Relative Minor vs non-relative (?) minor

[pf400]

Quick theory question...Am is the relative minor of the C scale and chord. Looking at the major scale, we see that the 2nd, 3rd and 6th degrees of a major scale are minors. The 6th degree is always the relative minor, but what do we call those other minors?

[jonfields45]

Originally Posted by pf400

Quick theory question...Am is the relative minor of the C scale and chord. Looking at the major scale, we see that the 2nd, 3rd and 6th degrees of a major scale are minors. The 6th degree is always the relative minor, but what do we call those other minors?

https://www.pianogroove.com/jazz-pia...cale-tutorial/

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by pf400

Quick theory question...Am is the relative minor of the C scale and chord. Looking at the major scale, we see that the 2nd, 3rd and 6th degrees of a major scale are minors. The 6th degree is always the relative minor, but what do we call those other minors?

There may be some names I'm forgetting, but in general, I'd say that Am is not the relative minor of the C scale, it's the relative minor of the C major chord. The other two minors in the key of C are Em, which is the relative minor of the G Major chord, and Dm which is the relative minor of the F Major chord. So the "relative minor" is associated with a chord, not a key. Tho I did find a page:

http://www.musiceducatorsinstitute.c...ve_chords.html

that calls all the minors "relative minors" of the key, like it's a collection. I suppose that's one way to think about it, but I think that page is playing the terminology a bit loose (which is ok).

There are names for each of the degrees of a scale, in C, C is the tonic, D is the supertonic, E is the mediant, etc (you won't hear these names kicked around much in popular music), but that's notes, not the chords.

All this stuff is naming conventions and it varies a bit with the type of music. There may be some official name for the minor chord built on the supertonic degree of the scale, etc, in classical analysis, but I'm not remembering what it is, and at the very least I don't think it comes up in popular music, folk, rock, jazz, etc. When we're talking about keys, we usually just talk about the "ii chord", etc. The "relative minor" thing comes up mostly when talking about chord substitution, like "for the IV chord, I like to use its relative minor, Dm"

[LeftArm]

A is the relatice minor to the key of C major because all the notes of the scale are the same only starting on A instead of C.
C major scale CDEFGABC
A minor scale ABCDEFGA
The others only relate to the chords. the ii in the key of C is Dm
notes D,F,A. The D major scale has C#

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by pf400

Quick theory question...Am is the relative minor of the C scale and chord. Looking at the major scale, we see that the 2nd, 3rd and 6th degrees of a major scale are minors. The 6th degree is always the relative minor, but what do we call those other minors?

"Relative" really refers to keys, not scales.

The minor key has a major 2nd and usually a minor 6th, unless raised in melodic minor. That doesn't match the modes of the C major scale on D or E.
The D mode (dorian) has a major 6th (B), and the E mode (phrygian) has a minor 2nd (F).

Minor keys evolved out of Aeolian mode, same as major keys evolved out of Ionian mode. The previous modes - Dorian and Phygian (minor) and Lydian and Mixolydian (major) - fell out of favour, or were increasingly altered to resemble Aeolian and Ionian. (Something like that, the history is obviously way more complicated.)

[raysachs]

I don’t have the detailed theory that a lot you folks do, but I learned about relative minors initially with chords, probably the C - Am. But it started to get clearer and make more sense to me after I’d gotten comfortable with the minor pentatonic scale and then started branching out to the major pentatonic scale. And saw immediately that to go from a C minor to a C major, you slide down three frets, which makes the C major pentatonic and the Am pentatonic the same scale. Obviously with different root notes and different relationships and requires a different way of approaching it, but the exact same notes nonetheless.

Which doesn’t answer the OP’s question at all, but helped me understand how the concept of relative minors relates to keys rather than just scales or just chords.

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by pf400

Quick theory question...Am is the relative minor of the C scale and chord. Looking at the major scale, we see that the 2nd, 3rd and 6th degrees of a major scale are minors. The 6th degree is always the relative minor, but what do we call those other minors?

The relative minor key of a major key share the same notes (key signature) (when using the relative minor scale anyway)
but in a different order as to which is the base (tonic) note. That works out using the sixth degree of a major scale as the
new tonic note, but not for the second or third degree of the scale as being the new tonic note of a minor key.

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by raysachs

I don’t have the detailed theory that a lot you folks do, but I learned about relative minors initially with chords, probably the C - Am. But it started to get clearer and make more sense to me after I’d gotten comfortable with the minor pentatonic scale and then started branching out to the major pentatonic scale. And saw immediately that to go from a C minor to a C major, you slide down three frets, which makes the C major pentatonic and the Am pentatonic the same scale. Obviously with different root notes and different relationships and requires a different way of approaching it, but the exact same notes nonetheless.

Which doesn’t answer the OP’s question at all, but helped me understand how the concept of relative minors relates to keys rather than just scales or just chords.

Ya I am a "relative" neophyte to theory But when finally taking lessons at 66 (to learn how to play lead) I also found it interesting that the relative minor pentatonic is the same position as the relative major ( as per the circle of fifths) with only the starting root note obviously different AND the fingering of the basic sequential pattern going the opposite direction on the fretboard from the root . Or maybe that's just the way the teacher showed me .

[1neeto]

Originally Posted by LeftArm

A is the relatice minor to the key of C major because all the notes of the scale are the same only starting on A instead of C.

C major scale CDEFGABC

A minor scale ABCDEFGA

The others only relate to the chords. the ii in the key of C is Dm

notes D,F,A. The D major scale has C#

That’s what I got from his post. That he’s seeing I ii iii IV V vi viiidim which is major and minor chords that fit within a key

In any one key there are other relative minors. So, in the key of C the main relative minor is Am but if you move up the key Dm is often called the relative minor of F Major because they share two of the same notes (F and A), Em is relative to the dominant G because of notes G and B.

[Brent Hahn]

Every key signature represents a major and a minor key that are "relatives." The key signature with no sharps and no flats represents C Major and/or A minor. The key signature with one sharp represents G Major and/or E minor. And so on. It's pretty simple.

[1neeto]

Originally Posted by Brent Hahn

Every key signature represents a major and a minor key that are "relatives." The key signature with no sharps and no flats represents C Major and/or A minor. The key signature with one sharp represents G Major and/or E minor. And so on. It's pretty simple.

Yep. Circle of fifths.

[Ten]

The Mixolydian is out of favor? Somebody forgot to tell Trey.

[Brent Hahn]

Originally Posted by Ten

The Mixolydian is out of favor? Somebody forgot to tell Trey.

I know what the Mixolydian mode is, and that's still cryptic. Trey could explain it to me, but somebody forgot to tell him about it.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by Ten

The Mixolydian is out of favor? Somebody forgot to tell Trey.

It fell out of favour - along with dorian, phrygian and lydian - in the middle ages/early renaissance - and only in the Christian church, because that's the only music from then that we know about, because it was written down. That was because someone realised how cool the new modes of ionian and aeolian were, to make major and minor KEYS. Amazing new invention in music! (Aeolian had to be messed around a little with harmonic and melodic alterations, to make the "minor key".)

Once major and minor keys began to fall out of favour in their turn, in the late 19th/early 20th centuries (again I'm talking European art music, aka "classical" in the broad sense), then modes started to come back into fashion. Debussy, Ravel, Satie etc.
Same thing happened in jazz in the late 1950s. The more advanced musicians got bored with keys, same as the classical guys had 60 years earlier. Hello "modal jazz."

Meanwhile, modes like mixolydian, dorian and aeolian had always been around in folk music, in various European cultures - certainly in British and Irish music. Just nobody ever wrote folk music down. Some African scales are similar too.

So once African-American music - a mix of African and European folk habits - started to dominate popular music (early 20th century in US at least), then mixolydian and dorian (in particular) got more popular. Blues is essentially a loose combination of mixolydian and dorian. Most jazz was still more interested in KEYS, though (even after modal jazz), and it took rock music to being blues into the spotlight, and exploit its natural modal form.

[/lecture]