A question about the Doric scale A moll

[jancivil]

Minor as a concept was brand-spanking new in the early 18th century. Some believed that Bach proceeded from the Dorian mode and added a leading tone; Rameau and others believed that the basic form of minor was the harmonic and any scale's native 7th is major; one of the arguments was that the sixth must reflect the third at the perfect interval, so t'was the sixth was the tricky bit.
To say any one 'theory' is *wrong* is well fatuous to those who have some history to draw from here. It's a rookie quality mistake to say that because of the modern jazz 'jazz minor' scale(s) (6/7ths of which are synthetic), the earlier conception is *wrong*, let alone that of a mere pedant.

I could show JS Bach doing the major upper tetrachord in descension in minor mode, but one may also argue 'exception proves the rule' because of prevalence. Or simply say 'the major mode here'. Whether the decision owes to distaste for the augmented second or Dorian with a #7, I reckon none of this talk came from the horse's mouth.

The melodic minor we receive from Common Practice was not codified during JS Bach's life; it's post facto discussion, as theory does.
NB: the reasons for an ascending drive to tonic or the upper tetrachord being major and the descending relaxation a la natural minor are musical {ideas}. So we've confused names for things for the thing-in itself essentially, talking like that.

[Functional]

Minor as a concept was brand-spanking new in the early 18th century. Some believed that Bach proceeded from the Dorian mode and added a leading tone

Leading tone "alteration" was already common in modes that had no leading tone AFAIK, so I don't think Bach has anything to do with that. However, I want to point out something interesting about Bach: he had surprising amount of minor compositions in general compared to CCP people. Beethoven, Bach et cetera IIRC had a 1/4 fraction or something like that often in minor, whereas Bach had something closer to 4/10 in minor.

A fun hypothesis could be that minor just has slowly fallen out of flavor and somewhere along the way perhaps some exoticism started to surround it. But my personal conjecture is that things got damaged as soon as the hyperfocus on scales begun. Since common practices with minor to make it "work" under CCP didn't fit into a single 7-tone scale, issues arose. I think it's more worthwhile to consider whenever not only was melodic minor not codified during life of Bach, but scales in general as they are seen now. Standard pedagogy drives people easily to think that music derives from scales - an idea I personally find dubious as I learned more. I mean, it can technically derive from scales if the creator picks one and limits themselves to notes of only that scale - but it's not quite what I'd consider as "derives from scales" in some ontological sense.

[jancivil]

Minor as a concept was brand-spanking new in the early 18th century. Some believed that Bach proceeded from the Dorian mode and added a leading tone

Leading tone "alteration" was already common in modes that had no leading tone AFAIK, so I don't think Bach has anything to do with that.

The topic was melodic minor, and I made the remark based in a fair survey of writers of the time. My statement there is

proceeded from the Dorian mode and added a leading tone

straight reportage from my reading of the matter. (I'm not doing original research here.) I did not assert Bach was the first, and that is not my thought on it. I don't know and don't pretend to.

The ficta ("alteration") in that era was essentially on the order of fmr's "bemollization" per Lydian and Dorian from whence basic major and minor derive.
You're going to have to cite where you get alteration to a leading tone was common in modes which had no leading tone or give examples. Dorian with a leading tone before the harmonic era (ie./eg., JS Bach as exemplar of as it matured), alright?

My thesis there is that this leading tone is part and parcel of harmonic practice; once there was this alteration it is about a dominant to tonic, which is not part of modal polyphony a la The Church. I wouldn't say that JS Bach was the first, as we have it from Monteverdi in the 17th century. Starting with a Dorian mode kind of thing and ending up in what we might call melodic minor.

dorian to mel.minor.jpg

dorian to mel minor.jpg

The practice by the time of JSB has matured and we don't find much modal flavor any more, but the practice there I have to call harnonic, tonal music. You have stated 'common in modes', modes themselves, which suggests the practice in modal music, I don't think so.

[jancivil]

As pertains to "Minor as a concept was brand-spanking new in the early 18th c (eg., JS Bach's early career)":

1722: As for the minor mode, it differs from the major only in that the its third and sixth should be minor, although there are various problems with regard to the sixth, - Rameau, Treatise on Harmony (Dover, p. 158)

Others wrote other things regarding minor, such as 'Dorian with a leading tone' yadda ya, all of which appears to be an observation of practice, none of which I'd wish to be dogmatic regarding.

[jancivil]

By the time of that Monteverdi, we already note the tendency of that B in D Dorian leading to C major (losing the modal flavor in favor of the other thing).

[Functional]

The practice by the time of JSB has matured and we don't find much modal flavor any more, but the practice there I have to call harnonic, tonal music. You have stated 'common in modes', modes themselves, which suggests the practice in modal music, I don't think so.

Okay, I get it now - I think. I wasn't really talking about dominant to tonic harmony nor necessarily any kind of polyphony; just that the leading tones were already a thing in melodic sequences even in the church. Though I assume this is pretty trivial knowledge to you and, as you said, I just read a sentence of yours wrong (or perhaps more accurately didn't understand the implications) - I thought you meant that it was specifically Bach whose music de facto codified the usage of leading tones in general, beyond the V-I cadences.*

As far as minor tonality goes, I'm totally with you on that one. Pretty sure it was Bach who made it a thing.

*after giving it some more thought now, I think I can see your objections. If it really is functioning like a leading tone and articulating some form of closure, it certainly wouldn't have anything to do with church music. I thought it occurred during late renaissance period, but as I try looking for examples, they're surprisingly hard to find. Chromaticism (or more like accidentals)? Sure. But actual leading tone as per function? Nah. So my apologies.

[jancivil]

yeah, I don't expect you'll find anything but maybe Gesualdo who slipped in time to the 19th c numerous times, which I guess you need to be beyond psychotic to be able to do

No, I quickly found the Monteverdi doing leading tone a century earlier. I don't really care for that sound though. I'm quite far from expertise on the old polyphony but I did try it on a couple of times (and got tired).

[Functional]

I even confirmed this specifically from someone who studied gregorian chants (and performed them in choirs). Yeah, not a thing really, even when they would be diatonical.

It's funny though. As I think more of it, I'm actually confusing leading tone with a CAT. Like, we recently made this plain iv-i song where, every time it goes back to iv, the bass does that b3-3-4 figure. It doesn't sound anything like V-i thing at all - it's all firmly iv-i. Which I guess makes the CAT in question distinct from a leading tone since that should make it sound more like V-i with the b7 (during V) being a mere appoggiatura.

Eh, guess I learned something here