Re: [Harp-L] Re: When Johnny Comes Marching Home

[philharpn@xxxxxxx]

Johnny is in the key of G minor in the 1863 sheet music. It is relative minor of Bb. (You can get a copy on the web FREE. It's also in the Civil War Songbook by Dover.)


Is the relative minor of any key in the same position as the major key? 
The natural minor is also known as the Aeolian scale  and when a major scale and natural minor scale have the same key signature they are relative keys.
A natural minor scale has the same notes as its relative major sale but  starts from the 6th note of the relative major scale.


If you transpose Johnny to the key of D you will be playing it in the key or B minor (same notes as D scale only starting on 6th of D scale)


You can't transpose a natural minor (Aeolian mode) tune into a Dorian mode -- no matter how you do it. The modes have different starting notes.


And when you transpose Johnny to the key of D you end up playing it in B minor, its relatiive minor.  If you play Johnny on a D harmonica, you can play it in different positions but only if you can overblow or bend the notes to make the required (missing major scale) notes.


Switching harps without bending notes pretty much guarantees you will be playing Johnny in the relative minor to the key stamped on the harp. Chromatic is different without needing bends to get missing notes, of course.


The key of A major is 4th position on a C harp. Does that make A minor first position? Or 4th? The A major scale and the A minor scale have different notes. But then somebody once claimed that positions are neither major or nor minor. But if you are trying to play 4th position in the relative minor key you are in effect playing the same notes as the 1st position major key!?


This whole discussion proves once again that musical terminology better explains music than the short-hand of position, which is great for a down and dirty explanation but confusng when it gets beyond starting points.


And what was the original question about Johnny? I forgot. 


Phil Lloyd










-----Original Message-----
From: Harmonicology [Neil Ashby] <harmonicology@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: harp-l <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wed, Jun 11, 2014 10:27 am
Subject: Re: [Harp-L] Re: When Johnny Comes Marching Home


(Michael Rubin)->"When using a mode of a major scale, the key is now the same 
name as the new root."

(Winslow Yerxa)->"but it is named for its tonal center, D,"

Is there any situation such that the  "tonal center" or "root" would be 
ambiguous?

/Neil (" http://thebuskingproject.com/busker/2025/ ")


On â6â/â10â/â2014 at 10:41 AM, "Michael Rubin" <michaelrubinharmonica@xxxxxxxxx> 
wrote:
>
>Neil,
>When you transpose the song to the key of D, it remains a minor 
>song.  The
>notes you are playing are all white notes and therefore are 
>members of the
>D Dorian scale, which is a mode of the C major scale.  
>Coincidentally,
>there are other D scales that use all of these notes, so this 
>melody is not
>necessarily dorian.  The D aeolian scale has all of these notes as 
>well as
>do others.  For the purpose of this discussion we'll call it 
>dorian.  But
>that does not make it in the key of C.  When using a mode of a 
>major scale,
>the key is now the same name as the new root.
>