[LAU] ot-ish: musical scales question

[Dave Phillips]

David wrote:
> On Mon, 5 Jul 2010 11:26:56 +0100
> James Morris <james at jwm-art.net> wrote:
>
>   
>> So the major pentatonic in C is the minor pentatonic in A?
>>     
>
> Yes, but I think you have a typo in your array :
>
>   
>>   { "Major Pentatonic",   { 1, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0 }},
>>   { "Minor Pentatonic",   { 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 1, 0 }},
>>     
>
> The minor pentatonic scale should be :
>
> { 1, 0, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 1, 0 }
>
>   

Yes, that's one. However, "minor pentatonic" describes only two factors, 
that the 3rd is flatted and that there are five tones to the scale. The 
interval structure is not fixed, i.e. there are many  possible 
pentatonic scales. Persichetti's book includes a nice mini-catalog of 
useful pentatonic scales.

Best,

dp