Favourite Diatonic Mode

What's your favourite diatonic mode?

My favourite is Lydian. It just sounds so beautifully light, I use to associate its sound with the sky and the colour blue!

Lydian or Dorian for me.

I said Dorian, but it's really difficult. They all have their place (*sigh* yes, even locrian) and I prefer to mix and match than to pick a mode and stick to it.

Phrygian has always been very evocative to me.

I used to use Phryg and Lydian alot. Dorian is my current favorite.

Lydian.

definitely dorian for me.

i cant stand aeolian, simply because i cant stand natural minor scales and i always expect them to be harmonic or melodic.

I like phrygian the best and I like phrygian dominant even better.

I love improvising in dorian, but lately I've been getting a lot of ideas that happen to be Lydian.

I believe a friend of mine wrote a pop song in mix mode and I loved it.

That being said, I am not too terribly familiar with modes. Definitely something I need to research and learn more about!

definitely dorian for me.

i cant stand aeolian, simply because i cant stand natural minor scales and i always expect them to be harmonic or melodic.

Harmonic and melodic minor sound so corny, ugh, I love aeolian. It's probably the most popular mode nowadays, especially in mainstream music.

My favorites are aeolian and ionian. Wow am I the first to choose these?

Out of the more non-standard ones I like Lydian.

Out of the more non-standard ones I like Lydian.

Actually....many people feel Lydian is the standard...and scientifically, lydian is in fact a stronger harmonic home-base than ionian.

*goes back to reading about George Russell's Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization*

;)

Really? Usually when I improvise something in Lydian, the dominant seems to be stealing the tonic.

Really? Usually when I improvise something in Lydian, the dominant seems to be stealing the tonic.

I just mean that Lydian - i.e. the raised 4th is more "natural", theoretically.

The interval of a 5th is the "strongest harmonic interval". Stacking 5ths, when placed in tertian order, results in the Lydian scale.

Also, the overtone series fails to produce a natural-4 even when carried out to 20 harmonics. (the 11th overtone is technically 1/100th of a semitone closer to F# ..to-may-toe, to-mah-toe)

;)

I just mean that Lydian - i.e. the raised 4th is more "natural", theoretically.

The interval of a 5th is the "strongest harmonic interval". Stacking 5ths, when placed in tertian order, results in the Lydian scale.

Also, the overtone series fails to produce a natural-4 even when carried out to 20 harmonics. (the 11th overtone is technically 1/100th of a semitone closer to F# ..to-may-toe, to-mah-toe)

;)

Well, if you stack 5ths, all you technically get is a set of pitches, and depending on how many fifths you stack, how you order them and where you start, you get very different results. By stacking seven fifths and reordering them to a scale (or chord of thirds), you can get any of the 7 diatonic modes, depending on which tone you start with. Sure you can say that if you start with the lowest of the seven, you get lydian, but it seems a bit sought-after for me to claim any "naturality" in this, since the principle of reordering the pitches in the first place is a very conscious and artificially constructive idea, whithout which no scale would result.

I find the second explanation more logical, to make a direct comparisation with the first occurence of something "scale-like" in the harmonic series - i.e. the part between the 8th and 16th partial. Lydian and mixolydian get closer to that than the other modes, and even more so a mixture of both (lydian b7). Bartok used that one quite a bit. The closest solution in 12-tone equal temperament would be an octatonic scale such as C-D-E-F#-G-Ab-Bb-B, which is almost identical with Messiaen's third mode (which just would have an additional Eb in this example).

The funny thing is that I've always been partial to Messiaen's third mode, but hadn't realized this connection until right now.

Lydian. Duh.

[blah blah stacking 5ths] if you start with the lowest of the seven, you get lydian, but it seems a bit sought-after for me to claim any "naturality" in this, since the principle of reordering the pitches in the first place is a very conscious and artificially constructive idea, whithout which no scale would result.

Which is where George Russell's "Tonal Gravity" comes into play...

"Tonal Gravity, or 'tonal magnetism' within a stack of intervals of fifths flows in a downward direction. The tone F# yields to B as its tonic -- F# and B surrender "tonical" authority to E, and so on down the ladder of fifths -- the entire stack conferring ultimate tonical authority on it's lowermost tone, C." (From George Russell's LCCOTO)

:shifty:

BUT, yes. I totally get what your saying...and am only just now really starting to think about it.

they all suck.

Whole tone scales, FTW

Make your own modes.

Or not. I still think that having a favorite scale or progression or whatever is kind of silly.

Gotta go with Lydian.

Nobody likes Ionian and Aeolian except me, what the hell?

Nobody likes Ionian and Aeolian except me, what the hell?

I bet you like vanilla ice-cream, the colour 'beige' and eat only bread and water.

;)

I need to do more modal writing. I really wanna do some crazy stuff with Locrian... Hell, I need to play with tetrachords more. (It's bad, we'll be singing modes in choir and I'll be muttering the tetrachords under my breath...)

I bet you like vanilla ice-cream, the colour 'beige' and eat only bread and water.

;)

Sir, I vigorously protest against the implied allegation of deadheadedness in your post!

Ionian and Aeolian are absolutely amazing, and so are beige, bread, and water!

Ionian and Aeolian are awesome, and so is beige, bread and water!

Well...YOU and I know that...but does anyone else?

...also, what happened to vanilla ice cream? I happen to like vanilla ice cream. DONT U?!