You Are Reading the First 6 FREE Chapters (470 pages)

Major and Minor Pentatonic: Augmented Second and Whole Tone Intervals

Both the major pentatonic and the minor pentatonic scales use the same five black keys on the piano. Each scale has the same number of whole tone intervals (three), and the same number of augmented second intervals (two). Yet these two pentatonic scales sound markedly different from each other. How come?

Because, with any scale, each of the constituent tones forms an interval with the tonic note. So, if you change the order of the intervals, you change the character of the entire scale. Even if you use the same number and same sizes of intervals.

It goes back to ratios of frequencies.

Each tone of a scale has a unique frequency ratio with respect to the tonic note. If you move even one tone to a different position within a scale, you change its frequency ratio with respect to the tonic note—and with all the other notes in the scale. This changes the sound of the entire scale. Consequently, it changes the character of melodies crafted using the scale.

In other words, if you move even one tone in a scale, it becomes a different scale with different melodic potential.

< Previous   Next >