u/jazz_tunes

I get the sense most people think of minor as Dorian or Aeolian, or melodic minor (b3, raised 6 and 7).

I took counterpoint in college with a strict professor, and I didn't enjoy it and kinda resented it, but somehow that course ended up giving me lots of insights into music (maybe more than any other music class), including how I think about minor tonality.

Here was how minor was explained: it always has the flat 3. The 6 and 7 can be flatted or raised depending on the context. It's up to the composer. All the more convoluted things, like 'harmonic minor' with a flat 6 and raised 7, were the inventions of music theorists trying to explain musical practice after the fact.

So when you're in the key of D- in a functional tune, in Alone Together for example, it is up to you as the improviser how you wanna treat the 6 and 7. Even on the V chord you have access to the raised 7 of D-, as the 3 of A7, or the flatted 7, as the #9. Similarly with the raised and flatted 6. In So What, by contrast, you'd go with D Dorian, since it's a modal tune.

I'm curious how other people think about playing in minor. Am I just talking common sense?