(Theory) "Musical Modes" – What did they do to YOU, right now? That's the point.

[MikeRobinson]

Music-students since time immemorial (at least through the past several centuries ...) have been forced to endure the topic of "Musical Modes" without ... I submit ... really understanding them, nor their very(!) practical effect upon your musical compositions.  No, in their desperation to achieve whatever was (for them) "a passing grade," they very quickly realized that pig-Latin sequences such as "Ionian, Dorian, Phyrigian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian" were nothing more than irrelevant nonsense that had to be memorized (somehow) for at least the next twelve weeks.   So they came up with things like "I Don't Pet Little Monkeys After Lunch" to tide them over during their periodic "one-hours from Hell" before racing for the door.

 

So ... why am I bringing up this probably still-sore point now?  Because there really was a very-essential and very-useful "point of pragmatic music theory" out there which you can actually use for dramatic effect in your songwriting.  (Actually, in your orchestration of whatever you have written ... which actually turns out to be a very important part of what you must do. Unless you don't.)

 

(First of all, and before we continue, "the Nashville Number System."  No more pig-Latin: just numbers, "one through seven."  Say goodbye to those monkeys.)

 

The first(!) essential idea, in all of Western music, is staring you in the face whenever you look at your keyboard and play "the C-scale, all white notes":

1. The "white notes" are separated by "black notes."  ... but ...
2. The arrangement of white-and-black notes is not symmetrical, and the spaces where "no intervening black key exists" is also not symmetrical.  It exists between notes #3-4 and (wrapping around(!)) notes #7-8.
3. If we agree to call "white-key to next-white-key" a "whole step" when there's a black-key in the way, and a "half-step" when there isn't, we actually see a very definite pattern to those steps:  "W-W-H-W-W-W-H."  (Go ahead, check it out.  I'll wait.)

 

Well, the second(!) essential idea is most likely where your music-theory semester ran out – as they patiently explained what "all those sharps and flats on the left side of a piece of music were arranged in just the way they are.  It turns out that, if you start on any of the twelve-total notes in the scale, and follow the above-mentioned progression of halfs and wholes, you will (the hard way ...) "play a major scale in" whatever ... "key" ... you found yourself in.  (The "key" having been determined by whatever note you started on.  Try it.  I'll wait.)

 

So  now, the third(!!) essential idea:  What if "this is the key that I'm in, and I'm stickin' to it?"  Well, of course you could simply give them "three chords and the truth," but you could also decide to play a musical trick on them:  instead of sounding the "next note" that would be proper in the key of (say that you are now in) "C," what if you gave them the note that would sound just-right in "E?"

 

(Nashville numbers:  C=1, E=3, difference=2.) 

 

You have just dealt them a mathematically-simple musical surprise that "sounds right, except that it doesn't sound quite right in this context, except that it sounds right and I'm not entirely sure why."

 

Here's the trick:

1. Your music teacher would say that you "used a <<pig-Latin>> mode."
2. A mathematician would say that you "rotated the progession of halves and wholes."
3. And yet, most-importantly, your audience didn't see it coming.

 

Here's the math:  (nothing more than a simple rotation!)
 

  Math:     1 2 3 4 5 6 7

  C-Major:  W W H W W W H

  C + 3:    H W W W H W W

  Math:     3 4 5 6 7 1 2

Now, "if you persist in this trick," for more than a measure or so, then your audience will of course "enjoy a key-change," and expect your newly-established key to "become the new major."  Within seconds, their sense of surprise will have been overcome by expectation.  But ... what else can you do?

 

- - -

 

Suppose that you "salt" the melody that you are playing, "in the key of (say) C," with the sharps-or-flats ... but perhaps not all(!) of them ... from some other key?

 

Until now, you called them "accidentals ..."

[geographyhorse]

I use modes often. I'm a sucker for Dorian and Locrian (I love challenging myself and trying to use Locrian in a manner that sounds "musical"). I also use "accidentals" although I've always called them "Incidentals". Oh well. 😛 Key changes, for me, are most useful for recapitulation so you can repeat a previous phrase or "hook" without boring your audience. I did this my most recent song and tend to use either the dominant or sub-dominant major to express the key change (i.e go from C major to either F or G major; sounds the most natural to my ears).

 

I've never actually gone to school for any of this stuff (I took piano lessons but was admittedly "a poor student"). I actually got most of my "theory" education while working with a cellist when I was staying in Philadelphia. It became easier to communicate complex musical ideas using proper terminology and in writing on sheet paper than having to show each other the idea on the respective instruments. 

 

I'm sure my piano teacher would get a good laugh out of how integral "theory" has become to a large body of my musical compositions. Although, she would still be miffed that I approach such things the way a jazz musician would and not necessarily how a classical musician would. I consider myself a performer first; composer second. The end goal (to me; anyway) for all of this stuff is to both entertain and ultimately; be entertained. If I'm not enjoying myself, then what's the point. 😜 

[MikeRobinson]

What I remember from every "music theory class" I ever took was that they focused on the Pig Latin and never got around to pointing out the very simple musical ideas that were actually lurking just behind it.

 

"Music" is naturally very mathematical and therefore has a lot of "theory."  A lot of that "theory" is actually boots-on-the-ground useful!  But, there's a whole lot of "memorization fodder" that gets put in the way.  For instance, we could just as easily refer to the modes using numbers, 1-7.  And stop "petting little monkeys after lunch."