Please help to settle a disagreement

viz

Maybe not, I just wasn't sure what you were getting at and if it is, you only have to stay there for 5 minutes anyway.

mike_l

Typically, I can't find the notes I have on the J-scale.

 

 

viz

J scale lol

mike_l

On the plus side I did find a nice modes exercise, which I'll put in it's own thread

thisisguitar

I'd personally think of it as being F Lydian (key signature as C major). The first chord in most music gives away the key. Starting with F and moving to G would imply the IV / V progression. 

There is no Am in the song, though Fmaj7 can be thought of as Am/F, but the root from the bass means any Am would be Fmaj7.

A lot of vocal melodies are based around pentatonic options, even when more complex options are available. Same with guitar solos. Sticking to pentatonics with this would leave the opportunity of hitting 'B' out of the equation… and it sounds great.

The vocal melody does home in on the 'A' note a lot, but it's still a strong note over F as it's the third. 

Try singing the melody over an Am / G progression and it sounds odd (maybe because we are used to the song!).

It's a great song, and cleverer than it's two chord progression would suggest.

close2u

@thisisguitar

 

The genius of Lyndsey Buckingham.

thisisguitar

@close2u

The best thing I ever read about Lindsey, is that when he couldn't do a Fleetwood Mac tour it took two guitarists to replace him! (I forget where this is from).

thisisguitar

Forgot to mention that Unravel by Bjork and Man On The Moon (verse) by REM both use a IV / V progression. 

viz

Man on the moon is definitely in C Lydian because from the rhythm and melody it's clear that he's landing on the C and that's the root. The C is homed in upon by the very chord structure - C/D/C/C.

But in Dreams, we have F/G/F/G all the way through, so it's basically not in F. Because even though F is the first and last chord in the song, it's unresolved. It only resolves briefly in the chorus when it eventually finds its way home to the Am then moves away again, but all the way through, that Am is implied, by the melody and the accented A notes throughout. That doesn't mean the pianist in close2u's band is right in playing Am chords throughout - it should be F and G only, of course.

It would have been more likely to be in G mixolydian than F Lydian (because F/G/F/G does indeed land on G every bar) but it isn't because it's not in any major key at all, it's in Am.

Clearly though, you're right in saying the F is indeed Lydian and the G is indeed Mixolydian because these scales are consistent with Am (and C major but that's irrelevant because it's not a major song, it's a minor song).

thisisguitar

It definitely has a minor tonality Viz, I agree.

I like reading peoples thoughts on the theory threads here (all the threads!), there's always something interesting to ponder or learn from. Glad I joined the community :-) 

I always imagine a melody is the thread, tying all the chords together, even when the chords don't technically belong together.

Also, piano players often believe the score is god. They are often wrong!

viz

Like the thread concept very much. I think of that very same thing when listening to rachmaninov's etudes tableaux - the chord progressions are really strange in some of them and the only thing you can hang onto is the melody, it's like a lifeline.

mike_l

@viz I found the notes I was looking for on the J-scale.

Found it, it's exactly as you described the melodic minor.

I stand edumacated.

viz

Ah cool, i never thought of melodic minor as a J scale but then i spose jazz is so much more advanced than smoke on the water etc that it uses everything and can claim anything it likes as its own. I'm not arguing with any Jazzers that's for sure.

thisisguitar

I remember watching a Howard Goodall program on music theory once, it was on the BBC. I remember doubting I'd learn anything from it, until he started talking about how every note has 6 basic triads that will contain it. He took 'C' as an example. C is found in Am, Ab, C, Cm, F and Fm. I grabbed a guitar and started playing around with these chords and realised that I could modulate to some ridiculous chords as long as they supported a given note in my melody. 

I actually got out a sheet of paper and worked out each note with the surrounding chords. Was amazed that I hadn't already thought of this, as it seems obvious.

thisisguitar

Anyone interested in the series, it can be found here. Not sure which part my above post mentions, but it's likely to be the Melody or Harmony episode (there were a few)

viz

nice.

mike_l

viz said:

Ah cool, i never thought of melodic minor as a J scale but then i spose jazz is so much more advanced than smoke on the water etc that it uses everything and can claim anything it likes as its own. I'm not arguing with any Jazzers that's for sure.

But arguing with Jazzerists is fun. And they don't like it when you give them an amp with a bucket-load of gain dialled in (Yep that's my evil streak....)

ddlooping

thisisguitar said:

There is no Am in the song...

In the guitar break.

viz

I wire my amp's gain knob back to front for them.

ICBM

close2u said:

I'm practicing the Stevie Nicks song Dreams from Rumours.

I reckon that the chord progression is simply F to G and back to F.  The F chord is sometimes F major7, sometimes F add9 ... and the G chord is sometimes G7.  I play one, and one only, bar of A minor in the 2nd repeat of the instrumental guitar part.

So, I have it in C major / F lydian if thinking in modal terms. (G mixolydian at a push is also possible).

Our keyboard player, playing a piano part from a music score reckons it is in A minor and he plays arpeggiated Am to G to F to G repeatedly (with some additional notes making those chords in to 9s etc).

The melody is pretty much centred around the notes C and A and the others in a pentatonic C, D, E, G, A (C major pentatonic or A minor pentatonic - you take your pick).

C Major is the parent of F lydian, G mixolydian and A minor.

But I do not hear / see / think the song as A minor at all.

What do you reckon?

I think you're right. For a start the bass plays F to G repeatedly not A G F G. I know that's not conclusive but it doesn't sound 'minor' to me either - it's wistful, or dreamy, but not sad. It sounds more like a sort of unresolved major-y key (sorry, I don't know the proper names for this sort of stuff, so maybe I shouldn't be contributing at all!), and that's how I would approach it if I was playing it, either on guitar or bass.