I've got a song in D (Dorian) - it has a Major focus, how do I convert it to a minor feel ?

Chords, scales, harmony, melody, etc.
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I made a song in D Dorian. Its mostly Major focused.
I'd like to remix it into a Tech House genre, and I think I'm going for a more minor chord feel.

Is there a good resource online that might help me do this?
Is it just a matter of looking at a parallel minor ?
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Change all F# notes to F, andx it should be minor. Job done :shrug:
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The i, ii, v diatonic chords in D Dorian are minor. What do you mean by “more minor chord feel”?

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Um, flatten yer six?

Note: Not really “more minor”, just more “classically minor”.

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Chords common in D dorian would be Dm F G Am C. If your spending a lot of time with the C, F and G chords that'll likely give it or more major feel. If you spend most time with Dm and Am, with a few of the other chords now and then, that should make a more minor feel.

But what do you mean by a song? Is it a melody over a bunch of chords? If that's the case the melody might fit over different chords, or might not. You'd have to experiment. A melody that fits over a C will probably fit over an Am for example.

Also, you'd want your home note to feel like it should be a D or at least the chord to be a Dm. If it feels like its G or C or something, you're probably not using D dorian at all.

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Last edited by claudedefaren on Thu Apr 15, 2021 7:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Maybe what you need to do is analyze all of the voices and determine if you’re actually Major or Dorian, and figure out what you really mean by “minor”.

Do the chords really indicate Dorian (and appropriate substitutions)? Have you analyzed all of the voices and determined what you’re really looking at?

Might be worth starting from basics and also determining what you’re aiming to achieve?

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You can do it with a chord track type program and just replace the whole chord harmony with an extended D minor chord of the C major scale. That would at least change those notes that make it sound major and leave the rest, if you've chosen to use a minimal change transformation . Or you can transpose notes up or down before the transformation, or rearrange the note pitches before or after each time you click a button until it sounds minor and so on, like ChordwarePA does - not a plugin yet so you would need to assign channels to your audio plugins before exporting to cpa. Channels can be changed within cpa too if needed. It will also record midi output from your DAW.

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Thanks for all the responses.
I have Scaler plugin, and that determined for me that my song was in D Dorian. I do focus on the majors in that mode mostly, so thats why it has a major feel. I could look at using the relative minor.
I was fascinated by this Youtube channel where they switched popular songs from major to minor and vica versa. Just wondering what method they used.
Last edited by MasterTuner on Tue Feb 11, 2020 2:56 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Reaper (win), i7-7700k, 16GB

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Maybe the plugin is wrong? It’s better to do your own analysis as there’s often more than one answer to which key/scale is being used, and I doubt that the software will be able to make those judgment calls, especially when it comes to identifying accidentals.

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MasterTuner wrote: Tue Feb 11, 2020 2:18 pm I have Scaler plugin, and that determined for me that...
and now people have to sort you. You might be grateful people will expend their energies and time for this, but I don’t think this is good for the person asking, and we see huge expenditures of time by the group and we’re still baffled lotta the time.

Chances are pretty good the problem begins here with total reliance on software. Dorian is knowable, DIY.

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MasterTuner — never let somebody make you feel bad for asking a question. We are happy to help.

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claudedefaren wrote: Wed Apr 15, 2020 2:05 am MasterTuner — never let somebody make you feel bad for asking a question. We are happy to help.
thanks, and to be honest, I don't think jancivil read my original post. I was asking for an online resource that would help me learn how to do it myself actually. I don't want people to "sort" it out for me. I ignore the negative stuff, and appreciate all the good stuff that people like yourself contribute.
Reaper (win), i7-7700k, 16GB

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You probably shouldn't assume that Jan didn't read your first post, as your post about using the software tool was what really made it difficult to answer your first post, as it's not clear that you're looking for an online resource to be able to do this without a tool.

Jan possesses a wealth of knowledge, and is willing to help anyone asking for advice, even those who have previously insulted her, often for no better reason than because they don't like her answers. If you ask a specific question I'm sure you will get an answer.

I'm still not sure what you're trying to achieve from your first post, so if you can clarify what you mean it will help. Making something "more minor" isn't really a thing. Most intervals in a scale don't determine Major or minor, so there's no magic formula for adding notes that do this. Using the parallel minor will make something sound minor compared to the Major, but is that your question?

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MasterTuner wrote: Tue Feb 11, 2020 2:18 pm I was fascinated by this Youtube channel where they switched popular songs from major to minor and vica versa. Just wondering what method they used.
Well, you could start with transcribing the whole song. Transcription means to write it out as notes on staff paper. Then it's most likely a simple matter of changing some # and b (sharp & flat) signs in the key signature at the far left side of the paper, and the job is done. Oh, then you have to perform it again from sheet music ofcourse.

What makes a scale major or minor? Mainly the third note counted from its root: is it a major or minor third? But also the sixth and seventh note of the scale go flat in the natural minor scale.

In short (there are exceptions) to go from major to minor you'd add 3 flats; from minor to major add 3 sharps. But other scales and thus possibilities do exist!

More info, better explanations:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_and_minor
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Key_signa ... _structure
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