Pentatonic scales were developed independently by many ancient civilizations[2] and are still used in various musical styles to this day. As Leonard Bernstein put it: "the universality of this scale is so well known that I'm sure you could give me examples of it, from all corners of the earth, as from Scotland, or from China, or from Africa, and from American Indian cultures, from East Indian cultures, from Central and South America, Australia, Finland ...now, that is a true musico-linguistic universal."[3] There are two types of pentatonic scales: those with semitones (hemitonic) and those without (anhemitonic).
Musicology commonly classifies pentatonic scales as either hemitonicoranhemitonic. Hemitonic scales contain one or more semitones and anhemitonic scales do not contain semitones. (For example, in Japanese music the anhemitonic yo scale is contrasted with the hemitonic in scale.) Hemitonic pentatonic scales are also called "ditonic scales", because the largest interval in them is the ditone (e.g., in the scale C–E–F–G–B–C, the interval found between C–E and G–B).[7] (This should not be confused with the identical term also used by musicologists to describe a scale including only two notes.)
Anhemitonic pentatonic scales can be constructed in many ways. The major pentatonic scale may be thought of as a gapped or incomplete major scale, using scale tones 1, 2, 3, 5, and 6 of the major scale.[1] One construction takes five consecutive pitches from the circle of fifths;[8] starting on C, these are C, G, D, A, and E. Rearranging the pitches to fit into one octave creates the major pentatonic scale: C, D, E, G, A.
Another construction works backward: It omits two pitches from a diatonic scale. If one were to begin with a C major scale, for example, one might omit the fourth and the seventh scale degrees, F and B. The remaining notes then make up the major pentatonic scale: C, D, E, G, and A.
Omitting the third and seventh degrees of the C major scale obtains the notes for another transpositionally equivalent anhemitonic pentatonic scale: F, G, A, C, D. Omitting the first and fourth degrees of the C major scale gives a third anhemitonic pentatonic scale: G, A, B, D, E.
The black keys on a piano keyboard comprise a G-flat (or equivalently, F-sharp) major pentatonic scale: G-flat, A-flat, B-flat, D-flat, and E-flat, which is exploited in Chopin's black key étude.
Although various hemitonic pentatonic scales might be called minor, the term is most commonly applied to the relative minor pentatonic derived from the major pentatonic, using scale tones 1, ♭3, 4, 5, and ♭7 of the natural minor scale.[1] (It may also be considered a gapped blues scale.)[9] The C minor pentatonic scale, the relative minor of the E-flat pentatonic scale, is C, E-flat, F, G, B-flat. The A minor pentatonic, the relative minor of C pentatonic, comprises the same tones as the C major pentatonic, starting on A, giving A, C, D, E, G. This minor pentatonic contains all three tones of an A minor triad.
The standard tuning of a guitar uses the notes of an E minor pentatonic scale: E–A–D–G–B–E, contributing to its frequency in popular music.[10]
Each mode of the pentatonic scale (containing notes C, D, E, G and A) can be thought of as the five scale degrees shared by three different diatonic modes with the two remaining scale degrees removed:
Each mode of the pentatonic scale (containing notes C, D, E, G and A) features different intervals of notes from the tonic according to the table below. Note the omission of the semitones above (m2) and below (M7) the tonic as well as the tritone (TT).
Naturals in that table are not the alphabetic series A to G without sharps and flats: Naturals are reciprocals of terms in the Harmonic series (mathematics), which are in practice multiples of a fundamental frequency. This may be derived by proceeding with the principle that historically gives the Pythagorean diatonic and chromatic scales, stacking perfect fifths with 3:2 frequency proportions (C–G–D–A–E). Considering the anhemitonic scale as a subset of a just diatonic scale, it is tuned thus: 20:24:27:30:36 (A–C–D–E–G = 5⁄6–1⁄1–9⁄8–5⁄4–3⁄2).
Assigning precise frequency proportions to the pentatonic scales of most cultures is problematic as tuning may be variable.
For example, the slendro anhemitonic scale and its modes of Java and Bali are said to approach, very roughly, an equally-tempered five-note scale,[15] but their tunings vary dramatically from gamelan to gamelan.[16]
Composer Lou Harrison has been one of the most recent proponents and developers of new pentatonic scales based on historical models. Harrison and William Colvig tuned the slendro scale of the gamelan Si Betty to overtones 16:19:21:24:28[17] (1⁄1–19⁄16–21⁄16–3⁄2–7⁄4). They tuned the Mills gamelan so that the intervals between scale steps are 8:7–7:6–9:8–8:7–7:6[18] (1⁄1–8⁄7–4⁄3–3⁄2–12⁄7–2⁄1 = 42:48:56:63:72)
The major pentatonic scale is the basic scale of the music of China and the music of Mongolia as well as many Southeast Asian musical traditions such as that of the Karen people as well as the indigenous Assamese ethnic groups.[citation needed] The pentatonic scale predominates most Eastern countries as opposed to Western countries where the heptatonic scale is more commonly used.[65] The fundamental tones (without meriorkari techniques) rendered by the five holes of the Japaneseshakuhachi flute play a minor pentatonic scale. The yo scale used in Japanese shomyo Buddhist chants and gagaku imperial court music is an anhemitonic pentatonic scale[66] shown below, which is the fourth mode of the major pentatonic scale.
InJavanesegamelan music, the slendro scale has five tones, of which four are emphasized in classical music. Another scale, pelog, has seven tones, and is generally played using one of three five-tone subsets known as pathet, in which certain notes are avoided while others are emphasized.[67]
Somali music uses a distinct modal system that is pentatonic, with characteristically long intervals between some notes. As with many other aspects of Somali culture and tradition, tastes in music and lyrics are strongly linked with those in nearby Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti and Sudan.[68][69]
InScottish music, the pentatonic scale is very common. Seumas MacNeill suggests that the Great Highland bagpipe scale with its augmented fourth and diminished seventh is "a device to produce as many pentatonic scales as possible from its nine notes" (although these two features are not in the same scale)[clarification needed].[70][failed verification] Roderick Cannon explains these pentatonic scales and their use in more detail, both in Piobaireachd and light music.[71] It also features in Irish traditional music, either purely or almost so. The minor pentatonic is used in Appalachian folk music. Blackfoot music most often uses anhemitonic tetratonic or pentatonic scales.[72]
InAndean music, the pentatonic scale is used substantially minor, sometimes major, and seldom in scale. In the most ancient genres of Andean music being performed without string instruments (only with winds and percussion), pentatonic melody is often led with parallel fifths and fourths, so formally this music is hexatonic.[citation needed]
Jazz music commonly uses both the major and the minor pentatonic scales. Pentatonic scales are useful for improvisers in modern jazz, pop, and rock contexts because they work well over several chords diatonic to the same key, often better than the parent scale. For example, the blues scale is predominantly derived from the minor pentatonic scale, a very popular scale for improvisation in the realms of blues and rock alike.[73] For instance, over a C major triad (C, E, G) in the key of C major, the note F can be perceived as dissonant as it is a half step above the major third (E) of the chord. It is for this reason commonly avoided. Using the major pentatonic scale is an easy way out of this problem. The scale tones 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 (from the major pentatonic) are either major triad tones (1, 3, 5) or common consonant extensions (2, 6) of major triads. For the corresponding relative minor pentatonic, scale tones 1, ♭3, 4, 5, ♭7 work the same way, either as minor triad tones (1, ♭3, 5) or as common extensions (4, ♭7), as they all avoid being a half step from a chord tone.[citation needed]
U.S. military cadences, or jodies, which keep soldiers in step while marching or running, also typically use pentatonic scales.[74]
Hymns and other religious music sometimes use the pentatonic scale; for example, the melody of the hymn "Amazing Grace",[75] one of the most famous pieces in religious music.[citation needed]
The common pentatonic major and minor scales (C-D-E-G-A and C-E♭-F-G-B♭, respectively) are useful in modal composing, as both scales allow a melody to be modally ambiguous between their respective major (Ionian, Lydian, Mixolydian) and minor (Aeolian, Phrygian, Dorian) modes (Locrian excluded). With either modal or non-modal writing, however, the harmonization of a pentatonic melody does not necessarily have to be derived from only the pentatonic pitches.[citation needed]
Most Tuareg songs are pentatonic, as is most other music from the Sahel and Sudan regions.
The Orff system places a heavy emphasis on developing creativity through improvisation in children, largely through use of the pentatonic scale. Orff instruments, such as xylophones, bells and other metallophones, use wooden bars, metal bars or bells, which can be removed by the teacher, leaving only those corresponding to the pentatonic scale, which Carl Orff himself believed to be children's native tonality.[76]
Children begin improvising using only these bars, and over time, more bars are added at the teacher's discretion until the complete diatonic scale is being used. Orff believed that the use of the pentatonic scale at such a young age was appropriate to the development of each child, since the nature of the scale meant that it was impossible for the child to make any real harmonic mistakes.[77]
In Waldorf education, pentatonic music is considered to be appropriate for young children due to its simplicity and unselfconscious openness of expression. Pentatonic music centered on intervals of the fifth is often sung and played in early childhood; progressively smaller intervals are emphasized within primarily pentatonic as children progress through the early school years. At around nine years of age the music begins to center on first folk music using a six-tone scale, and then the modern diatonic scales, with the goal of reflecting the children's developmental progress in their musical experience. Pentatonic instruments used include lyres, pentatonic flutes, and tone bars; special instruments have been designed and built for the Waldorf curriculum.[78]
^ abcdeBruce Benward and Marilyn Nadine Saker (2003), Music: In Theory and Practice, seventh edition (Boston: McGraw Hill), vol. I, pp. 36–37. ISBN978-0-07-294262-0.
^John Powell (2010). How Music Works: The Science and Psychology of Beautiful Sounds, from Beethoven to the Beatles and Beyond. New York: Little, Brown and Company. p. 121. ISBN978-0-316-09830-4.
^Bernstein, L. (1976)
The Unanswered Question, Cambridge Mass., Harvard University Press.
^Anon., "Ditonus", The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (London: Macmillan Publishers, 2001); Bence Szabolcsi, "Five-Tone Scales and Civilization", Acta Musicologica 15, nos. 1–4 (January–December 1943): pp. 24–34, citation on p. 25.
^Paul Cooper, Perspectives in Music Theory: An Historical-Analytical Approach(New York: Dodd, Mead, 1973), p. 18. . ISBN0-396-06752-2.
^Ben Johnston, "Scalar Order as a Compositional Resource", Perspectives of New Music 2, no. 2 (Spring–Summer 1964): pp. 56–76. Citation on p. 64JSTOR832482. (subscription required) Accessed 4 January 2009.
^"The representations of slendro and pelog tuning systems in Western notation shown above should not be regarded in any sense as absolute. Not only is it difficult to convey non-Western scales with Western notation ..." Jennifer Lindsay, Javanese Gamelan (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), pp. 39–41. ISBN0-19-588582-1.
^Lindsay (1992), p. 38–39: "Slendro is made up of five equal, or relatively equal, intervals".
^"... in general, no two gamelan sets will have exactly the same tuning, either in pitch or in interval structure. There are no Javanese standard forms of these two tuning systems." Lindsay (1992), pp. 39–41.
^Ernst H. Meyer, Early English Chamber Music: From the Middle Ages to Purcell, second edition, edited by Diana Poulton (Boston: Marion Boyars Publishers, Incorporated, 1982): p. 48. ISBN9780714527772.
^Judit Frigyesi (2013). "Is there such a thing as Hungarian-Jewish music?" in Pál Hatos & Attila Novák (eds.) (2013). Between Minority and Majority: Hungarian and Jewish/Israeli ethnical and cultural experiences in recent centuries. Budapest: Balassi Institute. p. 129. ISBN978-963-89583-8-9.
^Qian, Gong (19 June 1995). "A Common Denominator Music Links Ethnic Chinese with Hungarians". China Daily – via ProQuest.
^ abVan Khe, Tran. "Is the Pentatonic Universal? A Few Reflections on Pentatonism." The World of Music 19, no. 1/2 (1977): 76–84. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43560446.
^Bruce Benward and Marilyn Nadine Saker, Music in Theory and Practice, eighth edition (Boston: McGraw Hill, 2009): vol. II, p. 245. ISBN978-0-07-310188-0.
^Menon, R.R. (1973). Discovering Indian Music. Somaiya Publications. p. 50. Retrieved 26 May 2021. Some prefer the first Raga to be pentatonic in scale. Let us take for an example, the pentatonic Bhoopali. Its notes are: SA RI GA PA DHA SA up and down the scale.
^Thatte, A.; Sabanīsa, M. P. (2000). Vande Mataram, Down the Memory Lane. Jayanti Samaroha Samitee Vande Mataram. p. 77. Retrieved 26 May 2021. Named after the powerful Hindu goddess, Raga Durga is pentatonic, omitting the third and the seventh degrees, while emphasising the sixth and the second.
^Nizami, F.; Arshad, S.; Lakhvīrā, N. Ḥ. (1988). ABC of Music. Punjab Council of the Arts. p. 54. Retrieved 27 May 2021.
^"Katyayani". Krsna Kirtana Songs. 13 June 2009. Retrieved 27 May 2021.
^Thom Lipiczky (1985). "Tihai Formulas and the Fusion of 'Composition' and 'Improvisation' in North Indian Music". The Musical Quarterly. 71 (2): 157–171 (160). They are set to one of the most widely performed ragas in North India, the pentatonic midnight raga Malkauns. The most important notes of Malkauns are Sa (the tonic) and Ma (the fourth). Both the gats and the tihais "cadence" on one of ...
^Karnani, C. (2005). Form in Indian Music: A Study in Gharanas. Rawat Publications. p. 81. ISBN978-81-7033-921-2. Retrieved 27 May 2021. Ghulam Ali showed unusual fondness for pentatonic modes like Gunkali, Malkauns, Kausi Dhani and Bhopali. Even Shudh Sarang and Megh Malhar are largely pentatonic.
^Mohamed Diriye Abdullahi (2001). Culture and Customs of Somalia. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 170. ISBN0-313-31333-4. Somali music, a unique kind of music that might be mistaken at first for music from nearby countries such as Ethiopia, the Sudan, or even Arabia, can be recognized by its own tunes and styles.
^Tekle, Amare (1994). Eritrea and Ethiopia: from conflict to cooperation. The Red Sea Press. p. 197. ISBN0-932415-97-0. Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia and Sudan have significant similarities emanating not only from culture, religion, traditions, history and aspirations ... They appreciate similar foods and spices, beverages and sweets, fabrics and tapestry, lyrics and music, and jewelry and fragrances.
^Seumas MacNeil and Frank Richardson Piobaireachd and its Interpretation (Edinburgh: John Donald Publishers, 1996): p. 36. ISBN0-85976-440-0
^Roderick D. Cannon The Highland Bagpipe and its Music (Edinburgh: John Donald Publishers, 1995): pp. 36–45. ISBN0-85976-416-8
^Bruno Nettl, Blackfoot Musical Thought: Comparative Perspectives (Ohio: The Kent State University Press, 1989): p. 43. ISBN0-87338-370-2.
^Steve Turner, Amazing Grace: The Story of America's Most Beloved Song (New York: HarperCollins, 2002): p. 122. ISBN0-06-000219-0.
^Beth Landis; Polly Carder (1972). The Eclectic Curriculum in American Music Education: Contributions of Dalcroze, Kodaly, and Orff. Washington D.C.: Music Educators National Conference. p. 82. ISBN978-0-940796-03-4.
Jeremy Day-O'Connell, Pentatonicism from the Eighteenth Century to Debussy (Rochester: University of Rochester Press 2007) – the first comprehensive account of the increasing use of the pentatonic scale in 19th-century Western art music, including a catalogue of over 400 musical examples.
Yamaguchi Masaya (New York: Charles Colin, 2002; New York: Masaya Music, Revised 2006). Pentatonicism in Jazz: Creative Aspects and Practice. ISBN0-9676353-1-4