I posted a video in the media section. I'm just trying to figure out if somebody can help me with the key signature thus far so I can continue writing. Thanks everyone!
Trying to figure out key signature for an original
- Thread starter Holly Vin Gruinelle
- Start date
Hey Holly! You'll find you get different answers to this question depending on how people are viewing the harmony in context, but I'll give it a bash! This will probably get hairy pretty fast, theory wise. Hopefully I can keep the mistakes to a minimum!
Here's the chords you were playing (I think) - Bb Lydian/D | A | F Augmented | A | Dm | F augmented | A | A minmaj7 | Bbmin
What I'll say is that it's technically not in a conventional Major or Minor key, in the sense of true Major or Minor, as there are a lot of flavors in the harmony that lend themselves to Harmonic Minor. It sounds beautiful by the way! - One thing my ear notices is that in a way you're always resolving back to the A Major chord.
Your starting chord leading back to A major chord makes my ear want to hear that A as being A Phrygian Dominant (Really D Harmonic Minor), Then the F Augmented (which makes sense in the key of D Harmonic Minor, as it's a chord built from it's 3rd Mode Ionian #5), leading back to A, giving the same tonality as before, Dm next, which makes sense, as we're technically in D harmonic minor, then it's going back into the F augmented resolving to A like before - Up until this point I've been viewing the song in either D harmonic minor or A Phrygian Dominant, as the tonal weight seems to be leaning back to the A chord every time.
The song then modulates to A minmaj7, which could be A harmonic minor, and then Bb min, which takes the tonality straight to straight B minor.
So key wise, It's like D Harmonic Minor for the home key, but the ear (or at least my ear) is being lead towards A Phrygian Dominant for the majority of the tune.
It's like A Phryg Dom/A Harm min/Bb min.
The above is fun to know and theorize about, but the most important thing is that you've written a really beautiful and unusual progression
Hope this gives some insight!
Here's the chords you were playing (I think) - Bb Lydian/D | A | F Augmented | A | Dm | F augmented | A | A minmaj7 | Bbmin
What I'll say is that it's technically not in a conventional Major or Minor key, in the sense of true Major or Minor, as there are a lot of flavors in the harmony that lend themselves to Harmonic Minor. It sounds beautiful by the way! - One thing my ear notices is that in a way you're always resolving back to the A Major chord.
Your starting chord leading back to A major chord makes my ear want to hear that A as being A Phrygian Dominant (Really D Harmonic Minor), Then the F Augmented (which makes sense in the key of D Harmonic Minor, as it's a chord built from it's 3rd Mode Ionian #5), leading back to A, giving the same tonality as before, Dm next, which makes sense, as we're technically in D harmonic minor, then it's going back into the F augmented resolving to A like before - Up until this point I've been viewing the song in either D harmonic minor or A Phrygian Dominant, as the tonal weight seems to be leaning back to the A chord every time.
The song then modulates to A minmaj7, which could be A harmonic minor, and then Bb min, which takes the tonality straight to straight B minor.
So key wise, It's like D Harmonic Minor for the home key, but the ear (or at least my ear) is being lead towards A Phrygian Dominant for the majority of the tune.
It's like A Phryg Dom/A Harm min/Bb min.
The above is fun to know and theorize about, but the most important thing is that you've written a really beautiful and unusual progression
Hope this gives some insight!
T
TheRedMageGuitarist
Guest
Holy shit. Mic drop.Hey Holly! You'll find you get different answers to this question depending on how people are viewing the harmony in context, but I'll give it a bash! This will probably get hairy pretty fast, theory wise. Hopefully I can keep the mistakes to a minimum!
Here's the chords you were playing (I think) - Bb Lydian/D | A | F Augmented | A | Dm | F augmented | A | A minmaj7 | Bbmin
What I'll say is that it's technically not in a conventional Major or Minor key, in the sense of true Major or Minor, as there are a lot of flavors in the harmony that lend themselves to Harmonic Minor. It sounds beautiful by the way! - One thing my ear notices is that in a way you're always resolving back to the A Major chord.
Your starting chord leading back to A major chord makes my ear want to hear that A as being A Phrygian Dominant (Really D Harmonic Minor), Then the F Augmented (which makes sense in the key of D Harmonic Minor, as it's a chord built from it's 3rd Mode Ionian #5), leading back to A, giving the same tonality as before, Dm next, which makes sense, as we're technically in D harmonic minor, then it's going back into the F augmented resolving to A like before - Up until this point I've been viewing the song in either D harmonic minor or A Phrygian Dominant, as the tonal weight seems to be leaning back to the A chord every time.
The song then modulates to A minmaj7, which could be A harmonic minor, and then Bb min, which takes the tonality straight to straight B minor.
So key wise, It's like D Harmonic Minor for the home key, but the ear (or at least my ear) is being lead towards A Phrygian Dominant for the majority of the tune.
It's like A Phryg Dom/A Harm min/Bb min.
The above is fun to know and theorize about, but the most important thing is that you've written a really beautiful and unusual progression
Hope this gives some insight!
Wow just wow! That's pretty cool I had no idea it was so complicated LOL! I do know when I wrote this I was experimenting with augmented chords so I guess this kind of makes sense I guess haha! That is a whole lot to unpack but I will look into these and kind of see what I can do as far as keeping it simple in the beginning. You are amazing thank you so much for taking the time to give me such a detailed response! Thank you for the compliment and thank you so much for responding.Hey Holly! You'll find you get different answers to this question depending on how people are viewing the harmony in context, but I'll give it a bash! This will probably get hairy pretty fast, theory wise. Hopefully I can keep the mistakes to a minimum!
Here's the chords you were playing (I think) - Bb Lydian/D | A | F Augmented | A | Dm | F augmented | A | A minmaj7 | Bbmin
What I'll say is that it's technically not in a conventional Major or Minor key, in the sense of true Major or Minor, as there are a lot of flavors in the harmony that lend themselves to Harmonic Minor. It sounds beautiful by the way! - One thing my ear notices is that in a way you're always resolving back to the A Major chord.
Your starting chord leading back to A major chord makes my ear want to hear that A as being A Phrygian Dominant (Really D Harmonic Minor), Then the F Augmented (which makes sense in the key of D Harmonic Minor, as it's a chord built from it's 3rd Mode Ionian #5), leading back to A, giving the same tonality as before, Dm next, which makes sense, as we're technically in D harmonic minor, then it's going back into the F augmented resolving to A like before - Up until this point I've been viewing the song in either D harmonic minor or A Phrygian Dominant, as the tonal weight seems to be leaning back to the A chord every time.
The song then modulates to A minmaj7, which could be A harmonic minor, and then Bb min, which takes the tonality straight to straight B minor.
So key wise, It's like D Harmonic Minor for the home key, but the ear (or at least my ear) is being lead towards A Phrygian Dominant for the majority of the tune.
It's like A Phryg Dom/A Harm min/Bb min.
The above is fun to know and theorize about, but the most important thing is that you've written a really beautiful and unusual progression
Hope this gives some insight!
I'm really just waiting to be corrected because I did it in a hurry haha
T
TheRedMageGuitarist
Guest
It tends to happen as soon as you add in Augmented & Minmaj7 chords in the mix haha - It's only really because you can't find them in a Major Key, so you're immediately on to the more exotic modes of Harmonic Minor - but once you get your head around it, it's not that bad! They are amazing chords to play with though.
If you want to be able to unpack all the jargon then Rick Beato is 100% your man - I used his videos to re-teach myself theory because I sucked at it in college
Notepad and pen & a strong coffee with some of his Lecture videos will really clue you up fast with the stuff.No problem at all! it was a lot of fun to try and figure it out - feel free to DM anytime if you want any q's answered, I really enjoy taking those kinda things apart
Haha you're too kind! I think I'd have heart palpitations if he were fact checking, he's like music Dumbledore to me
Thank you so very much again! You are truly incredible. I hope that I can continue this song and make it even half as cool as I made the intro. I often think about it and wonder how the hell I managed to write this at all LOL. But anyway, you are incredible thank you again so very much and I will keep all of that in mind haha probably take me 5 years to finish it
Honestly, no problem at all! If you write the rest the same way you wrote the start the process should be a breeze for you
Hey Holly! You'll find you get different answers to this question depending on how people are viewing the harmony in context, but I'll give it a bash! This will probably get hairy pretty fast, theory wise. Hopefully I can keep the mistakes to a minimum!
Here's the chords you were playing (I think) - Bb Lydian/D | A | F Augmented | A | Dm | F augmented | A | A minmaj7 | Bbmin
What I'll say is that it's technically not in a conventional Major or Minor key, in the sense of true Major or Minor, as there are a lot of flavors in the harmony that lend themselves to Harmonic Minor. It sounds beautiful by the way! - One thing my ear notices is that in a way you're always resolving back to the A Major chord.
Your starting chord leading back to A major chord makes my ear want to hear that A as being A Phrygian Dominant (Really D Harmonic Minor), Then the F Augmented (which makes sense in the key of D Harmonic Minor, as it's a chord built from it's 3rd Mode Ionian #5), leading back to A, giving the same tonality as before, Dm next, which makes sense, as we're technically in D harmonic minor, then it's going back into the F augmented resolving to A like before - Up until this point I've been viewing the song in either D harmonic minor or A Phrygian Dominant, as the tonal weight seems to be leaning back to the A chord every time.
The song then modulates to A minmaj7, which could be A harmonic minor, and then Bb min, which takes the tonality straight to straight B minor.
So key wise, It's like D Harmonic Minor for the home key, but the ear (or at least my ear) is being lead towards A Phrygian Dominant for the majority of the tune.
It's like A Phryg Dom/A Harm min/Bb min.
The above is fun to know and theorize about, but the most important thing is that you've written a really beautiful and unusual progression
Hope this gives some insight!
This reminds me of the old days in the late 80s, reading the tab notes on songs in songbooks or in Guitar for the Practicing Musician magazine. See, the notes would always explain the theory behind a song and especially the solo. And for people, like Vai and whatnot, who were very theory oriented, it was a very straightforward thing.
But when you got to people who played by ear and feel, and not theory, it was a mess. Look at guys like George Lynch who does a lot of pattern work that dances outside specific keys, while generally remaining loosely around the primary pentatonic box locations, and you'd have a 20 second solo with six paragraphs explaining how "the first section is loosely based around G Phrygian, but for the second note of the third pattern, he swerves hard into mixolydian before coming back to D flat Phygian and then back into the G Phrygian modality to close out."
This would go on for half a page. You'd read this and know that Lynch had no idea what the fuck he was playing, from a theory perspective, he just knew it ripped.
Same thing here, and it's glorious. Great piece, by the way Holly. Some nice sounding odd chords in there! I may steal a few...
This is a really great point! Like how playing based on your own set of rules can add to the creativity because you'll wind up playing more unconventionally & arrive at more interesting things as a result
Haha yeah I could imagine an analysis of a Vai solo being just... 'Lydian'
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