Talk:Phrygian mode

F# minor being Phrygian (True or false??)
This article says F# minor is Phrygian, but what does this mean?? Of course, it it makes sense that the F# Phrygian mode is a mode of the D Major scale, namely, F#-G-A-B-C#-D-E. True or false; this is what the sentence means. 66.245.117.183 19:03, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)


 * "Additionally F# minor is sometimes referred to as Phrygian."
 * I removed the sentence. Hyacinth 00:20, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Removed
I removed the above sentence because far from being interesting the observation is self-evident. If you define the Phrygian mode as the major scale, then of course only pitches in the major scale will be in the Phrygian mode. Hyacinth 00:18, 14 Sep 2004 (UTC)
 * "Interestingly, a note is in the Phrygian mode of a given tone if and only if the given tone is in the major scale of the note being mentioned first."

I dont understand this sentence. "Confusingly, the Phrygian mode is the same as the mediaeval and modern Dorian mode." If this is true then why does dorian mode of c major start on "D" and the phrygian in c start on "E"--Esmason 02:04, 13 February 2006 (UTC)


 * The sentence says that what the ancient Greeks called Phrygian mode is exactly the same as the mediaeval and modern mode called the Dorian mode. All that happened was that the meaning of the names was misinterpreted in mediaeval times. This mode consists of the intervals tstttst, whereas the major mode is ttsttts (where a t is a tone, s is a semitone). Therfore,
 * C major is C D E F G a b c
 * Greek Phrygian in C is C D Eb F G a bb c
 * Mediaeval/modern Dorian in C is C D Eb F G a bb c (same as above)
 * Greek Dorian in C is C Db Eb F G ab bb c
 * Mediaeval/modern Phrygian in C is C Db Eb F G ab bb c (same as above)
 * D major is D E F# G a b c# d
 * Greek Phrygian in D is D E F G a b c d
 * Mediaeval/modern Dorian in D is D E F G a b c d (same as above)
 * Greek Dorian in D is D Eb F G a bb c d
 * Mediaeval/modern Phrygian in D is D Eb F G a bb c d (same as above)
 * E major is E F# G# a b c# d# e
 * Greek Phrygian in E is E F# G a b c# d e
 * Mediaeval/modern Dorian in E is E F# G a b c# d e (same as above)
 * Greek Dorian in E is E F G a b c d e
 * Mediaeval/modern Phrygian in E is E F G a b c d e (same as above)
 * I hope that makes it a little more clear. --Gareth Hughes 16:07, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Too clear cut?
I've been fascinated by Ancient Greek music theory and have been studying it for a little while, and I'm worried that this description of the Ancient Greek concept of "Phrygian" (and indeed all of the modes) is far too clear-cut given the current understanding. From what source have you derived this description, is it Aristides Quintillianus? The Quintillianus explanation (sorry if I'm spelling that wrong) is highly suspect. Alypius, though certainly not without his problems as well, has a completely different and, at least for some, more definitive description of the Ancient Greek tonoi (which may not even translate comfortably as mode at all) which seems to place the concept somewhere closer to the modern-day idea of key.

I certainly wouldn't suggest ommitting the description currently in the article, but I would suggest giving the source of this description more obviously and adding some alternate understandings of the Greek concept of tonoi. For instance, the description of a "phrygian tetrachord" in the article is very strange. It implies that there were different tetrachords for each mode, but that seems highly unlikely to be the case. Although just plain "tetrachord" was undoubtedly of massive importance to Ancient Greek music theory, it does not appear to have any bearing on modal or tonoi considerations. The only types of tetrachord I'm aware of in Ancient Greek thinking are diatonic, chromatic, and enharmonic; which are often considered to ROUGHLY represent W-H-W (e.g. D-E-F-G), H-H-m3 (e.g. D-Eb-E-G), and 1/4-1/4-M3 (e.g. D-Dquarter# -Eb-G) respectively. Only the relative choice of tetrachords within the Greater Perfect System seem to have had any bearing on mode or tonoi.

I guess this is just a long-winded request for more information/source-citing. I haven't changed the article because I'm new here and am still trying to get my mind around the basic protocols. --P4limpsest

Project for Mode Articles: Standardization and Consolidation
The mode articles are a mess when taken together. The articles need to be standardized and some of the general information consolidated into the Musical mode article and removed from all the articles about specific modes.

a few specific propositions:

corresponding information
 * I think all the mode articles should have corresponding information in corresponding sections. For example, the intervals that define the mode should be given at say, somewhere near the top of the article in a section called "intervals" or something (whatever, as long as its standard for all articles and maximally descriptive). Also things like if the scale is "symmetric" or "asymmetiric" or whether its a "minor" or "major" scale should be all in one place (perhaps a table would be best for these things).

Information about modes in general
 * All information that is about modes in general (i.e. applies to all modes) should be moved to the Musical mode article, and not mentioned in the articles about specific modes (all articles should of course be linked to the general Musical mode article). Information about idiosyncratic properties of the modes then will be easier to find that way, and there will be no confused and redundant info (sorta like this paragraph).

''Greek vs. modern terminology confusion'
 * Information about the confusion between the greek and modern terminology should stay in the Musical mode article, with a note at the top of each article--out of the main body--highlighting the terminology confusion (to eschew obfuscation). Perhaps there should be serperate disambiguable articles for the greek modes e.g. a article for Ionian (Greek Mode) and Ionian (Gregorian Mode).

avoiding articl style divergence with later editors not privy to the standardization project
 * As time passes, people who don't know about the effort to standardize the article no doubt will add information to the article in their own style, perhaps causing the articles to diverge in style over time. To avoid this, we can make a template to go at the top of each talk page that tells editors to keep in mind the style standardization (perhaps a project page--"metawiki pages" I think they are called--with a template and style explanation). Although this may not be that much of a problem, if the style is obvious and is suffieciently elegant to begin with.

Am I getting across the idea here? What do you guys think about such a project? I know there is a way to set up a wikiproject for this sort of thing, but I've never done it before. I'll look into how to do it. Any other ideas on how to make the articles fit better together? Any objections or improvements to the above suggestions? Brentt 09:28, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
 * PS please respond and discuss at the Musical mode talk page

Confusion about tetrachords
There is a discrepancy between this article and the Tetrachords article about the varieties of diatonic tetrachord. This article claims that the Phrygian tetrachord is "a series of rising intervals of a whole tone, followed by a semitone, followed by a whole tone," that is to say, TsT. The Tetrachord article, however, describes it as "a rising scale of a semitone followed by two tones," or sTT. I don't know myself which is correct, but the two articles should agree on one of them.

User:Ixionid, Dec 29 22:39:00 EST 2006.

Well-known music in this key
I plan on deleting any unsourced entries from this in a few weeks. (Listening to a piece and trying to figure out the key is not a source, and is also WP:OR.) Torc2 (talk) 08:28, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Rewrite/partial cleanup
Hi. I've reorganized the article and done some cleanup. Here some of what I did:
 * Tried to make musical examples clearer, at least barring any actual images of chords and scales.
 * Simplify the sus4/jazz section. IANAJazzMusician so if you notice any mistakes, you know what to do.
 * Removed any glaringly extraneous copy from the Modern examples section. The relevance and usefulness of these sections can be dubious, so at least I've made it as inconspicuous as possible.

Here's some of what I didn't do:
 * Remove any copy. I did rewrite and rearrange, but it's basically intact. I think there's still some debris in there, but I'll let someone else take a crack at it.

Thanks for reading. --Blehfu (talk) 06:48, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Removed claim that "If You Seek Amy" is in Phrygian
The song is clearly in a minor (aeolian) tonality throughout the song, and the natural two is used throughout the song. Whoever put this up noticed there was a b2 in the chorus, but a single accidental doesn't mean this song is in Phrygian mode. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.192.216.178 (talk) 06:17, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
 * this is actually a major problem with all of these articles on musical modes. people are doing original research and adding information to articles without citing sources. sometimes they're right and sometimes they're wrong, but mostly no one can tell whether they're right or wrong. the list in mixolydian mode is maybe in the best condition, but the guitar nut citation is self-published and the rest of the article is mostly without sources. if you know of any reliable sources for any of these articles about modes, please either add them to the articles or mention them in talk and someone else will add them. —Chris Capoccia  T&#8260;C 07:26, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Revert of improvement of references
diff — Summary: "revert arbitrary change of reference format without the required editorial consensus" It seems like a bit of a distortion to call my improvements "arbitrary". What should be properly understood as arbitrary is the home-brewed reference formatting that was in the article before. At least my format is follwing WP:CITE/ES. My changes also improved verifiability by adding DOIs and URLs and improved readability by following a standard order of elements in each reference and hyphenating the ISBNs. Finally, what kind of useful "editorial consensus" is present for this article when it's filled with original research? The "editorial consensus" is the reason why the article has a huge example section with only one self-published reference. —Chris Capoccia T&#8260;C 07:30, 23 October 2009 (UTC)
 * The reference formatting that you changed was hardly "home-brewed", unless you are labeling as such the Chicago Manual of Style preferred format, which is sanctioned at Citing_sources/example_style. If you believe that Wikipedia ought not to sanction this style, the correct place to raise the issue is on Wikipedia talk:Citing sources, not on individual article pages with established styles. While it may be true that there remains a lot of doubtful or OR material, almost entirely in the "modern" section and its list of examples, the many citations of the respected sources by Powers, Gombosi, and Solomon, particularly in the section labelled "Ancient Greek Phrygian mode" (though these sources ought also to be added to the section on Medieval and Renaissance usage) hardly merits being called "original research". ISBNs and URLs can be added to the list of References without disturbing the present citation format, which renders the text far more readable than a bunch of unsightly footnote numbers that require jumping back and forth (but this argument, too, belongs on Wikipedia talk:Citing sources, not here). The unreferenced "examples" ought simply to be removed, not used as an excuse for sidestepping the citation-format guidelines at Citing_sources and Citing_sources, where it says "editors should not change an article with a distinctive citation format to another without gaining consensus".—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:44, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Something's wrong...
I am quite sure this version of the major phrygian is false... the 1 b2, b3 ... is not major. It is the normal Phrygian mode which is minor!!! The major phrygian mode is 1 b2 3 4 5 6 7/#7 8. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 58.168.59.59 (talk) 09:20, 23 August 2010 (UTC)
 * There is no such thing as "major Phrygian". The passage to which you are apparently referring says it illustrates "how the modern major mode … can be altered to produce the Phrygian mode". In order to alter the major scale to Phrygian, it is necessary to lower scale-degrees 2, 3, 6, and 7, hence "1 ♭2 ♭3 4 5 ♭6 ♭7 1". If this is not clear as it stands, perhaps it should be rewritten to help avoid misunderstanding.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 15:44, 23 August 2010 (UTC)

The given Respighi example is not in Phrygian mode, it is in F major
I find this article very interesting overall, I would just like to point out a little factual mistake I noticed. The quoted Respighi theme, from Trittico Botticelliano as an example of Phrygian mode is not in that mode, but rather it is in F major. But there is a nice example that could replace it by Respighi that is in Phrygian mode and that is the opening the 1st prelude in Tre Preludi sopra melodie gregoriane (3 preludes on gregorian melodies) for piano, composed in 1919.

For your information, in 1925, Respighi orchestrated and transposed these 3 preludes, and added a 4th orchestral piece. He called the whole 4-part work Vetrate di chiesa (Church Windows). The 1st prelude became The Flight in Egypt and the phygian melody is heard by the clarinet. But i believe, to illustrate clearly the Phrygian mode, it would be better to use the original piano version. You could find a recording of this Prelude in the iTunes site. The track number of that particular prelude is 18.

The score of the Preludi can downloaded here. I think it is in public domain since Respighi died in 1936. I think the 1st three bars of the melody, at the top voice, would be sufficient to illustrate the Phrygian mode.

I would have edit the article myself, but i don't have the skills and the software to send the musical staff with the melody, nor the midi file. If someone could do it it would be nice. I am a professional violinist in a symphony orchestra. I am not an English native speaker, sorry for any mistake in this post.

Thank you

Claudio Ricignuolo — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.48.116.99 (talk) 07:31, 19 January 2012 (UTC)
 * You may well be right, but if the cited source (Benward & Saker) say it is in the Phrygian mode on A, then it is in the Phrygian mode on A. That is the sad situation on Wikipedia. According to Verifiability, "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth". However idiotic, Benward & Saker will prevail until a contrary source can be found.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 07:49, 19 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I defer to Prof. Kohl's expertise in the great majority of such matters, but if a published work says "idiotic" things, then how can it be considered a reliable source? Propagating previously published error should have no place in a responsibly written encyclopedia. The history of scholarship may be full of such clerical inanity, but we have no obligation to continue in a similar manner. __ Just plain Bill (talk) 15:24, 19 January 2012 (UTC)
 * Indeed we do not have any obligation to blindly accept such inanities (if inanity this be), but two things need to be weighed very carefully here. The first is: who will demonstrate that Benward & Saker are wrong on this point? No Wikipedia editor's assessment of the key of this musical example will suffice—it requires a reliable source. The second is that Benward & Saker, as a widely used college textbook, has been cited as an authority on dozens of music-theory-related Wikipedia articles (Chord (music), Diminished triad chord, Dominant seventh chord, Texture (music), Imitation (music), Diminished octave, Augmented seventh, etc.). If Benward & Saker can be shown to be so flagrantly wrong in such an elementary matter as this (and, since the book is now in its eighth edition, this can hardly be regarded as a teething problem), how can their reliability be accepted for any of those other articles?—Jerome Kohl (talk) 18:11, 19 January 2012 (UTC)

Source for Britten's St. Cecilia
Apologies for adding without one, but I think i've now found a good source for Phrygian mode in Britten's Hymn to St Cecilia: aberdeenbachchoir.com, Notes by Peter Parfitt, ©2011 Aberdeen Bach Choir.

If so, perhaps the entry can be re-added? Marcas.oduinn (talk) 22:59, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
 * The source only verifies Phrygian for the first section, though it could be trying to say the refrain is also in Phrygian. As long as you don't exceed what the source says, yes, I would say it looks reliable.—Jerome Kohl (talk) 23:16, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Unholy Confession does not use Phrygian mode
The entire song uses both D natural and harmonic minor. A better example of a song with phrygian is Painkiller by Judas Priest (though they also have some instances of aeolian mode). I can't find a written source regarding Painkiller's use of phrygian, but I think we should talk more about the prevalence of phrygian in hard rock and heavy metal, if someone could find more sources for this. Yungstirjoey666 (talk) 21:18, 25 September 2023 (UTC)