Hi Enlo! How are you?

This thread is to help you to understand and get the most from Modes. The idea is to learn the theory behind them, practice shapes, work on improvisations and compositions applying the theory concepts.

At first please let me know how what you know about modes...

well what I know about modes so far, is that it's starting on a different note than the root and ending in that note? It's playing for example a Gmajor over and E minor chord, but i'm not sure as to why etc, also I'm still lost about how the modes make up chords. Also i'm not sure how to apply them to minor chord progressions

Ok, this is a good starting point but the best is to see each more as a different scale, with different intervals and sound. You said that you are already comfortable with major modes, let's start working with one of the minor ones. Let's start with Dorian.

If we see each mode as a different scale, it's also true that we can harmonize in thirds each of the notes and get 7 chords that belong to Dorian tonality. This means that you don't only can create "dorian" melodies over a minor chord, you can also build dorian progressions.

The first main thing that you have to get is the sound of the mode. We won't think on any other scale, just dorian mode, a mode/scale that is formed by a Root, major 2nd, minor 3rd, perfect 4th, perfect 5th, major 6th and minor 7th.

This means that D dorian would be: D E F G A B C

Please read and work on this thread: Dorian

Just listen to this lesson where you will hear a D Dorian progression: https://www.guitarmasterclass.net/misc-less...rd-progression/ Can you get the vibe of the more there?


IMPROVISATION EXERCISE IN E DORIAN:

Let's use this E dorian backing track to practice the scale, play the notes up an down, listen how it sound, try to create phrases, record yourself and post your recording here. The chords are: //: Em7 / G A7 / Em7 / G A7 ://

This post has been edited by Gabriel Leopardi: Jun 29 2014, 07:40 PM

i'm confused as to what the chords are are they em 7, g and then a7? or are they the same thing? and also i wonder why i'm playing D dorian over E minor? like why is it that that works?

Hi mate, now I added a bold tittle to the last exercise that I gave you, which is in E dorian (not in D dorian), you have to use E Dorian over it. The chords that you are asking are also part of E dorian tonality, what's exactly your question about the chords? how to play them?

oh I got confused because I saw D dorian on the first message !

Perfect! And what about the chords question?

the chords question was like how do you make up those chords? using the 1 3 5 formula diatonicly using the Dorian scale?

Exactly. I invite you to harmonize in third E dorian and write here the chords that you get.

hey man, so I gave the mode thing another shot lol, Here i played c major chord in the background, and c lydian over it, In my head, i was thinking of the Gmajor shapes. would that be C lydian? I know it's a crappy example and sloppy playing but i just wanted to make sure i was doing it right

Hi mate, the recording is very short to let me see if your soloing is sounding lydian, but from what I can hear, I can say, so so.... there is some characteristic sound there, but the fact that you are playing G instead of C, generates that you are note focusing on notes from C triad plus the augmented fourth.

What about recording an improvisation using a longer backing? Also, I was wondering, have you been following my improvisation course? I covered major and minor scales, pentatonic, and started with Arpeggios. I will be also covering modes in the near future. Combining major arpeggios with C lydian could be a good idea...

Improvisation Course: Lesson notes HERE.

Each video can be replayed.

thanks for the link man, i'm not sure which one to go to lol i started with the g major scale one

If you don't have a strong background with this concepts, I recommend you to start with week#1 and follow the whole course. It's a very effective training that will cover all the important topics to master improvisation.