Melodic minor is different going up in pitch from when it returns down to the tonic. What other scales do this?
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BOSTON
its not *really* a different scale going up and down, just that in traditional counterpoint, even if you were in a natural minor key you would still use a dominant 7th or some sort of tonicization before a cadence to the I chord, so in practice the approach notes of the melody would be that of major scale. but since nobody learns counterpoint, its easier to just explain it as "minor scale, with a #6 & #7 when approaching the tonic".
since its basically a progression rather than a scale you could say there are plenty others that are commonly used in western music, but most of them just fall into the general area of "well known melodies found in modal harmony, substitutions, pivot chords, etc." and are not awarded sexy scale status.
Last edited by BR1GHT PR1MATE (May 2, 2013 6:44 am)
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BOSTON
if you are really interested in the study of scales (which is damn fascinating) i recommend these two books above all else:
Yusef Lateefs "repository of scales and melodic patterns", which covers a huge amount of ethnic and jazz melodic permutations
http://www.amazon.com/Repository-Scales … B000O9TN46
and Slonimsky's Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns, which essentially covers every possible scale, but from a more serialist approach of building permutations from interpolation of row clusters. still damn interesting:
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Youngstown, OH
Bright Primate with the kill, very nice
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Alive and well in fucksville
That was hard to understand. You really are a bright primate.
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BOSTON
its a little confusing to be sure. basically, the typical modern understanding of scales and harmony is different than how it was taught in the 1600s-1900s. the melodic minor is a way of easily conveying, in scale form, what was actually the "sound" of a V7-i progression (which is non-diatonic, or not "natural", to the minor scale) that, for whatever reason, classical ear loved so much. Similar to the picardy third, which was the practice of using a major chord resolution at the end of a minor (or modal) piece of music.
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Brunswick, GA USA
They were also trying to make V-i without accidentally sounding "arabic" by playing a raised second.
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Montreal, Canada
It was also to help singers, since whole tones are much easier to hit and semitones. Or so I've heard.. dunno....I can't hit any tone myself. When I sing, babies cry.
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Youngstown, OH
Sol La Ti Do is "easier" to sing than Sol Le Ti Do. It was typically avoided but in contemporary music this rule has weakened. But the point of both harmonic minor and melodic minor is to raise the leading tone from Te to Ti in the V, making the arrival to i much for definitive. The difference between v to i and V to i is significant but both can be nice.
La or Le ascending (melodic or harmonic minor) is personal preference. Descending in minor Te Le Sol is much more definitive.
btw it's called "harmonic" minor because the V to i is more harmonically conclusive.
If this all seems messy, welcome to music theory.
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Alive and well in fucksville
Music theory annoyed me. I always wondered why sight singing avoided di,ri,fi,si,li,te,le,me, and ra. So much more could be possible for singers if they learned the entire chromatic scale. It would be nice to have had a more complex foundation seeing as how there are so many more scales than the major scale... 12 tet is really dissonant anyways. what ever happened to just tuning? I hope to find an instrument someday that can hit tones that show a cymatic pattern.
Last edited by bitjacker (May 3, 2013 9:31 pm)
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Montreal, Canada
I think it is a matter of practicality. There is a range of intervals that most singers are comfortable with and find easier to sing. Whole tones, third, fifth, octave...these are all relatively easy to hit spot on.
Singing in semitones, while totally possible and quite common, is harder than whole tones. It's like when you record a singer... a lot of the people I've recorded in my life wanted to have a reverb-drenched mix of their voice in the headphones because that way they can hear their last note and hit the new one more precisely, especially for semitones or long intervals like 8-9 semitones. They're also dependent on the music. If they have "help" from the music, meaning there are clear notes and rhythms helping them figure out where to pitch their voice, it's much easier for them to hit it right. But if you're dealing with super minimalist music where not a whole lot of notes are playing to guide you as a singer, certain intervals become quite challenging. That's why it sounds so damn good when a jazz singer singing over almost no music hits that perfect semitone before the band has played any notes to indicate where it's going. We're conditioned to prefer, or at least expect certain intervals, and then POW.. this perfectly pitched weird ass tone comes in and surprises you. A very powerful tool.
The complex foundations are there, and they are used all the time, but as with anything.. when you get into more complex shit, you need people with a certain degree of talent to pull it off properly.
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Alive and well in fucksville
Wouldn't it be less rare for a normal person to hit a semitone, if when taught early, semitones were given the same artistic value? it would change music as we know it!
Last edited by bitjacker (May 3, 2013 9:47 pm)
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Brunswick, GA USA
There is 12 tone and so called atonal music, much respect to people who do them well.
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Youngstown, OH
I'm not sure where you went but sight singing does not avoid altered tones. Beginner sight singing does but obviously you branch out from there. There is highly chromatic sung music (look at Ligeti or Webern: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnuAaKiX1sg, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_xGz0YIZdo).
Now your average singer is most comfortable in a predictable key with a limited range of say an octave and a half, but if you can keep track of your pitch and land further ones accurately in your range, there is no problem. I'm not sure where this talk of semitones came from but the only scale that doesn't include them is the whole tone scale. I've never met anyone who's had significantly more trouble with the semitones of a scale before.
*or the whole steps
**augmented seconds (le to ti in harmonic minor) I have though
Last edited by sleepytimejesse (May 3, 2013 10:28 pm)
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chunter wrote:
There is 12 tone and so called atonal music, much respect to people who do them well.
3 semesters into composing atonal music at my University for atonal comp classes. So hard to get used to, but also extremely expressive. 
Been thinking about adapting some of my works for chip...
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NC in the US of America
I've never met anyone who's had significantly more trouble with the semitones of a scale before.
Maybe he's referring to semitones outside of the scale/key? Of course it's easy to hit the semitones in a standard scale (major, minor), because they just go well with everything else.
Wouldn't it be less rare for a normal person to hit a semitone, if when taught early, semitones were given the same artistic value? it would change music as we know it!
Yes, it is less rare. It happens all the time. Incidentally, everything is still the same. It's not a matter of if this happens, but who is initiating it.