GuitarBizarre

My understanding of all of this, feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, I rarely deal with strict notation or form.

Note = The musical notes, all of them, ABCDEFG, and their respective sharps and Flats. If referring to a specific note in a specific octave, in isolation of musical context, the musical notes, by octave, become specified, IE Low C, Middle C, High C, or A1 A2 A3, where the numbers refer to the octaves of the notes (Each numbered octave usually being split at the C).
Tone= Tone or semitone - another term for intervals one note apart, or two notes apart. Also referred to as being one half step apart or one step apart.
Pitch = The specific Hz frequency of a sound, IE, instruments tuned to A440, are tuned to a 440Hz pitch.

You can use all 3 of these to refer to notes, and people will generally understand you, but its a little confusing in some situations. Honestly though, mostly semantics and preference as to whether someone says notes or tones, or even pitches, since there aren't a ton of real-life situations where the other person will be confused by using them interchangeably.

Interval = The distance between two notes played either simultaneously or next to each other.

For example, a note of A (note being defined as above), played with a note of E, is an interval of a perfect 5th. A note of A, played with a note of D, is a perfect 4th.

The names of the intervals is derived from their position within a traditional major/minor scale, where if starting on A, E is the 5th note you would play as you ascended the scale, and D the 4th. (Since this gap exists in both Major and minor scales, these intervals are known as "perfect". Intervals such as the 3rd, which is in a different place in a Major Scale or Minor Scale, are usually defined as major or minor 3rd.

If you are playing in a scale or context other than the basic major scale, intervals cease to be simply perfect 5ths or Perfect 4ths or Major/Minor 3rds and so on, and you get things like augmented or diminished intervals, the descriptions of which serve to denote how those intervals differ from the major/minor scale's standard arrangements.


Scale - A grouping of notes separated by specific intervals. (Notes as described above), repeated by octave. This can be any number of notes, for Example Pentatonic being 5, A traditional major or minor would contain 7 notes, a full chromatic scale would contain 12 notes. (A, B flat, B, C, D flat, D, E flat, E, F, G flat, G, and A flat).

Scales are odd in that they refer to the intervals between the notes, and not the notes themselves. A major scale starts at a given root note, and ascends in a given sequence of intervals. A major scale for example ascends by a tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone, tone, semitone. A minor scale ascends in a pattern of tone, semitone, tone, tone, semitone, tone, tone. They can both start on a note of A, and repeat across all octaves.

The actual notes within that sequence are defined by the root note, that which is defined as first in the scale. (Intervals, as we discussed before, are also discussed based on this, at least when using the major scale.) There *are* strange things that can be done with this, such as with the various modes, and with "outside" playing, but those are something of a multi-headed beast and can get relatively complicated very quickly.


Octave = A doubling of frequency. For example, a guitar is traditionally tuned to a note of A, A being defined as 440Hz. An octave above that note is another note of A, at 880Hz. Another octave above that, is A1760Hz.

An octave of a scale, is exactly the same. The same scale repeats, with the same notes, but all the frequencies are doubled and therefore the notes are all one octave higher. As before, the scale can realistically have any number of notes, as long as the intervals between them are the same leading up to the next octave. Commonly, 5 notes in a pentatonic scale, 7 in a traditional, diatonic, major or minor scale (And the modes thereof), and a chromatic scale would have 12. Other, more esoteric scales, might have more or less, such as blues scales, which have "6", and one of those is a fluid, which is why you often hear blues music use quarter tone bends and so on, which is a peculiarity of blues.

You can also get musical systems, such as indian music, which deal with microtones, and split the octave into more than the traditional 12 semitones, such as systems with as 19 or more possible notes, though I don't know how many notes these musical systems tend to use to define the scale.

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