Heptatonic scale are considered subsets of a twelve-pitch scale roughly analogous to the Western chromatic scale. The first and fifth melakarta tones, corresponding to the first and eighth chromatic tones, are invariable in inflection, and the fourth melakarta tone, corresponding to the sixth or seventh chromatic tone, is allowed one of two inflections only, a natural ("shuddah") position and a raised ("tivra") position. The second and third melakarta tones can be picked from the 4 chromatic tones (second through fifth), and similarly for the sixth and seventh. Thus the number of possible forms is equal to twice the square of the number
Scale (music) the scale, and the selection of chords taken naturally from the scale. A musical scale that contains tritones is called tritonic (though the expression is also used for any scale with just three notes per octave, whether or not it includes a tritone), and one without tritones is "atritonic". A scale or chord that contains semitones is called hemitonic, and without semitones is anhemitonic. Scales can be abstracted from performance or composition. They are also often used precompositionally to guide or limit a composition. Explicit instruction in scales has been part of compositional training for many centuries. One or more