Posted
See attached GIF for details.
I started with a Melodic Major scale in an embedded palette. If I select the chord sequence C, Fm, Ab, Bb all the chords show the horizontal scale as C.melodic-major except for the Ab which shows C.natural-minor. This is great as it's giving the desired results for the melody.
However, if I then press 'stop', start selecting other chords and then re-select the Ab, the scale for that chord is now C.natural-minor-b5 and it changes the melody if I drop the chord in.
If I then re-select the original chord sequence, it goes back to the C.natural-minor again.
Is there a musical reason for this (if so, what is it?), or is it a bug?
Sun, 2014-10-12 - 00:06 Permalink
Scale selection is sensitive to the last 2 or 3 chords played. You get a different scale depending on what was playing previously.
Ah ok, I didn't realise that and it's useful to know. Thank you.
Also, the chords on top of the palette are out of scale, which is why you get a different horizontal scale selection there.
Yes, I noticed the global key had changed to Eb, but that was not my doing. I started in a C key, added the melodic-major scale and removed the other reference scales. Somehow, that changed the key to Eb, not sure I understand why.
Sun, 2014-10-12 - 00:30 Permalink
Thinking about the first point further, it obviously means it's important to 'play' a sequence of chords rather than just drop chords in?
I started with my original sequence (which gave me the natural minor), then I tried changing the Ab chord. I didn't like it so decided to revert to the Ab. But dropping that back in to the sequence gave me the b5 scale, and the only way I could get the original back was to 'play' the C, Fm sequence again first. I find that a bit confusing.
Shouldn't it detect the previous 2 chords and alter the scale accordingly, without having to run through the sequence?
Sun, 2014-10-12 - 11:52 Permalink
Somehow, that changed the key to Eb, not sure I understand why.
The chord doesn't fit into your scale set (aka 'key'). That's why it selects a close relative key here.
Shouldn't it detect the previous 2 chords and alter the scale accordingly, without having to run through the sequence?
Maybe, yes. Although if you like Synfire's default scale suggestions, just run an 'Estimate' on the whole progression and it will select the scales according to the entire sequence of chords.
Sun, 2014-10-12 - 12:45 Permalink
Shouldn't it detect the previous 2 chords and alter the scale accordingly, without having to run through the sequence?
You mean the scales of the chords that you picked from the palette should be altered automatically when you drop them into the progession (based on the previous chords of the progression)? Wouldn't that be even more difficult to handle? Then you could never be sure that you get exactly the chord-scale combination that you picked from the palette when you drop it into the progression.
I think the current solution which enables a manual recalculation of the scales (Estimate command) is quite reasonable.
Sun, 2014-10-12 - 13:26 Permalink
a manual recalculation of the scales (Estimate command) is quite reasonable.
Yes I agree. I had forgotten about this option to be honest. There's so much to remember with Synfire, it's sometimes easy to forget things you learned once if you haven't used them for a while!