Help please with Dorian confusion!

[Amazoman]

Hi my knowledgeable friends. I was looking at  a YouTube lesson regarding the Dorian scale. It seemed to suggest that this mode could be played over any chord progression and it made reference to countless tracks that had used it. So say you were playing a 1,4,6 progression in A major the Dorian mode would be a B Dorian. Now Bm is not in the progression and the only chord that is minor is F# m. So could you or should you not play B Dorian. I know there are better options to pick but it was simply this notion that Dorian could be played over any changes.

[iconic]

Can you post the link. 😎

 

 

[Oomo]

I'm far from an expert, but I'd look at it in a different way.

 

You can play anything over anything (even a chromatic scale), it just depends what effect you want to achieve, e.g. something harmonious or dissonant, something bluesy/jazzy/funky, etc.

 

Whatever you play over any particular chord in a key will sound different depending on the notes in that chord. E.g. if you play an A major scale (A B C# D E F# G#) over an A major chord (A C# E), some of those scale notes are going to sound pleasing, others might sound more tense and feel like they want to resolve to a chord tone. The notes of B dorian are exactly the same as those in A ionian (i.e. A major scale), so the same applies.

 

However, ignoring the chords you're playing over, each mode has quite a distinctive sound, so if you play a melody that starts on B and plays up/down B dorian a bunch, it'll have a very dorian sound, quite different from than if you'd started on A and played A ionian up/down.

[David Cook]

Thanks both for taking the time to respond. Sorry iconic, can't remember which video it was, I look at so many!!! I think it could have been a Dan Hawkins one. I understand what you say Oomo. I was just curious about the notion that so many songs incorporate the Dorian mode. I am just trying to branch out a little from chord tones and pentatonics which I know all work well.

[iconic]

Great example of a Dorian mode song.....Good Times, Chic. A lot of funky stuff uses Dorian, great 'scale' to noodle with😎

[Baloney Balderdash]

9 hours ago, iconic said:

Great example of a Dorian mode song.....Good Times, Chic. A lot of funky stuff uses Dorian, great 'scale' to noodle with😎

I've always thought Dorian to have a very pronounced folky quality/character to it.

 

Like traditional folk in specific.

 

"Scarborough Fair" for example is in Dorian. 

 

However though the Dorian Scale can get quite jazzy too, depending on which notes in specific you chose, especially if some chromatic notes are mixed in as well, specifically from the Blues and Minor Scale in the same key.

 

Still folky is definitely Dorian's inherent quality/character if you ask me.

 

Edited May 17, 2023 by Baloney Balderdash

[chyc]

On 26/04/2023 at 14:45, David Cook said:

I am just trying to branch out a little from chord tones and pentatonics which I know all work well.

The b pentatonic has notes b d e f# a b. The b dorian has notes b c# d e f# g# a b. There's a fair amount of overlap there. In fact the Venn diagram would be concentric circles! I could guess that what this video was saying was that when you'd normally reach for a pentatonic, try using the dorian instead. The added notes won't clash if the pentatonic scale fit already, and it immediately takes your solos to the next level in terms of colour and vocabulary.

 

Now that I'm saying this, I remember a video by Guthrie Govan on this very topic, but your video obviously couldn't have been this one because he's a guitarist 😜

 

In terms of playing a b dorian over an A major, a lot of jazz and surprisingly a lot of pop centres the solo around the 9th degree of the scale. Playing too many As in an A major piece can get boring real quick. Changing the scale up a tone can help break the mindset of sticking to the root note, something I'm definitely guilty of in my own playing.

[ASW]

On 16/05/2023 at 23:06, chyc said:

The b pentatonic has notes b d e f# a b.

Isn't that the B minor pentatonic?

[ASW]

On 22/04/2023 at 18:42, Amazoman said:

So say you were playing a 1,4,6 progression in A major the Dorian mode would be a B Dorian.

 

I'm not quite sure what's meant by the Dorian mode in A Major would be B Dorian. B Dorian does share the same notes as A Major/Ionian (as does C Phrygian, D Lydian, E Mixolydian etc.) but if you're using the notes from B Dorian over something in the key of A Major, you're not playing a Dorian scale at all. You're still playing a major/Ionian scale. As I understand it, the scale that is played is dictated by the tonal centre of the music.

 

I'm not sure what stands to be gained by calling a scale something which is not, but which uses the same notes. Other commenters appear to understand though so I think it may just be me!

 

It would be interesting to see the video if you can find and share the link!

[chyc]

2 hours ago, ASW said:

Isn't that the B minor pentatonic?

Sorry yes.

[nige1968]

6 hours ago, ASW said:

 

I'm not quite sure what's meant by the Dorian mode in A Major would be B Dorian. B Dorian does share the same notes as A Major/Ionian (as does C Phrygian, D Lydian, E Mixolydian etc.) but if you're using the notes from B Dorian over something in the key of A Major, you're not playing a Dorian scale at all. You're still playing a major/Ionian scale. As I understand it, the scale that is played is dictated by the tonal centre of the music.

 

I'm not sure what stands to be gained by calling a scale something which is not, but which uses the same notes. Other commenters appear to understand though so I think it may just be me!

 

It would be interesting to see the video if you can find and share the link!

 

Simply that starting in a different place, and using different hand shapes / positions, tends to make you reach for different notes. Same as playing in C major over a song in A minor -- the notes are the same but you wouldn't necessarily call them the same thing.

Edited June 1, 2023 by nige1968

[ASW]

1 hour ago, nige1968 said:

 

Simply that starting in a different place, and using different hand shapes / positions, tends to make you reach for different notes. Same as playing in C major over a song in A minor -- the notes are the same but you wouldn't necessarily call them the same thing.

Ah, I think that's making more sense. So it's more about patterns on the fretboard rather than music theory.

 

So it seems the answer to the OPs question is that you can play B Dorian over a 1, 4, 6 chord progression in A major as you are in fact using the A major scale over an A major key chord progression. Is that right?

[nige1968]

All music is just patterns made (in our neck of the woods) from the same 12 notes. Scales just miss some of them out.
 

The names came afterwards and are for musicians’ convenience.
 

All I can say is that if you try playing F# minor over A major it will probably sound different, even though it’s the same notes. That’s the bit you can use, however you describe it.

 

[velvetkevorkian]

2 hours ago, ASW said:

Ah, I think that's making more sense. So it's more about patterns on the fretboard rather than music theory.

 

So it seems the answer to the OPs question is that you can play B Dorian over a 1, 4, 6 chord progression in A major as you are in fact using the A major scale over an A major key chord progression. Is that right?

B dorian might have the same notes as A major but it's not harmonically the same -- e.g. a B dorian line will probably be trying to resolve to the B tonic, which can create a tension (playing "outside", in jazz terms), although not as much as playing a line with notes from outside the scale.

 

The exact point at which it switches from "playing a line in A major" to "playing a line in B dorian" is fuzzy, there's hundreds of years of theoretical analysis dedicated to unpicking that sort of thing.

[ASW]

19 hours ago, velvetkevorkian said:

B dorian might have the same notes as A major but it's not harmonically the same -- e.g. a B dorian line will probably be trying to resolve to the B tonic, which can create a tension (playing "outside", in jazz terms), although not as much as playing a line with notes from outside the scale.

 

The exact point at which it switches from "playing a line in A major" to "playing a line in B dorian" is fuzzy, there's hundreds of years of theoretical analysis dedicated to unpicking that sort of thing.

Interesting. I think I'm getting it now. I'd like to hear what that sounds like.

[Marti T]

I found this really useful from Joe Hubbard