scaleit

[Nanakai]

All a flat or a sharp is, is a tone that's raised or lowered... Usually by a semi-tone from what I understand, but for instance, you could say "flatten by an octave" and while I'm pretty sure it'd be incorrect from a classical vocabulary standpoint, someone who's not a dullard would understand you're asking to lower a tone by an octave. Anyway, as such, every tone is a flat and a sharp of a tone around it. It's all relative.

SO WHAT?!

My beef is with the mass of people who can't get it through their thick skulls that maybe the way they learned is a plenty confusing way, that music in itself can be expressed logically and mathmatically in dozens of different ways, and to put it bluntly EVERYTHING is relative. Middle C can't even be middle unless there's something for it to be middle against.

You seem to have a very hard time understanding the nature of this conversation. There are plenty of ways to represent and think about music, and what's important is that the student understands in his/her own way. However, this (1) has nothing to do with the OP, scale references or learning, and (2) is not helpful to anyone trying to learn.

Tonal theory makes a lot of sense when you have some actual musical experience.

People who make posts like that serve to do nothing but make snarky useless comments, and then tell other people they're "wrong" when they try to help. Don't excuse that, just don't. There's dozens of ways to conceptualize music, the one that's "right" is the one that helps someone get the job done effectively. If their way is so much better, they can feel free to share, otherwise they need to can it.

As a practical exercise, go to the list of scales in all sharps that you posted and harmonize them. Then, write out some chord progressions. If you're at all a competent thinker, it'll take you 5 minutes to realize why it's a bad idea and why JJF advised against it. It's really not because he's some old curmudgeon.

It's really pretty sad that you go and post an EDM sound design question and you get dozens of useful answers, ask something involving music theory and you get slammed with idiocy. Some people like a bit of wine with their cheese, and that makes it awfully hard to have this.

It's pretty sad that people keep posting music theory questions expecting the same sort of answer they'd get for sound design. The OP asked about scale software. Like it or not, there are reasonable best practices when linguistically representing scales. No one is arguing with the OP's preference in scale tastes, or demanding that they use one over another. There is nothing questionable or controversial here. You need to lighten up.

For several years now, I've used a very simple program called ScaleIt to give me scale ideas. (Most often I use it to see possible scales for some melody I've come up with.) My old XP system finally gave up the ghost, and I'm now on Windows 7. ScaleIt seems to not run on 7. Does anyone know of a free program that does what ScaleIt does? (Not online, as I turn off my connection when I'm in Sonar.)

I doubt you're still around, but I would suggest shedding yourself of software for this sort of thing. I can promise that you'll be much better off with a month of practice than you will with a lifetime of software. There's plenty of resources that can help you with this.

[JumpingJackFlash]

But what's the theoretical difference you mention - and in what kind of situation does it make a practical difference?

If we're in F major, I expect to see B flats. Bb is the subdominant note and the root of the subdominant triad. It is a perfect fourth above the root and so on.

I would not on the other hand normally expect to see A sharps. They would be chromatic notes (not part of the key), and this could be a fairly significant thing that might affect how I play the piece. It might be the beginning of a modulation for example which would again give me some clues as to what to expect next (and how to deal with it).

[tapper mike]

I've been trying to avoid posting but here goes.

To recap.

Western music is based but not limited to the diatonic system. It's nice to have some conventions when trying to:
Understand Principles
Read Music
Play well with others In Context

The diatonic naming structure ABCDEFG works better if there are not two notes that share the same/similar name but are not the same. As previously pointed out the key of F has a Bb.

Why a Bb and not an A#?
Let's spell them both out.
F-G-A-Bb-C-D-E
F-G-A-A#-C-D-E

Do you see what's wrong with the picture? Two notes similarly named that don't sound the same.

When playing with someone who does have a musical background and not using the correct terminology regardless of how good you imagine yourself at being or how good you are If you don't know what you are talking about you look like an idiot. Which is what someone pointed out above about saying you know French making up words that sound French to you then going to France and being unable to communicate with anyone. You quickly find yourself in a Monty Python skit

[ras.s]

Ok, I think I have a hunch of what you mean, have to let it simmer for a while though.. Thank you.

[Fox Crazy]

Do you see what's wrong with the picture? Two notes similarly named that don't sound the same.

I see nothing wrong with this picture as I recognize A and A# as two separate tones. You could call them acidburger and saladmonkey and it wouldn't make a damn difference if I knew what they meant.

Now that someone has explained this to me, it's clear the reasoning is even more asinine than I originally thought. Which is pitiful, I was kinda hoping I was wrong.

you look like an idiot.

See, it's funny how perceptions work. As far as I'm concerned, everyone else in this thread but Ras.s look like idiots, because they can't comprehend relativity whereas he nailed it in one swing.

As it turns out, this is going to be a good time to start christening my ignore list, I held off thinking that maybe there was a point behind this rabble but now that I can see there is none I don't see any reason to ever read anything those people post again. I'd rather be what they call "wrong" than carrying around actual misconceptions.

EDIT: Also, all languages are gibberish to someone who's never heard them. Individual languages also have different dialects and slang. Most of them are less logical than music is. These people remind me of those ignoramuses who scream at people to speak English for speaking another language in the Youtube comments sections. Someone uses different words to say the same thing I do, bawwwww, it's so terrible!

[JumpingJackFlash]

everyone else in this thread but Ras.s look like idiots, because they can't comprehend relativity... I'd rather be what they call "wrong" than carrying around actual misconceptions.

It's clear you don't understand. That's fine, we've all got to start somewhere. But to revel in your own ignorance and insult (or ignore) others who are trying to educate you is not a particularly wise thing to do.

I'm afraid you are the one with misconceptions. I've tried to help, but I'm not sure why I bothered.

I also find your sig rather ironic!

Also, nobody has yet mentioned this nugget of wisdom:

C Dominant 7th C D E F G A A# C

I don't know where to begin correcting that!

[Nanakai]

I also find your sig rather ironic!

That's because you don't know what "helpful" actually means. You're supposed to simply accept the Master's teachings in whole, lest you be an "ignoramus" or an idiot. It's all relative to the image Fox Crazy wants to portray.

Relativity, you eediot!

[arkmabat]

Scroll down to the last article for a chart:

http://www.novusmusic.org/traxweek.html

[sjm]

@Fox: The others are right. The C major scale is C D E F G A B C. It's not C D Fb E# G A Cb C. It doesn't matter that the notes are equivalent in ET, it's still a load of nonsense.

There's a good reason to ensure that each letter only appears in the scale once (for a start, how would you write the key signature in sheet music??). It means that you immediately know what the fourth is (it's an F note, not E note), say or the seventh (which for C is B note (Bb) and not an A note (A#); the A note (A) is the sixth). While the notes might be the same, you'll do yourself a disservice if you don't understand why it makes a difference, and why it makes things much easier in the long run. It'll help you in naming chords for a start.

Instead of arguing that to you they're the same, you'd be better off understanding why they're not to people who actually understand this stuff and in some cases have spent years studying it.

Another example that might help you understand what the problem is, is how we count:
"One, two, three, four etc."
We don't count
"One, two, two plus one, five minus one etc."
Sure, two plus one is three and five minus one is four, but to say that that's how we count would again be nonsense.

[Fox Crazy]

Scroll down to the last article for a chart:

http://www.novusmusic.org/traxweek.html

Where's a thumbs up button when you need one.

That is really informative and I can't fathom how I haven't stumbled upon something like it in the past despite outright looking for such. All the lame pandering towards tradition in this thread is made utterly irrelevant by a single frigging chart. It's logical, it's concise and it's easy to understand. It's also now in my bookmarks.

[Crimsonghost]

If you happen to have an iOS device, guitar toolkit is great. As a guitar player it's worth way more then the $10 I paid for it. When I'm not using it for playing its nice to be able to tap out notes to find scales/chords ect.

[Tricky-Loops]

These charts are great, too, for looking after the right scales and chords:

http://www.howmusicreallyworks.com/PGS_ ... Phone.html

[JumpingJackFlash]

Fox is probably ignoring me now, but for the benefit of others, here is a little more information.

Although A# and Bb sound the same in equal temperament, the universal adoption of this is a relatively recent development. There is therefore a lot of music in existence which was not written for equal temperament, and thus where there could actually be an audible difference between A# and Bb.

If you look at some early keyboard instruments, the "black notes" were sometimes split up into two; one part would produce the sharp and the other the flat.

You can also look at the overtone series.
I'm not going to go into detail here, interested parties can research it themselves.

But suffice it to say that an examination of overtones actually results in two different ratios for the semitone.

One is the ratio 15:16, and one is the ratio 16:17.

Obviously, these are not the same. In equal temperament, we fudge things in order to make all semitones equal, but acoustically they are not. In natural physics, B to C is not quite the same interval as C to Db.

Bb is a perfect fourth above F, A# is a augmented third above F. These are different intervals that have important theoretical implications.

[Hink]

Fox is probably ignoring me now, but for the benefit of others, here is a little more information.

Although A# and Bb sound the same in equal temperament, the universal adoption of this is a relatively recent development. There is therefore a lot of music in existence which was not written for equal temperament, and thus where there could actually be an audible difference between A# and Bb.

If you look at some early keyboard instruments, the "black notes" were sometimes split up into two; one part would produce the sharp and the other the flat.

You can also look at the overtone series.
I'm not going to go into detail here, interested parties can research it themselves.

But suffice it to say that an examination of overtones actually results in two different ratios for the semitone.

One is the ratio 15:16, and one is the ratio 16:17.

Obviously, these are not the same. In equal temperament, we fudge things in order to make all semitones equal, but acoustically they are not. In natural physics, B to C is not quite the same interval as C to Db.

Bb is a perfect fourth above F, A# is a augmented third above F. These are different intervals that have important theoretical implications.

I agree but I would like to bring up a little point, language changes and becomes convoluted..for instance the example of "there", "their" and "they're"...I have no doubt that one day these misspellings will merge together and become acceptable. Spoken language does indeed evolve and to the dismay of many who deem things "proper". It's admirable that you want to keep it proper and you are doing so for all the right reasons as I see it...but mankind is mankind...ask has turned into ax, some people do not lend money, they "borrow" it to someone and these are just tiny examples from the age we are in now...look at what years have done to the spoken language (I can only speak for English, please forgive my ignorance on other languages)...so you might be fighting a losing battle.

I can give you another example that irks me and directly applies to music as we know it today and that's the difference between DP and FX...in my almost ten years here I have seen these two separate things merge into one more and more...worse I have been attacked for trying to explain the difference on many times, told I dont know what I am talking about...one person even attacked my manhood over it.

So just keep in mind even though you are right there are those who would rather make right wrong so they can be right

FWIW, I have given up on explaining to some very educated and intelligent people that "No one" is two words, notone

[sjm]

[some people do not lend money, they "borrow" it to someone and these are just tiny examples from the age we are in now...look at what years have done to the spoken language (I can only speak for English, please forgive my ignorance on other languages)...so you might be fighting a losing battle.

Is that actually a common phrase amongst English (native) speakers where you live? The confusion surrounding borrow/lend is exceptionally common amongst non natives who speak a language without any distinction between" the two. For example German only has "borgen" (which is obviously from the same root as the English "borrow"), so German speakers normally only ever use "borrow" in English irrespective of which side of the transaction they are referring to, as they aren't used to the distinction between lending and borrowing. I've not personally noticed English native speakers making this mistake though.