Lesson 2 - The Major Scale

What is a Scale?

In music, a scale is simply one or more of the 12 notes we have to play with in music arranged in a pattern that progresses up or down the keyboard. For example, in the previous lesson when you played all of the Ds from the lowest sounding one to the highest one, what you played could be called a scale. If you were to begin on the lowest D on the keyboard (or any note) and play each of the black and white notes (all 12 sounds) ascending in order, you'd also be playing a scale. There are 479,001,600 possible scale patterns! However; there is only one scale you need to know and it's a pattern of 7 sounds known as the Major scale. It's the most important scale because it's used as a reference to identify and define two fundamental musical elements of pitch organisation: melody and chords.

What is the Major Scale?

Without realising it, you possibly already know the answer to this. Many children learn to sing it when they're very young with the words:

Doh Ray Me Far So La Tee Doh

When you sing this little pattern what you are singing is the Major scale. It has eight steps that we will label using Roman numerals:

I = Doh
II = Ray
III = Me
IV = Far
V = So
VI = La
VII = Tee
VIII = Doh (and is the same sound as step I, only an octave higher)

What are the Notes of the Major Scale on a Keyboard?

You'll remember we have 12 notes - seven white keys and five black keys. Thus, there are 12 possible notes from which you can create the Major scale. In other words, "Doh" (step I of the Major scale) can be any one of those 12 notes. When the note C is step I ("Doh") the Major scale pattern is all white keys:



The most important thing to observe at this stage is that the Major scale is constructed using a sequence of "intervals". An interval is simply the term used in music to describe the distance between any two notes. The smallest distance we have on keyboard instruments is a half-step (traditionally called a semitone). For example, there isn't any note between step III and step IV of the Major scale nor between steps VII and VIII. In other words, the interval distance between E and F and between B and C is a half-step.

The black key between step I and step II is a half-step higher than C and a half-step lower than D. Therefore, step II (D) is a whole-step interval higher than step I (C).

This pattern of half and whole-step intervals used to construct Major scales is of fundamental importance when learning to create any of the 12 possible Major scales. Perhaps the easiest way to remember the pattern is to think of it as being two identical four-note patterns with the intervals in brackets between the steps:

I (whole-step) II (whole-step) III (half-step) IV

V (whole-step) VI (whole-step) VII (half-step) VIII

The interval that connects the two identical 4 note patterns (IV to V) is a whole-step.

Because this Major scale begins on a C it's name is the C major scale.

Activities:

• Observe the way the musical pattern of the first 4 steps sounds the same as the second 4 steps.
• Play step I and then step IV. This interval (called a fourth) is arguably the easiest to learn to recognise because it sounds like the first two notes of Here Comes the Bride. Can you hear the similarity?
• Play step V and then step VIII. This interval is also a fourth and thus also sounds like Here Comes the Bride.
• Play and sing the C Major scale using the names of its steps as words (i.e., "one, two, three..." etc.
• Play and sing the C Major scale as above but down from step V (i.e., "five, four, three, two, one")
• Play and sing other patterns using C Major scale notes. For example, I, III, V ("one, three, five")