What is a Mode?

My first interaction with the musical term modes was Leonard
Bernstein’s brilliant Young People’s Concert, also called What is
a Mode? In that show, Bernstein showed how modes are an
essential part of what makes modern music, meaning pop and rock
music, tick. This was central to Bernstein’s point during this
amazing show, which is available on Youtube, and he punctuated
his discussion with multiple examples of pop music from the time
that used modes. Today, on this Patreon sponsored episode, I was
asked to go through all of the modes and show how they have been
used in classical music. Much of my show today is modeled on and
takes its inspiration from that Bernstein Young People’s Concert,
and I’ll be peppering clips from that show throughout my own
exploration. As Bernstein says, the common practice period of
classical music, starting with Haydn and ending sometime early in
the 20th century, didn’t feature a lot of modal music, though
that doesn’t mean it was completely absent. So today I’ll explain
what modes are, and we’ll go through each of the so called church
modes, explaining their characteristics, and then showing you
examples throughout musical history of exactly how these modes
were used by the great composers. This show might seem a bit
technical, but I think there’s a lot of really interesting and
fascinating stuff here, so stick with me, and let’s explore modes
together. Join us!