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Octatonic scale
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<p>An octatonic scale is any eight-<a href="/facts/Musical_note/spIQyV4T">note</a> <a href="/facts/Musical_scale/QjMlvs3u">musical scale</a>. However, the term most often refers to the <a href="/facts/Ancohemitonic_scale/kHrXDfW2">ancohemitonic</a> <a href="/facts/Symmetric_scale/Kar84PhS">symmetric scale</a> composed of alternating <a href="/facts/Major_second/x94d53Fo">whole</a> and <a href="/facts/Semitone/lVBsLYSA">half steps</a>, as shown at right. In classical theory (in contrast to <a href="/facts/Jazz_theory/FrQyspN3">jazz theory</a>), this symmetrical scale is commonly called the <i>octatonic scale</i> (or the <i>octatonic collection</i>), although there are a total of 43 enharmonically inequivalent, transpositionally inequivalent eight-note sets. </p><p>The earliest systematic treatment of the octatonic scale was in <a href="/facts/Edmond_de_Polignac/eLBPeb1x">Edmond de Polignac</a>'s unpublished treatise "Étude sur les successions alternantes de tons et demi-tons (Et sur la gamme dite majeure-mineure)" (<i>Study of the Succession of Alternating Whole Tones and Semitones (and of the so-called Major-Minor Scale)</i>) from c. 1879,[1] which preceded <a href="/facts/Vito_Frazzi/VuAvS9eK">Vito Frazzi</a>'s <i>Scale alternate per pianoforte</i> of 1930 by 50 years.[3] </p>