I want to preface this buy saying that I’ve gone through & watched a few theory videos but i’m still kind of confused on something.
When writing a track after I pick a key like F# minor does that mean all melodies have to be written in F# minor (I understand that I can use the circle of fifths to decide what other minor / major key will work). But for example if I was writing chords in a minor scale can I just go to like a middle eastern scale or will it sound off? Can I switch to any other scales & work as well or do I strictly write in that specific mode?
(I’m using Maschine currently & I use it’s scale mode etc to write)
I think i’m going to do that Patch. I just want to write so as long as i’m 100% sure the notes played will sound “good”. Thanks for the advice - i’m off to write me some tunes!
You can do whatever you’d like, that sounds good. I’d recommend you look into different minor scales. You could switch or add melodic lines that switch from one melodic minor scale to another as the difference is only a note or two. Switching altogether to a Middle Eastern scale would likely sound pretty bad, however you might be able to pull it off by switching as you go to a breakdown or something.
Also look into major scales/keys vs relative minors. (C Major is the same notes as A minor, but the I, IV and V chords are different)
Finally, you can look at scale modes and switching scale modes within a song. Essentially a mode is using the same scale, but starting on a different note. For C Major, the first note is typically C, but if you make the “first note of the scale an F it sounds different.”
