Harmonica — minor tunes (including Dorian) and a primer on the modal scales

LearnTheHarmonica.com https://www.youtube.com/@Learntheharmonica.

Fair warning: If you surf onto this page looking for basic harmonica instruction, keep surfing! I’m a rank beginner, and I’m entirely self-taught. So I’m pulling together YouTube videos of tunes I want to learn and links to copies of the music in standard notation (the “dots”), mostly from The Session website. It’s strictly for my own use, and it’s pretty idiosyncratic!

There’s also some basic information here on the old modes — or scales — of so much Anglo-Irish traditional music. Since I play the mountain dulcimer in a very traditional way, I’m already familiar with the modes and find them useful because Irish, Scottish and English trad music is so often modal. But you’re not, don’t bother with them.

One more caveat: I’ve copied videos and notated versions of the tunes willy nilly, without regard to what key they’re in. Since I play by ear, I’m comfortable just following the intervals and honking out a tune in whatever key my harmonica is in. Don’t look for consistency here.

But first, a primer by Liam Ward — embedded above — on the modes and how to play them on a harp in first position I figure the other stuff can come later.

Ward has a good overview of the modes, and how to derive them from a regular C major scale (or a major scale — Ionian in mode-speak — in any other key). But this is the part I’m most interested in:

You can play a mode in any key or position if you have the required technical ability. But to start with, it’s easy to play each mode on your C harmonica as long as you know your major scale. Simply pick a different starting degree and you’re on your way:

Ionian: 4 -4 5 -5 6 -6 -7 7
Dorian: -4 5 -5 6 -6 -7 7 -8
Phrygian: 5 -5 6 -6 -7 7 -8 8
Lydian: -5 6 -6 -7 7 -8 8 -9
Mixolydian: 6 -6 -7 7 -8 8 -9 9
Aeolian: -6 -7 7 -8 8 -9 9 -10
Locrian: -7 7 -8 8 -9 9 -10 10/ (or avoiding the blow-bend: -3 4 -4 5 -5 6 -6 -7)

Excerpted from: Liam Ward, “What Are Modes & How to Play Them on Harmonica,” Learn the Harmonica, June 29, 2023 https://www.learntheharmonica.com/post/modes-harmonica-lesson.

Another handy reference: