InWestern music, the adjectivesmajor andminor may describe aninterval,chord,scale, orkey. Acomposition,movement,section, orphrase may also be referred to by its key, including whether that key is major or minor.
The words derive from Latin words meaning "large" and "small," and were originally applied to the intervals between notes, which may be larger or smaller depending on how manysemitones (half-steps) they contain. Chords and scales are described as major or minor when they contain the corresponding intervals, usually major or minor thirds.
A major interval is onesemitone larger than a minor interval. The wordsperfect,diminished andaugmented are also used to describe thequality of an interval. Only the intervals of a second, third, sixth, and seventh (and thecompound intervals based on them) may be major or minor (or, rarely, diminished or augmented).Unisons, fourths, fifths, and octaves and their compound interval must be perfect (or, rarely, diminished or augmented). In Western music, aminor chord "sounds darker than amajor chord".[1]
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Major andminor may also refer to scales and chords that contain amajor third or aminor third, respectively.
The hallmark that distinguishes major keys from minor is whether the thirdscale degree is major or minor. Major and minor keys are based on the corresponding scales, and thetonic triad of those keys consist of the corresponding chords; however, a major key can encompass minor chords based on other roots, and vice versa.
AsmusicologistRoger Kamien explains, "the crucial difference is that in the minor scale there is only ahalf step between '2nd and 3rd note' and between '5th and 6th note' as compared to the major scales where the difference between '3rd and 4th note' and between '7th and 8th note' is [ahalf step]."[1] This alteration in the third degree "greatly changes" the mood of the music, and "music based on minor scales tends to" be considered to "sound serious or melancholic,"[1] at least to contemporary Western ears.
Minor keys are sometimes said to have a more interesting, possibly darker sound than plain major scales.[2] Contrariwise, the minor key has also been considered less justifiable than the major, withPaul Hindemith calling it a "clouding" of major, andMoritz Hauptmann calling it a "falsehood of the major".[3]Harry Partch considered both to have equal standing, with the major corresponding to "an immutable faculty of the human ear", and the minor to "the immutable faculty of ratios, which in turn represent an immutable faculty of the human ear."[3]
Changes of mode, which involve the alteration of the third, andmode mixture are often analyzed as minor changes unless structurally supported because the root and overall key and tonality remain unchanged. This is in contrast with, for instance,transposition. Transposition is done by moving all intervals up or down a certain constant interval, anddoes change thekey but not themode, which requires the alteration of intervals. The use oftriads only available in the minor mode, such as the use of A♭-major in C major, is relatively decorativechromaticism, considered to add color and weaken the sense of key without entirely destroying or losing it.
Musical tuning of intervals is expressed by the ratio between the pitches' frequencies. Simple fractions can sound more harmonious than complex fractions; for instance, anoctave is a simple 2:1 ratio and afifth is the relatively simple 3:2 ratio. The table below gives frequency ratios that are mathematically exact forjust intonation, whichmeantone temperaments seek to approximate.
| Note name | C | D | E | F | G | A | B | C′ |
| frequency ratio (just int.) | 1 / 1 | 9 / 8 | 5 / 4 | 4 / 3 | 3 / 2 | 5 / 3 | 15 / 8 | 2 / 1 |
| Interval name (fromC) | perf 1 st | Maj 2 nd | Maj 3 rd | perf 4 th | perf 5 th | Maj 6 th | Maj 7 th | perf 8 th |
| Interval size (incents) | 0¢ | 203.9¢ | 386.3¢ | 498.0¢ | 702.0¢ | 884.4¢ | 1088.3¢ | 1200¢ |
Injust intonation, a minor chord is often (but not exclusively) tuned in the frequency ratio 10:12:15 (playⓘ). In12 tone equal temperament(12TET, at present the most common tuning system in the West) a minor chord has 3 semitones between the root and third, 4 between the third and fifth, and 7 between the root and fifth.
In12TET, the perfect fifth (700 cents) is only about two cents narrower than the justly tuned perfect fifth (3:2, or 702.0 cents), but the minor third (300 cents) is noticeably (about 16 cents) narrower than the just minor third (6:5, or 315.6 cents). Moreover, the minor third (300 cents) more closely approximates the19-limit (Limit) minor third (19:16Playⓘ or 297.5 cents, the nineteenthharmonic) with only about a 2 cent error.[4]
A.J. Ellis proposed that the conflict between mathematicians and physicists on one hand and practicing musicians on the other regarding the supposed inferiority of the minor chord and scale to the major may be explained due to physicists' comparison of just minor and just major triads, in which case minor comes out the loser, versus the musicians' comparison of the equal tempered triads, in which case minor comes out the winner,[clarification needed] since the12TET major third is about 14 cents sharp from the just major third (5:4, or 386.3 cents), but only about 4 cents narrower than the 19 limit major third (24:19, or 404.4 cents); while the12TET minor third closely approximates the 19:16 minor third which many find pleasing.[4](p298)[a]
In theNeo-Riemannian theory, the minor mode is considered theinverse of the major mode, an upside down major scale based on (theoretical)undertones rather than (actual)overtones (harmonics) (See also:Utonality).
Theroot of the minor triad is thus considered the top of the fifth, which, in the United States, is called the fifth. So in C minor, the tonic is actually G and theleading tone is A♭ (a half step), rather than, in major, the root being C and the leading tone B (a half step). Also, since all chords are analyzed as having atonic,subdominant, ordominantfunction, with, for instance, in C, A minor being considered the tonic parallel (tP) (US relative), the use of minor mode root chord progressions in major such as A♭-major–B♭-major–C-major is analyzed as sP–dP–T, the minor subdominant parallel (see:parallel chord), the minor dominant parallel, and the major tonic.[5]
