# How to tell if a piano sequence is minor or major if it's not a traditional scale



## Ulterior Motif (May 11, 2019)

I'm thinking of writing a looping piano piece in a minor key at the moment, but I don't want to follow the ascending/descending scales. Is there a way to make sure it stays in minor, because with my idea some of the notes don't line up with my starting key's scales. Plus it's going to be in 3/4, so that's a slight hurdle to get around too. I had thought "only have notes sequenced by minor intervals", but with tritones and perfect fourths and fifths that logic goes out the window. Are there any cheats?


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## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Ulterior Motif said:


> I'm thinking of writing a looping piano piece in a minor key at the moment, but I don't want to follow the ascending/descending scales. Is there a way to make sure it stays in minor, because with my idea some of the notes don't line up with my starting key's scales. Plus it's going to be in 3/4, so that's a slight hurdle to get around too. I had thought "only have notes sequenced by minor intervals", but with tritones and perfect fourths and fifths that logic goes out the window. Are there any cheats?


Well, with the diminished (whole-half) scale (C-D-Eb-F-Gb-Ab-A-B), you have plenty of minor thirds, plus a fourth, and a tritone. No fifth, though.
The half-whole scale (C-Db-Eb-E-F#-G-A-Bb) you have all that with no fifth.

Perhaps you could use both scales: the H-W when you want stability, and the W-H when you want instability or to modulate.


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## Guest (May 11, 2019)

millionrainbows said:


> Well, with the diminished (whole-half) scale (C-D-Eb-F-Gb-Ab-A-B), you have plenty of minor thirds, plus a fourth, and a tritone. No fifth, though.
> The half-whole scale (C-Db-Eb-E-F#-G-A-Bb) you have all that with no fifth.
> 
> Perhaps you could use both scales: the H-W when you want stability, and the W-H when you want instability or to modulate.


Only a couple of quibbles:

1) The diminished (whole-half) scale (C-*D*-Eb-F-Gb-Ab-*A*-B) does have a fifth as shown in the bolded notes "D" and "A"; the *Gb-A* "sounds" as a minor third but is in fact spelt as an *augmented 2nd*, as is the case with the *Ab-B*.

2) The half-whole scale (*C*-Db-Eb-E-F#-*G*-A-Bb) does have a fifth (see bolded notes "C" and "G").

I'll have my cigar back, thanks.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

millionrainbows said:


> Well, with the diminished (whole-half) scale (C-D-Eb-F-Gb-Ab-A-B), you have plenty of minor thirds, plus a fourth, and a tritone. No fifth, though.
> The half-whole scale (C-Db-Eb-E-F#-G-A-Bb) you have all that with no fifth.
> 
> Perhaps you could use both scales: the H-W when you want stability, and the W-H when you want instability or to modulate.


Those scales are the same diminished octatonic scale, just a transposition of each other, and just as instable.

The goal is of the OP isn't that clear to me. Is the goal to have minor chord arpeggios instead of all the scale notes? Like a minor version of Chopin's Etude No.1?






Or like Liszt using the diminished 7th chord arpeggios? There are a few options available. The main thing is to avoid the major 3rd of the key it is in. Even then you can do that temporarily if it is the desired effect. It all depends on the goal or desired effect.


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## Ulterior Motif (May 11, 2019)

I guess I wasn't clear. I want to avoid the normal "unison, major 2nd, minor 3rd, perfect 4th, perfect 5th, minor 6th, minor 7th" pattern and have complete freedom with whatever I play, but also find a way to check if my result will always end up in a minor key.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

Ulterior Motif said:


> I guess I wasn't clear. I want to avoid the normal "unison, major 2nd, minor 3rd, perfect 4th, perfect 5th, minor 6th, minor 7th" pattern and have complete freedom with whatever I play, but also find a way to check if my result will always end up in a minor key.


You can always progress to related chords while staying in your minor key, or modulate to other keys, that introduce notes not in the 7 notes of your minor key, which following traditional rules for more consonant sounding music, while add suspensions, etc. for dramatic effect.

Or you could add chromaticism, like notes from whole tone or octatonic and other scales, for more dissonant sounding music.

There is a lot of freedom depending on what you want to do, with different effects. The idea is not to lose the listener by introducing something completely random or arbitrary.


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## MarkW (Feb 16, 2015)

Write it the way that sounds the way you envision it, and let the technical definition of major/minor/modal/whatever be what it is


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