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Major and Minor are related!
We covered the two most important scales: major and minor. We used the simplest scales for this: C major and A minor. Both scales consist of only root tones, no sharps or flats.
Wait a minute, the scale of C and A consist of the same tones!. The only difference is the first/ground tone:
Well spotted! If you play a major scale from the sixth tone (or rather: if you make the sixth tone of a major scale the ground tone / tonic), then you have a minor scale from that new ground tone.
And vice versa: If you play a minor scale from the third tone (… if you make the third tone of a minor scale the ground tone), then you have a major scale from that new ground tone.
So: C major and A minor consist of the same tones, but the tonic/ground note is different.
In this way, every major scale has a minor brother or sister, and vice versa.
Key signatures
If you want to start major and minor scales on different tones, the same rules apply: each tone gets its own letter, and the distances between the tones are W-W-H-W-W-W-H (major) or W-H-W-W-H-W-W (minor). Before we look at how to exactly make scales that start on other tones, we'll have to look at something else first: key signatures.
Songs (or more formally “compositions”) consist roughly of a melody, rhythm and accompaniment. The signature key (just "key" in short), is about the melody and melodic or harmonic accompaniment only. Rhythm is not part of the "key".
The melody and accompaniment are made up of tones. The melody (this can also be a solo!) is a sequence of tones, accompaniment is mostly done with chords (several tones at the same time).
The tones of the melody and the chords originate in the same scale. The melody goes up and down, in all kinds of variations, via the tones of the scale. The chords are built using tones from that same scale.
The melody finds a resting point in the ground note (tonic) of the scale. The chord that has the ground note as its basis also offers a kind of static rest. All other tones of the scale provide a bit of tension. We do say that tones and chords want to “resolve” to the ground tone. Only when you play the ground tone in a melody or accompaniment, you feel you are “home”, with both feet on the ground.
This is an example of a melody and chords that do not resolve to the ground tone. Because it doesn't "come home", it feels like it is not finished:
Next, the same melody and chords that do resolve to the ground tone:
The fragments are from the composition "Greensleeves", composed by Francis Cutting, somewhere around 1580.