Appendix B: Video Transcripts
0.1 Basics of Printed Music
Hi. My name is Morgan Hanna. I’m a 2023 graduate of MacEwan Musics Program, and I’m a guitar player. Today I’m here to talk about things you might see on printed music and these are things that me myself, I see all the time as a professional working in the music industry now.
So I think it’s really important for you to know these things as well. One of the first things you would see would be things like a staff, bars, and bar lines.
The next thing you would see would be clefts, key signatures, and time signatures. All three of those things that I just listed are usually towards the front of the piece of music.
Then you’ll also see things like notes and rests dispersed throughout, you’ll see chord symbols, and you might see lyrics on a line below the staff.
[Return to Basics of Printed Music video]
11.1 Scales
Hi. My name is Devin Hart, and I’m an instructor here at MacEwan University. Today, I’m going to talk to you about scales.
We’re going to start with the major scale. This is what C major sounds like. There’s lots of different ways to think about the major scale, but one way is to look at the distance between one note to the very next note and the pattern of tones and semitones that that creates.
In all major scales, we have a pattern of a tone. Another tone, a semitone, a tone, a tone, a tone, and then a semitone to end. This remains true of all major scales regardless of which note we start on. While there are many types of minor scales, we’re going to focus on two of them today.
The first one is the natural minor scale, and the second one is the harmonic minor scale. We’re going to compare C natural minor to C major.The differences are on the third, sixth and seventh note. In C minor, we’re going to lower the third, sixth and seventh notes by one semitone each to create C natural minor, which sounds like this.
C harmonic minor only has a lowered third and lowered sixth when compared to C major, and it sounds like this. Another way to think of the natural minor scale is as a major scale, but starting on a different note. A natural minor and C major have the exact same notes.
C major starts on C and is all white notes on the piano. A minor starts on A, and is again, all white notes on the piano. This is called related major and minor scales. To go from the major to the minor, you can count up six letter names, C D E F G A, and that’s you’ll start on for the related minor.
If I make a major scale, but instead of starting on starting on D, I’m going to have to incorporate some of the black notes on the piano. If I go from D to E, I have a tone, from E to F is a semitone, so I’ll raise that node to an F sharp to get the tone. From F sharp to g is a semitone. I’m good there.
G to A is a tone. A to B is a tone. B to C is only a semitone, but I need a tone, so I’ll raise it to C sharp, and then I have a semitone here to end. What this means is that D major scale has two sharps, F sharp and C sharp. These are the two sharps that we would also include in the key signature for D major scale.
15.1 Rhythms and Baselines
Hello. My name is Rubim De Toledo, and I am the head of the base program here at MacEwan University. Today I’m going to be playing some rhythms or some baselines so that you can see what they look like on the staff, as well as what they sound like.
First examples in the Key of C, it’s in base clef in 4/4 time, and it’s predominantly quarter notes, and it sounds like. I’ll play it again, and I’ll count the beats. One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four.
The next rhythm is similar to the first one, except now I’m using a lot of eighth notes. When we count eighth notes, we can go one and, two and, three and, four and. So I’ll try that. I’ll count it and play it at the same time. One and, two and, three and, four and, one and, two and, three and, four and, one, two, three, four.
The next rhythm introduces some rests. In this case, quarter note rests. Now, I’ll count it up. One, two, three, four, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four. Now, I’ll introduce some eighth note rhythms to this. And I’ll count this time. One and, two and, three and, four and, one an,d two and, three and, four and one.
Now, I’ll introduce some 16th note rhythms. And finally, I’ll play a baseline that has some 16th note rests in it.
[Return to Rhythms and Baselines video]
19.1 Intervals
Hi. My name is John McMillan. I’m the head of songwriting at MacEwan University, and I’m going to talk about intervals.
There’s two kinds of intervals. There’s melodic, and there’s harmonic. And what they really are is the building blocks, the ingredients of melody and harmony.
And so we’re going to start with major intervals. Major intervals are Major second. Major third. And then we got Major six. And Major seven. And you’ll notice, I missed the fourth and the fifth. And that’s because those are called perfect intervals. And so a perfect fourth and a perfect fifth. And we also have a perfect octave, which is just the bottom note to the same note up high.
Then from there, we have minor intervals, and that’s when you take a major interval and you lower the top note. So we go a minor second. A minor third. A minor six and a minor seven. And then with perfect intervals, if we lower them, we actually get diminished intervals.
And a diminished fourth is actually the same as a major third. So here’s a fourth. And here’s a diminished fourth, which is actually a major third. And that’s because those two notes are only a semi tone apart. But if we go a diminished fifth, and that one is also called a tritone. I’ll show you some intervals on the piano.
This is a major third. This is a minor third. This is a major second and I’ll lower the top note to make a minor second. This is a major six. Again, I’ll lower the top note to make a minor six. This is a major seven And I’ll lower that top note to make a minor seven. Then we have a perfect fourth. We have a perfect fifth. And I’ll lower that one, the top note to make a diminished fifth. That one’s also called a tritone. And that’s it. Those are intervals.
23.1 Triads
Hello. My name is Katie Perman. I’m the head of the Vocal department here at MacEwan University. And today, we’re going to talk about triads.
A triad is a cord made up of three notes, the root, the third, and the fifth. There are four main types of triads we’re going to discuss today. The major triad, the minor triad, the diminished triad, and the augmented triad.
This is a major triad. If we lower the third, we get a minor triad. If we now additionally lower the fifth, we get a diminished triad. If we go back to our major triad and raise the fifth, we now have an augmented triad.
Another way to think of the root third and fifth of a triad is based on intervals. So a major triad again, is one, three, five. And that is us stacking a major third and then a minor third on top. That’s how we create that major triad sound.
If we take a minor triad, where we now have lowered the three, so one lowered three or flat 35. This is now a minor third with a major third stacked on top to create that sound.
If we have a diminished triad, we’re now lowering that fifth, so we’re stacking minor thirds on top of each other. A minor third a minor third makes our diminished.
And our augmented triad is a major third stacked with another major third because we’ve now raised the fifth. So it’s one, three, sharp five, which is a major third and a major third to create our augmented triad sound.
If we take our triad and move the bottom note up to the top, we get what is called an inversion. This is in root position. There is a major chord in root position. If we’re to take the bottom note and put it on the top, we have first inversion. Then if we’re to take this bottom note, put it on the top, we are now in second inversion. Then we can go back down to first and back down to root.
