Hi, i’ve been trying to learn music theory and there is a lot of things I don’t get.
Is a scale all the notes that sound good together? If so, why do some of them played together in the scame scale sound bad/dissonant? It makes no sense to me. Also, what is a key? Is it a group of notes/chords that sound good together? How do I start writing my own fingerstyle tabs?
In: 35
A scale is a collection of notes that form a key. A key is the set of notes that sort of work together to form a foundation for a song. Certain groupings of notes in a key work well together and have a purpose, for instance, the first note in the scale of the key is the “home base,” that makes a song sound settled. That’s why songs usually start and end with a chord that uses the first note in the scale.
Scales are formed as a collection of whole steps and half steps (which is the interval between two notes. Easiest to check by looking at a piano). No matter the starting note, a major scale will always follow the same pattern of whole and half steps: WWHWWWH. This creates the seven notes of a major scale.
Not all notes in a scale will sound good together because they serve different functions, and the same with chords. I mentioned the first note as the “home base.” The seventh note is purposely dissonant, because it’s used to “lead” back to note 1, the home base.
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