The Modes

Every mode of the major scale is the major scale. That is the sentence that makes modes easy, and the one most lessons avoid, because it sounds like it can't be enough. It is. C major and D dorian are the same seven notes; so are E phrygian, F lydian, G mixolydian, A minor and B locrian. What changes is which note is home — the one your ear returns to, the one the chord under you is built on. On the instrument, that means the modes are not seven new sets of shapes. They are the scale you already know, with a different note lit as the root.

Above is D dorian on the guitar: C major's notes, from D. The capsule changes the mode, the root chip the key, the picker the instrument. The figure follows the text from here.

One scale, seven homes

Seven homes: the wheel turns, the notes stay

Play C major and rest on C: major, plain, done. Play the same notes and rest on D — D dorian — and the sound turns minor, but a bright minor, because the sixth above D is B, a major sixth, where a natural minor scale would have B♭. Rest on E and it is E phrygian, a darker minor with F a semitone above the root. Each home note gives a different pattern of distances, and the distances are the sound.

The same notes, the same shapes

Nothing moved on the instrument between those three. Every position of C major is a position of D dorian and of E phrygian; every fingering is the same. What is different is which note you start phrases on and end them on — and, when you are labeling the instrument by degree as this figure does, which note is the 1. The wheel above turns and its wedges stay where they are; that is the whole relation. On a guitar the scale positions are the shapes and the modes are what you do inside them; on a piano the white keys are all seven modes of C, and which one you are playing is the key you keep coming back to.

Where the chords land

A key's chords come from its scale, so all seven modes of C share the same three major triads — C, F and G — and the same three minor ones. What changes is what those chords are called from the new home. This is the part that trips players up: a C chord is still C in every mode of C. In D dorian it is the ♭VII; in G mixolydian it is the IV. Same shape, same place, a different job — and the chord that gets a new name is the one that makes the mode. Chords in a key draws every mode's row.

Mode (of C)	Home chord	C, F and G become
Ionian (C)	C	I, IV, V
Dorian (D)	Dm	♭VII, ♭III, IV
Phrygian (E)	Em	♭VI, ♭II, ♭III
Lydian (F)	F	V, I, II
Mixolydian (G)	G	IV, ♭VII, I
Aeolian (A)	Am	♭III, ♭VI, ♭VII

Ionian

Ionian is the major scale under another name, and the mode nobody thinks of as one. Home is the I chord; the IV and V pull back to it. Everything else on this page is measured against it.

Dorian

Dorian is minor with a major sixth — the B in D dorian — and that one note makes it the minor of funk, of Santana, of half of jazz. Home is Dm; the chord a whole step below it, C, is the ♭VII, and a Dm–C vamp is dorian in two chords. The IV is G major, not minor, because of that sixth. On the neck: D dorian in every key.

Phrygian

Phrygian is minor with a flat second — F a semitone above E — which is the Spanish sound, the metal sound, the note that makes a riff feel like it's leaning. Home is Em; the ♭II, F major, is the chord that defines it. E phrygian on the neck.

Lydian

Lydian is major with a sharp fourth — B against F — and it floats: film scores, Steve Vai, anything that wants to sound like it hasn't landed. Home is F; the II, G major, is where the sharp fourth lives. F lydian on the neck.

Mixolydian

Mixolydian is major with a flat seventh — F against G — the scale of the dominant chord, of blues that isn't quite blues, of most rock riffs that sound major but not sweet. Home is G; the ♭VII, F major, a whole step down, is the chord that says mixolydian. G mixolydian on the neck.

Aeolian

Aeolian is the natural minor scale — the one you already call "minor" — with a flat sixth and flat seventh. Home is Am; the ♭VI and ♭VII, F and G, are the chords under most minor-key choruses. A minor on the neck.

Locrian

Locrian, from B, has a flat second and a flat fifth, so its home chord is diminished and doesn't sit still. It is a scale you can name and almost never a mode you play in; it is here because the table has seven rows.

On the guitar

D dorian on the guitar: the five positions of C major with D lit as 1. A mode on the guitar is a position you know and a root you choose; the scale positions page has the five.

On the piano

D dorian on the piano: the white keys, resting on D. Every mode of C is the white keys from a different note — the fastest way anywhere to hear all seven, one after another, with nothing to relearn.

On the ukulele

D dorian on the ukulele: the same notes as C major in the same small shapes, the character note — the B — under the same finger it always was.

On the bass

D dorian on the bass: the bass player's mode more than anyone's — a dorian groove is a root and its major sixth, and the box is the minor scale's with one note raised.

On the mandolin

D dorian on the mandolin: the fiddle tunes' mode, the same fifths-tuned positions as C major from the second note.

Hearing a mode

You don't learn a mode by learning its shape — you already have the shape. You learn it by hearing its character note against the root: the major sixth of dorian, the flat second of phrygian, the sharp fourth of lydian, the flat seventh of mixolydian. The app's melody games play a phrase in a mode and ask you to play it back, root shown — every mode, on the instrument you hold. In the browser the loop plays the major scale and the minor scale; every mode is one of those two with one note moved, and the moment you can hear which note, the shapes stop mattering.