Aeolian (Natural Minor)
This scale is also known by other names: Minor, Natural Minor.
2 - 1 - 2 - 2 - 1 - 2 - 2About Aeolian (Natural Minor)
The D minor scale has one flat, B♭, and a reputation older than any of us. It is the relative minor of F major, it sits in first position on the guitar with the open D as its root, and it carries a weight that has been remarked on since long before the joke about it being the saddest of all keys.
The notes
D E F G A B♭ C, then D. One flat, shared with F major. The B♭ is the sixth degree, and it is what separates this scale from D dorian — a mode identical in every other note and noticeably brighter for that one difference.
The seventh, C, is a whole tone below the tonic. Raised to C♯ it produces the harmonic minor and the step-and-a-half between B♭ and C♯ that gives so much Spanish and Middle Eastern-influenced music its colour.
On the fretboard
The open D string anchors the scale, and the shape sits comfortably in first position with one fretted flat. It is one of the few minor keys that works without moving up the neck.
The chords are Dm, E diminished, F, Gm, Am, B♭, C. Two barres — Gm and B♭ — which is why songs in D minor often substitute or capo, and why the Dm–C–B♭–A progression, using an A major borrowed from the harmonic minor, is so much more common than the strictly natural version.
Where it is used
Folk, flamenco and film scoring, plus a great deal of baroque music — Bach wrote in D minor often enough that the key carries his fingerprint.
On guitar it is the natural minor key for anyone who has learned C, F and G, because the shapes overlap. That accessibility is part of why it appears so often in singer-songwriter material.
Related Scales from Diatonic
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