minor 2nd?

[Jesse Boley]

I've always thought it was weird that the interval of a half-step is called minor 2nd.. If you take the name of any other interval, it describes the distance between that step of the scale, and its root note. For example, a major 3rd is the distance between the root and 3rd of a major scale, a minor 7th is the distance between the root and 7th of a minor scale, and a perfect 5th is the distance between the root and 5th of both a major and minor scale. So why isn't a minor second called a diminished 2nd, and a major 2nd called a perfect 2nd? Any thoughts? It's just something that's always bugged me. I wonder if anyone here knows the history of how the intervals were named.

[Chris Alpiar]

I might be wrong, but I think its because in the middle ages the perfect 5th and the perfect octave were the only 'consonant' sounds and everything else was considered dissonant (by the church, which was the law) and a perfect 5th inverted is a 4th and with similar consonance so it was 'perfect' as well. That was all the intervals used in harmony at that time, Gregorian chant etc, anything else was sacreligeous. So later when secular music grew and competed with religeous music, I think there was a lot of risque' moments where people added in intervals almost out of shock value (OH MY LORD A MAJOR 7th!!) almost as means of artists stretching their wings from the rigid demands of the church... Anyway I digress... anyway i think all the intervals were major, minor, augmented or diminished and the only notes that were different were the founding intervals of P4 P5 and P8

Maybe later I will read up on my old books from Berklee and remember what they taught us about the etymology of note naming ;-) Interesting post, thanks Jesse

[Chris Alpiar]

Yes and I should be called 'Perfect Chris' ;-)

[Adrian Allan]

Is it because they noticed that when the intervals became inverted, a perfect fifth became a perfect fourth and visa versa ? I'm sure that it had something to do with that fact.

[Chris Alpiar]

I have a fantasy of warping in time to the Pope Gregory era with a batttery pack powered Marshall stack and a guitar and bring it into the basilica and crank out some tritones heeeeeheeeee

And I wonder, they often speculate on if Mozart or Bach or someone heavy like that were to warp to today, what would they think of modern music. And while some might enjoy some parts of it, I am willing to bet that they would for the most part be scared out their minds - give them Jimi Hendrix or John Coltrane or something equally as hard core... Mozart would think the demons had arrived to punish him for his 'indulgences' ;-)

[Chris Alpiar]

I would go back to Nazi Germany and kick Hitler in the testicle (singular)

[Chris Alpiar]

hahah

[Jesse Boley]

Adrian might be on to something... maybe they intentionally messed with the names so that the inversion rule would work, i.e: an interval and its inversion add up to 9, perfect remains perfect, major becomes minor. diminished becomes augmented, and vice versa.

[Ed Sharpe]

The problem I believe is you are starting from a false axiom; id est you are using a modern frame of reference, Major and minor scales. When the intervals where being “named” church modes where what was used, not the Major and minor scales as we know them now. And in the phygian mode the second degree is lower, that is, it is only a half step above the final (tonic). So it was not always the same in every mode, where the fifth degree was always perfect (the locian mode was not used at the time, it was a much later addition/invention).


Note: There are diminished and augmented seconds, along with Major and minor seconds, just no perfect seconds.

PS: The notion that some intervals where “sacrilegious” is a grossly over statement and simplification of the reality.

[Jesse Boley]

yes, I'm well aware of diminished and augmented seconds. I also know that there aren't perfect seconds... my point was that there SHOULD be.

If the intervals where named after the church modes and not the major and minor scales, then that makes even less sense, since the intervals are called "major" and "minor." If the minor second was named from the interval found in the phrygian mode, then why not call it a phrygian second? Why name it after a scale that didn't exist yet? (I believe that the Ionian and Aeolian modes were seldom used during early church music, and not yet called Major and Minor.)

It also seems like a huge coincidence that every other major, minor, and perfect inteval DOES match the modern major and minor scales.

[Ed Sharpe]

Sorry I was a bit imprecise, I was just trying to point out that using the Major/minor scale paradigm was problematic since at the time they did not exist. A 2nd is a dissident (at that time) and could not be by definition be perfect. I am not sure that intervals (2, 3, 6, 7 )where referred to as Major/minor at the time, probably not.

[Oscar Luis Santos]

Let me put my 5 cents on this.

First, it's quite right that there were no such a thing like "major" or "minor" scales; in fact there were not even something like "scales" in those times. The whole issue is about the theory of music that was in discussion in the middle age.

Second, the Church didn't stablish what was "discordant" or not. RCC (roman catholic church) didn't say anything mandatory about music still Council of Trento in the XVI century.

The name of the intervals and what was discordant or not, is a consecuence of that music theory: a) the tunning was based upon math ratios according Pithagoras of Samos (and Ptolomeus of Alexandria); b) the "scale" (be aware about the warning before) just had only 4 notes (tetrachords) or 6 notes (hexacords) according what they believe was the "greek music theory". The "scale" of 8 notes is from the bizantine music (the "octoechos") a couple of centuries later.

Let's start with the basis of the "theory", about XI century (with d'Arezzo), but mainly with the studies of "L' Ecole de Notre Dame" (c.XIII)

The only "perfect" interval was the octave (ratio 2/1); after that, according to Pithagoras, was the fifth (ratio 3/2), what was named "just" (not "perfect") and its inverted the fourth (ratio 4/3). The names "major" or "minor", applied on intervals, refers relatively to its distance, as the words, literaly, means. So, the names "augmented" and "diminished" refers to a "more than a major" or "less than a minor" (applied to 2nds, 3rds, 6ths and 7ths), or "more (or less) than a just interval or perfect interval. As you can see, it's relative, and answering to Mr. Sharpe, I might say yes, the names was in use to 2, 3, 6 and 7 at that time.

All of this is related, also, to the extension (distance in hertz, we can say today) of the "semitone". In the middle ages (and the early renaissance) there were two of them: the st chromatic and the st diatonic, having different extension. So the interval between C and C# was different than the one between C and Db (Pithagoras had too much to say about this).

Finally (because this post is becoming too large) intervals like thirds, and mainly the sixths was dissonant because the epoch's tuning, not because any Church's law. (If anybody is thinking about "diavolus in musica" you may jump into another historic dimension because that is an other totally different story).

Hope this could be helpful and please, forgive my poor english.

[Oscar Luis Santos]

A note: Modes IX and XI (aeolian and ionian) were not in use in early church music. Modes IX-XII were an addition made by Glareanus in XVI century. The minor second was not named after mode III (phrygian). In fact we can find minor seconds in all the modes.

Scales are related to "tonalities" (a XVII or XVIII century "discoveries"), instead of "modes". But be aware about names, because the latin word "tonus" (italian "tono") were largely used as "mode", f. ex. "Magnificat in V tonus", what means "Magnificat in mode V or lydian" in early music.

And as I said below, the only "perfect" interval was the "perfect ratio" of 2/1, the octave; even fifths and fourths weren't "perfect"; they were (and are) "just".