A Little Double Harmonic Minor Theory For Ya! It's Easy To Grasp, I Promise!

[TSJMajesty]

Play an F chord in its first inversion on the top 4 strings. (The "Cowboy Chord" shape, on the 1st fret, if you don't know the inversions, or what that means.) Then drop the top note to open e, so it becomes F Maj7. Then play it as an ascending arpeggio, (each note individually ), but add in the next-higher note on each string before playing the next-higher string. That is the 5th mode of the Double Harmonic Minor scale. Sounds cool huh?

I used to fool around with that after discovering it by accident, before I even knew what it was, or that it could be used musically.

Well guess what? John Petrucci wrote Night Terror around that scale, and discussed it in detail at his last camp.

So if you start on a low F, and play the F minor scale, but raise the 7th a half step, you get the harmonic minor scale. Raise the 4th a half-step and now it's a Double Harmonic Minor Scale. Sometimes called Hungarian or Gypsy, although I believe it needs to stay in the mode of how the notes ascend in my first paragraph: 1 b2 3 4 5 b6 7 to have that name, by I digress.

So go back to F minor: F G Ab Bb C Db Eb F. Raise the 4th and 7th a half step: F G Ab B C Db E F and you have the Dbl Hm scale. Start on E instead of F, and you get the mode that John wrote Night Terror in.

Cool huh?

Here's a part in the song where he's using the notes in succession, so you can clearly hear the tonality:



By the way, he asked if anyone knew the 1 time in the song where he resolved it to its F note root. I was pissed I didn't know.

The very last note of the song.

Pretty damn cool how you can write songs around all sorts of interesting scales! I think it is, anyway.

 

[AlbertA]

I need tabs

 

[TSJMajesty]

I need tabs

For what

 

[Los-D]

I need tabs

 

[la szum]

Play an F chord in its first inversion on the top 4 strings. (The "Cowboy Chord" shape, on the 1st fret, if you don't know the inversions, or what that means.) Then drop the top note to open e, so it becomes F Maj7. Then play it as an ascending arpeggio, (each note individually ), but add in the next-higher note on each string before playing the next-higher string. That is the 5th mode of the Double Harmonic Minor scale. Sounds cool huh?

I used to fool around with that after discovering it by accident, before I even knew what it was, or that it could be used musically.

Well guess what? John Petrucci wrote Night Terror around that scale, and discussed it in detail at his last camp.

So if you start on a low F, and play the F minor scale, but raise the 7th a half step, you get the harmonic minor scale. Raise the 4th a half-step and now it's a Double Harmonic Minor Scale. Sometimes called Hungarian or Gypsy, although I believe it needs to stay in the mode of how the notes ascend in my first paragraph: 1 b2 3 4 5 b6 7 to have that name, by I digress.

So go back to F minor: F G Ab Bb C Db Eb F. Raise the 4th and 7th a half step: F G Ab B C Db E F and you have the Dbl Hm scale. Start on E instead of F, and you get the mode that John wrote Night Terror in.

Cool huh?

Here's a part in the song where he's using the notes in succession, so you can clearly hear the tonality:



By the way, he asked if anyone knew the 1 time in the song where he resolved it to its F note root. I was pissed I didn't know.

The very last note of the song.

Pretty damn cool how you can write songs around all sorts of interesting scales! I think it is, anyway.

Pretty cool stuff. It's fun taking a scale and then building chords from that scale, and then building
progressions and riffs from those chords and scales.


That scale certainly brings the dark and ominous vibes. In the end that is what music
is about, isn't it.... creating moods, vibes, and textures.

 

[TSJMajesty]

Pretty cool stuff. It's fun taking a scale and then building chords from that scale, and then building
progressions and riffs from those chords and scales.


That scale certainly brings the dark and ominous vibes. In the end that is what music
is about, isn't it.... creating moods, vibes, and textures.

It was also very evident The Troochinator was quite proud of that song.

For that master class, while he was warming up, they had us wait at the entrance doors, but when they let us in, I snagged front-row-center, and got to see him play that song like 5 feet away from him!! (Then he discussed the writing of it afterwards.)

Yeah, I was pretty fuckin stoked!

 

[la szum]

That's so awesome. Man, that must have been a great time.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

Additionally you can get there this way...

Double harmonic major is major with a b2 and b6.
C Db E F G Ab B

Mode 4 is Hungarian/Gypsy/Double Harmonic minor.
You can view that as Harmonic Minor #4
Which is your
F G Ab B C Db E

The 3rd mode is Phrygian b4 bb7
E F G Ab B C Db

That's the beauty of if you know the modes of the unaltered major scale, the other stuff is literally just an alteration away.

As in melodic minor you can view as Dorian #7 or Ionian b3
For that logic mode V in Mel min be Mixolydian b7 or Aeolian #4 etc.

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

Which actually brings some funny logic things up.

If you go through the alteration cycle say fir melodic minor

Dorian #7 or Ionian b3
Phrygian #6 or Dorian b2
Lydian #5 or Phrygian b1
Mixolydian #4 or Lydian b7
Etc...

I always wondered why there was Lydian b7 and Mixolydian until I wrote it out and came across the Phrygian b1 and major #1.
Which initially was just weird.

But the more I pondered it the more sense it made.
Over G7akt use F# major with all the F# raised to G. Kinda easier to visualize than Ab Mel min or G altered.

 

[TSJMajesty]

As in melodic minor you can view as Dorian #7 or Ionian b3
For that logic mode V in Mel min be Mixolydian b7 or Aeolian #4 etc.

I recall being taught in high school that melodic minor was a minor scaled with a raised 6th and 7th when ascending, but natural minor when descending. I know I'm not remembering wrong, so what's that all about?

 

[Ed DeGenaro]

I recall being taught in high school that melodic minor was a minor scaled with a raised 6th and 7th when ascending, but natural minor when descending. I know I'm not remembering wrong, so what's that all about?

I'll try to make it concise.
Minor keys dint have the dominant tonic resolution as major does.
Fir that they started using a major chord as in E to Am or E7 to Am.
That change made it necessary to have the Am scale have a raised 7 in it.
Harmonic minor or it's 5tj mode, Phrygian dominant.
But it had the b3 leap from b6 to 7.

So in order to make that easier on the ears they raised the 6 on the way to the leading tone and tonic.
But it wasn't necessary on the way back (descending).

Later on guys started thinking of that V chord's scale as Harmonic minor mode V plus the #9.

That gave you both 7s
As in a b c d e f g g#
Which also alleviated the b3 leap.

Side note, in more current decades melodic minor that has the raised 6 and 7 also descending was referred to as Jazz minor.

In general you can see minor as 1 2 b3 4 5 plus any 6 or 7.