19

This is a very minor question, but I'm trying to learn a piece (a Bach Concerto in D minor) that has the following sequence of notes played in order:

A B C# D E F G A

My piano teacher said it was a scale, but could not/did not determine what it is called. So to satisfy my curiosity, what would you call it?

Dom
  • 47,641
  • 23
  • 155
  • 287
Brian Schroth
  • 543
  • 3
  • 8
  • 2
    These are exactly the notes from the D minor scale, are you only confused because you start and finish on A? Or am I misunderstanding something? – Anthony Labarre May 06 '11 at 15:17
  • 4
    @Anthony: Not true. The D minor scale (natural and melodic at least) has a B flat. – Noldorin May 06 '11 at 15:20
  • 1
    As per the sheet music, there is in fact a natural on the B. –  May 06 '11 at 15:39
  • 1
    @Brian: Yep, it appears right there in the 3rd bar. (I checked on another score too.) The base clef includes a simultaneous and parallel scale. I would presume the D was simply naturalised for "chromatic effect", and would classify it as such: a "modified D harmonic minor scale". – Noldorin May 06 '11 at 15:43
  • @Matthew Read: That sheet music to which you linked is peculiar in the sense that it explicitly marks every Bb with the accidental rather than using a key signature. Why would the editor make that choice? It seems so cumbersome. – Alex Basson May 06 '11 at 15:53
  • @Alex I found that strange myself, but I would assume it's a tangential issue. –  May 06 '11 at 15:57
  • @Alex Basson: The piece is still in D minor, regardless of whether most of the B flats are naturalised. I suspect you'll find Bs without any accidentals later on in the score. – Noldorin May 06 '11 at 15:58
  • @Noldorin: Isn't D-E-F-G-A-B-C-D the D Dorian mode rather than D-minor? Could that be what Bach intended? I don't know this piece at all, you may be right that B's without accidentals occur later, and I can't claim any knowledge of Bach's intentions. But for a piece marked as being in "D-Minor", it seems a strange choice not to use its corresponding key signature. Anyway, Matthew's probably right about this being a tangential issue. – Alex Basson May 06 '11 at 16:04
  • @Alex: Which Dorian mode? Perhaps you mean the Hypodorian mode. There's a C# however. Perhaps I misunderstand... in any case, we all agree it's beside the main point here. – Noldorin May 06 '11 at 16:08
  • IIRC the sheet music I have is a different version and uses the right key signature, though a lot of the Bb are explicitly marked anyway. – Brian Schroth May 06 '11 at 16:09
  • @Noldorin: I'm sorry I wasn't more clear. I wasn't referring to the OP's scale, which I don't recognize but which certainly isn't D-Dorian. I was referring to your assertion that the piece is "in D-Minor, regardless of whether most of the B flats are naturalised." I was wondering whether, hypothetically, such a piece would still be considered as being "in D-Minor" instead of, say, being modally centered around D-Dorian. – Alex Basson May 06 '11 at 16:14
  • @Alex: Ah, now I see. That's a fair point I suppose. A music theorist might be needed to answer it. :) – Noldorin May 06 '11 at 16:20
  • @Alex Bach did write a number of modal pieces, especially chorales, but I am not familiar with any piece of his using modes of the melodic minor scale. It is difficult to say without more context what Bach's intent was, but the notes as given are those of the 5th mode of the D melodic minor scale (even though I doubt that was the original intent). – Rein Henrichs May 07 '11 at 02:27
  • 1
    "a very minor question" - lol – Mr. Boy Jan 13 '15 at 07:57

3 Answers3

31

This is a D melodic minor scale (The root of the scale would be D since this Bach), which alters depending on if it is descending or ascending. When ascending the 6 and 7th degrees are raised, and then decending they are lowered. So when descending it is the same as a natural minor scale.

enter image description here

These are pretty common in classic music and are often standard of youth symphony auditions.

As a side note, there are some interesting sounds based on different modes of the melodic minor scale (i.e. the same notes, but starting on notes other than D).

Kyle Brandt
  • 4,131
  • 1
  • 23
  • 18
  • that looks like it to me...well done. – Brian Schroth May 06 '11 at 16:13
  • +1 You're right, this is the D minor melodic! As an amateur, I wasn't very familiar with it. (Certainly not encountered nearly as often as the harmonic or even natural perhaps.) Glad someone trained in music knows, though. – Noldorin May 06 '11 at 16:24
  • The ascending melodic minor scale is also known as the "jazz minor" scale and its modes are used in the voicings for mM7 chords, minor II-V and II-V-I progressions (like the Em7b5 A7b9 that begins Stella By Starlight), 7#9, 7alt and susb9 chords. Very interesting sound, made popular by artists like by Miles Davis and Bill Evans. – Rein Henrichs May 06 '11 at 18:10
  • BTW the fifth mode of melodic minor rarely appears even in Jazz music. – Rein Henrichs May 06 '11 at 18:50
  • 6
    If we wanted to look at it in modal terms (given the starting note A), it is A mixolydian b6 - the fifth mode of D melodic minor, as Rein Henrichs pointed out. –  May 07 '11 at 01:39
  • A beautiful example of this scale is in Carmen's entr'acte inside the third act. Both going up (upward melodic minor starting on the dominant) and down (downward melodic minor starting on the dominant). Maybe it is supposed to sound spanish... – Gauthier May 07 '11 at 11:12
  • I am going to go home and re-study minor scales. I should not have forgotten this. +1 Kyle –  May 12 '11 at 21:46
  • 1
    @Kyle Brandt: While I do agree that these are the tones of ascending D melodic minor, I wonder if this mode (based on A in this example) has a name. You wouldn't say that G mixolydian is C major, so if this is not D ascending melodic, this is A what? – Gauthier Sep 01 '11 at 12:17
  • @Faza: is A mixolydian b6 a standard name, or something you came up with here? – Gauthier Sep 02 '11 at 07:30
  • 1
    After more research, it seems to me that Faza has the correct answer: mixolydian b6. It might also be called the Hindu scale. ref: http://www.jazzguitar.be/melodic_minor_modes.html – Gauthier Sep 02 '11 at 07:37
  • 1
    @Gauthier It's the standard name. See The Jazz Theory Book by Mark Levine. – Rein Henrichs Sep 02 '11 at 08:03
  • 1
    @Rein: I just saw that and wrote it in an answer. I don't mean to hijack and use your knowledge in an answer I write, I just thought the name should figure in an answer rather than a comment. Also, I own that book and did not even check there :) ... books do not have a search button. – Gauthier Sep 02 '11 at 08:17
  • 1
    @Gauthier No worries. I hijacked all my knowledge from someone else too. I think they call that "learning". :) – Rein Henrichs Sep 02 '11 at 08:29
10

It seems to me that Faza has the correct answer in his comment to Kyle Brandt:

A mixolydian b6

It may also be called the A Hindu scale.

References:

Still unsure if it is appropriate to use Mixolydian b6 are Hindu for a mode.

Gauthier
  • 4,668
  • 2
  • 27
  • 36
  • Perhaps edit into "A mixolydian b6" to point out that this is the scale starting on A as per the question? (Which happens to use the same note material as the ascending D melodic minor scale, and also is a consequence of the tonic being D minor.) – Ulf Åkerstedt Dec 29 '12 at 19:51
0

In my opinion it falls under the definition of a diatonic scale, where two WWH back to back are separated by a W. As said by some of the experienced musicians in the earlier comments, it has similarity to a Mixolydian scale with an exception of the 6th note. This cannot be called a melodic scale because ascending & descending orders appear to be the same. I think there is little need to call it by any name. Just play and enjoy the sound.

Sabyasachi Ghosh, Mumbai

Sabyasachi Ghosh
  • 21
  • 1
  • 2
    Because it comes up in the context of a Bach piece in D minor though, It's really just D melodic minor. If it was in a context where A was the pitch centre, I'd agree with everything you've said; but in this case it's simply a rune of notes that starts and ends on the fifth degree of the scale. – Some_Guy Jul 28 '15 at 08:43