Minor Scales
Lesson 18 from: Music Theory for Electronic ProducersTomas George
Minor Scales
Lesson 18 from: Music Theory for Electronic ProducersTomas George
Lesson Info
18. Minor Scales
Lessons
Introduction
00:58 2Basic Music Theory Terms
08:07 3Keyboard Layout and Octaves
06:19 4Working out Major Scales
08:58 5Perfect 5ths
06:42 63rds - Part 1
08:05 73rds - Part 2
07:39 8Perfect 4ths
04:36Chords and Inversions - Part 1
10:05 10Chords and Inversions - Part 2
09:13 11Chord Progressions - Part 1
10:22 12Chord Progressions - Part 2
08:26 13Inversions
08:53 147th Chords
09:48 15Chord Extensions
08:09 16Suspended Chords
02:40 17The Circle of 5ths
04:30 18Minor Scales
08:09 19Chords in the Natural Minor scale
09:56 20Harmonic and Melodic Minor
09:30 21Write the Chords, then the Melody
09:03 22Write the Melody, then the Chords
18:01 23Arpeggios
08:00 24Writing Bass Parts
11:35 25Writing Bass Riffs and Adapting Melodies
14:10 26Song Analysis - Chords, Part 1
10:17 27Song Analysis - Chords, Part 2
05:58 28Song Analysis - Melody
08:55 29Song Analysis - Arrangement
07:30 30Song 2 Analysis - Arrangement
05:04 31Song 2 Analysis - Chords
08:55 32Song 2 Analysis - Melodies
06:34 33Song 3 Analysis - Chords
11:41 34Song 3 Analysis - Melodies and Arrangement
06:55 35Create a Song from a Drum Beat - Part 1
10:22 36Create a Song from a Drum Beat - Part 2
18:47 37Create a Song from a Drum Beat - Part 3
18:49 38Create a Song from a Drum Beat - Part 4
08:21 39Create a Song from a Chord Progression - Part 1
08:16 40Create a Song from a Chord Progression - Part 2
08:07 41Create a Song from a Melody - Part 1
07:27 42Create a Song from a Melody - Part 2
09:05 43Modes Intro
04:10 44Ionian
00:43 45Dorian
04:31 46Phrygian
02:09 47Lydian
01:35 48Mixolydian
02:13 49Aeolian
00:39 50Locrian
01:50 51Dorian Mode Example
09:12 52Pentatonic Scales
12:27Lesson Info
Minor Scales
Hello. In this lecture, we're going to be looking at minor scales. So previously, we had a look at major scales, how to work out a major scale. We have tone tone semitone, tone, tone, tone semitone. We also had a look at some major core progressions and how to work out which chords you can use in a major scale. Now, we're going to be looking at minor scales, minor scales can give a different sound to a major scale. If you're writing a lot of dance music and electronic music, you really want to know how to write minor scales as well as major scales just because you've got a minor chord. This doesn't mean it's a minor scale. You can get minor chords in a major scale also. So going back to major, it was tone tone semitone, tone, tone, tone semitone to work out a major scale. I'm sure you're sick of this now, but you really need to internalize this just so you can get the basics of working out a major scale and then let's have a look at C major. And from this, we know the notes in C major ...
and the different types of chords. So we know it's, if we're sticking to the scale, we can explore new scales. We don't have to stick to the scale. But if you're new to music theory, it's a good idea to know the basics and to just stay in key and just use the notes and the chords to start with. And then when you get a bit, but when you get a bit more comfortable and you kind of want to explore new ideas, then we're going to be having a look at changing key modulation. So moving keys and creating some new experimental ideas, but for now, let's just stay in key. So we have C major. This triangle means major. This dash here means minor. This circle means diminished. So C major, D minor, E minor, F major, G major, A minor B diminished and C major. So that's basically a major scale, you can shift this up. So to D major E major F major D flat major loads of different scales and this is the major pattern. So now let's have a look at the minor pattern. Easy thing to do. We can actually change a major scale into a minor scale by flattening the third, the six and the seven. So this basically means we take the note here and just put it down one semitone. So if we have C major, the notes will be CD efgab and C. So if you flatten the third, it will be E flat or D sharp, but generally in this scale, it's an E flat. So we have an E flat, an A flat and a B flat. Let's just hop into Ableton Live now and I'll write out a major scale and I'll show you a really quick way of turning this major scale into a minor scale. And that is by flattening the 3rd 6th and the seventh, this will create a natural minor scale. There's other types of minor scales going to look into later on. But the natural minor is kind of the the standard minor scale. So if you recall, it's to tone semitone, tone tone tone semitone. So this is C major and to turn this into C minor, let's just write it here next to it. So same kind of thing, you have to flatten the third. So here's the third. So just one step below, make this note, then let's continue and it, it was the sixth as well. So just flatten this here. So it's this note and flatten the seventh. So it's this note. So you can see quickly we have the first notes, the second notes, the flattened third note, the fourth note's the same fifth note's the same. Then we have the flattened six and the flattened seven and the same with the octave. So this will play a major scale first of all, and then a minor scale after it's a big cluster at the moment so you can't really tell, but let's just move this along. So this is ac major scale. Then we're going to put in the C minor scale straight after hopefully be able to hear the difference. The major scale generally is happy. A bit of an over simplification and the minor scale is sad. OK, let's slow the tempo right down and I'll play the major scale and then the minus girl straight after listen for the third, the sixth and the seventh note, you can hear it slightly different. May I just spell name minor? Should the here? They're slightly different just by flat in the third, the 6th and 7th, but they create a completely different sound. If you want to create generally darker music, you might want to use a minor scale. But like I said, in a major scale, you still get minor chords. So for example, D minor E minor and a minor in C major. So this is kind of the, the quick shortcut way of writing a minor scale to write a major scale flatten the third flat in the sixth and flat on the seventh or we can use a pattern tone semitone tone tone, semitone tone tone, you might want to write this down or remember this. So it's tone semitone tone tone semitone tone tone. So we can use this for working at a minor scale as well. So it's town semitone tone tone semitone tone tone. So this is very similar to working at a major scale. We just use a different pattern. So it's tone semitone tone tone semitone tone tone, we can use it here. So tone Samit town tone town semitone tone tone. So in the C minor scale, it will be CD E flat FG A flat B flat C. So this is the basic pattern of working it out. This pattern actually repeats round. So if we have a look at the major pattern, tone tone semitone, tone tone tone semitone, and the minor pattern tone semitone, tone tone semitone tone tone, you'll see it's just the same, but it's shifted over. So the minor scale as the major scale starting here, so it's just the same pattern that's shifted round. We'll have a look at this in more detail. When we look at core progressions, it's just a series of patterns that shifted in a different position. This is basically how you can work out a minor scale. So just try and remember this tone semi tone tone tone, semi tone tone tone. And this is how you can work out a minor scale. If you know how to work out a major scale, it's the same thing really just the same pattern in a different order. Or if you want the cheeky easy way, just flatten the third flatten the sixth flatten the seventh. And that will allow you to write or convert a major scale into a minor scale. This won't give you the relative minor, we'll look at relative minor later on. So each major scale will have a relative minor, so kind of the minor equivalent. But for now, just remember this pattern tone semitone tone tone semi toone tone tone to work at a minor scale, or you can flatten the third flat and the sixth flat and the seventh to turn the major scale into a minor scale. So thank you for watching this lecture. I hope you found it useful and just try and remember these key takeaways, like I said, minor scale pattern tone, semitone, tone, tone, semitone tone tone. I'll see you in the next lecture where we're going to be looking at minor chord regressions and how to work out the different chords you can get in a minor scale.
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