Comments on: Scales: theory

By: Soleares

Soleares — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 06:31:19 +0000

[...] played “por arriba” or “por abajo”. In other words in the Phrygian Mode see link here for a descrption of this scale. Por arriba refers to the scale starting on Emajor and por medio [...]

By: Richard Sweeton

Richard Sweeton — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 17:06:35 +0000

Suggest you add something about the key signature used in scores of Flamenco music. While the chords are [dominant] Phrygian, the signature is Ionian — see Koster, page 13.

By: tomer

tomer — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 22:27:44 +0000

to tim richards,
about the name “Dorian”, as far as i know, it refers to an altogether different set of mode names- who ,researchers want to believe, were used in ancient greece (that is, more then 2000 years ago). around 1000 AD the modes that were used for the cantilations in the christian church were given the names of the old (and forgotten) greek modes that were mentioned in the writings of many (plato to name one…), but without them having anything to do musically with one another. so, “our” phrygian may be equivalent to the ancient greek dorian (even though they probably used only tetrachords or pentachords- a little like classical arabic music).
about the harmonic minor- see my earlier comment.
nowadays, the melodic minor scale- that is widely used in jazz has also found it’s way into the flamenco- and creates the typical sound of “nuevo flamenco”.
be in touch…

By: miguel

miguel — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 06:42:15 +0000

I agree totally with your observations and would also say that you certainly seem to know a lot more about the theory of music than I. Thank you for your observations and sharing your ideas. Please keep them coming.

By: tomer

tomer — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 12:47:10 +0000

i would actually say that the scale used in flamenco is a variant of the phrygian mode that contains both the minor and the major 3rds at once. it would be misleading to say that the flamenco scale is only the one with the hightened 3rd , as the III degree is often used and sometimes even the tonic chord is minor . also i would say that ,statistically, the minor third is as ,if not more, common then it’s major counterpart .

what do you think?

By: Tim Richards

Tim Richards — Sat, 18 Jul 2009 14:03:13 +0000

Hi, thanks for all the interesting information on this site.

I thought I would point out that the ‘Andalusian Phrygian’ or ‘Spanish Gypsy’ scale you mention is simply a harmonic minor scale starting on the 5th note. So E F G# A B C D E is actually a mode of A harmonic minor.

I don’t know why anyone would want to call this a Dorian scale – that’s simply incorrect! ‘Phrygian Dominant’ makes a certain kind of sense, but why do we need to invent a new name for a scale that already exists?

Perhaps it’s a bit cumbersome, but jazz musicians usually refer to this scale as the ’5th mode of the harmonic minor’ …