Guitar Reviews

 HARMONIC MINOR Fig. 1 What is a Harmonic Minor Scale? Looking back at modes of the major scale , a Harmomic Minor Scale can be seen as a Natural Minor (Aeolian Mode) with a major seventh note(Fig. 1) Fig. 2 Fig. 2 above shows a regular A Aeolian Mode. The Aeolian Mode is the 6th Mode in the Parent Scale, in this case the scale of C, whilst Fig. 1 shows the Harmonic Minor comprisong of the altered 7th note.  The Leading Tone of the Harmonic Minor As our ears can very easily pick up intervals in music. We can tell a half, or a whole step interval. An augmented second interval (3 half steps) would always cause trouble for composers and performers. Composers had set rules when writing melodies so no unexpected interval jumps would create an unwanted sound in the melody. The whole step movement in the Natural Minor, or Aeolian Mode, between the 7th note and the octave was something that somewhat concerned composers, so they sharpened the 7th create a 'leading tone' so it would na...

    modes (sounds scary, eh?) Not really. Music modes explained   Modes in music have been around for a long time, they are nothing new. They were formalized in the 1600’s and are used in all types of music and used by a wide variety of musical instruments. Should I learn modes? Learning modes allows you to colour any tune you are playing, or improvising, with feeling. It also allows the sound of the song to focus on a differing tonal centre. If your playing is beginning to sound boring and you feel you are stuck in a rut, this could another reason to study modes. Modes can be seen as scales within a parent scale. Many people use mode and scale to mean the same thing, however, this is not strictly true. A mode can be seen as a scale of it’s parent scale, derived from a different point in the parent scale. All modes are scales but not all scales are modes. The Blues Scale for example is not a mode. From the ...