Degree (music)

As tone is called the functional designation of a single tone in a tone scale. In Western 7-point sound system the sounds with the pitches A, B, C, D, E, F and G are called, corresponding to each of a tone in the Aeolian scale on A (= corresponding to A minor ) and are then called naturals.

Increases: To designate other scale tones, the tone levels are lowered with an attached accidentals ♭ or a ♯ ( "cross" to them). The submission shall ensure that each tone is occupied only once - so the e- Dorian scale is named with the following shades:

E F ♯ G ♯ A B C D

A designation of the second scale tone with G ♭ would be wrong, because thereby the tone "G" would be doubly occupied.

In the German -speaking world (as well as in Polish, Czech and Scandinavian countries ) is said for historical reasons "H " instead of " B " or " B " instead of " B ♭ ", which can lead to confusion partly because the tone levels after division of the octave (which is constant as frequency doubling ) and open it in contrast to the ordinary tones, the tone levels H, I, etc. can certainly occur in partition systems with quarter tones, which are to be regarded as independent steps. In the example, a 10-level system then the pitches A would be assigned to J, in which case a triad on H would be a strictly formal sense of the tones H, J and B.

Stages chords

From a Terzschichtung of tone levels, the levels of chords of a scale which Western 7 -stage sound system are usually named with Roman numerals from I to VII arise. This allows three-, four -, five- or even greater multiple sounds are formed. Here the example of an F major scale and an F- HM6 scale, which results from the harmonic minor scale from the 6th tone: