A Minor Issue

[ChrisN]

I'm learning from books and have reached a confusing point about improvisation using minor scales vs major scales.

For context: I understand basic major scale theory, and how relative minor scales are born. I understand "A minor" is the relative/natural minor scale of "C major" that the two scales have the same notes, but in different order (so they will sound different, when played as a scale), and that the different note order necessarily results in the creation of different chords between the 2 scales. I understand that the difference between the "A major" and "A minor" scales is that the 3rd, 6th and 7th degrees are flattened to achieve the "a minor" scale. I understand that you can create the "A Minor" scale in 2 ways - (1) using the 6th degree of the relative major scale as the first note, and (2) flattening the 3rd, 6th, and 7th degrees of the minor's own "major" scale (eg, using "A major" to create "A minor).

Then I read things similar to this:

If you take C major scale and compare it to A minor scale, you will see that they have exactly the same notes. In other words, the major scale has a related minor that is identical to it. Incredible, isn’t it? This is why the name “relative”. Compare below, for example, the scales C x Am and G x Em:

C major scale: C, D, E, F, G, A, B
A minor scale: A, B, C, D, E, F, G
G major scale: G, A, B, C, D, E, F#
E minor scale: E, F#, G, A, B, C
This is extremely useful! It means that we can use A minor scale to do a solo in a song which tonality is C major. In other words, when we have a major tonality, we can think in two scales: the major scale of this tonality and the relative minor scale of it. This increases our options when we are thinking in solo.

The bolded material is what is confusing to me. If I play the "A minor" scale in order (regardless of starting point), it's going to sound different from C major, however, if I solo or improvise in A minor, I'm using the same notes I'm using to solo/improvise in C major. Same for G major and E minor - the notes are the notes, and hopping around playing them in different order during an improvisation isn't going to sound any different between the 2 scales. I'm missing something.

While it likely has the same explanation, I'm also confused by the excerpt's reference to "we can use A minor scale to do a solo in a song which tonality is C major" - and "we can think in 2 scales." To my state of confusion, there would be no difference, so I don't understand the distinction.

Thanks for any guidance on this issue.

[SunnyDee]

Someone will come along and say something complicated, but for the way you are thinking of it, you are right, there is no difference between the notes and chords in Am and the notes and chords in Cmajor. The difference is in where you put the "home" chord, what key it feels like it's in because of where you start and end a phrase. The I (first) chord is different in each one, so if you played a I IV V (first, fourth, and fifth) chord progression, you'd get a different sound in each. But they'd still sound like they go together.

It's because you wouldn't just hop around playing them in random order, you start from a home and you return to it, you find ways to make the melody rise and fall, make phrases question.. and answer...and return home again.... If it were random hopping, yes, it would sound the same.

[Gordon Currie]

C major and A minor (in your example) aren't truly separate scales. The A minor is a mode (Aeolian) of the C major scale. (There are other minor modes as well, less used as they might sound too unusual for some music.)

That is why they are so interchangeable - because they share the same notes.
Often the only way to tell if someone is 'thinking' in C major or A minor is to observe what note they start off on.

The value of this concept for improvisers is that it encourages you to look at what you do from a different angle. Is the glass half-empty, or half-full? Is the dress blue, or gold

Does this help?

[MC5C]

Lets say you decided to play a simple lick in C over a I VI II V progression, really common. The pattern is /C C Am Am/Dm Dm G7 G7/. The first bar has two chords, C and Am. You might play an arpeggio C E G E, for the first two beats (eighth notes) and that would define the C chord perfectly. The next thing you play is A B C B. Because that part of the line starts on A, the C note is a minor third interval, and so that sequence defines the A minor chord. The next triad is Dm - the II chord - so you might use the notes D F A, maybe in a descending arpeggio - A F D F. Note the F is a minor third above the D. The final chord is the V chord - G7 - with the notes G B D F. You might stick with the F, which becomes the dominant 7th of the G instead of the minor third of the D, slide up to G to emphasise that, down to D and finish on C# - resolving to the tonic C. C# is the flat five of the G-7 chord, is a tri-tone note that kind of lives in both the G7 and C chords as a passing tone. All notes are in the C major scale (except the C#), all notes define the chords they are hoping to imply, the minor thirds are all implemented, as is the dominant nature of the V chord, and you just played through a I VI II V turnaround in the blues.

[ChrisN]

Originally Posted by SunnyDee

Someone will come along and say something complicated, but for the way you are thinking of it, you are right, there is no difference between the notes and chords in Am and the notes and chords in Cmajor. The difference is in where you put the "home" chord, what key it feels like it's in because of where you start and end a phrase. The I chord is different in each one, so if you played a I IV V chord progression, you'd get a different sound in each. But they'd still sound like they go together.

It's because you wouldn't just hop around playing them in random order, you start from a home and you return to it, you find ways to make the melody rise and fall, make phrases question.. and answer...and return home again.... If it were random hopping, yes, it would sound the same.

Originally Posted by Gordon Currie

C major and A minor (in your example) aren't truly separate scales. The A minor is a mode (Aeolian) of the C major scale. (There are other minor modes as well, less used as they might sound too unusual for some music.)

That is why they are so interchangeable - because they share the same notes.
Often the only way to tell if someone is 'thinking' in C major or A minor is to observe what note they start off on.

The value of this concept for improvisers is that it encourages you to look at what you do from a different angle. Is the glass half-empty, or half-full? Is the dress blue, or gold

Does this help?

Originally Posted by MC5C

Lets say you decided to play a simple lick in C over a I VI II V progression, really common. The pattern is /C C Am Am/Dm Dm G7 G7/. The first bar has two chords, C and Am. You might play an arpeggio C E G E, for the first two beats (eighth notes) and that would define the C chord perfectly. The next thing you play is A B C B. Because that part of the line starts on A, the C note is a minor third interval, and so that sequence defines the A minor chord. The next triad is Dm - the II chord - so you might use the notes D F A, maybe in a descending arpeggio - A F D F. Note the F is a minor third above the D. The final chord is the V chord - G7 - with the notes G B D F. You might stick with the F, which becomes the dominant 7th of the G instead of the minor third of the D, slide up to G to emphasise that, down to D and finish on C# - resolving to the tonic C. C# is the flat five of the G-7 chord, is a tri-tone note that kind of lives in both the G7 and C chords as a passing tone. All notes are in the C major scale (except the C#), all notes define the chords they are hoping to imply, the minor thirds are all implemented, as is the dominant nature of the V chord, and you just played through a I VI II V turnaround in the blues.

While I'm going to have spend more time with MC5C's response (a bit like drinking from a firehose, at my level, but I welcome the challenge), I think the responses thus far address my confusion. I was thinking in terms of the individual scale notes, alone, when thinking about soloing/improvisation (same notes = same sound, so what's "minor" about that?), without regard to the chords.

I haven't progressed to the point where I need to consider individual notes within the greater guiding context of the chords over which those notes are played. Once the chords are reordered and the chord-forming notes employed around them for the solo are played over the chords through different progressions, the sound would, indeed, be different, even though the same notes (and same key signature) are used. If I've missed it, please let me know, but I think that makes sense.

[Mandobart]

Originally Posted by SunnyDee

Someone will come along and say something complicated, but for the way you are thinking of it, you are right, there is no difference between the notes and chords in Am and the notes and chords in Cmajor. The difference is in where you put the "home" chord, what key it feels like it's in because of where you start and end a phrase. The I chord is different in each one, so if you played a I IV V chord progression, you'd get a different sound in each. But they'd still sound like they go together.....

Wrong, there are BIG differences - the I, IV and the V chord. In C major C is I, F is IV and G is V. Sure Am is vi. In the key of Am, Am is the I, Dm is the IV and E (major) is the V. To refer to a vi chord in a minor key doesn't make any sense.

[Gitfiddlemann]

When I practice scales these days, I usually do two octave major and melodic minor scale forms. The melodic minor scales are a nice sonic counter point to the major scales.
But note: the ascending melodic minor scale has a different pattern than the descending melodic minor scale form.
Am for example has F# and G# notes in its ascending form, but follows the key signature (no sharps, no flats) in its descending form.
So, when talking about minor scale forms you have to be mindful of which of the three types you are referring to: natural, harmonic or melodic.

[ChrisN]

Originally Posted by AndreF

When I practice scales these days, I usually do two octave major and melodic minor scale forms. The melodic minor scales are a nice sonic counter point to the major scales.
But note: the ascending melodic minor scale has a different pattern than the descending melodic minor scale form.
Am for example has F# and G# notes in its ascending form, but follows the key signature (no sharps, no flats) in its descending form.
So, when talking about minor scale forms you have to be mindful of which of the three types you are referring to: natural, harmonic or melodic.

Understood as to harmonic/melodic. Thanks

I can hear the difference in relative/natural minor scales when played as scales, but was a bit lost when it came to hearing any difference from improvisation, given the notes in relative/natural scales are the same. I think I understand the issue better now.

[Gordon Currie]

Originally Posted by Mandobart

In the key of Am, Am is the I, Dm is the IV and E (major) is the V. To refer to a vi chord in a minor key doesn't make any sense.

A minor (natural) has an Em as the V (or v) chord. F major is the VI.
Am7, Bm7b5, Cmaj7, Dm7, Em7, Fmaj7, G7.

You may be thinking of the A harmonic minor scale, which WILL give you the V major. But, it is no longer relative to the C major scale, which was the point raised by the original poster.

[mattbn73]

Easy to overcomplicate a lot of things with minor. First, it's very rare to see tunes which are pure natural minor. Most minor tunes have other chords in them. Pure natural minor is really a modal sound. It's actually most useful probably as a theoretical jumping off point for understanding the other minor scales etc.

If you want to learn everything theoretical about minor keys you'd have to understand all the different combinations. You'd need to know all the chords derived from natural minor, all the chords derived from harmonic minor, and all of the chords created from melodic minor. If you're not seriously studying jazz, that's probably overkill.

Ascending and descending melodic minor is actually a pretty good way to think of "minor" because it covers all the variations in pitch between the three scales. You just need to understand that they change in various ways and don't adhere to a ascending/descending type rules. It might be helpful at some point to understand how to create the different chords using those three minor scales, just for help in analysing a tune or something, but the melodic stuff is best understood as just natural minor with occasional natural 6 and natural 7.

Don't get too bogged down in a minor scale theory. It's not as linear and clean as major. What minor tunes are you learning ? What progressions in actual minor tunes are you using to explore some of this type of thing? Theory may help answer some questions about trouble spots with these kind of questions - brought about by actual songs, but it won't make much sense beforehand in abstraction.

[stanron]

The short answer is "It doesn't matter." The long answer is "It doesn't 'flipping' matter!" You shouldn't be trying to improvise by following theoretical rules. You should be trying to imagine SOUNDS and trying to find those SOUNDS on your guitar. This happens on your own, in your own head and nobody should be telling you what you should be doing. Including me.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by ChrisN

For context: I understand basic major scale theory, and how relative minor scales are born. I understand "A minor" is the relative/natural minor scale of "C major" that the two scales have the same notes, but in different order (so they will sound different, when played as a scale), and that the different note order necessarily results in the creation of different chords between the 2 scales.

Except it doesn't. The chords are the same, only their order is different, like the different note order.

Originally Posted by ChrisN

I understand that the difference between the "A major" and "A minor" scales is that the 3rd, 6th and 7th degrees are flattened to achieve the "a minor" scale. I understand that you can create the "A Minor" scale in 2 ways - (1) using the 6th degree of the relative major scale as the first note, and (2) flattening the 3rd, 6th, and 7th degrees of the minor's own "major" scale (eg, using "A major" to create "A minor).

All good!

Originally Posted by ChrisN

Then I read things similar to this:

If you take C major scale and compare it to A minor scale, you will see that they have exactly the same notes. In other words, the major scale has a related minor that is identical to it. Incredible, isn’t it? This is why the name “relative”. Compare below, for example, the scales C x Am and G x Em:

C major scale: C, D, E, F, G, A, B
A minor scale: A, B, C, D, E, F, G
G major scale: G, A, B, C, D, E, F#
E minor scale: E, F#, G, A, B, C
This is extremely useful! It means that we can use A minor scale to do a solo in a song which tonality is C major. In other words, when we have a major tonality, we can think in two scales: the major scale of this tonality and the relative minor scale of it. This increases our options when we are thinking in solo.

The bolded material is what is confusing to me.

I'm not surprised. It's bollocks.
It's telling you firstly that the scales are same notes - which you know already (so you won't find it "incredible" ) - and secondly it's contradicting that by saying they are "two scales" and that this "increases our options". Obviously it doesn't. It's bollocks.

Originally Posted by ChrisN

If I play the "A minor" scale in order (regardless of starting point), it's going to sound different from C major, however, if I solo or improvise in A minor, I'm using the same notes I'm using to solo/improvise in C major.

Yes.

Originally Posted by ChrisN

Same for G major and E minor - the notes are the notes, and hopping around playing them in different order during an improvisation isn't going to sound any different between the 2 scales. I'm missing something.

No you're not missing anything. The book is talking bollocks, like I said.
The writer himself (I suspect it's a "him") is confused.

Yes, "A minor" is a different sound from "C major", but that's a contextual thing, a key thing, not a scale thing. The "key of A minor" is definitely different from the "key of C major". It's about what note sounds like the tonal centre, which is nothing to do with the order you play a scale in when improvising. (The "key of A minor" typically includes harmonic and melodic variations to confirm its difference - as mentioned above - but it doesn't have to.)

If the tune is in the key of C major, you can play what you (or that writer) think of as the "A minor scale", but it's going to sound like the C major scale, however much you "start on A", and whatever pattern of the scale you choose.

I.e., your instinct is exactly right. A "scale" is best seen as merely a collection of pitches, a bunch of 7 notes with no keynote built in. We have to call it "C major" or "A minor" because we have no other common name for those 7 notes, and because those two "keys" are the most common applications of those 7 notes. I.e., those 7 notes acquire their tonal identity - their sense of "key", or a hierarchy of notes - from the context in which we use them.

That context could be a single chord. Take a C major chord and play the "A minor scale" over it. It will sound like the C major scale.
Take an Am chord and play the "C major scale" over it. It will sound like the A minor scale.
Take a Dm chord and play either scale over it. It will sound like D dorian mode.
And so on.
It's true if you accent different notes in the scale you'll get different effects. Start and end on A when playing over C major, you'll get an emphasis on the 6th of C major. That's a nice effect, but it doesn't make it "A minor".

I had a similar argument on another forum recently, with a very experienced player who could not seem to accept that the phrase "C major scale" could be used to refer merely to a pitch collection (the way we understand it). He thought it had to mean "C major chord arpeggio, with passing notes". I.e., with C as obvious root note. To him, it would have made no sense to say "play the C major scale on a Dm chord" - to him that's a contradiction in terms, and would even sound wrong.
The writer you quote seems to be thinking the same way: treating a "scale" as implying a "key" (or mode) before we even do anything with it.

[JonPR]

Originally Posted by mattbn73

Easy to overcomplicate a lot of things with minor. First, it's very rare to see tunes which are pure natural minor.

It's actually quite common in rock, pop or folk.
Difficult to say whether it's more or less common than full blown minor key (with harmonic/melodic variation), and it probably depends on genre. In jazz certainly the classical minor key system is much more common.

[ChrisN]

Originally Posted by mattbn73

Easy to overcomplicate a lot of things with minor. First, it's very rare to see tunes which are pure natural minor. Most minor tunes have other chords in them. Pure natural minor is really a modal sound. It's actually most useful probably as a theoretical jumping off point for understanding the other minor scales etc.

If you want to learn everything theoretical about minor keys you'd have to understand all the different combinations. You'd need to know all the chords derived from natural minor, all the chords derived from harmonic minor, and all of the chords created from melodic minor. If you're not seriously studying jazz, that's probably overkill.

Ascending and descending melodic minor is actually a pretty good way to think of "minor" because it covers all the variations in pitch between the three scales. You just need to understand that they change in various ways and don't adhere to a ascending/descending type rules. It might be helpful at some point to understand how to create the different chords using those three minor scales, just for help in analysing a tune or something, but the melodic stuff is best understood as just natural minor with occasional natural 6 and natural 7.

Don't get too bogged down in a minor scale theory. It's not as linear and clean as major. What minor tunes are you learning ? What progressions in actual minor tunes are you using to explore some of this type of thing? Theory may help answer some questions about trouble spots with these kind of questions - brought about by actual songs, but it won't make much sense beforehand in abstraction.

I appreciate all of the responses, but this one in particular reflects another thing I need to modify, which is my approach to learning music, as distinct from other, more practical, things. Rather than sit down, learn 3 chords, and knock out a simple tune, I . . .

. . . learn the fretboard and why that second string poses issues. I learn all about the mechanics of guitars (acoustic and electric) to decide what I like (and end up with 18 guitars, even after selling 5), and don't like, do my own modifications/repairs, learn major scale theory, chord building (and all of the chords, major/minor/dims/7s), all of the major scales, now onto the minor, you get the idea.

I'm building the house by first taking the foundation-making course, then the wall-making course, while the other guy's already wrapping up his first small cottage. Because I'm not putting it together as I go, I don't see how the weather vane is to be placed because I've not finished my roof-making course. Meanwhile, other folks are happy as clams learning and playing a bunch of songs.

One of my problems is that I need to understand what I'm doing and why I'm doing it - I need to understand it, not just do it, but if that was the right way to handle it, would I have ever learned to drive a car, or to tell time? Of course, one of the big reasons I undertook this journey was to provide mental stimulation going into life's "back 9," so, for me, excess analysis of the physical parts and process is also part of the fun.

I'm not planning to be a hardcore jazz guy, just want to be able to more easily learn a song I want to play without running into roadblocks because I don't understand the fundamentals. I'll now work on tying it together so that I can move forward.

Also, the excerpt in my original post is not from my books, but from a website I ran across while I searched for an answer before posting here. My books spend hardly any time on minor theory, and perhaps I now know why. Thanks for the help.

[jaymarsch]

Hi Chris,

I certainly can relate to your needing and wanting to understand the theory of music. I have a similar mind and have had to find a balance between learning my way through and feeling my way through. I think that it was Larry (lj here on the forum) who is a guitar teacher who once said that learning music is a lot like a child learning language. At first they don't know anything about how language works but through listening and repetition and trial and error, children learn to speak their native language. As they get older, then they learn all of the parts of speech and the sentence structure of language and how language actually works. It is great to cultivate both minds - the structured and unstructured. At some point they will integrate and then a whole new level of understanding is reached. and at that new level, part of the learning is letting go of the understanding.

Best,
Jayne