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Music Theory Monday | 04: Natural Minor (Patreon)

Published:
2020-04-07 00:38:12
Edited:
2022-08-12 22:15:52
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This week we discuss the concept of relative minor and dig into why the dominant7 chord is so important in the major key and how the minor key essentially got jealous and wanted the dom7 V chord for itself.

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Files

Music Theory Monday | Natural Minor | 4.3.20

This is "Music Theory Monday | Natural Minor | 4.3.20" by Scott Paul Johnson on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.

Comments

Tasha McManus

Hi. I am not seeing the lesson on 7 chords. Maybe I’m just blind?

Davin

Hey Scott, thanks for all the great content and explanation! Putting some context around the purpose of the Harmonic Minor and the sharp 7 was super helpful and it makes a lot more sense now. I like the idea of covering the Melodic Minor scale in a future video and maybe understand why it's different on the way down....so weird.

Scott Paul Johnson

Hi everyone - I forgot to link the PDF I was using - it should be available now. Thanks for being here!

Jeanna

That Harmonic minor progression you played sounded like the song "Stray Cat Strut." (Am, G, F, E)

Leslie

Hey Scott, appreciating the work youre doing! I am a bit confused about one thing that came up in this episode; specifically re: the difference between the natural and harmonic minor, and namely the chord Em7 in the key of A minor (harmonic). Isn't this also an E (major) Dom 7 in the key of A major? As far as I can see, they both have the same notes: E, G#, B and D, though maybe i'm making a mistake somewhere? If I am right, what could this mean? whyyyy? Like, why call it an Em7 at all? Feel like I must be missing something here, but I perked up when you covered this chord in particular cause its one i noticed in a song lately and was messing around with, but experiencing some confusion about it and not knowing if it was a minor or major chord... im wondering if my confusion is part of some mystical theory I dont know about...

Riccardo Emanuele

Loved this lesson. So much to take in but it now explains what the harmonic minor scale is. I had to learn it for a grading but had no clear understanding of what it was for. Thanks.

Raphael Barcelos

You made the scales seems to be very easy and reasonable. Great job!

Daniel Ankrom

Thank you for these lessons. This is making a lot of sense to me. Keep up the awesome work.

Tim Rowley

Working with a BMaj scale, the relative minor scale is G#, with the 7th note being an F#. If I'm sharping the 7th note to make it harmonic, then I can't avoid having two G's in the scale - a G and G# at positions VII and i respectively. So harmonic minor scales can't conform to having one of every 'alphabet' note in them always, right?

Scott Paul Johnson
>>48821091

Tim! This will come up a little more in some future lessons, but this is where you run into double sharps. It's so important to NOT have duplicate notes in a scale that composers a long time ago realized that double sharps should be a thing.

Scott Paul Johnson
>>48821091

oddly enough, double sharps are written with a lowercase "x" where you would normally write a sharp, and a double flat is two flat symbols in a row "bb"

DeDé

Still not liking dominant chords. They just now screw up the natural minor scales. Bastards! 🤬

Andrew Klein

This was an awesome lesson - thanks, Scott. I’ve been really enjoying all of them, but I really appreciated your explanation of the relationship between natural and harmonic, and that *tension* between chords. Really cleared up some half-understood things for me!

Emily Raw

So many cool head exploding moments in this one! Great great stuff as usual :D

Brian

Hey when you say the harmonic five resolves the minor one, what are you talking about? Specifically what does it mean for a chord to resolve another chord?

Scott Paul Johnson
>>65660653

Ooooo, excellent question. If you're watching these in order, that will make more sense in the next MTM lesson and a LOT more sense in MTM | 10: Dominant Chords (So Important!) Essentially though, it means that historically, when people heard the V chord, the most satisfying chord to hear next was the I chord.

Nathan

Haha---right around 21:30---love this guy!

Nathan

Around 35:30, I think Stray Cat Strut by the Stray Cats might have that chord progression? Not positive, but that song immediately came to mind.

Timm Delfs

Scott, could you please spell out the two composers you mention in the video?

Scott Paul Johnson
>>87763627

Shoot - I posted this a few years ago. Can you let me know what time in the video I mentioned these composers?

Timm Delfs

Oh blimey, I thought I‘d save myself the hassle of searching for it in the vid. Never mind, I‘ll search and keep pen and paper (or whatever) near. Thanks!

Timm Delfs
>>87763627

I found out: Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina and Guillaume de Machaut. I'll listen to this tonight.