The Chromatic Scale
All twelve notes, in order, with nothing left out. On its own it has no home and no character, which makes it the least musical scale here. Inside a key it becomes the source of every colour that theory calls chromatic.
- 12 notes
- every semitone
- none
which styles use it
- Jazz
- Classical
- Film music
- Prog
How it is built
Every semitone from a note to its octave. On a keyboard that is simply every key in a row. Because all the steps are equal, the scale is completely symmetrical and gives your ear no information at all about which note is the root.
Featureless when played on its own, which is a genuinely useful thing to hear once. The moment a key is established underneath it, the same twelve notes split into seven that belong and five that colour.
Where to use it
As passing notes between chord tones, which is what chromaticism mostly is in practice. As a run, in jazz and in classical cadenzas. As the raw material for twelve tone writing, where the absence of a home note is the whole compositional idea.
The chords that go with it
None of its own. Every chord in every key can be found inside it, which is another way of saying it tells you nothing.
What it gets confused with
With chromatic harmony, which is a different subject: that is about chords borrowed from outside the key, not about playing all twelve notes.