Major Scales - Music Theory Lesson 5

Welcome to Aristia Music. Let's talk about major scales. In our previous lesson, we learned what accidentals are, what they do, and how to use them. If you haven't watched that video lesson, I linked it in the description below, along with the lesson on tones and semitones, just in case you need to re-watch it because we're going to be using that knowledge for today's lesson. In this lesson, you will learn what an octave is, what a scale is, what is meant by major when talking about a major scale, and how to build a major scale in any key. In order to understand what an octave is, I will start by making a simple analogy. As you can see, here is a color scheme for the color green. It goes from dark to light, and even though the green color varies in shade, it stays green. Sound is like the color green, and the octaves are like the change in shade. In other words, a sound can be the same but change in pitch. Here is an example. Listen to this sound and notice how it stays the same, even though it increases in pitch. The increase or decrease of pitch in the sound is the shade, from darker to brighter. The pitch itself always has the same color of sound. The distance between two different shades of the same sound color is called an octave, because it takes 8 keys, or pitches, to move from one shade of sound color to the next. Let's count those pitches. As we've learned in previous lessons, moving from one key or pitch to the next involves either a tone or a semitone. Here is the basic key pattern of the keyboard. This is also the octave pattern of our middle pitch. Each octave is made up of 12 semitones. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, and 12. Or 6 tones. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Once you have reached the octave pitch or key, the pattern repeats over and over and over throughout the keyboard at higher or lower pitches. As you can see, the pattern is made up of 5 black keys. 2, then 3. Below these 5 black keys, there are 7 white keys. I'm not including the octave key or pitch to this pattern, because that just restarts the whole pattern again. At the two extremes of the keyboard, the pattern would go on. However, we run out of keys. Therefore, the pattern ends without including certain black keys. There are 7 full sets of this pattern in a full keyboard. 7 x 12 equals to 84, plus the 3 keys at the bottom, and the 1 at the very top, which gives us 88 keys total on a full keyboard. The middle pitch is the 4th pattern, in the middle. The middle pitch color will always be 1 semitone below the first of the 2 black keys in our 5 black key pattern set. So now that we know how to find it, let's play every octave of the middle pitch going up and going down. As you can hear, the sound color is the same, but in a different pitch or shape. If we play two of these pitches together, we get one solid sound, one color. Now that we know the octave is the 8th pitch of a sequence of pitches, let's learn about the scale. Scale literally means ladder, stairs, or steps in Latin or Italian. You pronounce it scale. The scale is an arrangement of tones and semitones, occupying the sound space between two notes of the same color, aka octaves. There are countless ways in which we could arrange the tones and semitones of our scale, but only a few make sense to an ear accustomed to western sounds and instruments. The middle pitch is special because not only is it the meeting place between the two clefs, but it is where the major scale establishes itself. The white keys of a keyboard are set to a major scale by default. The word major in major scale refers to the specific arrangement of tones and semitones that make up that scale. Now, I am abstaining from naming pitch names in order to give an understanding based on reason and experience alone. Let's analyze the major scale and see how the tones and semitones that make up the major scale are arranged. We are going to focus on this section of the keyboard. The section of keys in between the red lines will be represented right here in a zoomed-in version. Now we count how many tones and semitones it takes to go from one white key to the next one. We're only going to count semitones to make it easy. This is our starting pitch and we start from here. 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1. Now that we've done that, let's see how this formula applies in different keys. Let's take this key for example. If I just play the scale up one octave from this key, it sounds off because this is not the middle key and the scale has a different arrangement of tones and semitones. This scale has the following arrangement of tones and semitones. 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 1, 2. Now let's arrange the tones and semitones in this octave to build a major scale starting from this very key. The major scale formula is 2, 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 1. Let's try it. This is our starting pitch. 1, 2, semitones. 1, semitone. 1, 2, semitones. 1, semitone. Here is what our major scale will sound like now. Voila! Let's try another key. First, we play one octave up the scale. From the sound of it, we know it is not a major scale. Let's make it into one by applying the major scale formula. Here is our starting pitch. 2, 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 1. Now that you know all of that, feel free to print out the free staff paper in the description so that you can follow along in the independent practice exercises that I will provide for you now. You can also pause the video and complete the exercises before getting the answer. Here we go. Number 1. Build a major scale on this key. First, we listen to the scale being played from one octave to the next. We're not altering any of the white keys in order to get to that next octave. Starting on this pitch, we're going to apply the major scale formula. 2, 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 1. Lastly, we play our scale and we have a major scale on this key. Number 2. Build a major scale on this key. First, we listen to the scale being played from one octave to the next. We're not altering any of the white keys in order to get to that next octave. Starting on this pitch, we're going to apply the major scale formula. 2, 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 1. Lastly, we play our scale and we have a major scale on this key. Number 3. Build a major scale on this key. First, we listen to the scale being played from one octave to the next. We're not altering any of the white keys in order to get to that next octave. Starting on this pitch, we're going to apply the major scale formula. 2, 2, 1, 2, 2, 2, 1. Lastly, we play our scale and we have a major scale on this key. As you've learned, an octave refers to two pitches of the same color and different shape. A scale is a series of eight pitches occupying the interval between the octave pitches, including the octave pitches. And the way we arrange the series of pitches, through tones and semitones, determines whether the scale is major or not. Congratulations! You are now able to build a major scale on almost any key. In our next lesson, we will be learning about double accidentals. Click on the link and don't miss it. If you find my videos helpful, give a like and subscribe to help me bring you more free music lessons. In the meantime, have a musical day and I'll see you in the next one.