Been trying to learn scales by learning songs. What are some songs I can use to learn harmonic minor?
Preferably songs that don’t just borrow chords from the scales. The songs can also use the modes of the harmonic minor.
This is mostly phrygian dominant, the fifth mode of harmonic minor.
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The truth is that not a lot is actually written in specifically harmonic minor or any of its modes. The idea of harmonic minor being its own distinct mode is fairly recent (and by that I mean 100 years). Back in the day (day of common practice/tonal harmony/functional harmony) the harmonic, melodic, and natural minor were all extensions of the minor scale and intertwined fluidly depending on what both the harmony and melody required. This is more of a deeper music theory discussion though.
If you are a rock guitar player and want songs that reek of it - All of Yngwie Malmsteen’s catalogue. Like seriously, all of it.
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Yeah, what Fossegrim said - if you want something to practice harmonic minor in, play or write in natural minor but then every once in a while add a V-i resolution. You can certainly just write a melody in harmonic minor and then flesh out chords around it and go from there, but more traditionally would be a song in a minor key, and possibly including the occasional minor 5 chord, but that modulates to harmonic minor for V-i modulations.
Idunno, something like Am - C - F - Em - Dm - F- C - E and repeat.
If you don’t want to go about it in this sense, then maybe just play an A drone and improvise in A harmonic minor, and every now and then drop an E under the G#. But, definitely think about the A harmonic minor as having not a major 7th to the tonic, but a major 3rd to the 5th.
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^ this is pretty much it. If one wants a really simple description it is basically a way of implementing a stronger V-i resolution in a minor key since you have a lot of pull both downward and upwards to the tonic by doing that. You may find something that may be classified a modal harmonic minor vamp, but not typically. Both harmonic and melodic minor were mostly seen as tools to adhere to good voice leading.
Melodic minor is another permutation used in mostly melodic contexts, and for the same voice leading principles as above but you guessed it to handle more of the melody lines in a piece. The two could be used simultaneously in the piece. Nobody back them considered them distinct modes or scales, they were all just the minor scale that would augment the 6th and 7th degrees depending on what was needed from a harmonic/melodic/voice leading perspective.
Melodic Minor however has come to prominence starting in the 20th century as a standalone and is super popular in jazz.
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Man that is hardcore megadeth… what song is that? … If dave stole that, humm…
Sails of Charon from Scorpions. Predates Megadeth by a good 6 years.
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Really just adding to what others have said. You could also look at baroque period music (especially Bach) and transcribe parts / lines.
It’s easy to confuse scales with keys. You don’t necessarily write in the scale of harmonic minor, you write in a minor key and use harmonic minor where necessary / intended, etc. All of these ‘altered in some way’ scales and modes often have the best effect when used occasionally.
Take a simple i, iv, V chord progression.
Am - Aminor
Dm - Aminor
E - A harmonic minor / E phrygian dominant (really hammer home that G#).
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More hardcore YJM. Uli was one of his influences no matter how much he wafts in and out of claiming otherwise.
So it’s contextual right. It really depends on the use case, and what you are trying to achieve and maybe something that is best looked at holistically in many cases. You could write something that is primarily modal; it just has certain limitations, and in many cases there may be a better interpretation of what’s actually happening.
The difficulty with strict modal writing is that with the exception of a few of the modes, you are really just stuck with a relatively small number of chords before whatever you try to compose starts to become an unstable progression and lose its gravity towards an established tonic.
It’s often the case that much of what people may claim is modal, is really just a good example of modal interchange. Which IMHO is a far more useful concept.
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Honestly, minor keys are, in general, a bit more loosey-goosey, and that’s part of the appeal.
Really, it comes down to what common practice/classical pedagogy would consider the “diatonic” chords of a minor key.
They are:
i-ii°-bIII-iv-V-bVI-vii°.
In my favorite key, D Minor, those are the chords:
Dm-E°-F-Gm-A-Bb-C#°.
That is, we have two minor chords on the i and iv chords, three major chords on the bIII, V, and bVI chords, and two diminished chords on the ii° and vii° chords.
However, if we take Natural Minor, or the Aeolian mode, the chords would be:
i-ii°-bIII-iv-v-bVI-bVII.
In my favorite key, D Minor, they’d be:
Dm-E°-F-Gm-Am-Bb-C.
And if we take harmonic minor and harmonize it, the chords would be:
i-ii°-bIIIaug-iv-V-bVI-vii°.
In the key of D Minor, that’d be the chords:
Dm-E°-Faug-Gm-A-Bb-C#°.
And, finally, if we take melodic minor, the chords would be:
i-ii-bIIIaug-IV-V-vi°-vii°.
In the key of D Minor, the chords would be:
Dm-Em-Faug-G-A-B°-C#°.
So we can see that minor keys in general share a lot of chords in common, and for this reason, modal mixture is far more common in minor keys than in major keys.
Not to say modal mixture doesn’t happen in major keys, just in minor keys, it’s far more common.
Best to think of minor keys as a big, overarching “MINOR” and let the harmony and melodies be as they are.
Most often, if we’re being strict and “diatonic” in minor keys, we assume harmonic minor, with the bIII chord borrowed from the parallel major key, because that augmented triad on the third chord isn’t the major scale, but the lovely named Ionian (#5).
So really, you can get away with playing in natural minor for a while, and then, when you want a strong cadence, put a V→i chord move to use harmonic minor over the V chord.
That emphasizes the leading tone more, putting more tension on the V chord more, which strongly emphasizes your Tonic even more.
For a fun example, here’s a popular Zelda theme:
It’s in the key of F# Minor, with the chords:
i-bVI-bVII-V.
With the key applied, those are the chords:
F#m-D-E-C#.
It was natural minor all the way up to the C# chord, the V chord of the key, where it then became harmonic minor for a moment.
How about another Zelda example?
This is the Dark World Theme from A Link to the Past, and it’s in the key of C Minor.
The progression is:
i-IV-bVI-bVII.
With the key applied, those chords are:
Cm-F-Ab-Bb.
It also uses modal mixture. If not for that IV chord borrowed from the Dorian mode, this would be in pure Aeolian.
However, that IV chord brightens things up a bit, and you can hear how dark it would sound by turning that IV chord into a iv chord.
Cm-Fm-Ab-Bb.
That’s pure C natural minor, and it sounds rather dark. But change that Fm into an F chord, then it sounds… uplifting, even if your Tonic is a minor chord, which traditionally sound sad, dark, and melancholic.
So, if you really wanted to emphasize harmonic minor, take a typical progression, like vi-ii-V-I, and make it minor. So we turn this:
vi-ii-V-I.
To this:
bVI-ii°-V-i.
In my favorite key, D Minor, that’s the chords:
Bb-E°-A-Dm.
Sounds fine, but maybe that E° chord sounds too dark, so we change it to an Em chord, which invokes the sound of melodic minor.
Bb-Em-A-Dm.
Maybe that A chord doesn’t carry enough emphasis or weight, so maybe we change it to an A7 chord.
Bb-Em-A7-Dm.
Maybe that Dm chord sounds a bit too… sad, so let’s soften the blow by changing it to a Dm7 chord, ya know what? Let’s play around with some inversions on the Bb and Em chords. Why not?
Bb/D-Em/B-A7-Dm7.
See how loosey-goosey minor keys really are?
We basically have a chord progression where we can play D natural minor, D melodic minor, and D harmonic minor over it, and it doesn’t sound a million miles away!!
This is the fun of minor keys!
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Excellent post! (common D Minor lover here, in my case most likely because I tune my guitars to D 
)