Hello and welcome back to those who are returning, and welcome aboard for those of you who are new to the series! Sorry this took me so long to post but I've been loaded down with stuff and I sort of forgot about this episode. So after I made the episode for last week I read over it and found out you were suppose to read this a few months ago... So, here we are! We need to start getting down towards the heart of music, and start learning about intervals and why they are important to music. If you like this post is great then please share this by clicking the Facebook, Twitter or Google+ buttons at the bottom!
First off you need to know what an interval is. An interval is the distance between two notes. There are 8 basic intervals: A Unison (same note or C to C), a 2nd (C to D), 3rd (C to E), 4th (C to F), 5th (C to G) 6th (C to A), 7th (C to B) and an octave or 8th (C to higher C). This distance will work between any series of notes but I was using those as an example. A to F is still a 6th just like a G to an A is a 2nd.
There are three main qualities of intervals: Major, Minor, and Perfect. The best way to see this is to separate the different qualities into their own section and learn them individually. First is the Perfects, which are only used to describe a perfect unison, perfect fourth, perfect 5th or perfect octave. As the perfect unison is the same note being repeated, and a perfect octave is the same note being played back to back but one is higher than the other. The perfect fourth and fifth are special because as it says, they are an important part of music. A perfect 4th is 5 half steps from the tonic note. The tonic is the note that starts the comparison or chords as we will get to later. If you need to review half steps and whole steps, please refer to episode 2 (click here). A perfect 5th is 7 half steps from the tonic note. Think about it from the layout of a keyboard. If we start on C, a perfect forth above would be an F (C#-D-D#-E-F) and C to G would be a G (C#-D-D#-E-F-F#-G). A forth above G would be a D (G#-A-A#-B-C-C#-D) and a forth above F would be a Bb (F#-G-G#-A-Bb).
Now major and minor intervals work in the same way. They include 2nd, 3rd, 6th, and 7th. A major 2nd is 2 half steps, which is a whole step, or another way to say it is from C to D. A minor 2nd is only a half step or from C to C#. A minor 3rd is 3 half steps or from C to Eb. A major 3rd is 4 half step or C to E. A minor 6th is a 8 half steps or a C to Ab and a major 6th is one half step higher, C to A. Finally A minor 7th is 10 half steps or C to Bb and a major 7th is one higher C to B.
For those who this is just too much information then, I have a chart to help you comprehend this a little better. The numbers is the number of half steps from tonic to the note.
Minor Major Perfect
1 0
2 1 2
3 3 4
4 5
5 7
6 8 9
7 10 11
8 12
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