Just discovered the Lydian mode

cool.
you'll love lydian flat 7 and lydian augmented even more (they're both melodic minor modes). BTW, Mick Goodrick once suggested to me that in most cases, any out-of-key major chord in a song, other than the actual 1 should be handled via the lydian mode.

 

It's a beautiful sound. Too bad it's been pretty well beaten to death by millions of guitar players.

slopeshoulder, ever try it (regular lydian) on the I chord? It's a nicer sound to my ears than ionian.

 

Here's a whole song dedicated to it by our group:

~Sparks of Lydian~ (Mood Piece) - The Gear Page

 

I love the Lydian sound. I always think of "Flying in a Blue Dream" when I hear it. The sound seems to be fairly common in Indian music and they'll hang on that #4.

Bryan

 

That's exactly what it is.

 

#4 on Lydian (you know, as opposed to +1.... ah, forget it)

 

Hey Sid, Mike Dodge here.

I'm glad that lesson clicked for you. Breaking the scales out that way can open up years of creativity, especially when you relate it to the other Modes/scales.

Hopefully you made it through a 3 parts of the tutorial. I have Part 4 just about ready for prime-time except for the audio recordings. Take a look at it here: http://lessons.mikedodge.com/lessons/Lydian/LydianPatterns4.htm

That lesson will hit on even a lot more for you, kind of from a different direction. It REALLY gets into all the add9 cords that the scale feeds off from. And it shows a progression that uses multiple Lydian scales to play form, IOW, VERY Modal.

I'm also working on a 3rd Indian Sliding Technique lesson explaining using the technique with the Lydian scale, this will cover quite a bit of stuff related to the Satch/Vai sound.

The Lydian scale is a scale of expression more so than a "licks based out of Lydian" that a lot of others scale can fall into. Here's a few musical examples that the scale just breaths in:

Here it's used as complete expression over a drone backing. Many people think the Lydian is very bright and ajor sounding, this clip sompletely disspells that thought. Here it creates a very dark atmosphere: http://test.mikedodge.com/mvdmusic/MikeD1/elydian.mp3

Here it's use direct in the Steve Vai vein (note, the ending chords sequence is the chord progression example in Part 4 link): http://test.mikedodge.com/mvdmusic/MikeD/LimitedAbility_NotFinished.mp3

Here it's used in a modern Jazz tune. The chords are Cmaj9-Am9-Cmaj7 essentially. Lydian is used in the main melody as well as ANY time in solo'ing over the Cmaj9 and Cmaj7 chords. You can really "hang on the #4" over this progression, the guitar, bass, and mandolin do it quite a bit in this tune. This is a tune were you can definitely use Lydian over the "I chord".: http://test.mikedodge.com/mvdmusic/MikeD/SongForJohnFinalMix.mp3

I'll post a thread when Part 4 has the audio but you can use it now, and also when the Indian Slide Technique using Lydian is complete.

Enjoy!!!

 

If you do, you'll be doing what jazz players have been doing for decades.
The great thing about lydian mode on a tonic major (instead of the in-key Ionian) is that is has no "avoid notes". That means any note in the scale can be held over the chord without having to resolve it.
That's not the case with G ionian (major) on G. Play a jazzy Gmaj7 chord, and try holding a C note over it - ouch! C# sounds much better (at least if played fairly high.
Listen to the difference between these:

Gmaj7(11)
--8-----------------
--7-----------------
--7-----------------
--9-----------------
--10-----------------
-------------------
= uurgh!

Gmaj7#11
--9-----------------
--7-----------------
--7-----------------
--9-----------------
--10-----------------
-------------------
= N-i-i-i-c-e! :AOK

BTW, your sequence - Gadd9,Dsus4,Em6,G maj - actually suggests G lydian throughout anyway. There's no C in any of the chords, and Em6 has a C# in it.
(Normally, in the G major key, you should use the G major scale throughout, only switch to lydian on the final G chord. Otherwise, it might just sound as if you are in the D major key, waiting for a final D chord...)

 

Mike Dodge, those recordings sound really nice. Great playing!

 

Pentatonic-izing the Major scales is a heavy aspect of Vai and Satch (whether they explain it that way or not). But their playing always sounds so melodic but almost like general Pentatonic licks. The reason being is that there's a ton of Pentatonic-type maps across the fretboard that are WAY beyond the basic 5-position linear Pentatonics most people most people are shown. Of course it's all the same thing, but this is such a fresh way of breaking out those Diatonic scales in to nice little usable scale fragments.

It ends up being a TON of scales inside the full scale.

I think you'll really like lesson 4. Let me know what you think of it since it's not really posted yet but close to being done.

As for my forum, my forum hoster disappeared before Thanksgiving. So, everything is gone I have most of the good stuff backed up though, but not everything. I need to remove that link from my site cause I don't think it's coming back, bummer.