Musical modes explained: the seven modes and how to use them

A mode is a scale made by starting the major scale on a different note and treating that note as home. Play the white keys from C to C and you hear the major scale, called Ionian; play the same white keys from D to D and you hear Dorian; from E, Phrygian; and so on through all seven. The notes are the same, but the home note changes where the whole and half steps fall, and that changes the sound. The scale finder spells all seven modes in any key.

What a mode is

The idea is older than major and minor keys. Medieval church music was organised in modes, and in 1547 the Swiss theorist Heinrich Glarean added the Ionian and Aeolian modes to the system; the names come from ancient Greek regions, though the Greek modes themselves were different scales. Modern musicians use the term more narrowly for the seven modes of the major scale described below. Ionian is simply the major scale, and Aeolian is the natural minor, so you already know two of them.

The seven modes

Each mode has its own pattern of whole steps (W) and half steps (H), and its own white-key starting note:

• Ionian (major): W W H W W W H, starting on C.
• Dorian: W H W W W H W, starting on D.
• Phrygian: H W W W H W W, starting on E.
• Lydian: W W W H W W H, starting on F.
• Mixolydian: W W H W W H W, starting on G.
• Aeolian (natural minor): W H W W H W W, starting on A.
• Locrian: H W W H W W W, starting on B.

Notice that each pattern is the previous one rotated by one step. That is all a mode is: the same cycle of steps read from a different starting point.

Comparing modes from one root

The white-key view hides the character of each mode, because the root keeps changing. To hear the differences, play every mode from the same root. Here they all are from C:

• Ionian: C, D, E, F, G, A, B
• Dorian: C, D, E♭, F, G, A, B♭
• Phrygian: C, D♭, E♭, F, G, A♭, B♭
• Lydian: C, D, E, F♯, G, A, B
• Mixolydian: C, D, E, F, G, A, B♭
• Aeolian: C, D, E♭, F, G, A♭, B♭
• Locrian: C, D♭, E♭, F, G♭, A♭, B♭

Three modes have a major third (Ionian, Lydian, Mixolydian) and four have a minor third (Dorian, Phrygian, Aeolian, Locrian), so each mode is best understood as a slightly altered major or minor scale.

The note that gives each mode its colour

Each mode differs from plain major or minor by one or two characteristic notes, and those are the notes to lean on when you want the mode to be heard:

• Dorian is natural minor with a raised 6th (A instead of A♭ in C), which makes it brighter and is common in funk, folk and jazz.
• Phrygian is natural minor with a lowered 2nd (D♭ in C), a dark sound often associated with flamenco and heavy metal.
• Lydian is major with a raised 4th (F♯ in C), a floating, dreamy sound popular in film music.
• Mixolydian is major with a lowered 7th (B♭ in C), the sound of much blues-rock and of the dominant seventh chord.
• Locrian has a lowered 2nd and 5th; its home chord is diminished, so it is rarely the main mode of a whole piece.

Using modes in practice

The quickest way to hear a mode is a drone: hold the root, or loop a single chord, and play the mode over it. Over a D minor chord the white keys sound Dorian; over G major with an F in the melody they sound Mixolydian. A chord progression that keeps returning to the characteristic note helps, such as D minor to G major for Dorian, where the B in G major is the raised 6th. The chord progression generator gives you backing chords, and the virtual piano is enough to try each mode slowly. Use the circle of fifths to find a mode's parent major key: D Dorian belongs to C major, so it has no sharps or flats.

If modes still feel abstract, start with the two you know, then add Mixolydian and Dorian, which turn up most often in popular music. Major vs minor scales: what actually differs covers the foundations, and The pentatonic scale: what it is and how to use it shows a five-note scale that fits over many modes at once.