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When substituting the viib for V7 in minor keys
I have noticed that the bass note is often flattened
making it a major VIIb {the leading note is not
raised a semitone}. This I can comprehend because
in a minor key approaching a cadence the V major is
used not the v minor { in viib7 the 7th
[6th of the scales] is still raised}. Have I got
this all correct? Thanks

What's viib?

She means bVII.

And when the leading tone is not raised, then the VII chord does not function as a substitution for the dominant. Instead, it's often a V7/III instead. (Or simply a part of a step progression.)

If vii is used as a dominant, then the leading tone has to be raised.

Lucy,

Terminology, and your use of the flat (b) sign, are getting in the way here. Adding some to Kreisler’s info:

Using the natural minor scale, the triad built on the 5th degree of the scale is minor, and the triad built on the 7th degree of the scale is major.
Example: Key of D natural minor. The v chord is A-C-E, and the VII chord is C-E-G.

If the composer is using the harmonic minor scale, with the 7th degree of the scale raised one-half step, the triad built on the 5th degree of the scale is now major, and the triad built on the (raised) 7th degree of the scale is now diminished.
Example: Key of D harmonic (sometimes melodic) minor. The V chord is A-C#-E, and the VII chord is C#-E-G.

Continuing to the rest of your question, depending on the composer’s intent, s/he may choose to make the chord built on the fifth degree of the scale a dominant seventh chord, in which case it will contain a major 3rd, a perfect 5th, and a minor 7th.
Example: Key of D minor. The V7 chord is A-C#-E-G.

The composer may also chose to use a seventh chord built upon the seventh degree of the scale. Two varieties are quite common, one based on the harmonic minor, and the other based upon the melodic minor.
Example: Key of D harmonic minor. The vii7 chord is a diminished seventh chord C#-E-G-Bb. (This is frequently used as a substitute for the dominant seventh chord.)
Example: Key of D melodic minor. The vii7 chord is a “half-diminished” seventh chord C#-E-G-B.

If it sounds complicated, that is because it is a rather thick, and sticky subject. So, while you may have the concept correct, the terminology is not quite there yet.

Ed

Hope you don't mind my saying so, but that's a lot harder to understand than the original post.

I don't think it's going to help Lucy much. And BTW I had a fair amount of advanced theory and it would have taken a lot of effort for me to follow it!

Mark,

Perhaps my post is more complex because it seeks to explain the various ways of looking at Lucy's chords. As you, yourself, indicated, the original post made little sense.

But I am always happy to learn! Maybe you would like a go at the various chords that are commonly constructed on the fifth and seventh degrees of minor scales, and why and how they differ?

Ed

Good thought, but for things like this, I just try (if anything) to address the original post, in a way that is relevant and narrow and at the level of the question. What you're suggesting is sort of writing a textbook chapter and I'm not highly motivated to do that. I do hope that Lucy feels she's gotten a good answer.

Maybe we should check about this:

Do you mean the bass note, or the root?

Say that you are in the key of C minor. The 7th degree chord could be BDF (B dim) if the Bb has been raised to B, or BbDF (Bb) if the Bb has not been raised. The B or Bb respectively are called the Root of the chord.

A chord can be inverted. When you have the diminished chord, it is frequently (always?) inverted so that you'd probably have Bdim/D (DFB). In this case the bottom note would be D. Whatever note you have at the very bottom is the Bass. So even if the chord itself is BDF, and the Root is always B, the Bass may be a different note.

So did you mean Root?

What a load of cobblers!
Such gobbledegook deserves to be discombobulated, ground into fine chunks, and rammed down the throat of the giddy gents propogating the garbage.

No wonder children pack in their piano lessons.

Feel much better now having lit a fuse.

btb,

First of all, none of us here are little kids, learning childish music. If someone quits because they got a complete explanation to one of their questions, s/he probably was never meant to play or sing.

Once we "write it down", taking it out of the realm of simple sound, we (for better or worse) enter the world of Theory. Here we must use terminology, and some universal rules (derived from sound) apply.

I invited Mark to answer the OP's question in a complete, correct, and SIMPLE way. No-Go! I invite you to do the same.

Always learning . . .
Ed

Besides what I said in the previous post, I honestly just don't understand what is being asked, totally, at all. I have no idea what's being described.

Lucy: I think you might get better replies if you forget the terminology and just say what are the notes of the chords you're talking about. You might also need to rephrase what you're asking -- I don't know -- but first we need to understand better what you're talking about. Kreisler was pretty sure he understood, and probably he did. LoPresti was too, but I can't tell because I didn't understand his post.

For what it's worth, I thought your explanation was very straightforward and perfectly explained the OP's question. I think certain people (like me) prefer using an example key/scale/chord than just roman numeral notation. I like to see both laid out when someone is explaining something to do with harmony, because then you can double check to see if you are understanding the notation correctly. I understood what you were saying within the first two sentences and probably would have wrote the exact same thing.

Thank you for the vote of confidence - I appreciate it.
I, too, believe that the more light one can shed on theoretical principles, by using concrete examples, the better.

But, what has happened to Lucy?

Makes perfect sense to me what Kreisler and LoPresti said.

Seriously? Taking one excerpt at random

Parsing it:
- using the natural minor scale

Having taken advanced theory, the basic theory of natural minor scales should be familiar to you

- the triad built on the 5th degree...

Let's use A natural minor as an example. The 5th degree notes are E G B

- is minor

E G B is indeed minor.

- the triad built on the 7th degree

In A natural minor, this has to be G B D

- is major

Which GBD is indeed

Followed by an example.

Which of these things set out by Ed is unclear? This is quite basic theory, as is the rest of it.

In my book the Major scale is
TTtTTTt (totalling 6T)
and the minor scale
TtTTTTt (totalling 6T)

The ONLY differences between the scales is
the 2nd degree (t) half-tone and 3rd degree T (tone)
in the minor scale.

I didn't say it was unclear, just that it was hard to understand. I found it formidable, and I thought Lucy most likely would too. I was approaching this all in the context of the original post, and from the gitgo it seemed to me that his post was on a totally different level -- far more complicated and more detailed than what was being asked, including that he was saying a lot of stuff that wasn't necessary for answering the question. My first difficulty with the post was right up top, with the term "natural minor," which, believe it or not, I don't really know. I'm sure it's just a thing of what vocabulary gets used in what venues, and that it's synonymous with some term that I do know, but it would have taken my looking it up to see which one. Glancing down the rest of the post, I had a similar impression that it was both above and beyond what had been asked. I couldn't help thinking that someone who could easily understand his reply wouldn't have needed to ask the question. I gather that you don't think any of this -- and I imagine that with good reason Ed will feel your impression is more meaningful than mine.

Interesting. Would that TtTTTTt pattern of the minor scale be an exact reverse if played descending (tTTTTtT)?

Ed

Well, if that's the case you should add natural, melodic and harmonic minor scale to your book.

Not to be rude but knowing the different modes of minor scale, natural/melodic/harmonic is pretty basic theory...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_scale