Why are guitarists obsessed with modes?

jpfamps · May 2015

So why is there such fetish amongst guitarists with modes?

Very little pop / rock music is actually modal. The only song I have played that I would consider modal is Have Nagila which was a request at a Jewish wedding.

I know a ton of great horn player.

They can all read music, improvise over jazz changes, play by ear.

They don't have any interest in modes, nor see modes as an approach with any particular value. This includes an alto sax player whose band was nominated for a Mercury prize.

All these players are play far more harmonically complicated music than virtually all guitarists play.

I recently asked this question to a customer who is a lecturer in jazz at a London college. This guy plays tons of session on a wide variety of fretted (and indeed non fretted) instruments including guitar. He was also totally baffled by guitarists fetishes for modes too.

Can anybody help?

Teetonetal · May 2015

they aren't .just lots of those that are don't get them. so ask lots of questions which makes it feel like modes are very popular.

modes are easy once you find the sound, then you forget about all the theory nonsense and get the sounds out...

Jalapeno · May 2015

Beats me. Arpeggios & melody are where the cool stuff is.

spacecadet · May 2015

It's musical vocabulary. If you are learning a new language (in this case music) you need to get the basics down, grammar etc. If you want to sound really intelligent or articulate what you need to say better to many different levels of people, you learn big words or in this case, modes/ chords. Without realising it, you already play modes. Major/ minor scales are modes.

stickyfiddle · May 2015

Because most guitarists are not actually very creative so need to rely on rules rather than their ears and imaginations to come up with music?

monquixote · May 2015

I don't think what you are saying makes any sense.

All music is modal. The Aeolian and Ionian are modes, you might say the relative minor of C is A minor, but you are still talking about modes even if you choose not to use that language. I can call an apple a "pomme", but it doesn't stop being an apple.

Also any song that doesn't start on the Tonic is modal if you choose to look at it that way.

When you play "Come up and see me" which I'm sure about half of the pub bands on here do you start the song by running up the G mixolydian scale. You can say "Play the G mixolydian scale" or you can say "Play C minor, but start on G" or "Play G major, but flatten the 7th", but whatever language you choose to use it's still modal.

If you solo over the Dm chord in a progression in C major you can say you are soloing in C major, or D Dorian, or you can say you are targeting the chord tones, but you will still be playing the same notes.

Huge amounts of blues, jazz, funk and soul is modal. In fact it's far more common when I'm soloing over the music that my funk/soul band play that if I want to add in a 6th over a minor progression it's more often than not a major 6th.

Also a lot of traditional folk and world music is modal especially when it's played on an instrument that has 8 notes rather than 12 or doesn't have even temperament.

I think what is fairly unique to technical guitar players is the compulsive desire to play in things like the Locrian mode, just because it's there which is pretty rare outside of shred music.

randomhandclaps · May 2015

My belief is because guitarists in general mistake modes as a learning tool for modes as a shortcut or life raft.

ALL music is modal. A mode is literally a relationship between a note or groups of notes to the underlying chord. Guitarists, more than any other musicians, seems to see the leap into improvisation as a massive one. Perhaps a core reason for this is a vast amount of guitarists (unlike students of most other musical instruments) do not start by learning scales and gaining a strong fundamental understanding of the fretboard's structure.

I was taught and still believe that when you first look at a fretboard it is just a bunch of notes you don't understand. You then bit by bit learn scales in boxes across the fretboard and these become important footholds. Eventually once these are incorporated enough in your playing to become fluent, suddenly the fretboard returns to be a bunch of notes, only now a bunch that you understand in depth. I believe most guitarists will never move past the second stage.

When a horn player says "I don't use modes!" it's most probably down to two reasons - Firstly that he started in a solid and strict regime of learning scales from the ground up and secondly they live and breath the style they are playing and have spent endless hours jamming over tracks aided by their solid scale knowledge.

equalsql · May 2015

I've never studied modes and have no real desire to do so. I just want to play the notes I hear in my head. I listen to the chords and then try and play melodies that work with those chords but also stand up as melodies in their own right..if that makes sense.

It doesn't always work, but I like the idea of a listener being able to remove the backing chords I'm playing over and still be able to hear them subconsciously because the notes I play emphasize the key components of those chords..

This is my own blinkered approach but I think it comes from me learning to play over a lot of Steely Dan, Jeff Lorber type music in my early years. I've never been a speed player having always preferred the Dexter Gordon approach to playing.

DrJazzTap · May 2015

I would love to be able to hear the modes like Vai can. Sure certain sounds evoke something from a mode.
For instance

Lydian I think of Satch and Vai widdling away over a pad progression (usually with a fan blowing away and some dry ice).
Dorian - Santana wincing or Zappa's excellent "Santana secret chord progression".
Phrygian- Metallica, flattened second with some wah wah solo
Locrian- Wrong just wrong.

As for Mixolydian, nothing really springs to mind for me. Ionian and Aeolian goes without saying.

I need to spend more time with it, I was always told that you can use modes over an appropiate static chord but a modal progression is the key to understanding them. The chords should really be harmonised from that mode.

I spent a bit of time on it years ago but didnt really see the benefit for me then. I think if I invested more time into it and harmonised the appropriate chords. Then it'd sink in better.

I think guitarists lust over modes, as they perhaps see it as some short cut to playing more scales? For instance I'll fudge a Lydian mode over an Add9 or even a Major7, I don't feel i'm strictly playing in a lydian mode. I've just fudged it for myself.

I'm a big advocate of listening to new sounds instead, that works better for me.

steamabacus · May 2015

DrJazzTap said:

I would love to be able to hear the modes like Vai can. Sure certain sounds evoke something from a mode.
For instance
Lydian I think of Satch and Vai widdling away over a pad progression (usually with a fan blowing away and some dry ice).
Dorian - Santana wincing or Zappa's excellent "Santana secret chord progression".
Phrygian- Metallica, flattened second with some wah wah solo
Locrian- Wrong just wrong.

As for Mixolydian, nothing really springs to mind for me. Ionian and Aeolian goes without saying.

I need to spend more time with it, I was always told that you can use modes over an appropiate static chord but a modal progression is the key to understanding them. The chords should really be harmonised from that mode.

I spent a bit of time on it years ago but didnt really see the benefit for me then. I think if I invested more time into it and harmonised the appropriate chords. Then it'd sink in better.

I think guitarists lust over modes, as they perhaps see it as some short cut to playing more scales? For instance I'll fudge a Lydian mode over an Add9 or even a Major7, I don't feel i'm strictly playing in a lydian mode. I've just fudged it for myself.

I'm a big advocate of listening to new sounds instead, that works better for me.

This is a good video for hearing the 'flavour' of the modes, especially as it's done on keyboards and so takes us out of that 'guitar head' we can all get stuck in.....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZpeYO3iat8&feature=c4-overview-vl&list=PLFBZlIo53dQ4mdwSqjrJOggCLioPlJdbU

jeztone2 · May 2015

You raise an interesting point. I suspect it's to do with learning your way around the neck. I did spend a few weeks as a teenager learning modes. But I think they just made me more comfortable moving around the neck & shifting positions. Not musical as such, but perhaps useful in the bigger picture?

thomasross20 · May 2015

Jalapeno said:

Beats me. Arpeggios & melody are where the cool stuff is.

Maybe I'm not doing it right but I always found arpeggios restrictive!

frankus · May 2015

I know "a different perspective is worth 80 IQ points" but if the lecturer doesn't know, the chances are good any strong response will come from people defending their choice to invest in learning that approach, which isn't impartial.

I think it's one of those "if the only tool you've got is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail".

But I look forward to reading the responses

viz · May 2015

Mr. JPF is spot on, and to me the reasons are pretty clear.

Firstly, rock guitarists are not normally grounded in the classical tradition of musical upbringing.

Scondly, rock guitarists do not generally read or use sheet music, and TAB and chord names are the prevalent notation systems.

Thirdly, although it is tuned to the key of E minor (or G major), the guitar is inherently a key-agnostic instrument, mainly due to the barre chord. Pick any note on a piano and you can instantly name it; pick a random string and fret in the middle of the guitar and most guitarists can't.

For these 3 reasons, most guitarists' journey towards musical theory and understanding takes a completely different route from pianists, violinists, brass and woodwind players, who need to build their theoretical knowledge at the right pace to accompany their palying ability, so they can operate within the classical context. Classical musicians go through a well-defined path intended to ground them with a thorough understanding and language of how music really works, following something akin to this rough sequence:

Notation and naming basics
Major and minor
Keys and scales
Time signatures and rhythms basics
Reading music
Key signatures and ornaments
Harmony and chordal context
Melody writing
Transposition
Harmonic modulation
4-part writing and figured bass
Style recognition and composition

Obviously this is a totally valid approach for guitarists too as any guitarist with grade 8 theory will tell you, and nobody who's embraced it and gone through it successfully would say it stifles music making or creativity! But it's not fundamentally necessary for playing guitar in bands or orchestras. Guitarists tend to come at theory after reaching a certain playing standard. Therefore the journey is not theory-driven or even theory-parallel; rather the theory is used as a rear guard to vocabularise the playing, hence it tends to be very pragmatic and customised to individuals' advancement. Furthermore it is more informal and unstructured, and often more non-standardised - guitarists often develop their own ideas and language around theory rather than being taught the traditional theory.

Thus a typical journey might be:

Basic chord keys - E, A, G, C, D
Major and minor
I, IV, V and other popular chord progressions
Pentatonic scale
Circle of 5ths
Reading TAB
Basic chord extensions, 7ths, sus, 9ths, etc
Advanced chord extensions, b5ths, b9ths, etc.
Reading chord notation
Diatonic modes
Other scale families and their modes (melodic minor, harmonic minor)

The classical tradition bypasses modes because the thorough, key-specific grounding in harmony and melody doesn't really utilise the concept. Modes are a convenient, easy, key-agnostic way of describing scales, and are closely linked to the I, IV, V-type of approach, which is also key agnostic and doesn't require musical notation.

Guitarists tend to land on modes as a more advanced part of musical theory.

IMO.

EricTheWeary · May 2015

Well, arguably everything is modal so, as others have said, it's just another way of using the language. Rock ( in a very broad sense) guitar tends to be learned as patterns - or at least that those patterns are seen as a short cut to competency - and modes fall into patterns, patterns fall into modes,etc.

frankus · May 2015

Arguably everything is mathematics.

Except most guitarists approach to theory that's more often Numberwang, Wangernum or a cryptic rhyme off Ted Roger's 3-2-1.

The blues was an aural tradition and rock comes from that, so does jazz largely - in the early 80s guitar magazines came along and added mystifying stuff with modes to that aural tradition - now up and down the land at open mic nights and in the intervals at gigs... striving guitarists practice reciting this aural tradition, garnered from the worthy tomes that gave them the tab to ape their heroes.

BigMonka · May 2015

EricTheWeary said:

Well, arguably everything is modal so, as others have said, it's just another way of using the language. Rock ( in a very broad sense) guitar tends to be learned as patterns - or at least that those patterns are seen as a short cut to competency - and modes fall into patterns, patterns fall into modes,etc.

Wisdom. I was also going to say that a big part of it is that guitar, unlike most instruments, can be all about fretboard patterns. I have no doubt that other instruments are also playing modes but they probably think of it as putting accidentals into the correct scale, or following the chords with their melody - they just don't necessarily have the same need to give it a title.

monquixote · May 2015

BigMonka said:

EricTheWeary said:

Well, arguably everything is modal so, as others have said, it's just another way of using the language. Rock ( in a very broad sense) guitar tends to be learned as patterns - or at least that those patterns are seen as a short cut to competency - and modes fall into patterns, patterns fall into modes,etc.

Wisdom. I was also going to say that a big part of it is that guitar, unlike most instruments, can be all about fretboard patterns. I have no doubt that other instruments are also playing modes but they probably think of it as putting accidentals into the correct scale, or following the chords with their melody - they just don't necessarily have the same need to give it a title.

I think that's very valid.

You could equally say why are keyboard players so obsessed with how many sharps and flats there are in a key whereas guitarists often don't care and it's because it's what has an impact on the mechanics of playing.

hugbot · May 2015

DrJazzTap said:
As for Mixolydian, nothing really springs to mind for me. Ionian and Aeolian goes without saying.

I think of mixolydian as the slightly cooler major scale due to the flat 7th.

jpfamps · May 2015

viz said:

Mr. JPF is spot on, and to me the reasons are pretty clear.

Firstly, rock guitarists are not normally grounded in the classical tradition of musical upbringing.

Scondly, rock guitarists do not generally read or use sheet music, and TAB and chord names are the prevalent notation systems.

Thirdly, although it is tuned to the key of E minor (or G major), the guitar is inherently a key-agnostic instrument, mainly due to the barre chord. Pick any note on a piano and you can instantly name it; pick a random string and fret in the middle of the guitar and most guitarists can't.

For these 3 reasons, most guitarists' journey towards musical theory and understanding takes a completely different route from pianists, violinists, brass and woodwind players, who need to build their theoretical knowledge at the right pace to accompany their palying ability, so they can operate within the classical context. Classical musicians go through a well-defined path intended to ground them with a thorough understanding and language of how music really works, following something akin to this rough sequence:

Notation and naming basics
Major and minor
Keys and scales
Time signatures and rhythms basics
Reading music
Key signatures and ornaments
Harmony and chordal context
Melody writing
Transposition
Harmonic modulation
4-part writing and figured bass
Style recognition and composition

Obviously this is a totally valid approach for guitarists too as any guitarist with grade 8 theory will tell you, and nobody who's embraced it and gone through it successfully would say it stifles music making or creativity! But it's not fundamentally necessary for playing guitar in bands or orchestras. Guitarists tend to come at theory after reaching a certain playing standard. Therefore the journey is not theory-driven or even theory-parallel; rather the theory is used as a rear guard to vocabularise the playing, hence it tends to be very pragmatic and customised to individuals' advancement. Furthermore it is more informal and unstructured, and often more non-standardised - guitarists often develop their own ideas and language around theory rather than being taught the traditional theory.

Thus a typical journey might be:

Basic chord keys - E, A, G, C, D
Major and minor
I, IV, V and other popular chord progressions
Pentatonic scale
Circle of 5ths
Reading TAB
Basic chord extensions, 7ths, sus, 9ths, etc
Advanced chord extensions, b5ths, b9ths, etc.
Reading chord notation
Diatonic modes
Other scale families and their modes (melodic minor, harmonic minor)

The classical tradition bypasses modes because the thorough, key-specific grounding in harmony and melody doesn't really utilise the concept. Modes are a convenient, easy, key-agnostic way of describing scales, and are closely linked to the I, IV, V-type of approach, which is also key agnostic and doesn't require musical notation.

Guitarists tend to land on modes as a more advanced part of musical theory.

IMO.

Very eloquently put.

jpfamps · May 2015

BigMonka said:

EricTheWeary said:

Well, arguably everything is modal so, as others have said, it's just another way of using the language. Rock ( in a very broad sense) guitar tends to be learned as patterns - or at least that those patterns are seen as a short cut to competency - and modes fall into patterns, patterns fall into modes,etc.

Wisdom. I was also going to say that a big part of it is that guitar, unlike most instruments, can be all about fretboard patterns. I have no doubt that other instruments are also playing modes but they probably think of it as putting accidentals into the correct scale, or following the chords with their melody - they just don't necessarily have the same need to give it a title.

That's more the approach I seem to have arrived at, ie altering notes to give different flavours.

There does seem to be a swath of instrumental guitar rock, which started to appear en masse in the 80s, which seemed to me to be composed using modes as a basis..

I didn't really get into instrumental guitar-based rock at that time (in fact I didn't really get into very much music from the 80s at the time....) nor since.

bingefeller · May 2015

The best lesson I ever heard was a Pat Metheny lesson when he said that he could hear pretty much any note over any chord apart from a major 7 over a dominant chord.

Phil_aka_Pip · May 2015

DrJazzTap said:

As for Mixolydian, nothing really springs to mind for me. Ionian and Aeolian goes without saying.

You don't listen to blues then?

EricTheWeary · May 2015

I had YouTube open earlier and on What To Watch there was a how to play like Chuck Berry clip. I was vaguely interested and put it on. Within 30 seconds he was talking about the mixolydian mode.
Whilst I suspect Chuck didn't think in those terms it did seem to be an example of what @jpfamps was talking about in the OP and backing up my own point on this.
You play these types of songs in this mode and this is the pattern for that mode so if you play that pattern you can play more songs like this.

Jalapeno · May 2015

bingefeller said:

The best lesson I ever heard was a Pat Metheny lesson when he said that he could hear pretty much any note over any chord apart from a major 7 over a dominant chord.

Jimmy Bruno does a demo of playing the Maj7 note over a Dominant chord (as a passing note on the off beat) and it fits in perfectly. It's just not a note to loiter on, but does fit.

bingefeller · May 2015

Jalapeno said:

bingefeller said:

The best lesson I ever heard was a Pat Metheny lesson when he said that he could hear pretty much any note over any chord apart from a major 7 over a dominant chord.
Jimmy Bruno does a demo of playing the Maj7 note over a Dominant chord (as a passing note on the off beat) and it fits in perfectly. It's just not a note to loiter on, but does fit.

I'm sure Metheny uses that note too somewhere in his playing. To be honest, with Metheny, I'm certain he can just hear the notes simultaneously as he's playing them. He doesn't think in scales so much, but in 3rds, 5ths and 7ths and then adds in the gaps.

jpfamps · May 2015

EricTheWeary said:

I had YouTube open earlier and on What To Watch there was a how to play like Chuck Berry clip. I was vaguely interested and put it on. Within 30 seconds he was talking about the mixolydian mode.
Whilst I suspect Chuck didn't think in those terms it did seem to be an example of what @jpfamps was talking about in the OP and backing up my own point on this.
You play these types of songs in this mode and this is the pattern for that mode so if you play that pattern you can play more songs like this.

In my opinion blues / rock and roll songs aren't modal.

Yes you are playing notes from the mixolydian scale over say the I chord, but you will be play notes from a different scale over the IV and V chord.

In think as pointed out above, explaining that you are using the mixolydian mode over the I chord is any easy way to explain this to a guitarist, rather than saying you are using the major scale and flattening the 7th.

GuyBoden · May 2015

Lack of knowledge is probably the guitarist's dilemma, but I agree that most music can be analysed as being in a mode or multiple modes, even Western harmony with it's emphasis on harmonic progression and cadences etc could be analysed as each chord being a separate mode.

Check:
Arnold Schoenberg Structural Functions of Harmony.
The Lydian Chromatic System of Organization,
Chord Scale theory (Berklee College).

Start with these:
Berklee Harmony 1
Berklee Harmony 2
Berklee Harmony 3
Berklee Harmony 4

MatthewShreddery · May 2015

One explanation may simply be that most guitarists jump straight into improvisation and improvisational styles, whereas classical musicians learn to read and play written, non-improvisational music.

Therefore most guitarists in this sense become fascinated with scales and modes etc as they are one of the major ingredients to improvisation. Nothing wrong with that.

Most good improvisers know their modes and all that stuff, regardless of which instrument they play.

Jalapeno · May 2015

bingefeller said:

Jalapeno said:

bingefeller said:

The best lesson I ever heard was a Pat Metheny lesson when he said that he could hear pretty much any note over any chord apart from a major 7 over a dominant chord.
Jimmy Bruno does a demo of playing the Maj7 note over a Dominant chord (as a passing note on the off beat) and it fits in perfectly. It's just not a note to loiter on, but does fit.

I'm sure Metheny uses that note too somewhere in his playing. To be honest, with Metheny, I'm certain he can just hear the notes simultaneously as he's playing them. He doesn't think in scales so much, but in 3rds, 5ths and 7ths and then adds in the gaps.

I'm pretty sure he doesn't even think - I've heard Howard Alden, Sheryl Bailey, and a bunch of other great jazzers say that they don't - they just hear it and play it.

monquixote · May 2015

Jalapeno said:

bingefeller said:

I'm sure Metheny uses that note too somewhere in his playing. To be honest, with Metheny, I'm certain he can just hear the notes simultaneously as he's playing them. He doesn't think in scales so much, but in 3rds, 5ths and 7ths and then adds in the gaps.

I'm pretty sure he doesn't even think - I've heard Howard Alden, Sheryl Bailey, and a bunch of other great jazzers say that they don't - they just hear it and play it.

I think that's the mistake non schooled players make about high level musicians they assume they are thinking about the theory while playing. Theory is just a tool for learning and communicating, if you are still thinking about the theory you haven't learn't it properly yet.

Howdy, Stranger!

Categories

In this Discussion

Become a Subscriber!

Why are guitarists obsessed with modes?

Comments