minstrel: ladders and code

[Corrie Bergeron]

The ladder analogy is apt, but you're quite right - the rungs are not 
evenly spaced if each one represents a nopte in the major scale 
(do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-ti-do).  On a flute drilled for do-re-mi, you're 
skipping quite a few rungs.  

Picture the piano keyboard.  Black keys and white keys.  The white keys 
are the "naturals" - A B C D E F G A C B D E F G and so on.  The black 
keys are the "accidentals" - A#/Bb, C#/Db, D#/Eb, F#/Gb, G#/Ab.  #=sharp, 
a little bit higher, b = flat, a little bit lower.  The black key between 
C and D plays C# - it also plays Db.  Same pitch, two different names.

The distance from one key to the next - black to white, white to black - 
is called a "half step."  Two half steps make a "whole step." (At least 
SOME part of music theory makes sense!)

Most of the "white notes" are one whole step apart. 

BUT WAIT! you say.  The piano keyboard is snaggletoothed!  There are white 
keys snuggling together with - gasp - no black key between them!  Oh, the 
shock and the shame!

Yup.  B and C, and E and F, are only one half-step apart.  There's no such 
thing as B# or Cb, or E# or Fb.  Why? I have no idea.  (Someone on 
this board might, though!)  Get used to it, that's all I can say.

So find C on the keyboard - it's just to the left of the two black keys.  
Any two black keys, as opposed to three black keys.  (The black keys 
repeat a pattern, 2, 3, 2, 3...)

Now, starting on C, play the white keys up to the next C.  Sounds a lot 
like do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do, right?  (There's a reaon for that.)  Now 
thik of that in terms of a pattern of whole steps and half steps.  The 
pattern is W W H W W W H.  C to D is a W, D to E is a W, E to F is a H, 
etc.  The pattern WWHWWWH is a major scale (aka Ionian mode).  If you 
start on C, you're "in the key of" C.  

If you start on any other note and play a pattern of WWHWWWH, you'll 
get a major scale (or Ionian mode) "in the key of" whatever note you 
started on.

Your simple flute is designed to play a WWHWWWH pattern.  The size of the 
flute determines the key it plays in.  

Here's a little extra - If you play all the white notes, but start on a 
note other than C, you get modes.  Here they are:

C - Ionian (aka "major" Mnemonic: I OWN the C-major scale, since it's so 
simple!)
D - Dorian (Mnemonic - Starts on D)
E - Phrygian (Mnemonic - You'd think Phrygian would start on F, but no.  
It starts on E.)
F - Lydian (Mnemonic - Lydia is a Funny lady!) 
G - Mixolidian (Mnemonic, GEE, Lydia's a little MIXed up!)
A - Aeolian (Mnemonic: starts on A.  aka "minor")
B - Locrian (Mnemonic - You oughtta BE LOCKED up if you use this.  It's 
highly dissonant, and therefore favored by Death Metal guitarists.)


Keep in mind that you can play any of these modes in any key.  It's the 
whole-step/half-step pattern that determines the mode or scale.  The 
starting point determines the "key."


Hope this helps. 

Brendan O Corraidhe / Corrie Bergeron