What key am I pointing to?

[Stamped Records]

I worked on a melody over the last couple of days and it took me a while to home in on the chromatism as I did not see an obvious key in the melody. At first I thought I was using the blues scale and had a b5 but I've got a 4 note in the melody so no blues. Anyways, I harmonised the nelody with a Gm-Dm-D7-Dm-G7. I guess it's really only a play on the basic I-V-I between a G and Gm in parallel. I guess whats interesting is that it has an inversion of a harmonic cadence (v of I, instead of V of i).

The two parallel movements and the lack of a genuine cadence have me looking for some insights into this one.

[jancivil]

not my problem

btw: it would not be responsible nor kind to enable you, SR, the kind thing is the strong reality check.
You're a beginner, act accordingly and listen to people.

[Stamped Records]

Nah, thats not what I'm saying. I'm just picking out things that I find interesting about it.

I never saw the iiVI there but I think I like it as it is. I think a cadence would spoil the mood but maybe I'll play with that idea and see.

[jancivil]

not my problem


I'll leave the other advisements for the world at large, which includes any number of people not totally up their own ass, one supposes

[jancivil]

not my problem

[Stamped Records]

I messed around there, and the C does slot in nicely between the G7 and the Gm, it fits in harmlessly I should say, and it does actually seem to give it a pleasant accent. It's odd that the I chord should sound like an accent though, perhaps it's the fact that I was playing a second inversion though, I kind of like it accented/dissonant because I don't want to take away from whatever cool sound I think I've got here, but it's also cool to play around.

[jancivil]

I in second inversion hasn't resolved, typically it precedes V and is kind of a suspension over V. C/G may be more IV of Gm in that case.
IE: you can push to a sort of goal but it doesn't have to be a final goal.

[IncarnateX]

The point I'm trying to make is that there isn't a lot to be gained by shoehorning function into things which came from somewhere else, it's just empty theory. It doesn't matter like that, as it doesn't need to.

Yup. It is very typical that once you learn common sense harmonization (with or without Jazz harmony), you are going to project every rule of it into everything. Did that myself, but that is okay, because this means that you are learning. However, remember that a cadance is no natural law but a convention only. E.g. at some point the half-step lead tone from V to I was established as "best" way to return to the tonic, but frankly, as far as you got a sense of tonic at all, every other chord would like to end there in a tonal piece of music, and thus will have each their drive towards it. As far as drives towards tonic goes, it is the same principle by which you establish a "mode" when not using chords, e.g. as in Gregorian singing: You start and end on a base note and this will generally dominate the strong beats. The art is to establish the mode, so every other note sung wants to go back and rest on the base note. It does not have to be a "drone" running in the background like a bagpipe, but the movements of the melody has express this implied "drone" note as central for the mode to work as such. Likewise: If your tonic works as such, every other chord wants to end there. I may even go so far as to say "...and they are all cadences" in that regard, though some of them are indeed more historically praised and used compared to others.

And this is, btw, the difference between having a "modal approach to tonality" like above compared to the retrospective "tonal approach to modality" that easily get things historically confused and ends in oxymorons. Case is: Music is free. Choose the cadences you like unless you try to follow specific conventions. They are not "strange", but may be unconventional.

[Stamped Records]

Yeah, I get what you are saying, I see it as a language of patterns though, and I understand the patterns based on the unaltered rules, then I become aware that anything altered or unusual/rare or is not found in a scale, is interesting. I intend to keep adding to the list of ibteresting things rather than following strict rules.

That said, rather than start a new topic, because it's kinda related, I have a question...

Is the major scale really home base in terms of tonal music, the tonic key, so to speak. Because, everything I learned so far is in reference to the major key, anything minor is only relative to major, and all the modes are found, in my mind, through a major reference point, blues scale, trough major for me. Is understanding music achieved through understanding major, is understanding major and all it's possibilities, the key to understanding music? (Western music)

[IncarnateX]

I’d say that the major scale may seem very dominant but there are loads of pieces written in minor that are not lesser tonal than those in major. No, the core signifier is the major “dominant”, and to a lesser degree the gender of the tonic. Thus, natural minor was given a major dominant and became the harmonic minor that fits into a traditional tonal framework. Though in a deal of classical music you will find that even when the piece is in minor, the composer may choose to end it in major and thus replace V-i with a V-I in the ending measure.

[jancivil]

Is the major scale really home base in terms of tonal music, the tonic key, so to speak. Because, everything I learned so far is in reference to the major key, anything minor is only relative to major, and all the modes are found, in my mind, through a major reference point, blues scale, trough major for me. Is understanding music achieved through understanding major, is understanding major and all it's possibilities, the key to understanding music? (Western music)

I'm going to offer a resounding no to that.

First, modes are_not derived from the major scale. Modalization of a set of tones kind of works from a basis like that, but you cannot reasonably consider Dorian as <the second mode of a primary Ionian> as a truism any more than to consider <Ionian as the seventh mode of Dorian>. Neither - none - has any more weight than the next. And this is a basic mistake and really is a part of an ignorance of what modality is as a practical matter. So a person's next move is to state you have the same 7 chords to work with, and act as though it's the same usage. It isn't. Dorian doesn't have a dominant seventh harmony. So once again, when you construct that, major triad/minor seventh - IV7 of Dorian - your i-IV7 is the same thing as ii-V7 to its 7th degree. Chords aren't where it's at anyway. Less is more because they tend to cloud everything.

To bring in a modern practice, jazz theory modalizes other things; such as melodic minor.
C D Eb F G A B; fourth mode of that is F G A B C D Eb. Some people call that Lydian Dominant. There are a number of names. But it isn't modal usage per se. It may be, it may work in the whole ii-V-I paradigm, it may be used however it occurs to the creative mind.

Historically, major scale occurs centuries (if not millennia) later than the so-called Dorian and Phrygian mode; the so-called ecclesiastic modes have their origin in ancient history. Those two names were switched for some reason I'm unclear on.

When the so-called major/minor paradigm is finally codified into tonality, there is no particular distinction we can make such as between modal and tonal; they both function.

[jancivil]

Yeah, I get what you are saying, I see it as a language of patterns though, and I understand the patterns based on the unaltered rules, then I become aware that anything altered or unusual/rare or is not found in a scale, is interesting.

There are no rules like that; there are only conventions. The conventions altered things which were there before.
Major scale is not through itself fundamental or necessarily germinative. There is no teleology in music other than acoustics (which may be a property of this planet). There are musics in the world that deal for instance in instrument construction radically different than in the west, or than in most of the planet. Bali and their Gamelan set; Indonesia has a different set. There is more or less a 7-note equal tempered set in some places.

The 12 tone equal temperament quite disagrees with the overtone series once you get past the early entries. Et cetera.

[jancivil]

"Blues scale" (whatever that's supposed to be) has no particular need for the major scale to be anything. This is fallacious, don't buy into it, it's a red herring.

[AnalogGuy1]

My 2c: It's in C major, ends in a typical ii-V-I, and uses blues ideas, such as a Mixolydian scale in parts (sources your Gm) and the bluesy tritone sound your D major provides. Cool! Love the Mixolydian sounds of that I-v.

[fmr]

What about if the OP transcribes the melody and harmonies (or simply publish a small MID file) in order for us to really understand what's going on?

Anyway, Jan already dismantled many of the confusing terminology used. I bet in the end this will be much simpler than it looks on what was first described (it usually is).