Don Firth, I loved your post. Very interesting and clear - no descent into the nether realms at this time. You should be out there writing theory textbooks. Do you mind if I ask, how do you know this stuff? I've asked the same question of a few people who have degrees in classical music performance, and they had no idea.

M.Ted, thanks a lot for your answer as well. I wonder if you can expand on this at all: "The composers of each melody chose their scales to create a particular melodic quality partly based on his or her taste, but also because, in the time and place that they were writing, that was how you did it-- "

I would have thought that your two examples, Greensleeves and Star of the County Down, are the same kind of tune (i.e, Anglo-Celtic folk) - so since they use different minor scales, maybe it isn't possible to generalize what kind of tune uses what kind of minor. But you say, that time and place are a factor as well as creative decisions; are there any general rules that can be stated as to what minors are associated with what times and places? Your dialogue with McGrath seems to be suggesting that folk is usually natural minor and classical melodic minor, but that seems too simplistic to be true. Maybe because of the evolution that Don described, older tunes tend to be natural minor and newer tunes melodic minor?

Do you have any commonly known examples of songs in harmonic minor?

Thanks a lot gentlemen,

Marion