Coleman's March through the modes...

To continue the discussion on diatonic modes from last week (click here for that post), I thought I'd post just a few more (hopefully) helpful sound files.  

Last week I gave examples of fiddle tunes that were originally composed in Dorian and Mixolydian modes - these modes are commonly heard in old time, but less-commonly heard in many other forms of music, and the tunes may therefore seem a little "exotic" to western ears. Last year I recorded "Coleman's March," a popular fiddle tune, originally composed in D Ionian (a.k.a. D Major) in all seven diatonic modes and I've posted them below. 

The biggest point in doing this was for me to listen to the final versions and become more familiar with the sounds of these different modes; by comparing "more exotic" modes to Ionian I hoped to get to know the diatonic modes "off the page" and form opinions about the moods that they set when employed in music. "Coleman's March" makes an ideal choice for this exercise because its a tune I know well (so I know how it should sound), its usually played slow (giving me time to hear the differences between modes), and it hits all the notes in scale at some point (so they're all available for editing...see below).

The mechanics of doing this were fairly simple: basically I looked at how each mode differed from the Ionian (major) scale in which Coleman's march was originally composed, and changed the tune accordingly. For example, I know that the Mixolydian scale differs from the Ionian (Major) scale because the 7th note is flattened one half step; whenever that note came up in "Coleman's March," I flattened it to make a Mixolydian version.  Some of the other Modes (Locrian!) were a little harder but the principle was the same. 

​Anyways, hope you enjoy!

Note - these tunes are posted in the order that you would "March through the modes" if building them out of the major scale (Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian). A great way to remember this is the following pneumonic device: "I don't particularly like modes a lot." Don't remember where I read that unfortunately...