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A pentatonic scale is a musical scale with five notes per octave, in contrast to the heptatonic scale, which has seven notes per octave (such as the
major scale The major scale (or Ionian mode) is one of the most commonly used musical scales, especially in Western music. It is one of the diatonic scales. Like many musical scales, it is made up of seven notes: the eighth duplicates the first at doub ...
and minor scale). Pentatonic scales were developed independently by many ancient civilizations and are still used in various musical styles to this day. There are two types of pentatonic scales: those with semitones (hemitonic) and those without (anhemitonic).


Types


Hemitonic and anhemitonic

Musicology commonly classifies pentatonic scales as either ''hemitonic'' or ''anhemitonic''. Hemitonic scales contain one or more semitones and anhemitonic scales do not contain semitones. (For example, in Japanese music the anhemitonic ''yo'' scale is contrasted with the hemitonic ''in'' scale.) Hemitonic pentatonic scales are also called "ditonic scales", because the largest interval in them is the ditone (e.g., in the scale C–E–F–G–B–C, the interval found between C–E and G–B). (This should not be confused with the identical term also used by musicologists to describe a scale including only two notes.)


Major pentatonic scale

Anhemitonic pentatonic scales can be constructed in many ways. The major pentatonic scale may be thought of as a gapped or incomplete major scale, using scale tones 1, 2, 3, 5, and 6 of the major scale. One construction takes five consecutive pitches from the circle of fifths; starting on C, these are C, G, D, A, and E. Transposing the pitches to fit into one octave rearranges the pitches into the major pentatonic scale: C, D, E, G, A. : Another construction works backward: It omits two pitches from a
diatonic scale In music theory, a diatonic scale is any heptatonic scale that includes five whole steps (whole tones) and two half steps (semitones) in each octave, in which the two half steps are separated from each other by either two or three whole st ...
. If one were to begin with a C
major scale The major scale (or Ionian mode) is one of the most commonly used musical scales, especially in Western music. It is one of the diatonic scales. Like many musical scales, it is made up of seven notes: the eighth duplicates the first at doub ...
, for example, one might omit the fourth and the seventh scale degrees, F and B. The remaining notes then make up the major pentatonic scale: C, D, E, G, and A. Omitting the third and seventh degrees of the C major scale obtains the notes for another transpositionally equivalent anhemitonic pentatonic scale: F, G, A, C, D. Omitting the first and fourth degrees of the C major scale gives a third anhemitonic pentatonic scale: G, A, B, D, E. The black keys on a piano keyboard comprise a G-flat (or equivalently, F-sharp) major pentatonic scale: G-flat, A-flat, B-flat, D-flat, and E-flat, which is exploited in Chopin's black key étude. :


Minor pentatonic scale

Although various hemitonic pentatonic scales might be called ''minor'', the term is most commonly applied to the relative minor pentatonic derived from the major pentatonic, using scale tones 1, 3, 4, 5, and 7 of the natural minor scale. (It may also be considered a gapped blues scale.) The C minor pentatonic scale, the relative minor of the E-flat pentatonic scale, is C, E-flat, F, G, B-flat. The A minor pentatonic, the relative minor of C pentatonic, comprises the same tones as the C major pentatonic, starting on A, giving A, C, D, E, G. This minor pentatonic contains all three tones of an A minor triad. : The standard tuning of a
guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected string ...
uses the notes of an E minor pentatonic scale: E–A–D–G–B–E, contributing to its frequency in popular music.


Japanese scale

Japanese mode is based on Phrygian mode, but use scale tones 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6 instead of scale tones 1, 3, 4, 5, and 7. :


Pentatonic scales found by running up the keys C, D, E, G and A

The five pentatonic scales found by running up the keys C, D, E, G and A are: (A minor seventh can be 7:4, 16:9, or 9:5; a major sixth can be 27:16 or 5:3. Both were chosen to minimize ratio parts.) Ricker assigned the major pentatonic scale mode I while Gilchrist assigned it mode III. cites


Relationship to diatonic modes

Each pentatonic scale found by running up the keys C, D, E, G and A can be thought of as the five scale degrees shared by three different diatonic modes with the two remaining scale degrees removed:


Intervals from tonic

Each pentatonic scale found by running up the keys C, D, E, G and A features different intervals of notes from the tonic according to the table below. Note the omission of the semitones above (m2) and below (M7) the tonic as well as the tritone (TT).


Pentatonic vs diatonic chords

While the usual diatonic major and minor chords are commonly played over the pentatonic scale, they do not naturally arise from the pentatonic scale in that they require playing the two additional notes that are omitted from the pentatonic. Instead, pentatonic chords can be constructed by taking the root, third note and fifth note in the pentatonic scale similar to the usual construction of chords in the diatonic scale, which could then be playable over all notes without including extra notes. For example, the three chords that naturally arise from the diatonic scale are the major, minor and diminished chords. The three chords that naturally arise from the pentatonic scale however, are
inversion Inversion or inversions may refer to: Arts * , a French gay magazine (1924/1925) * ''Inversion'' (artwork), a 2005 temporary sculpture in Houston, Texas * Inversion (music), a term with various meanings in music theory and musical set theory * ...
s of the diatonic minor, major and suspended chords as shown in the table below. In contrast to diatonic chords which stack minor thirds and major thirds, pentatonic chords stack major thirds and perfect fourths. Chords containing chromatic notes can also be constructed analogously to the diatonic scale. The augmented chord fulfills the remaining M3–M3 stacking sequence, while diminishing or augmenting the third note from the root produces inversions of the diminished chord similar to the construction of sus2 and sus4 chords in the diatonic scale by diminishing or augmenting the third.


Pythagorean tuning

Ben Johnston Ben Johnston may refer to: * Ben Johnston (rugby union) (born 1978), British rugby player * Ben Johnston (composer) (1926–2019), American contemporary composer of concert music * Bennett Johnston, Jr. (born 1932), Washington, D.C.-based lobbyist ...
gives the following
Pythagorean tuning Pythagorean tuning is a system of musical tuning in which the frequency ratios of all intervals are based on the ratio 3:2.Bruce Benward and Marilyn Nadine Saker (2003). ''Music: In Theory and Practice'', seventh edition, 2 vols. (Boston: ...
for the minor pentatonic scale: Naturals in that table are not the alphabetic series A to G without sharps and flats: Naturals are reciprocals of terms in the Harmonic series (mathematics), which are in practice multiples of a
fundamental frequency The fundamental frequency, often referred to simply as the ''fundamental'', is defined as the lowest frequency of a periodic waveform. In music, the fundamental is the musical pitch of a note that is perceived as the lowest partial present. I ...
. This may be derived by proceeding with the principle that historically gives the Pythagorean diatonic and chromatic scales, stacking perfect fifths with 3:2 frequency proportions (C–G–D–A–E). Considering the anhemitonic scale as a subset of a just diatonic scale, it is tuned thus: 20:24:27:30:36 (A–C–D–E–G = ––––). Assigning precise frequency proportions to the pentatonic scales of most cultures is problematic as tuning may be variable. For example, the slendro anhemitonic scale and its modes of Java and Bali are said to approach, very roughly, an equally-tempered five-note scale, but their tunings vary dramatically from gamelan to gamelan. Composer Lou Harrison has been one of the most recent proponents and developers of new pentatonic scales based on historical models. Harrison and
William Colvig William (Bill) Colvig (March 13, 1917 – March 1, 2000) was an electrician and amateur musician who was the partner for 33 years of composer Lou Harrison, whom he met in San Francisco in 1967. Colvig helped construct the American gamelan used in ...
tuned the slendro scale of the gamelan Si Betty to overtones 16:19:21:24:28 (––––). They tuned the Mills gamelan so that the intervals between scale steps are 8:77:69:8–8:7–7:6 (–––– – = 42:48:56:63:72)


Use of pentatonic scales

Pentatonic scales occur in many musical traditions: * Indian classical music, both Hindustani and Carnatic traditions * Peruvian Chicha cumbia * Indigenous ethnic folk music of Assam * Sudanese Arab Music * Celtic folk music * English folk music * German folk music *
Nordic folk music Nordic folk music includes a number of traditions of Nordic countries, especially Scandinavian. The Nordic countries are Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland. The many regions of the Nordic countries share certain traditions, man ...
* Hungarian folk music *
Croatian folk music The music of Croatia, like the divisions of the country itself, has two major influences: Central European, present in central and northern parts of the country including Slavonia, and Mediterranean, present in coastal regions of Dalmatia and ...
* Berber music * West African music * African-American spirituals *
Gospel music Gospel music is a traditional genre of Christian music, and a cornerstone of Christian media. The creation, performance, significance, and even the definition of gospel music varies according to culture and social context. Gospel music is co ...
* Bluegrass music * American folk music *
Music of Ethiopia Ethiopian music is a term that can mean any music of Ethiopian origin, however, often it is applied to a genre, a distinct modal system that is pentatonic, with characteristically long intervals between some notes. The music of the Ethiopian Hig ...
*
Jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...
*
Blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the ...
*
Rock music Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States a ...
* Sami
joik A joik or yoik (anglicised, where the latter spelling in English conforms with the pronunciation; also named , , , or in the Sámi languages) is a traditional form of song in Sámi music performed by the Sámi people of Sapmi in Northern Europ ...
singing *
Children's song A children's song may be a nursery rhyme set to music, a song that children invent and share among themselves or a modern creation intended for entertainment, use in the home or education. Although children's songs have been recorded and studied ...
* The
music of ancient Greece Music was almost universally present in ancient Greek society, from marriages, funerals, and religious ceremonies to theatre, folk music, and the ballad-like reciting of epic poetry. It thus played an integral role in the lives of ancient Gr ...
** Greek traditional music and polyphonic songs from Epirus in northwest Greece * Music of southern Albania * Folk songs of peoples of the Middle Volga region (such as the Mari, the Chuvash and
Tatars The Tatars ()Tatar
in the Collins English Dictionary
is an umbrella term for different Turki ...
) * The tuning of the Ethiopian krar and the Indonesian gamelan * Philippine kulintang *
Native American music Indigenous music of North America, which includes American Indian music or Native American music, is the music that is used, created or performed by Indigenous peoples of North America, including Native Americans in the United States and Abor ...
, especially in highland
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(the Quechua and Aymara), as well as among the North American Indians of the
Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Thou ...
* Most Turkic, Mongolic and Tungusic music of
Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part ...
and the Asiatic steppe is written in the pentatonic scaleVan Khe, Tran. “Is the Pentatonic Universal? A Few Reflections on Pentatonism.” The World of Music 19, no. 1/2 (1977): 76–84. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43560446. * Melodies of
China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...
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Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic ...
,
Laos Laos (, ''Lāo'' )), officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic ( Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ, French: République démocratique populaire lao), is a socialist s ...
,
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
,
Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand ...
,
Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two regions: Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo's East Mal ...
,
Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...
, and
Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making ...
(including the
folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has ...
of these countries) ** Traditional Japanese court music **
Shōmyō is a style of Japanese Buddhist chant, used mainly in the Tendai and Shingon sects. There are two styles: ''ryokyoku'' and ''rikkyoku'', described as difficult and easy to remember, respectively. Shōmyō, like gagaku, employs the Yo scale, a pe ...
chanting * Andean music * Afro-Caribbean music * Polish highlanders from the Tatra Mountains * Western Impressionistic composers such as French composer Claude Debussy.


In classical music

Examples of its use include Chopin's Etude in G-flat major, op. 10, no. 5, the "Black Key" etude, in the major pentatonic.
Giacomo Puccini Giacomo Puccini ( Lucca, 22 December 1858Bruxelles, 29 November 1924) was an Italian composer known primarily for his operas. Regarded as the greatest and most successful proponent of Italian opera after Verdi, he was descended from a long ...
used pentatonic scales in his operas ''
Madama Butterfly ''Madama Butterfly'' (; ''Madame Butterfly'') is an opera in three acts (originally two) by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. It is based on the short story " Madame Butterfly" (1898) by John Lu ...
'' and '' Turandot'' to imitate east Asian musical styles. Puccini also used whole-tone scales in the former to invoke similar ideas.


Indian ragas

Indian classical music has hundreds of ragas, of which many are pentatonic. Examples include Raag Abhogi Kanada (C, D, E-flat, F, A), Raag Bhupali (C, D, E, G, A), Raag Bairagi (C, D-flat, F, G, B-flat), Raag Chandrakauns (C, E-flat, F, A-flat, B), Raag Dhani (C, E-flat, F, G, B-flat), Raag Durga (C, D, F, G, A), Raag Gunakari (C, D-flat, F, G, A-flat), Raag Hamsadhwani (C, D, E, G, B), Raag Hindol (C, E, F#, A, B), Raag Kalavati (C, E, G, A, B-flat), Raag Katyayani (C, D, E-flat, G, A-flat), Raag Malkauns (C, E-flat, F, A-flat, B-flat), Raag Megh (C, D, F, G, B-flat), Raag Shivaranjani (C, D, E-flat, G, A), Raag Shuddha Sarang (C, D, F#, G, B), Raag Tilang (C, E, F, G, B), Raag Vibhas (C, D-flat, E, G, A-flat), Raag Vrindavani Sarang (C, D, F, G, B), and others. (For Tamil Music System, See here - Ancient Tamil music#Evolution of panns )


Further pentatonic musical traditions

The major pentatonic scale is the basic scale of the music of China and the music of Mongolia as well as many Southeast Asian musical traditions such as that of the Karen people as well as the indigenous Assamese ethnic groups. The pentatonic scale predominates most Eastern countries as opposed to Western countries where the heptatonic scale is more commonly used. The fundamental tones (without ''meri'' or ''kari'' techniques) rendered by the five holes of the
Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...
ese shakuhachi flute play a minor pentatonic scale. The yo scale used in Japanese shomyo Buddhist chants and gagaku imperial court music is an anhemitonic pentatonic scale shown below, which is the fourth mode of the major pentatonic scale.


Javanese

In
Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...
nese gamelan music, the slendro scale has five tones, of which four are emphasized in classical music. Another scale, pelog, has seven tones, and is generally played using one of three five-tone subsets known as pathet, in which certain notes are avoided while others are emphasized.


Somali

Somali music uses a distinct modal system that is pentatonic, with characteristically long intervals between some notes. As with many other aspects of Somali culture and tradition, tastes in music and lyrics are strongly linked with those in nearby
Ethiopia Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...
,
Eritrea Eritrea ( ; ti, ኤርትራ, Ertra, ; ar, إرتريا, ʾIritriyā), officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa region of Eastern Africa, with its capital and largest city at Asmara. It is bordered by Ethiopi ...
,
Djibouti Djibouti, ar, جيبوتي ', french: link=no, Djibouti, so, Jabuuti officially the Republic of Djibouti, is a country in the Horn of Africa, bordered by Somalia to the south, Ethiopia to the southwest, Eritrea in the north, and the Red ...
and
Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...
.


Scottish

In Scottish music, the pentatonic scale is very common. Seumas MacNeill suggests that the Great Highland bagpipe scale with its augmented fourth and diminished seventh is "a device to produce as many pentatonic scales as possible from its nine notes" (although these two features are not in the same scale). Roderick Cannon explains these pentatonic scales and their use in more detail, both in
Piobaireachd Pibroch, or is an art music genre associated primarily with the Scottish Highlands that is characterised by extended compositions with a melodic theme and elaborate formal variations. Strictly meaning "piping" in Scottish Gaelic, has for some f ...
and light music. It also features in Irish traditional music, either purely or almost so. The minor pentatonic is used in Appalachian folk music.
Blackfoot music Blackfoot music is the music of the Blackfoot people (best translated in the Blackfoot language as ''nitsínixki'' – "I sing", from ''nínixksini'' – "song"). Singing predominates and was accompanied only by percussion. (Nettl, 1989) Bruno ...
most often uses anhemitonic tetratonic or pentatonic scales.


Andean

In Andean music, the pentatonic scale is used substantially minor, sometimes major, and seldom ''in'' scale. In the most ancient genres of Andean music being performed without string instruments (only with winds and
percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...
), pentatonic melody is often led with parallel fifths and fourths, so formally this music is hexatonic.


Jazz

Jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...
music commonly uses both the major and the minor pentatonic scales. Pentatonic scales are useful for improvisers in modern jazz, pop, and rock contexts because they work well over several chords diatonic to the same key, often better than the parent scale. For example, the blues scale is predominantly derived from the minor pentatonic scale, a very popular scale for improvisation in the realms of blues and rock alike. For instance, over a C major triad (C, E, G) in the key of C major, the note F can be perceived as dissonant as it is a half step above the major third (E) of the chord. It is for this reason commonly avoided. Using the major pentatonic scale is an easy way out of this problem. The scale tones 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 (from the major pentatonic) are either major triad tones (1, 3, 5) or common consonant extensions (2, 6) of major triads. For the corresponding relative minor pentatonic, scale tones 1, 3, 4, 5, 7 work the same way, either as minor triad tones (1, 3, 5) or as common extensions (4, 7), as they all avoid being a half step from a chord tone.


Other

U.S. military cadences, or ''jodies'', which keep soldiers in step while marching or running, also typically use pentatonic scales. Hymns and other religious music sometimes use the pentatonic scale; for example, the melody of the hymn " Amazing Grace", one of the most famous pieces in religious music. The common pentatonic major and minor scales (C-D-E-G-A and C-E-F-G-B, respectively) are useful in modal composing, as both scales allow a melody to be modally ambiguous between their respective major ( Ionian, Lydian, Mixolydian) and minor ( Aeolian, Phrygian, Dorian) modes ( Locrian excluded). With either modal or non-modal writing, however, the ''harmonization'' of a pentatonic melody does not necessarily have to be derived from only the pentatonic pitches. Most
Tuareg The Tuareg people (; also spelled Twareg or Touareg; endonym: ''Imuhaɣ/Imušaɣ/Imašeɣăn/Imajeɣăn'') are a large Berber ethnic group that principally inhabit the Sahara in a vast area stretching from far southwestern Libya to southern Al ...
songs are pentatonic, as is most other music from the Sahel and
Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...
regions.


Role in education

The pentatonic scale plays a significant role in music education, particularly in Orff-based, Kodály-based, and Waldorf methodologies at the primary or elementary level. The Orff system places a heavy emphasis on developing creativity through improvisation in children, largely through use of the pentatonic scale.
Orff instruments The Orff Schulwerk, or simply the Orff Approach, is a developmental approach used in music education. It combines music, movement, drama, and speech into lessons that are similar to a child's world of play. It was developed by the German com ...
, such as xylophones,
bells Bells may refer to: * Bell, a musical instrument Places * Bells, North Carolina * Bells, Tennessee * Bells, Texas * Bells Beach, Victoria, an internationally famous surf beach in Australia * Bells Corners, Ontario Music * Bells, directly st ...
and other metallophones, use wooden bars, metal bars or bells, which can be removed by the teacher, leaving only those corresponding to the pentatonic scale, which Carl Orff himself believed to be children's native tonality. Children begin improvising using only these bars, and over time, more bars are added at the teacher's discretion until the complete
diatonic scale In music theory, a diatonic scale is any heptatonic scale that includes five whole steps (whole tones) and two half steps (semitones) in each octave, in which the two half steps are separated from each other by either two or three whole st ...
is being used. Orff believed that the use of the pentatonic scale at such a young age was appropriate to the development of each child, since the nature of the scale meant that it was impossible for the child to make any real
harmonic A harmonic is a wave with a frequency that is a positive integer multiple of the ''fundamental frequency'', the frequency of the original periodic signal, such as a sinusoidal wave. The original signal is also called the ''1st harmonic'', t ...
mistakes. In Waldorf education, pentatonic music is considered to be appropriate for young children due to its simplicity and unselfconscious openness of expression. Pentatonic music centered on intervals of the fifth is often sung and played in early childhood; progressively smaller intervals are emphasized within primarily pentatonic as children progress through the early school years. At around nine years of age the music begins to center on first folk music using a six-tone scale, and then the modern diatonic scales, with the goal of reflecting the children's developmental progress in their musical experience. Pentatonic instruments used include lyres, pentatonic flutes, and tone bars; special instruments have been designed and built for the Waldorf curriculum.Andrea Intveen
Musical Instruments in Anthroposophical Music Therapy with Reference to Rudolf Steiner’s Model of the Threefold Human Being


See also

* Jazz scale * Quartal and quintal harmony *
Raga A ''raga'' or ''raag'' (; also ''raaga'' or ''ragam''; ) is a melodic framework for improvisation in Indian classical music akin to a melodic mode. The ''rāga'' is a unique and central feature of the classical Indian music tradition, and as ...
* Suspended chord * Traditional sub-Saharan African harmony


References


Further reading

* Jeff Burns,
Pentatonic Scales for the Jazz-Rock Keyboardist
' (Lebanon, Indiana: Houston Publishing, 1997). . * Jeremy Day-O'Connell
from the Eighteenth Century to Debussy''
(Rochester: University of Rochester Press 2007) – the first comprehensive account of the increasing use of the pentatonic scale in 19th-century Western art music, including a catalogue of over 400 musical examples. *
Trần Văn Khê Trần Văn Khê (24 July 1921 - 24 June 2015) was a Vietnamese musicologist, academic, writer, teacher and performer of traditional music. He was father of the musician ethnomusicologist . His ''La musique viêtnamienne traditionnelle'' (Paris, ...

"Le pentatonique est-il universel? Quelques reflexions sur le pentatonisme"
''The World of Music'' 19, nos. 1–2:85–91 (1977)
English translation: "Is the pentatonic universal? A few reflections on pentatonism"
pp. 76–84. * Yamaguchi Masaya (New York: Charles Colin, 2002; New York: Masaya Music, Revised 2006). ''Pentatonicism in Jazz: Creative Aspects and Practice''. * Kurt Reinhard, "On the problem of pre-pentatonic scales: particularly the third-second nucleus", ''
Journal of the International Folk Music Council A journal, from the Old French ''journal'' (meaning "daily"), may refer to: *Bullet journal, a method of personal organization *Diary, a record of what happened over the course of a day or other period *Daybook, also known as a general journal, a ...
'' 10 (1958).


External links

* , Bobby McFerrin {{Authority control 5 (number) Musical scales