Phrygian? I don't even know Ian!
September 6, 2023 6:31 AM Subscribe
Sure, you probably know there are major and minor scales. But unless you're really into music theory you might not realize those scales come in a whole variety of flavors called "modes"...
Modes are why some songs sound naturally spooky, or other naturally stressful. To help understand how it all works, 8-Bit Music Theory has spent the last several months looking at each of the major-scale modes to see what they are, how they're structured, and what they sound like using some of your favorite game music as examples:
* Ionian
* Aeolian
* Dorian
* Phrygian
* Mixolydian
* Lydian
* Locrian
Modes are why some songs sound naturally spooky, or other naturally stressful. To help understand how it all works, 8-Bit Music Theory has spent the last several months looking at each of the major-scale modes to see what they are, how they're structured, and what they sound like using some of your favorite game music as examples:
* Ionian
* Aeolian
* Dorian
* Phrygian
* Mixolydian
* Lydian
* Locrian
@pracowity, that's easy - just set the autotune to C major and sing in the key of F! Boom, Lydian autotune.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:08 AM on September 6, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:08 AM on September 6, 2023 [5 favorites]
We don't talk about the vii°
posted by MtDewd at 7:12 AM on September 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by MtDewd at 7:12 AM on September 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
What a fun video. I currently have a student (undergrad) who is obsessed with Locrian mode and keeps asking me to find repertoire in Locrian for the ensemble he's in to play (I expect he's going to just write something, which is the more fun and useful way for him to explore his fascination).
Church modes used to be one of the things in music theory and history that made students fall right to sleep, but their extensive use in video game music has reversed that--students come into first-year theory asking about modes now, which is unexpected.
posted by LooseFilter at 7:13 AM on September 6, 2023 [6 favorites]
Church modes used to be one of the things in music theory and history that made students fall right to sleep, but their extensive use in video game music has reversed that--students come into first-year theory asking about modes now, which is unexpected.
posted by LooseFilter at 7:13 AM on September 6, 2023 [6 favorites]
These are really cool! I started exploring the different modes after finishing Jo Walton's Thessaly series a few months back. I had heard of them, but never really got it. Now, it's really changed the way I write and play music.
posted by Cat Pie Hurts at 7:24 AM on September 6, 2023
posted by Cat Pie Hurts at 7:24 AM on September 6, 2023
Nice post! 8-Bit Music Theory is a great channel for this stuff.
You can also look at modes harmonically, where each scale corresponds to a chord.
For example if you play a triad on a piano, starting with C-E-G, and keep moving up by one (white) key, you'll get:
C major (I), D minor (ii), E minor (iii), F major (IV), G major (V), A minor (vi), B diminished (vii°).
So I like to think of the the modes as the scale version of this concept, where Phrygian is essentially just the scale tones for the iii chord. Locrian is like a diminished chord in scale form.
posted by swift at 7:25 AM on September 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
You can also look at modes harmonically, where each scale corresponds to a chord.
For example if you play a triad on a piano, starting with C-E-G, and keep moving up by one (white) key, you'll get:
C major (I), D minor (ii), E minor (iii), F major (IV), G major (V), A minor (vi), B diminished (vii°).
So I like to think of the the modes as the scale version of this concept, where Phrygian is essentially just the scale tones for the iii chord. Locrian is like a diminished chord in scale form.
posted by swift at 7:25 AM on September 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
IMO the easiest way to understand modes is to just start with the C major scale, which is all of the white keys on the piano. So the scale is c-d-e-f-g-a-b-c. That is also known as the Ionian mode. For each subsequent mode, just start the scale one note up. So:
- D dorian is d-e-f-g-a-b-c-d (1 note up)
- E phrygian is e-f-g-a-b-c-d-e (2 notes up)
- F lydian is f-g-a-b-c-d-e-f (3 notes up)
- G mixolydian is g-a-b-c-d-e-f-g (4 notes up)
- A aeolian (aka minor) is a-b-c-d-e-f-g-a (5 notes up)
- B locrian is b-c-d-e-f-g-a-b (6 notes up)
That way you can explore modes without having to learn about key signatures. And then when you are ready and understand key signatures, you'll know that, for instance, A phrygian has the same key signature as F major, because it is 2 notes up from F.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:38 AM on September 6, 2023 [21 favorites]
- D dorian is d-e-f-g-a-b-c-d (1 note up)
- E phrygian is e-f-g-a-b-c-d-e (2 notes up)
- F lydian is f-g-a-b-c-d-e-f (3 notes up)
- G mixolydian is g-a-b-c-d-e-f-g (4 notes up)
- A aeolian (aka minor) is a-b-c-d-e-f-g-a (5 notes up)
- B locrian is b-c-d-e-f-g-a-b (6 notes up)
That way you can explore modes without having to learn about key signatures. And then when you are ready and understand key signatures, you'll know that, for instance, A phrygian has the same key signature as F major, because it is 2 notes up from F.
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:38 AM on September 6, 2023 [21 favorites]
Last year physicist John Baez published a fun blog post about modes and some of their interesting patterns. I found it helpful in learning other ways of thinking about how they interrelate. Includes lots of fun YouTube links to examples.
posted by indexy at 7:55 AM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by indexy at 7:55 AM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
So I like to think of the the modes as the scale version of this concept, where Phrygian is essentially just the scale tones for the iii chord. Locrian is like a diminished chord in scale form.
That's a very jazz improv style of thinking about the relationship between chords and modes. It's especially useful when you're trying to understand the relationship between a relatively short harmonic structure (12, 16, 32 bar forms especially) of a piece and the way it relates to note choice over many repetitions of the form. It's also easily expanded to encompass other kinds of scales and modes built over them. Which is where so many jazz chord substitutions come from.
I think it's sort of important when you're having these discussions to keep in mind WHAT you're using the theory for. I've been doing a lot of composing the last couple of years, some for school, but now with an eye for getting published and performed. So a lot of my thinking is larger formal analysis, and building a coherent narrative structure to the harmonic at different lengths, and where the chords aren't necessarily repeating themselves. I also love using altered modes for my harmonic structures, but since I'm taking a pretty traditional western art music approach to the forms, I can't just use the approach above, of 1 chord = 1 scale. So I'm forced (and get to, every constraint is an opportunity to find a clever way around it) to think a lot more with where the notes of a chord feel like they're pulling in the context of the scale. Like how do you get a v - i of a Phrygian harmony, one where you've raised the 6 because that way there's an augmented chord to play with, to have the same feeling of arrival as a V7-I does in a major key? And then zooming out even further, what does modulating to another tonal center look like, and how can you do that in a way that makes sense in the larger scaffolding of the form. How do you make the cadences feel like cadences? It's a whole different kind of puzzle.
And that style of composition is pretty different way of thinking about a mode than the riff based writing that video game music tends to lend itself to, which is closer to the jazz improve style than it is to my larger scale form based thinking. Even though we're all essentially saying "I'm using these 7 (ish) notes to build the music out of". Neither one is better or worse, they are just for music that's serving different purposes. Additionally, I'm not sitting down thinking "O.k. I need to make this exciting/sad/peaceful, because that's what's going on in the game" which again, all creative constraints are opportunities.
So yeah, I think this kind of discussion always needs some explanation about "what I'm using these tools to do", and I appreciate how even though I've never watched any of them before, that context is automatically built into the 8-bit theory's videos without having to be made explicate every time. I was half expecting to sit there during the locrian video being all "Ahah! It's not doable, in practice, to write an entire piece in Locrian" but, yeah, that's not what he's talking about doing. That'll teach me not to have an open mind going in.
posted by Gygesringtone at 8:41 AM on September 6, 2023 [10 favorites]
That's a very jazz improv style of thinking about the relationship between chords and modes. It's especially useful when you're trying to understand the relationship between a relatively short harmonic structure (12, 16, 32 bar forms especially) of a piece and the way it relates to note choice over many repetitions of the form. It's also easily expanded to encompass other kinds of scales and modes built over them. Which is where so many jazz chord substitutions come from.
I think it's sort of important when you're having these discussions to keep in mind WHAT you're using the theory for. I've been doing a lot of composing the last couple of years, some for school, but now with an eye for getting published and performed. So a lot of my thinking is larger formal analysis, and building a coherent narrative structure to the harmonic at different lengths, and where the chords aren't necessarily repeating themselves. I also love using altered modes for my harmonic structures, but since I'm taking a pretty traditional western art music approach to the forms, I can't just use the approach above, of 1 chord = 1 scale. So I'm forced (and get to, every constraint is an opportunity to find a clever way around it) to think a lot more with where the notes of a chord feel like they're pulling in the context of the scale. Like how do you get a v - i of a Phrygian harmony, one where you've raised the 6 because that way there's an augmented chord to play with, to have the same feeling of arrival as a V7-I does in a major key? And then zooming out even further, what does modulating to another tonal center look like, and how can you do that in a way that makes sense in the larger scaffolding of the form. How do you make the cadences feel like cadences? It's a whole different kind of puzzle.
And that style of composition is pretty different way of thinking about a mode than the riff based writing that video game music tends to lend itself to, which is closer to the jazz improve style than it is to my larger scale form based thinking. Even though we're all essentially saying "I'm using these 7 (ish) notes to build the music out of". Neither one is better or worse, they are just for music that's serving different purposes. Additionally, I'm not sitting down thinking "O.k. I need to make this exciting/sad/peaceful, because that's what's going on in the game" which again, all creative constraints are opportunities.
So yeah, I think this kind of discussion always needs some explanation about "what I'm using these tools to do", and I appreciate how even though I've never watched any of them before, that context is automatically built into the 8-bit theory's videos without having to be made explicate every time. I was half expecting to sit there during the locrian video being all "Ahah! It's not doable, in practice, to write an entire piece in Locrian" but, yeah, that's not what he's talking about doing. That'll teach me not to have an open mind going in.
posted by Gygesringtone at 8:41 AM on September 6, 2023 [10 favorites]
And to help memorize the names: “I Don’t Particularly Like Modes A Lot"
posted by gottabefunky at 10:38 AM on September 6, 2023 [17 favorites]
posted by gottabefunky at 10:38 AM on September 6, 2023 [17 favorites]
See also: Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts "What Is a Mode"
posted by Omon Ra at 11:08 AM on September 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by Omon Ra at 11:08 AM on September 6, 2023 [3 favorites]
The thing that I (a casual student of guitar and bass) find frustrating about modes is identifying the tonal center. My teacher will listen to a piece of music and say, "Oh, yeah, the guitarist is soloing in mixolydian", and I'm like, "But it's just the notes in C major again, how can you tell?". And then when I say, "Hey, I found this song and the lowest note they keep returning to is <note>, so that means it's in <key+mode>, right?" And he'll reply, "Well, that would be true, but the implied tonal center is actually two notes down, so it's really <other key+mode>."
Every time I peel back a layer of, let's be honest, centuries-old and completely opaque musical terminology, I want to find the underlying math, but I keep finding, "...and you just have to sort of feel it, you know?"
Also?
posted by The Tensor at 11:12 AM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
Every time I peel back a layer of, let's be honest, centuries-old and completely opaque musical terminology, I want to find the underlying math, but I keep finding, "...and you just have to sort of feel it, you know?"
Also?
* IonianThose are OUT OF ORDER. Why would you DO that?
* Aeolian
* Dorian
* Phrygian
* Mixolydian
* Lydian
* Locrian
posted by The Tensor at 11:12 AM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
My guitar teacher has attempted to get me to recognize modes on and off over the past decade, and it's just never stuck. The best I can do is have my own little mnemonic of what the modes "sound like" to me:
Ionian = Major
Aeolian = Minor
Dorian = "Greensleeves"
Phrygian = Middle Eastern
Lydian = "The Simpsons"
Mixolydian = Bluesy
Locrian = Weird
Perhaps unsurprisingly, this hasn't changed my guitar playing much.
posted by Daily Alice at 11:23 AM on September 6, 2023 [6 favorites]
Ionian = Major
Aeolian = Minor
Dorian = "Greensleeves"
Phrygian = Middle Eastern
Lydian = "The Simpsons"
Mixolydian = Bluesy
Locrian = Weird
Perhaps unsurprisingly, this hasn't changed my guitar playing much.
posted by Daily Alice at 11:23 AM on September 6, 2023 [6 favorites]
Every time I peel back a layer of, let's be honest, centuries-old and completely opaque musical terminology, I want to find the underlying math, but I keep finding, "...and you just have to sort of feel it, you know?"
I know that since music theory uses numbers to describe a lot of the relationships between notes, it feels like there should be a deeper math, but there really isn't. I mean, yes there's the ratios between the frequency of certain intervals, but outside of tuning instruments we don't really use those. All the numbers and terms and symbols are just ways to communicate what it is we're hearing when we listen to a piece of music, be it something someone else is playing, or something in our head. So yeah, if you haven't internalized what Mixolydian sounds like, it's gonna be pretty useless to know the names of the notes in an G mixolydian scale. You may as well be memorizing a bus schedule for a city you've never seen.
posted by Gygesringtone at 11:32 AM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
I know that since music theory uses numbers to describe a lot of the relationships between notes, it feels like there should be a deeper math, but there really isn't. I mean, yes there's the ratios between the frequency of certain intervals, but outside of tuning instruments we don't really use those. All the numbers and terms and symbols are just ways to communicate what it is we're hearing when we listen to a piece of music, be it something someone else is playing, or something in our head. So yeah, if you haven't internalized what Mixolydian sounds like, it's gonna be pretty useless to know the names of the notes in an G mixolydian scale. You may as well be memorizing a bus schedule for a city you've never seen.
posted by Gygesringtone at 11:32 AM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
And here we are only talking about modes of the major scale. There are many others depending on the so-called parent scale. For instance, the modes of Harmonic Minor are, Harmonic Minor.
Locrian #6.
Ionian #5.
Dorian #4.
Phrygian Dominant.
Lydian #2.
Superlocrian.
posted by abakua at 11:49 AM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
Locrian #6.
Ionian #5.
Dorian #4.
Phrygian Dominant.
Lydian #2.
Superlocrian.
posted by abakua at 11:49 AM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
My teacher will listen to a piece of music and say, "Oh, yeah, the guitarist is soloing in mixolydian", and I'm like, "But it's just the notes in C major again, how can you tell?".
It's all descriptive anyway, so ultimately the "right" answer is the one that lets the musician grasp and work within a musical context in the ways that they want/need to. (I tell my students all the time, "the truth is always in the sounding music.") So if a piece is nominally in C major, but a related mode sounds interesting and fits within that context, a player may solo "in" mixolydian, but it's very often not clear exactly how the mixing is occurring (is the key the primary mode, or the mode that's primarily in use in any given passage considered tonic, or...?), and thus what we're really talking about is better described as mode mixture, and can often be analyzed "correctly" multiple ways.
Important to keep in mind that the concept of "key" grew from--and is more specific than--modes; tonal harmony and modal harmony, while greatly overlapping, are definitely also distinct practices. One of Coltrane's great compositional insights as a jazz musician was to conceive of a way to bridge those two worlds, using the older modal conceptions of pitch sets to guide improvisation within a tonal context.
Also, thinking about spelling pitch sets--scales or modes--as interval patterns is much easier for me than naming all the notes, or thinking about how one named pitch set relates to another one. So a major scale is just whole steps and half steps arranged as WWHWWWH (i.e., C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C, but start on any note and build the pattern and you have that scale/mode). I think about interval patterns way more than notes and note names.
posted by LooseFilter at 11:56 AM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
It's all descriptive anyway, so ultimately the "right" answer is the one that lets the musician grasp and work within a musical context in the ways that they want/need to. (I tell my students all the time, "the truth is always in the sounding music.") So if a piece is nominally in C major, but a related mode sounds interesting and fits within that context, a player may solo "in" mixolydian, but it's very often not clear exactly how the mixing is occurring (is the key the primary mode, or the mode that's primarily in use in any given passage considered tonic, or...?), and thus what we're really talking about is better described as mode mixture, and can often be analyzed "correctly" multiple ways.
Important to keep in mind that the concept of "key" grew from--and is more specific than--modes; tonal harmony and modal harmony, while greatly overlapping, are definitely also distinct practices. One of Coltrane's great compositional insights as a jazz musician was to conceive of a way to bridge those two worlds, using the older modal conceptions of pitch sets to guide improvisation within a tonal context.
Also, thinking about spelling pitch sets--scales or modes--as interval patterns is much easier for me than naming all the notes, or thinking about how one named pitch set relates to another one. So a major scale is just whole steps and half steps arranged as WWHWWWH (i.e., C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C, but start on any note and build the pattern and you have that scale/mode). I think about interval patterns way more than notes and note names.
posted by LooseFilter at 11:56 AM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
Also, just be clear here: when I'm writing music I only think "o.k. I should try " only when I can't quite match up the sound of the notes to the sound in my head, or I'm not sure where to go next. Mostly I'm thinking in sound. It's just that I know the sounds because I learned them along with someone naming the concepts.
posted by Gygesringtone at 12:17 PM on September 6, 2023
posted by Gygesringtone at 12:17 PM on September 6, 2023
My teacher will listen to a piece of music and say, "Oh, yeah, the guitarist is soloing in mixolydian", and I'm like, "But it's just the notes in C major again, how can you tell?". And then when I say, "Hey, I found this song and the lowest note they keep returning to is , so that means it's in , right?" And he'll reply, "Well, that would be true, but the implied tonal center is actually two notes down, so it's really ."
Some discussion about that from Pat Finnerty, in less than 60 seconds, when discussing D mixolydian vs just your bog standard G major scale. IMO, musicans like to make some things more complex than they need to be, and some songs are borderline, but most pop/rock songs are not.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:34 PM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
Some discussion about that from Pat Finnerty, in less than 60 seconds, when discussing D mixolydian vs just your bog standard G major scale. IMO, musicans like to make some things more complex than they need to be, and some songs are borderline, but most pop/rock songs are not.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:34 PM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
Metafilter: [M]emorizing a bus schedule for a city you've never seen.
posted by riverlife at 12:34 PM on September 6, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by riverlife at 12:34 PM on September 6, 2023 [2 favorites]
Those are OUT OF ORDER. Why would you DO that?
I'm sorry, I am a monster.
posted by Zargon X at 12:55 PM on September 6, 2023
I'm sorry, I am a monster.
posted by Zargon X at 12:55 PM on September 6, 2023
Through no fault of its own, the Phrygian Mode and I shall be mortal enemies as long as I walk this earth.
Ok, that’s not true. My ire should truly be reserved for whoever thought stacking arcane music theory concepts on top of learning to code was a good idea.
posted by FallibleHuman at 2:08 PM on September 6, 2023
Ok, that’s not true. My ire should truly be reserved for whoever thought stacking arcane music theory concepts on top of learning to code was a good idea.
posted by FallibleHuman at 2:08 PM on September 6, 2023
When you play Irish music you end up learning far too much about modes. Dmix for the win!
posted by misterpatrick at 4:43 PM on September 6, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by misterpatrick at 4:43 PM on September 6, 2023 [2 favorites]
The correct order for the modes, from brightest to darkest, is:
* Lydian
* Ionian
* Mixolydian
* Dorian
* Aeolian
* Phrygian
* Locrian
...and only one note changes between each mode in this order (which is by fifths)
posted by and for no one at 5:07 PM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
* Lydian
* Ionian
* Mixolydian
* Dorian
* Aeolian
* Phrygian
* Locrian
...and only one note changes between each mode in this order (which is by fifths)
posted by and for no one at 5:07 PM on September 6, 2023 [4 favorites]
Frank Gambale talks about learning modes (with Rick Beato)
posted by and for no one at 6:18 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by and for no one at 6:18 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
John Baez's blog series on modes followed up on the one note change between each mode idea here. Part 8 is especially interesting!
posted by samw at 6:36 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by samw at 6:36 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
i've got to say that i don't quite get modes
for one thing, if you're soloing, you're playing one note at a time, at least most of the time - that one note can lead to 11 different choices, 5 of which aren't a part of your mode - but you will often hear musicians drag one of those 5 notes in anyway, thus changing the mode
for another thing, i don't know that really fluid improvisers think in those terms while they're playing - they might analyze it like that later but not as they're going
one thing that carol kaye said was she didn't like modes, either - the old school way was to deal with chords and the extensions you could suggest while improvising - no one said, there's a 7-5 chord, so you play mixolodian b6 - you might end up playing something like that, but you could also end up adding something else that contrasted with the chord another way
also, i've got to say that a lot of the people who know this stuff often sound like they're practicing scales - or they play it all so fast that mere mortals like myself can't hear it all anyway
it's an interesting way to think about things - in fact, i did a song years ago that was a blues progression in locrian
still, i think it's more interesting these days to toy with polytonal stuff
and if you really want to go far down the rabbit hole look at george russel's "lydian chromatic concept of tonal organization" which i'm not sure i understood either
posted by pyramid termite at 6:36 PM on September 6, 2023
for one thing, if you're soloing, you're playing one note at a time, at least most of the time - that one note can lead to 11 different choices, 5 of which aren't a part of your mode - but you will often hear musicians drag one of those 5 notes in anyway, thus changing the mode
for another thing, i don't know that really fluid improvisers think in those terms while they're playing - they might analyze it like that later but not as they're going
one thing that carol kaye said was she didn't like modes, either - the old school way was to deal with chords and the extensions you could suggest while improvising - no one said, there's a 7-5 chord, so you play mixolodian b6 - you might end up playing something like that, but you could also end up adding something else that contrasted with the chord another way
also, i've got to say that a lot of the people who know this stuff often sound like they're practicing scales - or they play it all so fast that mere mortals like myself can't hear it all anyway
it's an interesting way to think about things - in fact, i did a song years ago that was a blues progression in locrian
still, i think it's more interesting these days to toy with polytonal stuff
and if you really want to go far down the rabbit hole look at george russel's "lydian chromatic concept of tonal organization" which i'm not sure i understood either
posted by pyramid termite at 6:36 PM on September 6, 2023
samw's link to John Baez's blog part 7 may be the first place I've seen them listed in the correct order. Most places talk about them in scale order, which isn't very interesting.
Baez also notes you can drop the tonic from Locrian and start over at Lydian, which makes for a finger exercise you can continue as long as you have room.
Also: as Frank Gambale says, using the same set of notes and moving the root isn't interesting. Use the same root, and change the set of notes around it is a more useful comparison.
posted by and for no one at 7:18 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
Baez also notes you can drop the tonic from Locrian and start over at Lydian, which makes for a finger exercise you can continue as long as you have room.
Also: as Frank Gambale says, using the same set of notes and moving the root isn't interesting. Use the same root, and change the set of notes around it is a more useful comparison.
posted by and for no one at 7:18 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
I've only heard of them because they're characters in MOTHER 3
posted by one for the books at 10:02 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by one for the books at 10:02 PM on September 6, 2023 [1 favorite]
Fun fact: The names of the modes come from ancient Greek writings (from Plato and possibly others), but we don't actually know what the Greeks were talking about (we don't know what Dorian or Phrygian sounded like), so we co-opted their terms for alternate scales.
posted by Brachinus at 5:04 AM on September 7, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Brachinus at 5:04 AM on September 7, 2023 [2 favorites]
also, i've got to say that a lot of the people who know this stuff often sound like they're practicing scales - or they play it all so fast that mere mortals like myself can't hear it all anyway
That's why I think using video game music (or film would probably work too) is a brilliant way to teach this- in a video game, a lot has to be conveyed in a relatively short piece of music without vocals to suggest mood. So I'd bet plenty of score composers do start with the shorthand of Locrian = weird for a piece of unsettling music or lydian = whimsical, and build melodies from there.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:18 AM on September 7, 2023 [1 favorite]
That's why I think using video game music (or film would probably work too) is a brilliant way to teach this- in a video game, a lot has to be conveyed in a relatively short piece of music without vocals to suggest mood. So I'd bet plenty of score composers do start with the shorthand of Locrian = weird for a piece of unsettling music or lydian = whimsical, and build melodies from there.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:18 AM on September 7, 2023 [1 favorite]
for another thing, i don't know that really fluid improvisers think in those terms while they're playing - they might analyze it like that later but not as they're going
I mean, it depends on what you mean by "thinks in those terms" because, yeah, top level players aren't thinking "I'm gonna play this whole tone riff now, so that's F-G-B-A-F-C#. NAILED IT!". That's for the same reason no extemporaneous speaker is thinking "O.k. so I'm gonna start this sentence with a noun, then a verb and then oh and I'm gonna end with an adjective and noun combination that's alliterative!". The whole point of practicing is to get things so thoroughly in your muscles and ear that you don't have to think about it up on stage. You do all the thinking ahead of time.
And yeah not every improviser builds their soling technique up from a modal concepts, but that is one of the ways that jazz improvisation is taught at higher levels. There are absolutely players who will have a sound in their head/fingers that's based on a modal frame work they developed alongside their approach to music. The mode names are symbols to make it possible to communicate what they hear, the map's not the territory you know?
I mean, also we're still getting into a discussion of if a tool is good or not without really establishing "for what". Are you a trombone player playing a supporting line in a dixie group? Then modes are the wrong approach. Are you taking a few choruses over Impressions? Absolutely use modes (well really just the one). French conservatory student improvising a fugue? You've got enough to keep track of without that extra headache. Bluegrass or Old Time fiddle? There's some tunes that it would definitely be a good approach.
My point isn't that modes are right for everyone, but that they can be the right for some people. I don't think that understanding modes is necessary for people to perform or enjoy music, even music with modal elements, but I do think that it can be a powerful way for people to conceptualize what's going on.
posted by Gygesringtone at 10:43 AM on September 7, 2023 [1 favorite]
I mean, it depends on what you mean by "thinks in those terms" because, yeah, top level players aren't thinking "I'm gonna play this whole tone riff now, so that's F-G-B-A-F-C#. NAILED IT!". That's for the same reason no extemporaneous speaker is thinking "O.k. so I'm gonna start this sentence with a noun, then a verb and then oh and I'm gonna end with an adjective and noun combination that's alliterative!". The whole point of practicing is to get things so thoroughly in your muscles and ear that you don't have to think about it up on stage. You do all the thinking ahead of time.
And yeah not every improviser builds their soling technique up from a modal concepts, but that is one of the ways that jazz improvisation is taught at higher levels. There are absolutely players who will have a sound in their head/fingers that's based on a modal frame work they developed alongside their approach to music. The mode names are symbols to make it possible to communicate what they hear, the map's not the territory you know?
I mean, also we're still getting into a discussion of if a tool is good or not without really establishing "for what". Are you a trombone player playing a supporting line in a dixie group? Then modes are the wrong approach. Are you taking a few choruses over Impressions? Absolutely use modes (well really just the one). French conservatory student improvising a fugue? You've got enough to keep track of without that extra headache. Bluegrass or Old Time fiddle? There's some tunes that it would definitely be a good approach.
My point isn't that modes are right for everyone, but that they can be the right for some people. I don't think that understanding modes is necessary for people to perform or enjoy music, even music with modal elements, but I do think that it can be a powerful way for people to conceptualize what's going on.
posted by Gygesringtone at 10:43 AM on September 7, 2023 [1 favorite]
So much locrian punk and hardcore
Born against are f ing dead
posted by eustatic at 5:24 PM on September 7, 2023
Born against are f ing dead
posted by eustatic at 5:24 PM on September 7, 2023
if you're soloing, you're playing one note at a time
Also if you're not soloing!
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:35 PM on September 7, 2023
Also if you're not soloing!
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:35 PM on September 7, 2023
if you're soloing, you're playing one note at a time
Really? You only play with one-finger, hunt-and-peck pianists?
And even on a one-note-at-a-time wind instrument, you have to know and think about the context of what you're playing; a player who thinks one note at a time will be hopelessly lost and playing a lot of wrong notes. (In fact, I don't think of individual notes often at all when I'm playing, it's patterns and intervals in a particular context, which is why how I conceptualize all this is quite consequential. I spend a lot of time teaching my students how to think about music while actually playing music.)
i don't know that really fluid improvisers think in those terms while they're playing
It might be interesting to read what some really fluid improvisers have written about how they think while they're playing. It will likely surprise you, given this characterization.
posted by LooseFilter at 6:31 AM on September 8, 2023 [1 favorite]
Really? You only play with one-finger, hunt-and-peck pianists?
And even on a one-note-at-a-time wind instrument, you have to know and think about the context of what you're playing; a player who thinks one note at a time will be hopelessly lost and playing a lot of wrong notes. (In fact, I don't think of individual notes often at all when I'm playing, it's patterns and intervals in a particular context, which is why how I conceptualize all this is quite consequential. I spend a lot of time teaching my students how to think about music while actually playing music.)
i don't know that really fluid improvisers think in those terms while they're playing
It might be interesting to read what some really fluid improvisers have written about how they think while they're playing. It will likely surprise you, given this characterization.
posted by LooseFilter at 6:31 AM on September 8, 2023 [1 favorite]
The thing about music is you mostly spend more mental energy thinking about what you're going to do than thinking in any way about what you're actually, literally doing in that moment. If I think about what I'm playing as I'm playing it, I'll be hopelessly lost in terms of musical time, my cognition is typically ahead of the present moment to varying degrees.
I do listen to what I'm doing in the moment, but the next level of mental energy is still not spent attuning to what I'm actually, literally doing in the present moment; it's spent critically listening to the music happening around me, and how what I just did fit into it (good, bad, late, early, sharp, flat, etc.). Learned, habitual skill is what I'm relying on to make the present moment of my playing happen as I'm imagining it, but in the moment of making music with an ensemble, good musicians are not living only in the present moment of their playing as it seems to be perceived here.
(I literally work with undergrad music students on eye tracking and how it relates to reading fluency--less experienced musicians tend to keep their eyes on the music they're playing in the moment, but like with any kind of reading, you have to track ahead of what you're actually doing/processing--part of your brain is out in front, taking in information before you have to act on it, part of your brain is decoding that information and turning it into action, part of your brain is coordinating the physical actions necessary to play what you're decoding, and part of your brain is listening to what you just played and comparing it back to what you wanted to hear and recommending adjustments/corrections back to the part that's out in front. So musical attention, while extremely engaged and focused, is multi-faceted and kind of multi-temporal, and is very definitely not just in the present moment. Training young professionals, we actually teach them to work toward the actual music-making being the part they can do without thinking about it too much--a carpenter learns to use a hammer well, but then while using the hammer to build is thinking about what they're building, how it goes together, but they're not thinking about how to use the hammer when actually nailing, that's just part of their learned technique to build a house. While building, they're thinking about the house, not the hammering. And if the hammering is a problem, you stop building the house and go practice just hammering until the hammering is consistent and easy, then you go back to building the house with the newly-improved hammering helping things along. But you went and practiced the hammering so that you could not think about hammering while building your house, even while hammering to build your house.)
posted by LooseFilter at 6:54 AM on September 8, 2023 [2 favorites]
I do listen to what I'm doing in the moment, but the next level of mental energy is still not spent attuning to what I'm actually, literally doing in the present moment; it's spent critically listening to the music happening around me, and how what I just did fit into it (good, bad, late, early, sharp, flat, etc.). Learned, habitual skill is what I'm relying on to make the present moment of my playing happen as I'm imagining it, but in the moment of making music with an ensemble, good musicians are not living only in the present moment of their playing as it seems to be perceived here.
(I literally work with undergrad music students on eye tracking and how it relates to reading fluency--less experienced musicians tend to keep their eyes on the music they're playing in the moment, but like with any kind of reading, you have to track ahead of what you're actually doing/processing--part of your brain is out in front, taking in information before you have to act on it, part of your brain is decoding that information and turning it into action, part of your brain is coordinating the physical actions necessary to play what you're decoding, and part of your brain is listening to what you just played and comparing it back to what you wanted to hear and recommending adjustments/corrections back to the part that's out in front. So musical attention, while extremely engaged and focused, is multi-faceted and kind of multi-temporal, and is very definitely not just in the present moment. Training young professionals, we actually teach them to work toward the actual music-making being the part they can do without thinking about it too much--a carpenter learns to use a hammer well, but then while using the hammer to build is thinking about what they're building, how it goes together, but they're not thinking about how to use the hammer when actually nailing, that's just part of their learned technique to build a house. While building, they're thinking about the house, not the hammering. And if the hammering is a problem, you stop building the house and go practice just hammering until the hammering is consistent and easy, then you go back to building the house with the newly-improved hammering helping things along. But you went and practiced the hammering so that you could not think about hammering while building your house, even while hammering to build your house.)
posted by LooseFilter at 6:54 AM on September 8, 2023 [2 favorites]
Man, music theory just does not click for me.
I'm a smart, analytical person. I spend 40 hours a week writing code. I have opinions about the methodologies of scientific papers.
On the surface, at least, music theory seems like exactly the sort of thing that should come naturally to me.
But every time I try to delve past that surface, it quickly goes sideways. Like, this field which looks like the orderly, rational, mathematically justified crafts that I'm into, turns out to be no such thing. And every time I ask "but why is it like that?", the answer is "because it just is".
I suspect that there are two main reasons for this:
1. Most musicians learn theory from a practical perspective – so they can read music, learn songs, communicate with bandmates, etc. This isn't the same thing as learning the actual, nuts-and-bolts theory from the ground up.
So you have a lot of people confidently proclaiming conceptual models which are perfectly serviceable for the purposes of a practicing musician – but which contain subtle (or not-so-subtle) technical accuracies which end up confusing the hell out of me, as a person who is expecting to start with the bare rudiments of frequency relationships and tuning systems, and then gradually build more complex concepts on top of that, with each layer justified in something like a mathematical proof.
2. The terminology and conceptual models that comprise music theory were never really designed to make sense as a unified, integrated, holistic system. It's just a hodgepodge of different ideas that have accreted over the centuries. I'm looking for a kind of order and tidiness which simply doesn't exist.
I'd really love if someone would devise an alternate way of understanding and analyzing music which does make sense to my computer-programmer brain. I think it would look very different than conventional theory, though.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 7:35 AM on September 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
I'm a smart, analytical person. I spend 40 hours a week writing code. I have opinions about the methodologies of scientific papers.
On the surface, at least, music theory seems like exactly the sort of thing that should come naturally to me.
But every time I try to delve past that surface, it quickly goes sideways. Like, this field which looks like the orderly, rational, mathematically justified crafts that I'm into, turns out to be no such thing. And every time I ask "but why is it like that?", the answer is "because it just is".
I suspect that there are two main reasons for this:
1. Most musicians learn theory from a practical perspective – so they can read music, learn songs, communicate with bandmates, etc. This isn't the same thing as learning the actual, nuts-and-bolts theory from the ground up.
So you have a lot of people confidently proclaiming conceptual models which are perfectly serviceable for the purposes of a practicing musician – but which contain subtle (or not-so-subtle) technical accuracies which end up confusing the hell out of me, as a person who is expecting to start with the bare rudiments of frequency relationships and tuning systems, and then gradually build more complex concepts on top of that, with each layer justified in something like a mathematical proof.
2. The terminology and conceptual models that comprise music theory were never really designed to make sense as a unified, integrated, holistic system. It's just a hodgepodge of different ideas that have accreted over the centuries. I'm looking for a kind of order and tidiness which simply doesn't exist.
I'd really love if someone would devise an alternate way of understanding and analyzing music which does make sense to my computer-programmer brain. I think it would look very different than conventional theory, though.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 7:35 AM on September 10, 2023 [1 favorite]
And every time I ask "but why is it like that?", the answer is "because it just is".
My impression is that much of this theory is post hoc explanation. Some of it is useful in a practical sense, but much of it is abstract theorizing that's meaningful to specialists as opposed to musicians.
Kind of like how you don't need to know information theory in order to do programming.
posted by sneebler at 11:30 AM on September 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
My impression is that much of this theory is post hoc explanation. Some of it is useful in a practical sense, but much of it is abstract theorizing that's meaningful to specialists as opposed to musicians.
Kind of like how you don't need to know information theory in order to do programming.
posted by sneebler at 11:30 AM on September 10, 2023 [2 favorites]
The thing about music is you mostly spend more mental energy thinking about what you're going to do than thinking in any way about what you're actually, literally doing in that moment. If I think about what I'm playing as I'm playing it, I'll be hopelessly lost in terms of musical time, my cognition is typically ahead of the present moment to varying degrees...
Thank you, that whole comment is a much clearer way of explaining what I meant by "front loading" the thinking.
I don't know, it's way less mental energy for me to be thinking in sound (sort of like an athlete visualizing their movements). I have kind of a fraught relationship with words, so maybe that's just a me thing. As an example I never think "I want the solo to build tension on the next 3 chords and release the tension on the last" but I do have a mental model of what that would sound like and do hear that internally as what I'm aiming for.
I don't know, there aren't a lot of good words out there for internal thought processes that aren't either visual or language based, so I'm often left kind of struggling to define HOW I get from A to B in my head.
I'd really love if someone would devise an alternate way of understanding and analyzing music which does make sense to my computer-programmer brain. I think it would look very different than conventional theory, though.
I mean, I've pointed this out before, but there are two sciences of music, Acoustics and Music Cognition. Both can make some very interesting contributions into how we approach performing, but neither one describes what creating that performance entails.
posted by Gygesringtone at 12:34 PM on September 10, 2023
Thank you, that whole comment is a much clearer way of explaining what I meant by "front loading" the thinking.
I don't know, it's way less mental energy for me to be thinking in sound (sort of like an athlete visualizing their movements). I have kind of a fraught relationship with words, so maybe that's just a me thing. As an example I never think "I want the solo to build tension on the next 3 chords and release the tension on the last" but I do have a mental model of what that would sound like and do hear that internally as what I'm aiming for.
I don't know, there aren't a lot of good words out there for internal thought processes that aren't either visual or language based, so I'm often left kind of struggling to define HOW I get from A to B in my head.
I'd really love if someone would devise an alternate way of understanding and analyzing music which does make sense to my computer-programmer brain. I think it would look very different than conventional theory, though.
I mean, I've pointed this out before, but there are two sciences of music, Acoustics and Music Cognition. Both can make some very interesting contributions into how we approach performing, but neither one describes what creating that performance entails.
posted by Gygesringtone at 12:34 PM on September 10, 2023
Mod note: [btw, this post has been added to the sidebar and Best Of blog]
posted by taz (staff) at 3:00 AM on September 11, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by taz (staff) at 3:00 AM on September 11, 2023 [1 favorite]
“What are the Melodic Minor Modes?”—8-bit Music Theory, 22 September 2023
posted by ob1quixote at 3:29 PM on September 22, 2023
posted by ob1quixote at 3:29 PM on September 22, 2023
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