Diatonic scale
The diatonic scale consists of seven notes with five whole-tone steps and two semitone steps. The major scale is the best-known example, and the white keys of the piano form it too. All seven church modes are shifts of the same seven notes.
- Notes
- seven
- Steps
- 5 whole tones, 2 semitones
- Major pattern
- W–W–S–W–W–W–S
- Example
- white keys from C to C
- Counterpart
- pentatonic (five notes, no semitone)
Seven notes, two semitones
The page Intervals describes the minor second as the smallest step of the Western diatonic scale and the major scale as five whole tones and two semitones in the order W–W–S–W–W–W–S (W = whole tone, S = semitone). The article The pentatonic as a first improvisation names the position of the semitones: between the third and fourth and between the seventh and eighth degrees.
C major as a diatonic scale
Five whole-tone steps and two semitone steps. The semitones lie between E and F and between B and C; E and B are marked.
Diatonic means: belonging to the key
This is the sense in which the page Diatonic chords uses the word: on every degree of the scale a triad arises from notes of the scale itself, the seven diatonic chords of the key. A chromatic chord, by contrast, borrows notes from outside the key.
From the same seven notes
The article The modes through familiar pieces shows what happens when you read these seven notes from different starting points: play the white keys from C to C and you hear C major, from D to D something different. This is how the seven modes arise.
| Mode | Begins on | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Ionian | C | identical to major |
| Dorian | D | minor with a raised sixth degree |
| Phrygian | E | minor with a lowered second degree |
| Lydian | F | major with a raised fourth degree |
| Mixolydian | G | major with a lowered seventh degree |
| Aeolian | A | identical to natural minor |
| Locrian | B | triad on the first note is diminished |
If, by contrast, you leave out the fourth and seventh degrees, five notes without a semitone remain, the pentatonic: there, according to the article, you can no longer land audibly wrong, but the pull of the cadence is missing too.
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Related terms
Major scaleMinorAeolianPhrygianKeyDiatonic chordSemitone
Editor: Maik Krohm · reviewed on 3 October 2026
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