What are Whole Tone Scales?

Welcome back to my ongoing series on music theory. Last time we covered Chromatic Scales – scales involving all half steps. Today’s subject is Whole Tone Scales.

If you’re wondering what a whole tone scale sounds like, you’ve probably heard them in Impressionist era music. They have an almost eerie quality to them.

As far as the scale itself, it’s actually very simple. While the Chromatic scale is all half-steps, the whole tone scale is simply a series of whole-steps (two keys together with one key between).

Much like the chromatic scale – which has only one iteration, considering it’s all the same intervals – the whole tone scale has just two possible versions. Play the scale, play it a half-step higher, then when you play one more half-step higher, you are back to the first scale again!

Next time we will cover diminished seventh scales.

Thanks again for joining me Robert Estrin Robert@LivingPianos.com (949) 244-3729