Intervals

The next topic is musical intervals and how they relate to guitar. This is going to be a brief definition of intervals, and I will add onto this tomorrow with a example of how an understanding of intervals can help make you a better songwriter.

I'm going to relate the intervals to the major scale box form show in the previous major scale lesson so that you have a frame of reference.

Here are the intervals that are all spelled out in the major scale. The 4th, 5th, and 8th are all called perfects because they are neither major or minor in tonality (when they are inverted, they invert into perfect intervals) The 2nd, 3rd, 6th, and 7th are all major in tonality (happy).

The notes that are not spelled out in the major scale all have a minor tonality(dark).

The only interval that hasn't been covered is the tritone. This is a unique interval in that it is exactly 3 whole notes away from the tonic note. It is used primarily in heavy music (Metallica, Black Sabbath, etc.) to create a dark and heavy feeling.

Examples of all of the musical intervals.

I'll post some riffs with different uses of intervals a bit later.

The response for the Danelectro contest has been outstanding. I'm almost at 1000 hits... Keep coming back and clicking on my sponors, or searching in the google search box, or downloading and installing Picasa... Or all three. I'll let you know as soon as I hit 1000 (as of this writing, I'm at 625 with about 30 sponsor clicks).