lydian mode allowed chords?

[Jafo]

A few musings...

Lydian mode is basically major with an augmented fourth. It f**ks up the IV-V-I cadence, giving instead #iv-V-I -- enh, fuggit. Forgot how to denoted diminished chords in ASCII. Sorry. Anyway, the IV-V becomes a dominant cadence: in F, it's b diminished 7 to C Major -- which is a V-I in C major. Avoid this.

II(7)-V-I is the new standard cadence; G(7)-C-F. You'll have to experiment with melodic voicing, rhythm, cycles, and other cues to keep it from sounding like an interrupted IV-V-I repeat.

Then again, II-I is kinda neat also.

You can also freely wander over a drone. That's pretty cool, too.

Throw in a flat seventh, making it Lydian Dominant, and you'll start sounding like Steve Vai or Leonard Bernstein. Also very cool for droning meanderings.

1 2 3 #4 5 6 b7
g a b c# d e f

Find that in standard diatonic harmony.

[jancivil]

Help?

I know that i should use fmaj7 in c lydian? but what other chords should i use and are there any progressions that should be avoided?

Is there any way to determine which chords are suitable for that mode any other than just trying out?!

I really would like to make a song in lydian mode but then always some strange chord appears that ruins the mode

you have it backwards, you use cmaj7 in f lydian.

modes are for lines, conferred against a strong tonic. modal thinking is not the same as diatonic thinking; your chords are window-dressing, never your thrust.

the important aspect of any mode is its characteristic interval(s). In c lydian it's f sharp versus c, the augmented fourth.

You do NOT want f sharp diminished, f#-a-c (except maybe with the seventh, the half-diminished or min7 b5 chord, f#-a-c-e. maybe as color). Because it wants to, by the dominant/tonic relationship, cf. D7-G, establish g major as a tonic.

c lydian will have c and d major as the two primary chords; g maj7 over c bass, or cmaj7 add#11; c and d major stacked as a polychord, this kind of thing.

you are getting 'some strange chord that ruins' trying to get function out of the thing, which, according to your key sig, g major, it all *functions* toward g major.

'harmony', chord progressions happen in diatonic, or functional harmonic vocabulary. This is something different.

apprendez-vous?

EDIT: I see I have already said all this in this very thread.
d'oh!

[Marc Schonbrun]

It's usually no more than a few chords. For example, the progression C D is though to be a C Lydian progression because when you pull the chords apart, you end up with a septachord C D E F# G A, which is almost C Lydian (it's close enough).

The trick really is to know a few chords that interact in a modal way.

I II for Lydian
I bVII for Mixolydian
I v for Mixolydian
i ii for Dorian
i IV for Dorian
i bVI for Aeolian
I IV for Ionian

All you need is a single chord for the tonic, and another chord that contains the modal "activator". Everything else is just gravy.

M

[Sascha Franck]

All you need is a single chord for the tonic, and another chord that contains the modal "activator". Everything else is just gravy.

That's a brilliant description.