Why am I always sticking to minor keys?

Question

When I'm improvising on my keyboard, or trying to compose a melody, I always find myself playing in a minor key -- and never a major one. (For keyboard it's usually G minor or D minor, but that I guess is more a question of fingering -- I've never had any musical formal training so I might have developed some fingering that is more suitable for that particular keys.) I certainly tried it but somehow it feels very hard to do. The same also happens when I'm listening to music -- I often skip tracks which sound obviously major (sometimes it's hard to tell because of difficult harmonic progressions involved though). It's not that pronounced when I'm listening, I just tend to stick to minor keys, but when I'm composing or improvising, it happens all the time. And the same thing -- it is hard to "push through" such a piece of music, that's why I often skip them. Is there any "scientific" (psychological?..) explanation for this? Is it something I should accept (well, I really do like sad/dark/tragic/horror/etc music!) or is it something I should (at least) try to overcome -- particularly, when composing?

Answer 1

It may be, simply, that all notes in the scale are acceptable melodic choices against a minor chord.

For example: in D minor, D, F, A, C Are chord tones and the remaining scale tones, E, G, B, are pleasant sounding upper extensions. This allows your melody to ramble freely without extreme unpleasantness.

Not true in major. The 4th degree must be handled with care or you end up with an ugly mess. Who wants to have to do the work required to get a good melody in a major key. The Pentatonic scales were created to avoid this very calamity.