# Is saying a piece of music written in C major scale the same as saying it is written in A minor natural scale?



## mozilla2004 (Nov 1, 2020)

I just came across some youtube videos explaining what minor scales are. One type of minor scale is the natural minor scale, which uses the exact same notes as its major scale counter part. So if a piece of music is written in C major scale, does that mean it is equally correct to say it is written in A minor natural scale? If so, then what is the purpose of coming up with two different names for the same thing?


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## knight_yyz (Mar 14, 2015)

They are the same scale with different root notes.


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## bigboki (Apr 16, 2015)

actually, it is the same set of tones in the scale, but the peace (and scale) "sounds" quite different
so no, it is not correct to say that peace written in C is the same like peace written in Am

there are not only 2 of the scales with the same notes, there are actually SEVEN of them (seven notes in the scale). Those are modes. Each one has its own "sound", feeling...


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## Stephenlouis (Jun 24, 2019)

My understanding or take in classical is they are closely related, but tonally C rests around C and Am would tend to resolve on the A. Imagine, by John Lennon is in C as an example... Listen to it and find a piece in Am and compare. It comes down to the tonic.


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## Analogman (Oct 3, 2012)

They’re different, they share the same notes but the tonic and target notes are different. 

The same theory applies to the other notes in the key. C Major is C (Ionian), Dm (Dorian), Em (Phrygian), F (Lydian), G (mixolydian), Am (Aeolian or natural minor), Bdim (Locrian). All the same notes as the parent major scale but by starting and stopping on different notes you’re changing the sound of the scale.


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

Enlightening thread!


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## Doug Gifford (Jun 8, 2019)

There are two separate things at play here. A scale can be thought of as the collection of notes the piece mostly uses. So C major and A natural minor use the same scale, as Analogman explains above. But they are different modes.

A mode is better thought of as the set of intervals relative to the root used in the piece. So anything in major has the intervals 
(root) - tone - tone - semitone - tone - tone - tone - semitone back to the root. 
Anything in natural minor has the intervals 
(root) - tone - semitone - tone - tone - semitone - tone - tone back to the root.

A major mode can start on any tone as long as it contains that sequence of intervals. Same with minor. A C major scale contains that sequence of intervals beginning on C.


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## GTmaker (Apr 24, 2006)

bigboki said:


> actually, it is the same set of tones in the scale, but the peace (and scale) "sounds" quite different
> so no, it is not correct to say that peace written in C is the same like peace written in Am
> 
> there are not only 2 of the scales with the same notes, there are actually SEVEN of them (seven notes in the scale). Those are modes. Each one has its own "sound", feeling...


you can look at this scale stuff in a lot of different ways but what bigboki explains above tells me the whole story as I understand things.
G.


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## Jim9guitars (Feb 15, 2016)

One way to hear how this works is to listen to some music that uses them. A lot of heavy rock has a minor key chord progression with a minor key guitar solo(Black Sabbath, AC/DC etc...). Bands like the Doobie Brothers and the Allman Brothers write in Major key quite often and use Major scales. The old standby description is "happy songs= Major key, sad songs= minor key." (insert Spinal Tap joke here). I've found that you can only get away with using a minor key to solo over a song that's in a Major key with some songs and vice versa. An easy experiment to hi-light this is to record your self strumming a C Major chord for a few bars and then while playing it back run through the C Major scale and then do it with the A minor scale.


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## KapnKrunch (Jul 13, 2016)

*Commonly expressed in sharps or flats...*

A piece of music that is ambiguous in its melodies and harmonies is simply expressed in its key signature...

No sharps & no flats will therefore include: C major, A minor, and all the modes of both.

If the band leader says: "OK guys, one sharp." It's G major, E minor and all the modes.

"One flat, people." F major, D minor and modes.

Etc.


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## KapnKrunch (Jul 13, 2016)

The key signatures are determined by the good old-fashioned:

The Cycle of Fifths (all the sharped keys from C to C#)

The Cycle of Fourths ( all the flatted keys from C to Cb)

If you haven't examined this *basic* yet, you've got the rest of today to do so...

😄😄😄 

Once you have learned this theory you can ignore practising it like I do.


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## jimmythegeek (Apr 17, 2012)

Analogman said:


> They’re different, they share the same notes but the tonic and target notes are different.
> 
> The same theory applies to the other notes in the key. C Major is C (Ionian), Dm (Dorian), Em (Phrygian), F (Lydian), G (mixolydian), Am (Aeolian or natural minor), Bdim (Locrian). All the same notes as the parent major scale but by starting and stopping on different notes you’re changing the sound of the scale.


Could you elaborate on target notes? My limited understanding is based around "safe" tones for resolving a phrase I.e. the root, 3rd and 5th notes on the scale. For C major that would be C, E and G. For A minor it's A, C and E. 
Assuming I'm rocking out to a I-IV-V progression then the sequence would be:

C-F-G or Am-Dm-Em
The outlier tones above are the G and the A. Playing a G over any chord in the major progression COULD work (using it as a bluesy bent 2nd over the F or as a 9th depending on voicing). In the minor progression, the G is either the minor 7th, 4th or minor 3rd depending on the chord. The first 2 intervals are potentially gross (again, dependent on voicing) but using the G from a C major scale over the Em would be OK.

Is it too simplistic to say that the major/relative minor scales are interchangeable based on the chord being played at any given time? Is it more appropriate to say that you're only thinking in terms of major or minor feel and associating the 2 scales with those terms but in reality, you're matching a mode with a major/minor tonality to the individual chord in a progression? These are the kinds of things that keep me up at night...


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## dgreen (Sep 3, 2016)

More commonly the key of A minor will always have the 7th note of the scale ( G) raised to a G#, which would be referred to as the Harmonic A minor scale. Also another version would be the melodic A minor which raises the 6th and 7th note when moving up the scale ( F# G# ) and then the same notes become natural when descending ( F G).
So if you see a piece written in a key with no sharps / flats ( typically C major) watch for the accidentals ( (F# G#) as that will confirm the A minor key.
Of course the obvious other detail is to check the last chord of the song which almost always is the tonic (root) chord, ie. Am.
Very common in Blues and jazz to see the harmonic and melodic versions of a minor scale used over a specific minor key. Gives that cool outside of the box sound


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## Analogman (Oct 3, 2012)

jimmythegeek said:


> Could you elaborate on target notes? My limited understanding is based around "safe" tones for resolving a phrase I.e. the root, 3rd and 5th notes on the scale. For C major that would be C, E and G. For A minor it's A, C and E.
> Assuming I'm rocking out to a I-IV-V progression then the sequence would be:
> 
> C-F-G or Am-Dm-Em
> ...


Exactly, target notes are safe notes or the notes of chord you’re playing over. The major and relative minor scales consist of the same notes (same with all 7 modes in any given key) but your safe notes change depending on the chord you’re playing over giving it a different tonality.


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## Dorian2 (Jun 9, 2015)

Just my 2 bits and another way to think about it. To answer the specific question. No. They aren't the same aside from using the same notes. Some important topics to consider:

Tonal center: While not always true, typically the Tonic of the song you are playing will be the 1st chord that is played. Tonic is the "sound" that the piece that you're playing wants to "resolve to". In any given scale or chord progression, the "function" of the scale step your note or chord is on will determine the strength of the resolution towards the Tonic of the piece being played.

An example of a "functional" chord tone or note that strongly resolves to the Tonal center of the piece is the 5th, or "Dominant" tone of that scale.

Say we're in the key of C Major. Here's the "diatonic chord progression": C Maj - Dm - Emin - F Maj - G7 - Amin - Bdim That G7 is going to have the strongest resolution to CMaj

Now say we're in the key of A minor, which is the relative minor to the key of C Major

Am - Bdim - CMaj - Dm - Em (or E7) -FMaj - G7 . Now the Tonic center is Am. In this case, the Dominant "place holder" happens to be Em, but the "functionality" of that particular note in sequence is a Dominant (5th note of the scale). So it's common practice in a minor key to "borrow" the dominant chord from the parallel Major scale (A Major in this case) so the chord resolves more strongly to the Tonic (Am).

Try playing an Am pentatonic lick against a A-D-E progression (blues) and then play the same lick against a C-F-G progression (country). It'll be clear as a bell how the tonality changes and how some of the exact same notes just won't work as well with one progression vs the other. Trust your ear to lead you there.

Sorry for the long ass reply. I'm shitty at parsing.


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