Changes needed for the melodic and harmonic versions of the scale are written in with accidentals as necessary. The F harmonic minor and melodic minor scales are
Glenn Gould once said if he could be any key, he would be F minor, because "it's rather dour, halfway between complex and stable, between upright and lascivious, between gray and highly tinted... There is a certain obliqueness."[1]
Hermann von Helmholtz once described F minor as harrowing and melancholy. Christian Schubart described this key as "Deep depression, funereal lament, groans of misery and longing for the grave".[2]
E-sharp minor is a theoretical key based on the musical noteE♯, consisting of the pitches E♯, F, G♯, A♯, B♯, C♯ and D♯. Its key signature has eight sharps, requiring one double sharp and six single sharps. Its relative major is G-sharp major, which is usually replaced by A-flat major. Its parallel major, E-sharp major, is usually replaced by F major, as E-sharp major’s four double-sharps make it impractical to use. Because of that enharmonic relationship, it is usually noted as the enharmonic minor of F minor whose key signature has four flats.
Changes needed for the melodic and harmonic versions of the scale are written in with accidentals as necessary. The E-sharp harmonic minor and melodic minor scales are:
Although E-sharp minor is usually notated as F minor, it could be used on a local level, such as bars 17 to 22 in Johann Sebastian Bach's The Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1, Prelude and Fugue No. 3 in C-sharp major. (E-sharp minor is the mediant minor key of C-sharp major.)