What is a major scale in music and how does it relate to melody, chords and key signatures?
Much of the music we hear in western culture uses the major scale. This includes nursery rhymes, pop songs, classical pieces and much more. Examples include: “The Itsy-Bitsy Spider”, “When The Saints Go Marching In”, “One Love” by Bob Marley, etc. The song “Don’t Worry, Be Happy” for example, uses a scale that is derived from the major scale; the major pentatonic scale. More on the major pentatonic scale later on. Aside from being one of the most widely used scales in western music, the major scale is also a good base for understanding music theory.
The Major Scale is made up of the following pattern of intervals:
Whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, half step. This pattern gives us the “happy”, major sound, characteristic of the major scale. So you can pick any note and then apply the above pattern to create a major scale. There is a more practical way to learn and remember scales and that is by learning all of the key signatures. Read last week’s article for an explanation.
We can also play the major scale starting on each note of the scale. This gives us different sounds, known as modes, that are created from the different patterns of intervals that occur when you start from different places in the scale. Each mode has a unique pattern of intervals– a unique sound, which means each mode has a unique chord embedded in it. The major scale has this pattern: Whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, half step. But if we start instead on scale degree 3 of the major scale, we would have this pattern: half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step. This pattern gives us different intervals, which results in a different sound. Continue reading about modes here.
The major pentatonic scale we mentioned earlier creates the melody of the popular song “Don’t Worry, Be Happy”. The major pentatonic scale is like the major scale, but without two of the notes. To explain further, the major scale has 7 notes (1,2,3,4,5,6,7) and the pentatonic scale has 5 notes (1,2,3,5,6). So, you can take away the 4th and 7th notes of the major scale to create the major pentatonic scale, or add the 4th and 7th notes to the pentatonic scale to create the major scale.
To develop a good understanding of all of the major scales in all 12 keys, you should know key signatures by heart. We talked about key signatures last week.
Stay tuned for next week’s lesson. We will be putting together our knowledge of diatonic chord progressions with modes and key signatures.
If you have any questions, email me at tetyanahar@gmail.com.
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