While enjoying music, people experience different emotions, happy or sad. It is not surprising that a gloomy or, on the contrary, vigorous melody can affect a person's mood. A significant role in this is played by the common musical modes - minor and major. How can you tell them apart? This is worth understanding.
What is minor and major
Minor (from the Latin word minor - "lesser") is a musical mode, the chord of which is based on the minor third. As a rule, the minor sounds sad, sad, depressing.
Major (from the Latin word major - "greater") is a musical mode, the chord of which is based on the major third. Major is characterized, as a rule, by a joyful, cheerful coloration of the sound.
What is the difference between minor and major
The contrast between major and minor is one of the most important in music. Major is the opposite of minor. According to European tradition, sounds are separated using tones and semitones. Due to the physical characteristics of sounds, as well as the physiological structure of the human ear, even a semitone creates a significant contrast in the perception of sound.
Most often, listeners perceive major chords as joyful, and minor ones as sad. For example, remember how the famous major work - "Wedding March" by Mendelssohn sounds. However, not all marches are usually energetic and cheerful. For example, Chopin's Funeral March was created in minor key, so when listening to it, there is a mournful, tragic feeling.
Minor has a pronounced "negative" coloring, and major - "positive". This feature of the sound of music is usually characterized by a person as "sadness" or "joy". Moreover, what is especially interesting, the emotional coloring of chords does not depend in any way on changes in the volume or timbre of their constituent sounds.
Nevertheless, it also happens that the major can express lyrical, tragic feelings, and the minor - joyful and light. For example, many American blues are created in major, but the Russian fiery "Gypsy" - oddly enough, in minor.
By analogy, in Russian, a minor is called a sad, dull, depressed, mournful mood, and a major is an elated, cheerful, cheerful state of mind.
Difference between minor and major
Thus, the difference between a minor and a major is as follows:
- in music, a minor chord is built on a minor third, and a major one on a major;
- in both major and minor scales, the order of intervals (both tones and semitones) is different;
- usually the minor has a gloomy and dark, and the major - the light color of sound;
- minor causes negative emotions, such as grief, despondency, sadness, and major - positive (joy);
- also a minor is often called a dull, sad, depressed state, and a major is an elated, cheerful, cheerful mood.
