Minor Scales

You know from the previous section that you can form major and minor scales using different intervals. Here too, you can start from any note to create a minor scale following these intervals.

1 tone - (For example: From A to B)

1 semitone - (From B to C)

1 tone - (From C to D)

1 tone - (From D to E)

1 semitone - (From E to F)

1 tone - (From F to G)

1 tone - (From G to A)

For the minor scale, we’ll take A-minor as an example (for the major scale we used C-major). Again, there are no black keys within this scale. You will probably notice right away that the intervals of a minor scale are not the same as those of a major scale. Try comparing the families C-major and A-minor for a moment and it will become immediately clear.

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Got it? Great! Now let's take it one step further: we'll include sharps and flats. Look at the above list of intervals again and try to form the B minor scale.

Here too, we can use numbers instead of letters; see the example below:

It is important to know that there are other types of scales that work in different ways. The easiest way is to distinguish between diatonic and non-diatonic scales.