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Great presentation. I like the way you explained your terms as well as the traditional names.

It is handy to see and hear the aug 2 in the context of scales, and also to not be restricted to the tired old harmonic minor scale. There are so many different scales out there. Middle East also includes India. The first scale taught in Carnatic Raga is the double harmonic minor. It is taught so young students will be able to practise singing and hearing the semitone, whole tone, and the "fat" which we would probably write as an aug2 if writing out that scale. (Maybe someone from that tradition can confirm?)

For those coming in from outside with some background: The bulk of this seems to involve the augmented chord - the two outer notes are our "augmented 5th" but can also appear as the "minor 6th". Having a universal name ("quad" = 4 whole tones) is a good way to see it as is. Also, traditionally taught, we expect too much to always see the snowball and a literal "aug5". This here helps dispell the fog. I like starting with a whole tone scale, because if we have that scale under our fingers, it is easy to recognize anything comprised of a number of whole tones. It's like a concrete visual, tactile, and aural measuring stick.

C clef for cello & viola too

The short video is a great idea. I frequently revisit to review. This enables me to find what I'm looking for easily and quickly.

Gary, you're not like most people. You *seek* info. Most people who live in TH-cam and TikTok just take whatever is pushed at them by "the algorithm." Think of pigs at the trough -- that's Most People. If people find this comment incendiary -- tough. It's 100% the truth. Most people just *passively* ingest info put in front of them.

This video is timely for me. I worked on a piece recently that was chock full of dim4's. I played one chord wrong because it "looked like" an inverted major chord (Cb/Eb = Eb, Gb, Cb - all in the key signature) - but in fact it was Eb G Cb, an augmented chord, and the G Cb was this diminished 4th. It was odd to see this "4th" looking thing on paper, but feel an M3 (bitone) in my hand. Yes, I encountered it in advanced traditional theory. But it was an abstract idea with no context in music - not even the fact of the augmented chord for context.

Thanks to you and the video I finally understand the 2 different names for this interval.

As much as I enjoyed the the music itself, I very much appreciated the talk afterward. Any of us serious students or musicians will appreciate this. Clearly worded and easy to follow. More of the same, please! 👍

I like the way you illustrated how to achieve a Middle Eastern feeling by using the Aug 2nd interval in these scales.

This upbeat music is just what I needed to set a positive mood for the day.

I needed the mood of this music today, and will probably go back to it for the same effect. What you did harmonically and such made it stay interesting, and of course these are also the things you teach.

It is interesting to see in the diagram, the interval qualities in these root position chords.

This was a fantastic piece! Towards the end, it sounds like something you'd hear in The Corpse Bride.

I enjoyed listening to this piece. Ending on a Picardy third made it even more to my liking.

This thing is lit, Gary. It builds, and builds, and builds and it's not all sad -- there are places where it unexpectedly goes major, or dom 7, and then back to minor. I really do like this. You could *easily* orchestrate this by adding more and more layers of instruments 'til you're tutti.

I enjoyed playing this earlier. What does it for me especially are the harmonies and the mood.

I would like to play this piece.

Interesting

Thank you

This question concerns guitar musical notation. Guitar music is written in the Treble clef but sounds an octave lower, I have always thought that to be a little crazy. Wouldn't it make more sense to write it in the Alto Clef?

Not sure why the algorithm recommended this, but good job algorithm, and good job Gary

The term is a complex one. Of course there is the capital C "Classical" period we learn about. Then there is the idea of music that a certain class of people listen to snobbishly, and nobody wants to be un-hip like them. And then there is the idea of high quality associated with those genres: when in fact high quality exists in all genres and when music of today still speaks to people in the future - that's our quality or 'classical' music. This is indeed food for thought.

That's a thing for us to play with at the piano. I do remember times in the past thinking "Is it this chord, or that chord - wait it's a bigger chord." (what you just wrote). So a question: is there a blurry line between bigger chords and actual "polychords"?

This was very interesting!

I like the way you've used this video to summarize the series of recent interval videos. I'll definitely be bookmarking this one to come back and review.

I like the name "quad" for this interval. It's very logical.

"Two short", i.e. looking down from the octave, is actually something that I did when first learning the traditional names of the bigger intervals. I.e. when I learned "minor 7th" I saw it as 2 semitones down from the octave, rather a whole bunch of places up from the bottom.

I really like this short format. Its simple and effectively delivers the info we need as your students. It's great work :)

I found it useful to see the intervals first presented by themselves, and then in the context of chords - that seems important. It seems a good idea to pause at each example so as to take in the information.

The song and the chocolate are pretty sweet

They way you've been describing tones in lessons has been wildly helpful for helping me remember them and which one is named which! It's also so useful for actually identifying diminished cords

The first time I encountered the idea I was intrigued, and then I embraced it. Yes, I have traditional theory solid; can recognize M6, dim7; know they are the "same enharmonically" and can hear it. But there is in fact a more solid instant certainty because it's more concrete. My "go to" were the first two notes of "It came upon a midnight clear..." - or using the m3 down from the next octave as a test. The "fat" as a kind of primary small interval, like even notches in a measuring tape, gives something else. That is why I embraced this. It doesn't mean abandoning anything I learned before - it completes it.

The name "unison" is also notation-independent, as far as I know.

Fascinating! (Why did Beethoven write it the way he did?)

0:33: 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟩⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩 🟩⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩 🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩⬛⬛⬛⬛🟩🟩 🟩🟩⬛🟩🟩⬛🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

minor scale with raised 7 (pick your choice of "melodic"/"harmonic") to 3rd scale degree is diminished 4th, no?

This theme slaps

Same comment as for fat tone. It is very useful to have a name for intervals that can be written more than one way, bypassing those "several different names", and be able to refer to it as something in a single name. "Bitone" makes sense since we already have "tone", and two of them give us this, however spelled.

These names solve a huge problem. Early on as a beginner violin student with the first harmonic minor scale, I was told to make a larger space between fingers in that one spot ..... What could the teacher call that "larger space" before much theory was learned, other than "minor 3rd", which of course in traditional theory it's not? It's an aug2. That thing needs a name and doesn't have one. Now we have a name that is outside of "music grammar". About time. :)

One of my favorite pieces beautifully arranged and played.

The scale has a cool sound. I've played it as octatonic followed by whole tone, but was missing the part about the dom7 minus 5th in the LH for the spelling. I like the idea about the split - I see inner notes hugging outer notes by a semitone for the first four notes.

Maybe that fabulous piano solo now exists, because I'm listening to it!

This music gives me a warm feeling.

How did I miss this one? I started listening without looking at the title since I had the playlist on, and the sound of it grabbed me. I've become an instant major 7th fan (and ofc it's also what you've done with it.)

I was enjoying the music and was disappointed when it ended unexpectedly.

I listened to other performances which are faster after listening to yours, and at the faster tempo to me it seems a lot is lost in expression and what can be drawn out of the music (and I hear in your performance). This grabbed me from beginning to end; it flows so smoothly and energetically that it belies the difficulty. I'm just starting to learn about Ravel.

I very much like this piece. I just read your last line about "quiet peace" - that perfectly describes what I feel. With you being a teacher, I feel that this music is also playable but students without being virtuosos, creating lovely music - and also CREATING music, making it their own. Still listening again while writing - I REALLY like this music!!

Not the typical Christmas song i'm used to hearing this time of year but it was still nice and enjoyable to listen to.

Really nice music to listen to.