Music Scales

Scale is a sequence of musical notes with specific order. There are few types of scale such as pentatonic (5 notes) and diatonic (7 notes). In this article we will see about diatonic scale. In diatonic scale, the first note is called tonic. The second note to the rest of the notes are respectively called super tonic, median, sub dominant, dominant, sub median and leading note. Under diatonic scale, there are few types of scale based on the intervals between notes which are grouped under major and minor scales.

I will use "F" as full and "H" as half to represent the interval. Major scale the intervals are F-F-H-F-F-F-H. For minor scale, there are 3 types: natural, harmonic and melodic.

The natural minor scale is formed using intervals F-H-F-F-H-F-F. The harmonic minor scale intervals are F-H-F-F-H-FH-H. The melodic minor scale has different intervals between the ascending and descending. The ascending is F-H-F-F-F-F-H and the descending intervals are the same as natural minor scale.

Here are some examples:

C major: C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C.

A minor (natural): A-B-C-D-E-F-G-A

A minor (harmonic): A-B-C-D-E-F-G#-A

A minor (melodic): A-B-C-D-E-F#-G#-A (asc) and A-G-F-E-D-C-B-A (desc)

written by SH