 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Jules
Date: 1999-10-21 03:19
Any one out there know alot about ancient greek music and the modes?
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Author: Eoin
Date: 1999-10-21 08:10
Ancient Greek Music was different from ours. It didn't have the concept of harmony and chords. There were two parts to the music, a melody and a drone. The melody was restricted to a scale which is similar to the white notes on a piano, but the quality of the music could be altered by deciding which of the notes to use as the base of the scale. If they used C, they got our normal major scale. If they picked G they got a major scale with a flattened seventh, which is also used in some Irish and Scottish music. The seven possible starting notes gave rise to seven scales known as modes.
The drone was one of the notes of the scale sounded continously. One of the principles of modal music is that since there are no changing chords, any note sounds good with any other. Much of early Irish and Scottish music is also written using modes.
Listen to Scotland the Brave played on the bagpipes. Although it is written in a more-or-less major scale, there is a constant drone "do" playing, which prevents you from imagining any chords to the tune. As a result, each note is considered only in relation to the drone, not to each other.
I know this is not very well expressed, but it is easy to hear it.
There are names for each of the seven Greek modes, such as Dorian or Mixolydian, but the important thing to know is what note they are based on. I find it easier to think of the "C mode and A mode".
The greeks used a few different instruments. One of these called the Aulos was a type of primitive clarinet. It was very small and had a single reed and was held in one hand. These instruments were always played in pairs, one in each hand, held at right angles to each other. They had between two and five finger holes. How you were expected to hold the pipe when you had all holes uncovered I don't know. The breath pressure required for the Aulos was so great that a special leather face mask was used which held in the lips.
Some Greeks disapproved of the Aulos, because it was used by the Dionysian cult as part of their riotous rites.
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Author: Jerry
Date: 1999-10-21 13:29
This book might help you: Music in Greek and Roman Culture by Giovanni Comotti (Johns Hopkins Press). Its probably still in print, but surely your library will have it. Also, there is at least one CD that attempts to perform what Greek music might have sounded like. Its rather eastern in sound.
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Author: Jerry
Date: 1999-10-21 17:02
I found my CD of Greek music. It's called Music of Ancient Greece by Christodoulos Halaris. It was produced by Orata, a Greek company, and goes by the number: ORANGM 2013. Unfortunately, I could not find it available at Amazon.com, CDWorld.com, or other CD suppliers. It may be out of print. The website below, however, lists several other recordings:
http://www.medieval.org/emfaq/cds/k617069.htm
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Author: Justice
Date: 1999-10-21 22:10
The sole heir to those modes today is jazz. In modern jazz, the use of modes facilitates much more creative improvisation. Listen to Miles Davis' So What, all Dorian. In jazz when you play a tune in a minor key, you generally use the Dorina mode, the reason for this is that every note in the scale is consonant. For instance, if you are playing a major tune, you have to be careful how you use the fourth scales degree, becasue it clases with the third of the chord. If you use the Dorian scale in a minor tune, every note sounds good because there is a whole step between the third and fourth scale degrees. Also, if you are playing a major tune, you can use the Lydian mode which has a raised fourth scal degree, thus not clashing with the third.
The modes can be built off of any major scale. Starting on the tonic of a "major" scale, you have the Ionian mode. Going up the scale you have in this order: Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolin, and Locrian. So, there are actually eighty-four modes in todays music, each of which has its own sound and usage.
Justice
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 1999-10-21 23:36
Justice wrote:
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The sole heir to those modes today is jazz.
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And much turn-of-the-century and early 20th century French composers, especially Satie (e.g., the Gnoisenne and Gymnopedia)
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Author: Hiroshi
Date: 1999-10-22 04:25
There are 7 modes. It is easy to understand. Use only white key of piano. C major is the oldest mode among them!
Dorian mode starts by D. Re-mi-fa-sol-ra-si-do-re, this is the Dorian mode.
Leonard Bernstein made a big contribution to young people's music education. CBS Sony sells a series of videos of this concerts. Among them there is a superb video on Modes.
As Mike pointed out Jazz is taking old modes. Even Beeltles took Dorian for their music. George Russel wrote a book titled 'Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization', which summarizes Jazz modes. and Miles Davis or other big name people based their musicn on. This book is now out of prints. But you may be able to buy a used one via Amazon.
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Author: mike
Date: 1999-10-22 05:12
the question was about the old greek modes but since the discussion has turned to the modes of the modern major scale i will take this oportunity to shout about my enthusiasim for the modes of the ascending melodic minor scale. one of my favorites is the seventh mode. in the key of c the a.m.m would be c,d,e flat,f g,a,and b. the seventh mode would be b,c,d,e flat,f,g,a. playing free with the spelling let me go ahead and rename that e flat as d sharp,and d as c double sharp. this gives us b as tonic, c as flat nine, c double sharp as sharp nine, d sharp as the third, f as the flatted fifth,g as flat thirteen, and a as the minor seventh. this gives us one highly altered dominant sound!! some jazz guys call this mode the altered scale. try playing it and then resolving into an e major scale (b is the dominant of e). i think you will find many interesting dominant-tonic resolutions in this exercise.
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 1999-10-22 12:10
mike -
I played jazz bass for quite a while (made a partial living at it way back when) and let me just say one thing:
We <i>never</i> thought in modes :^) Someone would start off in some altered scale on the melody (let's call it "variation 1", we'd pick up & comp on it, someone else would do a modification ("variation 2"), etc.
It was probably highly modal, but no analysis per se. was ever done. We played "what made sense". Knowing all your scales (finger positions on bass, actually - scales are relatively easy on a string instrument) does the trick - it feels like you're changing key as you play that way, not going "modal".
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Author: mike
Date: 1999-10-22 15:38
mark
i think that the "modes" and especially the modes of the ascending melodic are actually very tonal, by which i mean major! the modes of the melodic minor are commonly applied to the secondary dominants. for example the fifth mode of c minor g,a,b,c,d,e flat, f, often shows up in b flat major when we play V7 of ii i.e G7. to make that G7 the b flat of the b flat scale is raised to b and the result is a mode of the melodic minor. as we change notes in a major scale to make accomodations for the secondary dominants we encounter the modes of the ascending melodic minor. if we "know" it or not!....which is why i have found it so interesting and helpfull to study the "modes" of the melodic minor....not to play "modaly" but to learn a little more about the temporary aberations the secondary dominants use to color the tonality expressed by the major scale.
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 1999-10-22 16:14
What interesting explanations and discussions, thanx to all. Earlier I looked in my Larousse, didn't find much, and will look in Groves and probably copy it and these posts for my musical grandchildren and this engineer! Mark, will this be in the archives? It would seem desireable. Don
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Author: Mark Charette, Webmaster
Date: 1999-10-22 16:45
Don,
Everything that's been posted into the new BBoard (almost 12,000 messages so far) are available via the "Search" function here. The Klarinet archives are set up for the email lists only. I don't have plans to integrate them.
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Author: Don Berger
Date: 1999-10-23 21:31
As I said above, Groves Dictionary [every good library should have the set] has some 75 !! pages on Modes, with the Greeks on pg 381 [in the M volume] and commentary on Modal jazz. Overwhelming, except maybe for music majors! Happy reading, Don
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Author: paul
Date: 1999-11-02 21:52
Okay, I'll take a minute to crow about it...
For the folks who want to see what the folks above are talking about, find the Scales files on this BBS and open up one or two of them to see the modes to each major and commonly used minor scale. In a less than musically correct nutshell, the modes are simply the scales that start on the first, second, third, etc. note of the scale. Playing around with them does make for some interesting sounds. And yes, jazz was exactly the reason why I included the modes in all of the scale sheets.
Bon appetit...
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