Lydian Augmented #2

Four raised degrees

Set beside C major, the scale keeps the root, the third, the sixth and the seventh and raises everything else: the second, the fourth and the fifth all go up a semitone. What remains is a major seventh chord with an augmented fifth — C E G♯ B — decorated with a sharp ninth and a sharp eleventh.

The raised second is written D♯ and sounds a semitone below the third, so the scale opens with a wide step and then a narrow one. That asymmetry at the bottom is what distinguishes it by ear from Lydian augmented, and it is the only place the two scales differ.

One note from Lydian augmented

Lydian augmented, the third mode of melodic minor, is 1 2 3 ♯4 ♯5 6 7. Raise its second and you have this scale. Six notes shared, one changed, and the change turns a usable modern-jazz colour into something considerably rarer.

The practical consequence is that most players who think they need this scale need Lydian augmented instead. Reach for this one only when the sharp ninth is actually in the chord or the melody; otherwise the plainer scale does the same job with less friction.

The augmented second at the bottom

The family interval falls right at the start here: C up to D♯ is three semitones, the widest step in the scale and the first one you play. No other mode of harmonic major opens this way, which makes the scale easy to identify and awkward to finger.

On guitar it means the first two notes of any position are a stretch, and most players take the scale in a three-note-per-string layout to avoid it. On piano the same interval is comfortable, which is one reason the scale appears more often in written harmony than in improvised lines.

What it is for

Major seventh chords with a raised fifth are the target: Cmaj7♯5, and by extension the tonic of a piece that wants to end unresolved. Film and game scoring uses that chord for exactly this reason, and the scale supplies every available tension over it.

As a scale for melody it has little to offer on its own — too many raised degrees and no stable resting point below the third. Treated as a chord-scale, sounded rather than run, it does the job it exists for.

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