Student’s question:
I have a question to ask. I can practice scales but I do not know what to do with them. Do you teach how and what to do with scales? For example the E Phrygian scale in all its 5 positions. Thank you.
How we think about this in IFR:
Thanks for a fantastic question. I love the honesty of this insight:
“I can practice scales but I do not know what to do with them.”
I think this one statement perfectly sums up the experience of millions of people. We practice scales or modes or whatever we’re told, but none of this gets us any closer to expressing ourselves creatively through music.
Let me go out on a limb here and suggest that maybe what you need isn’t the E Phrygian scale at all. Maybe what you need is to actually experience improvising. Once you experience it for yourself and you discover your own ability to make music with whatever sounds you’re working with (which could just be the major scale in the beginning), then your question about the E Phrygian scale simply goes away. You’ll be able to improvise just as easily with the notes of any scale, because our ability to improvise doesn’t come from scales.
But there is no magical formula for “what to do” with any collection of sounds. These are simply the raw materials of our art and we can enjoy making music with them in endless ways. But what you’re missing is not more theoretical knowledge. What you’re missing is an ability. This ability is available to everyone, but you have to discover it for yourself. And the easiest way to discover it is by working with sounds that your ear is already accustomed to.
So my advice would be to start with our video course on Seven Worlds for your instrument. The video lessons will ease you into the experience of improvising in a way that I think you’ll find very natural. In parallel with this, start listening to Sing the Numbers 3: Seven Worlds every day. Those audio exercises will introduce you to hundreds of beautiful melodies that are just waiting to be discovered and played in the seven harmonic environments. Just listening to these gorgeous melodies will help you to feel more creatively inspired in your own improvising.
And then just to close the circle, when you get to the third harmonic environment, you’ll actually be improvising with exactly the Phrygian scale that you’re asking me about. The Phrygian scale is nothing more than the major scale when we’re feeling note 3 as our tonal center. So those lessons in particular will help you learn to create your own music with this exotic collection of sounds. But don’t start there. Start with the first harmonic environment, and just focus on learning to improvise melodically with those sounds. If you can do it in the first harmonic environment, then you can do it with any collection of sounds in the world.
Thanks for your honest question. I think it will really help a lot of people.
