The Major Scale Formula

Scales and Keys

Most music relies on key, a choice to use a pattern of seven notes forming a set called the major scale. The major scale is a series of 7 notes that are a subset of the 12 notes in the chromatic scale. These notes follow a formula where no note name is repeated. (For instance, A and A♭ cannot both be in the same major scale.)

The first scale you will learn is the C major scale, formed by playing the 7 natural notes with unique names. Play these notes on the B string of your guitar now. Why don’t E and F or B and C have an accidental between them?

We’ve chosen to divide the octave into 12 pieces, and give unique names to the 7 notes of this scale. There’s no room for an E♯ or a C♭ because if there were, we’d have 14 unique slices in our octave—and a very different set of notes.

When you played the C major scale, did it seem familiar? If so, that’s because it’s been used in most music since the year 1500 A.D., and most people have heard thousands of hours of music based on this scale by the time they reach adulthood.

The scale’s unique sound is a product of two things: first, the perceived root note or lowest note of the scale—in this case, C. When you play the scale from C to C, you will hear C as the most basic note. Second, all other notes that you played on your way up to the high C will now be heard in relationship to their distance from the first C.

Building the Major Scale

A movement up two blocks is called a whole step. A movement up just one block is called a half step. We can see that this C major scale is formed by starting on the root of the scale, C, and then moving through the chromatic scale notes: whole step, whole step, half step, whole step, whole step, whole step, half step. This pattern is so fundamental that it will be the basis of all other musical concepts that we study. Learn to play the scale, name the notes, and memorize the formula of steps needed to create this scale.

The C major scale, and this pattern for constructing scales, must both be accepted without question in order to study music. As you are beginning your study of how music works, now is not the time to ask, “but why C major? Why this pattern?” Since this pattern is used to comprehend all musical concepts to come, it must be taken for granted just as the sky is blue.

C major is not the only major scale there is. If we choose any note, such as E, and repeat this sequence of whole and half steps, we will have a new scale: the E Major scale. The notes will change. We must have sharps and flats: C major is the only major scale with no sharps or flats.

When we take one example of music, whether just a few notes, or an entire scale, or even a whole song, and move all of the notes up or down by an equal amount, the notes will all have the same relationship that they had before, but the song will sound higher or lower than before. This change is called transposing a song.

Comprehension Check

• What notes are in the E Major scale? (No note name can appear twice.)
• What notes are in the F Major scale?
• What notes are in the G Major scale?

Key Tasks

1) Try writing out the notes in the following major scales: C, G, F, D, B♭, A, E♭.

2) Memorize the formula: whole, whole, half, whole, whole, whole, half.

3) Memorize some key terms:

half step, whole step, key, major scale, root.