A mode is the emotional language of music. The most familiar modes are major (bright, joyful) and minor (sad, dramatic), but in truth there are many more.
Medieval modes (Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian) returned in the 20th century through jazz and rock. Ukrainian folk music is rich in unique modes: the Hutsul mode (with a raised 4th scale degree) sounds sharp and passionate, while the Pidhalia mode captivates with its archaic quality. Modern composers move freely between modes, crafting psychological shifts between states.
In the narrower sense, a mode is a scale with a particular order of tones and semitones and a hierarchy of stable and unstable degrees around the tonic. Besides major and minor there are the seven diatonic modes, as well as synthetic ones — the whole-tone, octatonic, and Hungarian. Each mode has its own “colour”: Lydian sounds bright and elevated, Phrygian severe and Eastern, Dorian restrained and noble.
