why it sounds exotic!
Can you pretty pretty PLEASE do a reaction commentary to Dirty Loops? The tracks "Hit Me" and "Follow the Light" would be a good start. Some of the most insane musicianship I've ever seen.
I don't know why but when you break it down it starts to give me Prince of Egypt vibes. I'm assuming it's because it kinda sounds like the cord used it many "I'm stuck in the hot dessert" songs
Didn’t know this song. Just immediately thought the sound clip was catchy, looked at the lyrics and good grief no thanks 😳 BUT, YOU know your way around a piano. Incredible! I could just listen to you play these chords all day! You know your stuff.
Please listen to the Master of Masters Theme from Kingdom Hearts. The theme of the track and the character together just screams "planned insanity" and I would love to see your take on the piece.
My recent marching competitions we had a peice called con slancio which is Latin sounding and it throws the keys around and makes use of something similar to the frigiant dominant.
I think they were thinking in Phrygian Dominant but when they came up with that last part, they needed a better passing tone than F on Dmaj hahaha. As a producer, that makes more sense to me, but idk.
I’m doing that annoying thing where I comment a few seconds into the video. But that’s just so I could share this organic realization without help from the instructor: this sounds just like Bacchanalia (sp?) from Samson & Delilah (always played it for the pops concert) it’s so catchy it’ll put you in a feverish dance trance. Perfection!
Its cool how it goes down in that bluesy tritone scale where its like harmonic minor then it uses the E note like the normal minor. It also happens on the unholy word which steps down down down in that kindof wrong brooding way. I dont like the song either but yea i like music so. And its not really a tritone i guess but it gives that effect. Which is why it has an Egyptian kindof sound but then has a bluesy kindof sound. I play this scale all the time. Pianists cant bend like a guitarist so they do a walk down a lot and make it wonky in the middle. Most people would say youre playing music WRONG. But its actually more beautiful and broken with resolve sometimes......like life.
I think I hear it more as a repeating V-VI in a minor key with the 7th scale degree being raised until the end of the chorus when it walks down do-te-le-le-sol.
I think it is catchy because it is good and tries to sit in the same memory bank in my brain as the Top Gun Anthem song with that similar melodic part that confuses my memory and makes me sing the wrong song but makes me remember it faster with the added old memory "of a similar song" that can help it stick to memory better. Old memories with similar melodies can probably trade short term memory with similar melodiy, creating a more catchy song. I'm saying depending on what memories you have you experience different songs to be catchy too you than to other people.
To me b does this the best. Im obsessed with b minor scales. I hate that i love them so much. The way the fingers lay on the keys just work you can just switch scales so easily and add so much personality. G is really good too. And A is very easy for anyone wanting to learn harmonic minor and cool weird stuff. But a gets boring bc its easy. B always challenges me in the perfect way. And its very easy to switch from b to b flat harmonic minor and you can switch to g if you do some weird aeolian? Stuff like the space sound. And then you can switch to d harmonic minor from b really easy bc of d and d flat and b flat are all in the b harmonic minor scale. And in guitar b a and g are all fun to switch around to. In harmonic minor. And dont be scared to add the bluesy tritone note during all this and all of a sudden you have SO MANY notes you can play. Its like a bop it. If you know how to play well nothing is really off limits. Its just how you play it. Also this scale can be switched to easy during b minor bc f sharp sounds so good in the b minor scale. Long story short b and f sharp are just magic and created perfect by god lol. When youre playing a b minor scale you can play f and fsharp for a really GRATING obscenely obvious blues sound just punching you in the face and if you walk down to d flat bam guess what you just played the f sharp and d flat scale this video was about and you went there in a very sassy powerful way your brain will be like wait wtf is going on is this b harmonic minor b major or f sharp harmonic minor or f sharp minor or d flat minor then BAM switch again to d harmonic minor jump down to b flat go down to a then BAM now youre in b flat harmonic minor go up to C!!! Then d flat then D SHARP THEN F THEN F SHARP THEN A FLAT BAM SWITCHED AGAIN BY NOT DOING A THEN PLAY B FLAT AAAAAGAIN BUT NOW ITS NOT IM THE KEY OF B FLAT NOW GO EFFING CRAZY AND PLAY D SHARP THEN PLAY D THEN PLAY C AGAIN BUT NOW YOURE IN C THEN POLAR OPPOSITE OF THE VIDEOS ORIGINAL SCALE BUT WAIT THERES MORE PLAY F G G SHARP AND NOOOT B FLAT PLAY B (C FLAT) BAM NOW YOURE IN C HARMONIC MINOR THEN PLAY F SHARP TO THROW A WRENCH IN THE WHOLE THING AND CRAWWWWWL DOWN FROM F SHARP TO F TO E TO D TO D FLAT AND BACKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK TOOOOOOOOO BBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBB. GOD. What a ride 🤤 youre welcome i just gave you all my secrets
Isn't this song actually in f# minor, but it just never uses the tonic chord, but rather the C# major dominant and D major is just the VI chord? So it's like constantly not fully resolved harmonic space that keeps you interested? And the melody just switches between natural and harmonic f# minor? So that's why we have E and E# next to each other? Btw, if you wanted to hear some similar harmonic idea in a pop song, check out Katy Perry - Bon Appetit, however there are also some chord extensions which make the song ever more weird and interesting 😄
This is amazing, I’ve heard this song too many times on TikTok but always wanna understand why I like the song and now I know, it would be awesome if you reviewed Celeste’s song Stop This Flame. Love your videos ❤️
I think it can be easily explained using 5th and 6th chords of Fsharp minor with both harmonic and melodic minor elements depending on the trajectory of the melody.
I spent all of last year studying pop music another thing that makes songs catchy and once you pick up on it you’ll hear it every where, the rhythm almost is 2 or 3 of the same and then a 3rd or 4th repetition is slightly different
Where did you get the little mouse and keyboard table you have behind your piano? I need one. My mouse, computer keyboard, synth and seaboard all sit on the back of my keyboard over the controls and speakers
8:18 My Ears are Pleased to Hear the Three Words I was Waiting for him to Say: Phrygian Dominant Scale. But As He Later Points out, There is a Note that is in the Song that is Not in Phrygian Dominant, But It Mostly is Though.
First I want to tell you you're one of my favorite youtubers :) I don't really do the modal approach, I understand and it makes sense but for me it's just a triton sub. Heh :) Keep up the great content my friend !
Very interesting to see my sense of some of these parts sounding Middle Eastern or Arab reflected in the comment. I’d be interested in a video on that, and a video on the music from The Prince of Egypt from Dreamworks.
There is an old 1970s cartoon that I love the theme song to it's entitled "Star Blazers" yes it's on RU-vid. Could you go over that song. You could even talk about the theme songs of the 70s shows. Oh. One song that replays in my head is the Banana Splits song. A 1970s live action cartoon. My favorite song is the "Star Cops" it's a scifi BBC production of the 1990s. I don't know why it's not more popular.
As far as I know you’re Periphery fan and friend. Could you please make an analysis of intro from Omega. There’s a piano intro that transforms into guitar riff.
