Have you ever asked yourself why we have Major and Minor Scales in music? With the exception of the Drums, you must know the Major and Minor Scales on the Musical Instrument that you want to learn. The reason for this is because most of the music that you hear in this world are derived from the Major and Minor Scales. There is rarely any song or music that you will hear in this world that is not derived from at least one of the Major and Minor Scales. Major and Minor Scales help us to create what is known as Tonal Music.
Tonal Music is based on Tonality. What is Tonality? Tonality is the arrangement of musical notes in which one musical note becomes the central/main note for the other musical notes. This main/central musical note is known as the tonic note; each of the remaining musical notes in this arrangement is defined in terms of how each of them relates to the main/central musical note. The concept of Tonality is what gave birth to Major and Minor Scales. The first musical note of any Major or Minor Scale is known as the tonic note of that Major or Minor Scale; the remaining musical notes of that Major or Minor Scale is defined in terms of how each of them relates to the tonic note; the other musical notes that are outside of that major or minor scale are also defined in terms of how each of them relates to the tonic note. Any music or song that is based on or created from a Major or Minor Scale is known as Tonal Music. Tonal Music sounds pleasant to the ears and it also sounds like the kind of music that makes sense. Most of the songs and music that you hear in this world is Tonal Music.
What does it mean for a piece of music or song to be based on or created from a Major or Minor Scale? It means that most or all the musical notes that were used to create that piece of music or song comes from a particular Major or Minor Scale. A few musical notes that are outside of the Major or Minor Scale that the music or song is based on could have also been used to create the song or music.
The opposite of Tonality is Atonality and the opposite of Tonal Music is Atonal Music. Unlike Tonality, Atonality is music that lacks a central/main musical note. The notes that the Atonal Music consists of do not have a central note among them that they relate or connect with. I’ve listened to Atonal music before and it didn’t sound pleasant to my ears to be honest. Atonal Music is very rare in this modern time; it will be rare for you to come across atonal music. Most of the songs and music that you hear in this world is Tonal Music.
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