[EDITED!] Music Theory for Dubsteppers [Production Bible v2]

[baydestrian]

Info about scales and keys was really helpful....

[teqh]

Boring shit to learn but veeeeeeeerrrrrrry useful!!! I remember getting this drilled into my head by my guitar teahcer

[jobbanaught]

Missed out on this when it was originally posted, could have spared me hours of pushing notes around more or less randomly
Really really helpful!

[c03]

Learning scales is a bit of a bitch and can be boring if you just sit down at your keyboard playing the scale and trying to memorise.

A "fun" way to learn scales etc off by heart is playing along to tunes - either other people's tunes or your own basic chord progressions. Just work out the corresponding scale(s) and then play around, eventually you will be able to improvise in these scales and you will know exactly what note you will produce before hitting the key.

The hard bit is learning enough scales by heart to keep up with the tunes in your head

tip - dub/reggae tunes are good to play along to, not too fast and relatively simple chord wise, plus you can vibe off the syncopated drums etc

[eyebrows]

Ok I'm new to all this so I could be hugely wrong but I think something's missing from your (otherwise bloody fantastic) explanation of the Minor Scales up there...

You list it as "T, S, T, T, S, T, S" but the diagram doesn't follow, because the jump from Ab to B is T+S, not T as you list it. The diagram is "T, S, T, T, S, T+S, S"... now a couple weeks back I was watching this guy's excellent series on how to play piano and he went through scales, and did mention something about raising the 7th note by one, in circumstances which I forget, but maybe you need to add that bit of explanation to the guide?

Wikipaedia lists the minor scale pattern as "T, S, T, T, S, T, T", which if you shift the 7th up by one would then become "T, S, T, T, S, T+S, S" which I think is what yours is supposed to be...

But as I say, new to this, it was just something I spotted that didn't look quite right

[mattdeficit]

Ok I'm new to all this so I could be hugely wrong but I think something's missing from your (otherwise bloody fantastic) explanation of the Minor Scales up there...

You list it as "T, S, T, T, S, T, S" but the diagram doesn't follow, because the jump from Ab to B is T+S, not T as you list it. The diagram is "T, S, T, T, S, T+S, S"... now a couple weeks back I was watching this guy's excellent series on how to play piano and he went through scales, and did mention something about raising the 7th note by one, in circumstances which I forget, but maybe you need to add that bit of explanation to the guide?

Wikipaedia lists the minor scale pattern as "T, S, T, T, S, T, T", which if you shift the 7th up by one would then become "T, S, T, T, S, T+S, S" which I think is what yours is supposed to be...

But as I say, new to this, it was just something I spotted that didn't look quite right

First of all, wicked post, really useful.

Any chance anyone could clear up the above.

Like eyebrows says according to the T,S,T,T,S,T,S rule the last note of the Cm scale should be B, but you've listed it at Bb. To my ears B sounds better than Bb but I was just wondering if someone could clear up why/how you add another semitone?

Cheers.

[gr00veh0lmes]

Ok I'm new to all this so I could be hugely wrong but I think something's missing from your (otherwise bloody fantastic) explanation of the Minor Scales up there...

You list it as "T, S, T, T, S, T, S" but the diagram doesn't follow, because the jump from Ab to B is T+S, not T as you list it. The diagram is "T, S, T, T, S, T+S, S"... now a couple weeks back I was watching this guy's excellent series on how to play piano and he went through scales, and did mention something about raising the 7th note by one, in circumstances which I forget, but maybe you need to add that bit of explanation to the guide?

Wikipaedia lists the minor scale pattern as "T, S, T, T, S, T, T", which if you shift the 7th up by one would then become "T, S, T, T, S, T+S, S" which I think is what yours is supposed to be...

But as I say, new to this, it was just something I spotted that didn't look quite right

the minor scale is an invention, and is derived from the major scale.

there is one major scale and three! minor scales.

harmonic, melodic and natural.

theory is some crazy shit blud. don't let it get ya down.

p.s the black notes make up a minor scale.

[mks]

Does the natural minor have the 'moodiness' of the harmonic and melodic minors?

The most important thing is the minor 3rd. I would say the natural minor is more moody because of the dominant 7 rather than the major 7's in the harmonic and melodic minors. Try a diminished or half-diminished for a real moody kind of sound.

EZ

[deadly_habit]

F diminished is essentially an arabian scale?

kinda some subtle difference in actual arabian instrument tunings

[skyh]

the original image is dead but I found this site, has alternative pictures if you scroll down

http://music.thefxcode.com/0003.htm

[IndigoChild]

This bit, I don't understand fully:

“Tone, Semi-Tone, Tone, Tone, Semi-Tone, Tone, Semi-Tone”

Each scale uses a mathematical interval which can be found on looknohands or chord house

[legend4ry]

so a semi-tone is a half-step and a tone is a full step.


so (_ is white key | is black key)


_ | _ | _
^ ^
Is a semi tone

_ | _ | _
^.. ^
Is a tone

so basically, a tone is miss a key, a semi tone is don't miss a key

[trypset]

so is a black key to a black key a tone?

[legend4ry]

so is a black key to a black key a tone?

it depends where its set on the keyboard..

[trypset]

man that was quick, thanks so much. That pic is awesome!!!

[yamaz]

First thank you for posting this as it's a great quick look at the theory behind things for people to discuss. I learned a new thing about the diminished scale!

To clear things up further, and it looks like this was recently touched upon. There is 1 form of Major scale TTSTTTS, and 3 forms of Minor. The particular one the author of this post used in his example was for a harmonic minor, TSTTSTS. The more basis one is the natural minor and it is TSTTSTT -- the last note is the difference. Anyway there is one more type of minor but it's a major pain in my ass so I won't mention it here!

Also just another tip, for me, trying to remember the whole(pun) - I mean entire 'tone and semi-tone' or 'whole note and half note' stuff is to use numbers as they are more intuitive and quick to spell out. For the above two examples, instead they would written or SAID instead as, 2122121 and 2122122 respectively. So for me it's like remembering a hot chic's phone number, was it that hot red head with big ( o ) ( o ) phone number # 221-2221 or that cute asian with big blue eyes ( o ) ( o ) -- # 212-2122. -- Cool eh?

When you compare the algorithm with major and 'natural' minor scales, you will see there is a repeating pattern, TTSTTTSTTSTTTSTTSTTTSTTSTTTSTTSTTTSTTSTTTS.........on and on, or 2212221221222122122212212221 . SO It was both of their numbers -- Hot damn they live together and they're lesbians! <sorry I need to get my head out of the piano -gutter>

So because of this, C Major has all white keys, and so does it's relative A Minor. So an easy way to play in all minor keys is just to use white ones, but start your root note from A and end there.

Also along these lines, you can then also determine this algorithm if you forget it, by starting from either C Major or A Minor, going up the white keys and count! So often times I will get mixed up while drunk or something, and if I want to find B Minor for instance, I start at A minor with the A note, count the white keys up back to A and bam, there's your algorithm, then apply to the B note and bam, B minor. So you see you can easily transpose this to any key on the fly without memorizing all the scales or having to reference a website if you are not hooked into the UBERNET.

[amplex]

p.s the black notes make up a minor scale.

well it depends on the root. they certainly are a minor in Eb, but in F# they are major again. the thing about saying any certain notes are any part of a scale also depends on the context, certain notes in minors and majors are transposable obviously (i.e some scales mix with each other, just not every note). the best players don't stay in the same scales/modes for very long either. its usually a systematic switching of roots/scales that makes music interesting to me. check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_k1LyMXOSG0 watch how this group makes a funky ass bassline by switching scales and walking his root notes up and around, while the guy on rhodes is doing all kinds of jazzy variants on each note. tune was catchy as hell to me. he starts on like a Gm7 (G root note, minor scale, 7th chord), walks (thru the minor scale) to A, A#, C, then he changes root notes to C#, and walks it up in the minor again (among MANY other variations). so he's basically on bass jamming on Gmin7, and C#min7, (and many more =). The way the other instruments interact with his scales make up the jazz, the meat of the tune. i know this jazz stuff can be hard to follow for people just getting an introduction to playing/writing music, but try to follow it as much as you can and dig in early into the theory. also theres nothing more empowering than playing/mastering an instrument if you want to write music. keys gives you a great layout of everything visually and you can start off with just two notes to make melodies (some fucking amazing songs are 2 notes at a time in essence, thats all). learn to use your left hand to walk along a scale for the bassline, then use your right to walk along another scale in twice the speed. once you can put them together, you can do big things =] not that you have to be able to do this to write good music on a daw/pc, but being able to helps your brain grasp the fact of what youre really doing. and its just fun as sh1t to be able to play a melody to a nice groove u just wrote.


also, I have to agree the OP explained the tone, semi-tone stuff seemed confusing initially. first of all because a tone or semi-tone is not in reference to a note itself, its a reference to the DIFFERENCE between the note that u just played and the note youre going to play next/before. like, D is one tone above C, and C# is one semi-tone above C. So, calling a scale T,S,T,T,S,T,T is just weird to me, since you're not including the first note. But I can see how it would help beginners grasp the difference between notes in the scale. It also helps if you can see it on a piano, and a guitar or bass fretboard. The fretboard has increments of 1 semi-tone per fret so it might be even easier visually for some people. Great post clarifying this Yamaz

ez