Hello guys,

I need some help to get some clarity into something that might be super obvious but I'm learning and quite confused at the moment.
Let's say I want to make a song on C Major (so it should only use all the white keys theoretically).

By the moment I want to do a chord progression:
There's some major chords that having a white key as root, end up using a key out of the scale (e.g, using D as root, i would have to use D, F#, A) - Can I still use those chords? It doesn't sound off to me but I'm unsure of how correct that is. Same would happen if instead of using major chords, I use 7th chords, then those can end up in the same way, with notes out of the scale).

So I guess the final question would be: how can I make sure I am sticking to the scale / doing it right? I want to learn the foundations properly going forward. Is it that if I'm in a major scale, I can only use major chords? Or that I should only use the notes within the scale, and the chords that come out should be a result of that and can be of any kind?

Thank you so much in advance!

 

Look, I play everything by ear, for over 20 years. You can do whatever you want if it sounds good to your ear. But if you want to delve into scales, how they are formed, and the reason behind everything, I recommend starting to read something about harmony. A colleague passed me some PDFs and a harmony book that answers those questions you have. If you speak Spanish, I can send you the PDFs via PM. There are several of them. D, F#m, and A are within the D scale in the chord progression. F# is not, but that doesn't mean that if you make a song with D F# A, it will sound bad. It will likely sound different from what one is used to hearing, but it all depends on the melody. For example, if when you go to F#, the melody falls on the note A, it will sound bad or "dissonant" because you have a seventh that clashes (A# and A, in F#). But the white keys have nothing to do with scales; for example, you have C7 that uses the note A#, as I said, I understand all of this by ear, but in a harmony book, it explains the reason for each thing. For instance, why a minor chord is formed from a major one, and it's because a B flat is added to the third note of the chord. Greetings

 

Thank you so much for the message,it clarifies all my doubts.
I know you can always do things "by ear" but I needed to understand the logic behind the models... Now everything makes sense, all the pieces fit together lol
Thank you again for the thorough reply, super helpful!

 

One guy that has some REALLY great videos on theory and stuff is David Bennett Piano. I'd seriously recommend going through his playlist, starting with the more basic stuff first. But I watch everything that guy ever puts out. He does a great job of explaining everything, and showing you with real song examples and such.. and I don't find it dry at all, unlike some YouTubers.

He's got plenty of videos on modes, scales, circle of fifths, and all sorts of relevant information. Plus I've learned about some concepts there that I had no idea even existed too. For years I've been someone who just did things by ear.. what sounds good, but I've opened the door to some other ideas by digging through some more deeper concepts that he talked about.

 

Not necessarily, there are great songs that have been composed by ear. The purpose of music is to convey beyond the elements you use. You can be a musical genius in terms of knowledge but it may not be liked, or you might fall into the same thing over and over again. Many songs have stood out for breaking structures.

 

It's question with many possibilities. Not difficult per se, but difficult to understand without knowledge of basic theory. A lot of it depends on what is happening around the chord, maybe most importantly what's happening next. For starters I'd recommend looking up chordfunctions, specifically the dominant chord (V7). Then follow that up with secondary dominants. Then you're able to turn that D chord into a II7, and use it as a V7/V ;) But for now your F# is just a chromatic note. Definitely doesn't imply a mode as people said before. But it could be passing, leading, dominant or interchange look up these terms after understanding secondary dominants, it'll definitely help.

Edit: and to answer one of your questions more directly: it's called a major scale because the 3rd note of the scale has a major interval: C-E.

 

Last edited: Dec 30, 2023

Music theory includes classical, jazz, pop, electronic, etc., and each of these have their own recommendations and rules. In each of these, some things are allowed and some things are not allowed. Some of these recommendations are common and some are different. These differences are an integral part of these musics. In my opinion, before asking any question in the field of music theory, the style of music and the period to which the music belongs should be determined first, and then the question should be asked.

 

Sorry, but that is incorrect.

 

just build chords in the scale - like when you see chords being talked about like: I-III-V, those are intervals of notes in the scale, from the root note (I) to build said chord. playing chords outside of the scale(off key) creates dissonance, but you can create that tension in different ways with using just chords in the scale, so its not needed to play chords outside of the scale, only if it sounds good to you. all of the notes within the scale make all of the chords for that key

like in the CMAJ scale like you mentioned, C is the root, the 3 note, then the 5th note in that scale make a C major chord. the next note in the scale is D, using that same formula with D as the root, the third note from it, paired and the 5th note, make a Dmin chord. that would read like I-IIIb-V. all minor chords have a flat 3rd, but since its in the CMAJ scale, and DMAJ (I-III-V) has F#, which isnt in the scale, the 3rd note is flat making it Dmin; though within the C Major scale you followed the same pattern of I-III-V to get that chord

using that you can access all of the major and minor chords and a diminished chord within the scale, to build on them add a VII, or IX or whatever chord type

 

Last edited: Jan 17, 2024

when you are on a chord you have all 12 notes to use for melody.
(because you play differently on weak beats vs strong beats)

 

If we assume C Maj, all your basic chords will use notes that are part of the scale.

If C is the root note of the chord you add a (major) third and a perfect fifth from that root. This will be the C Maj chord in the scale of C Maj. You can use any notes within the scale of C Maj as your root and add a third and a fifth and voila: there is your chord.

The terms "third" and "fifth" can be a bit misleading in the beginning, since they don't refer to the number of semitones between two notes, but to the staff positions in musical notation. Also there are minor thirds and major thirds.

major third = 4 semitones
perfect fifth = 7 semitones

This should help: https://www.musictheory.net/lessons/40



https://www.piano-keyboard-guide.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/chords-in-the-key-of-c-714x1024.png

 

Don't think of your song as being "in C Major so I will only use C Major pitches to sound good", as this only leads to sounding very limited and bland. Even classical composers never thought of it like that, they constantly change scales and shards of scales as the music goes on to evoke new feelings. Not just from section to section, the scale can flutter and change within small areas of 2-3 notes in the melody, so that later professors studying your classical piece will argue about what scale you wrote it in, since it can be several at once.

Instead think of it as having a C root. You can use major, minor, and any weird special scales (scales! not chords but scales) you want for your colors, different scales with different feels but they will all be rooted on C, built starting from C. Study how the different scales you picked for your palette of feelings intersect when they're all relative to the same root on C (you will easily see on the pianoroll what notes they have in common, that's what I mean by "intersect").

Exploring the sound of all possible scales and easily building them relative to C root:
https://ianring.com/musictheory/scales/

In old classical music composers went crazy with "modulation" which means changing this root mid-song, but smoothly and impressively instead of jarringly. It isn't anything special, just sort of its own feel you can get from music. If you're going for a more contemporary sound and are not Thom Yorke, you can just ignore the whole idea of modulating the root mid-song safely for now, because it's almost never used. As you learn more you might come back to it. Instead just pick your root, pick the scales you will use, and use several scales at the same time as you please, rooted on the same pitch like C (but can use any, for different color). Your music will immediately gain a level-up.

So what chords can you use when using scales this way, relative to a common root? Answer: All of them, your chord progression can be modified when the melody is doing something with a new scale, or it could be allowed to temporarily clash on purpose, because that's an exciting feel as well, a spice you definitely need. There is no need to only build chords within your chosen scales, but you can sometimes do so to get everything gelling together beautiful where you need it to.


This is the kind of knowledge you will need to actually compose your own, rather than play other people's music and to explore it on your own without any theory teachers, and get great results. Most music education centers around playing music, though. You have to be careful otherwise too much of that mis-education for "being a highly skilled playback device for music other ppl wrote" will send you down frustrating paths that are just pointless memorization, killing all your motivation to write your own music in the first place.



If you want a tip you can remember when you forget everything else about theory and are hung over, hating on a bitch, and got about three braincells still working but want to write music here's one that sets you completely free to write without thinking of almost anything. Let's say you are rooted on C (and maybe got midi transpose set up so it can automatically be any other key while you're always looking at C). If you look at your piano roll, there are white keys and two groups of black keys. The tip is this, In each of the two groups of black keys, ignore the very first black key of the group and never press it. In C, that's going to be the button for C# and the button for F# that you never touch. You can use all 10 of the others together, freely. Think of the black ones as "dark and minor sounding" varieties of spice that you can throw in when you want to change up one of the white buttons you've been using. This way you can make new scales on the run as you write melodies and chords, without even knowing what they're called or what their scale formula is.

What's the problem with the two black keys that we're deliberately ignoring? They are kinda cursed, in that they're useful for the aforementioned classical style "modulation" into new roots, and if you use them while rooted on C, they'll clash and confuse the listeners who will unconsciously be expecting that you're modulating away from root C when they hear those two pitches, 1 semitone and 6 semitones in the context of C root.

But you don't even need to remember that, just remember "no touching the first black key of every group of black keys, on the pianoroll".

 

Last edited: Jan 20, 2024

I've never really known any scale going in music and just threw together 3 notes and said 'ok this is the chord' without really knowing the name of the chord or even if it actually excited (it usually did) and in which scale it belonged. They ended up being al kinda chords like 7s or suspended or basically any kind, but I did not know it at the time. It felt like a wonderful journey to investate this myself rather to feel like I was doing some music 'homework' like memorizing this or that. I think the more you know, the more it can also limit you. For example ,beignners are often thought very uninpiring things like the C major scale, which can easily be too predictable and too much of what you've been hearing your whole life on the radio already.
So be sure to pick a style of learning that fits your natural personality. Are you the kind of guy that reads manuals before doing something like handling some devide or do you just start to play around.
Basically anything is allowed in music and sometimes knowing less limits you less since you are not knowingly sticking or breakign rules. You just do what is natural to you or feels natural to the song you are composing.
However, the downside is that sometimes you have a preference for a certain mode/scale without knowing it like I did. I've made like maybe 50 songs (often not completed though , just guessing the number) and the ones I've always liked most used the harmonic minor notes, without me knowing that was even a scale/mode as I just threw notes together and called it a chord. Apparently without knowing it that is my musical fetish, so to speak (harmnic minor). So now I've learned more actual music theory the last year I more so know how to get that specific sound to feed this musical fetish. I also found I liked the songs more where I changed keys without knowing by it was called or or where I used borrwed chords.
Now with all that knowledge in mind the last months I do find it a bit harder to start a song, because I feel like I conciously have to choose a direction, rather than just to let the music lead me whereever it seems to want to go. So I've lost a bit of that boylike naivety. So in the end I'd say it's like always a bit of a doubled edged sword and it depends on your personality what works best for you.