Can you construct chords from minor scales?

[silversky]

was wondering if you could constuct chords from Minor scales instead of major scales? For example If I took the F major scale - F G A Bb C D E , and constructed the F chordF-A-CCould I do the same with the F minor scale ? Would it automatically make any chords constructed in any minor scale a minor chord? Or would we only use major scales to contruct any type of chord such as Major,Minor,Augmented,Diminished,7ths?? or could we use the minor scales as well to do this? If so how?Thanks..

And I was also wondering how you calculate minor key signatures and how can you tell if a song is in a minor key when reading sheet music notation?

 

[silversky]

And I was also wondering about improvising, If I was improvising from a F major pentatonic scale and went to its relative minor- D minor , could I go to the F note thats on the 6th fret of the B string and still be in the key of F major by starting on that note and play the f major scale there even though the E string (bass string) would be in the key of A if played from there? or do I just play the lower strings and not play those bass strings to avoid being in the key of A. lol im a noob at theory

 

[Thumpalumpacus]

Yes. You still build chords by stacking thirds, it's just that because the step-pattern is different, so are the sequuence of chords built by your harmonization.

Note that the chords built from a major scale and its relative minor will be identical.

 

[garybaldy]

was wondering if you could constuct chords from Minor scales instead of major scales? For example If I took the F major scale - F G A Bb C D E , and constructed the F chordF-A-CCould I do the same with the F minor scale ? Would it automatically make any chords constructed in any minor scale a minor chord? Or would we only use major scales to contruct any type of chord such as Major,Minor,Augmented,Diminished,7ths?? or could we use the minor scales as well to do this? If so how?Thanks..

And I was also wondering how you calculate minor key signatures and how can you tell if a song is in a minor key when reading sheet music notation?

Cmaj key sig = Amin key sig
D= Bmin
E= C#min
etc
A tune in Amin for example would have the same key sig as Cmaj but would generally, but not always, finish on an A note.Another clue depending on what mode of minor scale is being used would be the introduction of accidentals ie G# and poss.F# (in Amin) aswell as the G and F naturals.There are other indications as well.

 

[JonR]

I was wondering if you could constuct chords from Minor scales instead of major scales? For example If I took the F major scale - F G A Bb C D E , and constructed the F chordF-A-CCould I do the same with the F minor scale ?

Yes.

Would it automatically make any chords constructed in any minor scale a minor chord?

No.

Or would we only use major scales to contruct any type of chord such as Major,Minor,Augmented,Diminished,7ths?? or could we use the minor scales as well to do this? If so how?

As Thumpalumpus said, the chords built from a major scale and its relative minor are identical.
Eg (following your example) the D minor scale produces the exact same chords as the F major scale: F(maj7), Gm(7), Am(7), Bb(maj7), C(7), Dm(7), Edim(m7b5).
If the key is Dm we just number them differently (from Dm = I).

(The F minor scale has the same chords as the Ab major scale.)

The harmonic minor scale, however, gives us a few different ones. Chords in D harmonic minor:
Dm(maj7), Edim(m7b5), Faug(maj7#5), Gm(7), A(7), Bb(maj7), C#dim(dim7).
The D melodic minor scale has a different set of chords again, but no actual new types - until you add 9ths. (Jazz makes use of some of these more extended chords from melodic minor, as subs in other keys.)

The important new chords in D harmonic minor are A7 and C#dim7 (C#-E-G-Bb). Dim7 chords are found only on the vii degree of harmonic minor.
In the key of D minor, you will find an A(7) chord much more often than Am, because it has a C# "leading tone" to make a half-step move up to D (as in D major), to make Dm sound stronger as the key chord.

And I was also wondering how you calculate minor key signatures and how can you tell if a song is in a minor key when reading sheet music notation?

Answered above, but just to repeat:
Major and relative minor share the same key sig. F major and D minor are both 1 flat.
You tell the difference by looking at the chord progression (does it end - finally - on F or Dm? Does it have an A or A7 chord anywhere?) and looking for C# notes in the notation. These are "accidentals" - appearing somewhere in the notation, not in the key signature. That's because not all the C's will be sharp.

But quite often songs flip back and forth between major and relative minor, and because so many chords are shared by both keys it's hard to say which is the main key (and it doesn't really matter anyway!). OK, the final chord in the song tells us the overall key, but at least half of the rest of the song might be spent in the relative key. So does the final key matter that much?

 

[JonR]

And I was also wondering about improvising, If I was improvising from a F major pentatonic scale and went to its relative minor- D minor , could I go to the F note thats on the 6th fret of the B string and still be in the key of F major by starting on that note and play the f major scale there even though the E string (bass string) would be in the key of A if played from there? or do I just play the lower strings and not play those bass strings to avoid being in the key of A. lol im a noob at theory

It's all the same notes.
I don't know what you mean by "even though the E string (bass string) would be in the key of A if played from there". If you're using the F major pentatonic scale, that's the same notes as D minor pentatonic, and all of them are in both keys. It makes no difference where you start playing from, or what pattern you choose (the lowest note is irrelevant).

The keynote is only important as a note you might want to end phrases on to have them sound "finished". And your phrases don't have to always sound "finished". (Indeed, on one or two chords it's best to NOT end on the keynote.)

You don't actually need to worry about theory here. All you need is to follow the chord tones. Whatever scale pattern you choose, look for chord shapes within it (for the chords in the progression).
Notes shared by scale and chord will be the best ones to start and end phrases on.
In a simple major key progression, every chord will have all its notes contained in every pattern of that major scale. If you choose a pentatonic, of course you lose a couple of notes, so some chord tones won't be present - doesn't usually matter too much, but good to be aware of which ones are affected.
Of course theory knowledge helps here (knowing which notes are in both scale and chords), but you can work solely from chords shapes, if you know enough of them.

So I always recommend learning lots of chord shapes, before learning scale patterns. Every major chord has 5 possible shapes, covering the whole neck, and of course each of those has its 7th (and maj7) versions, as well as other extensions. Minors only have 3 common shapes, but other useful partial ones which let you cover the whole neck.
If you know all those, then your solo material is automatically laid out for you, all over the fretboard, for any song. You can forget scale patterns, and everything you play will fit because it connects directly with the chords. (Although pents are still useful, if you can connect them.)

 

[huw]

was wondering if you could constuct chords from Minor scales instead of major scales?

As Jon has explained, the answer is yes. The first post in this thread...

http://www.mylespaul.com/forums/guitar-lessons/97488-reference-chords-all-modes-major-scale.html

...is a reference of the chords constructed from different scale types. The theory gets a bit chewy after that first post, but the reference chart is simple enough.

...Would it automatically make any chords constructed in any minor scale a minor chord?

Well, think it through - when we construct chords on a major scale we get three majors, three minors, and one diminished. So there's no link between the type of scale and the type of chords that can be produced. It's no different for minor.

A major scale will produce a major chord on the tonic, (ie a F major scale will produce an F major chord) and a minor scale will produce a minor chord on the tonic (ie F minor chord from F minor scale) but those are just one chord out of the seven triads that can be built on the scale.

...If so how?...

Stacking thirds, like Thumper said. That's how you build chords from any scale.

eg take F major...

FGABbCDE

... and from any starting note combine the 1st, 3rd & 5th notes to make a triad.

So starting with F that gives FAC (F major); starting with G that gives GBbD (G minor); starting with A that gives ACE (A minor) etc - do it from each note to build up the full set of basic triads available from that scale.

For minor scales the procedure is exactly the same: take F minor - FGAbBbCDbEb

Starting from F you get FAbC = F minor; from G = GBbDb = Gdim; from Ab = AbCEb = Ab major... etc etc

...And I was also wondering how you calculate minor key signatures...

Well you could look it up on a cycle of fifths image, like the one posted in your other thread, but calculate? That's a good idea - shows initiative.

It's really simple. Start with the major scale and lower the 3rd 6th & 7th, then count up the sharps & flats.

So to use F minor as an example:

F major = FGABbCDE.

Lowering the 3/6/7 gives FGAbBbCDbEb

Count 'em up and you have four flats. That's your key signature.

[nb - two golden rules: use each letter name once; don't mix sharps & flats]

...how can you tell if a song is in a minor key when reading sheet music notation?

You can't. Not from the key signature, anyway. As others have pointed out relative major and relative minor keys share the same key signature, so just looking at the sig won't tell you which it is (plus key sigs can also indicate modal use as well, but let's save that for when you're a bit more secure with the basics). So the key signature will only tell you what the set of notes in use is. To learn what key it is you need to look to the music - if you can read it from the notation, that's great; but if not play it & listen - does it sound major or minor? That's what makes it major of minor - how it sounds.

 

[garybaldy]

For minor scales the procedure is exactly the same: take F minor - FGAbBbCDbEb
Starting from F you get FAbC = F minor; from G = GBbDb = Gdim; from Ab = AbCEb = Ab major... etc etc

Don't forget as well as the natural minor scale that you mention here, there is also the harmonic minor scale which, in the key of Fmin (key sig is 3 flats ie Bb,Eb and Ab), has the notes F, G, Ab, Bb, C, Db, E natural.The E nat is the strong leading note and creates the chord of C7 stacking thirds off the C note.It'll be shown as an accidental in the sheet music as opposed to in the key sig and as such a strong indicator of the key.
The other form of minor scale is the melodic minor which would be F,G,Ab, Bb,C,D nat,E nat ASCENDING and F,Eb,Db,C,Bb,Ab,G,F DESCENDING.
Chord choice becomes vast and opens up the fascinating subject of altered chords particularly altered dominants.