What Is Tonality?
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Tonality in My Molto Adagio
Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre Jorge Gómez Rodríguez Constructing Tonality in Molto Adagio A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Music) Supervisor: Prof. Mart Humal Tallinn 2015 Abstract The focus of this paper is the analysis of the work for string ensemble entitled And Silence Eternal - Molto Adagio (Molto Adagio for short), written by the author of this thesis. Its originality lies in the use of a harmonic approach which is referred to as System of Harmonic Classes in this thesis. Owing to the relatively unconventional employment of otherwise traditional harmonic resources in this system, a preliminary theoretical framework needs to be put in place in order to construct an alternative tonal approach that may describe the pitch structure of the Molto Adagio. This will be the aim of Part 1. For this purpose, analytical notions such as symmetric pair, primary dominant factor, harmonic domain, and harmonic area will be introduced before the tonal character of the piece (or the extent to which Molto Adagio may be said to be tonal) can be assessed. A detailed description of how the composer envisions and constructs the system will follow, with special consideration to the place the major diatonic scale occupies in relation to it. Part 2 will engage in an analysis of the piece following the analytical directives gathered in Part 1. The concept of modular tonality, which incorporates the notions of harmonic area and harmonic classes, will be put forward as a heuristic term to account for the use of a linear analytical approach. -
Computational Methods for Tonality-Based Style Analysis of Classical Music Audio Recordings
Fakult¨at fur¨ Elektrotechnik und Informationstechnik Computational Methods for Tonality-Based Style Analysis of Classical Music Audio Recordings Christof Weiß geboren am 16.07.1986 in Regensburg Dissertation zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades Doktoringenieur (Dr.-Ing.) Angefertigt im: Fachgebiet Elektronische Medientechnik Institut fur¨ Medientechnik Fakult¨at fur¨ Elektrotechnik und Informationstechnik Gutachter: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Dr. rer. nat. h. c. mult. Karlheinz Brandenburg Prof. Dr. rer. nat. Meinard Muller¨ Prof. Dr. phil. Wolfgang Auhagen Tag der Einreichung: 25.11.2016 Tag der wissenschaftlichen Aussprache: 03.04.2017 urn:nbn:de:gbv:ilm1-2017000293 iii Acknowledgements This thesis could not exist without the help of many people. I am very grateful to everybody who supported me during the work on my PhD. First of all, I want to thank Prof. Karlheinz Brandenburg for supervising my thesis but also, for the opportunity to work within a great team and a nice working enviroment at Fraunhofer IDMT in Ilmenau. I also want to mention my colleagues of the Metadata department for having such a friendly atmosphere including motivating scientific discussions, musical activity, and more. In particular, I want to thank all members of the Semantic Music Technologies group for the nice group climate and for helping with many things in research and beyond. Especially|thank you Alex, Ronny, Christian, Uwe, Estefan´ıa, Patrick, Daniel, Ania, Christian, Anna, Sascha, and Jakob for not only having a prolific working time in Ilmenau but also making friends there. Furthermore, I want to thank several students at TU Ilmenau who worked with me on my topic. Special thanks go to Prof. -
Development of Musical Scales in Europe
RABINDRA BHARATI UNIVERSITY VOCAL MUSIC DEPARTMENT COURSE - B.A. ( Compulsory Course ) (CBCS) 2020 Semester - II , Paper - I Teacher - Sri Partha Pratim Bhowmik History of Western Music Development of musical scales in Europe In the 8th century B.C., The musical atmosphere of ancient Greece introduced its development by the influence of then popular aristocratic music. That music was melody- based and the root of that music was rural folk-songs. In each and every country, the development of music was rooted in the folk-songs. The European Aristocratic Music of the Christian Era had been inspired by the developed Greek music. In the 5th century B.C. the renowned Greek Mathematician Pythagoras had first established a relation between science and music. Before him, the scale of Greek music was pentatonic. Pythagoras changed the scale into hexatonic pattern and later into heptatonic pattern. Greek musicians applied the alphabets to indicate the notes of their music. For the natural notes they used the alphabets in normal position and for the deformed notes, the alphabets turned upside down [deformed notes= Vikrita svaras]. The musical instruments, they had invented are – Aulos, Salpinx, pan-pipes, harp, lyre, syrinx etc. In the western music, the term ‘scale’ is derived from Latin word ‘scala’, ie, the ladder; scale means an ascent or descent formation of the musical notes. Each and every scale has a starting note, called ‘tonic note’ [‘tone - tonic’ not the Health-Tonic]. In the Ancient Greece, the musical scale had been formed with the help of lyre , a string instrument, having normally 5 or 6 or 7 strings. -
Unified Music Theories for General Equal-Temperament Systems
Unified Music Theories for General Equal-Temperament Systems Brandon Tingyeh Wu Research Assistant, Research Center for Information Technology Innovation, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan ABSTRACT Why are white and black piano keys in an octave arranged as they are today? This article examines the relations between abstract algebra and key signature, scales, degrees, and keyboard configurations in general equal-temperament systems. Without confining the study to the twelve-tone equal-temperament (12-TET) system, we propose a set of basic axioms based on musical observations. The axioms may lead to scales that are reasonable both mathematically and musically in any equal- temperament system. We reexamine the mathematical understandings and interpretations of ideas in classical music theory, such as the circle of fifths, enharmonic equivalent, degrees such as the dominant and the subdominant, and the leading tone, and endow them with meaning outside of the 12-TET system. In the process of deriving scales, we create various kinds of sequences to describe facts in music theory, and we name these sequences systematically and unambiguously with the aim to facilitate future research. - 1 - 1. INTRODUCTION Keyboard configuration and combinatorics The concept of key signatures is based on keyboard-like instruments, such as the piano. If all twelve keys in an octave were white, accidentals and key signatures would be meaningless. Therefore, the arrangement of black and white keys is of crucial importance, and keyboard configuration directly affects scales, degrees, key signatures, and even music theory. To debate the key configuration of the twelve- tone equal-temperament (12-TET) system is of little value because the piano keyboard arrangement is considered the foundation of almost all classical music theories. -
Reconsidering Pitch Centricity Stanley V
University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Faculty Publications: School of Music Music, School of 2011 Reconsidering Pitch Centricity Stanley V. Kleppinger University of Nebraska-Lincoln, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/musicfacpub Part of the Music Commons Kleppinger, Stanley V., "Reconsidering Pitch Centricity" (2011). Faculty Publications: School of Music. 63. http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/musicfacpub/63 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Music, School of at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications: School of Music by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. Reconsidering Pitch Centricity STANLEY V. KLEPPINGER Analysts commonly describe the musical focus upon a particular pitch class above all others as pitch centricity. But this seemingly simple concept is complicated by a range of factors. First, pitch centricity can be understood variously as a compositional feature, a perceptual effect arising from specific analytical or listening strategies, or some complex combination thereof. Second, the relation of pitch centricity to the theoretical construct of tonality (in any of its myriad conceptions) is often not consistently or robustly theorized. Finally, various musical contexts manifest or evoke pitch centricity in seemingly countless ways and to differing degrees. This essay examines a range of compositions by Ligeti, Carter, Copland, Bartok, and others to arrive at a more nuanced perspective of pitch centricity - one that takes fuller account of its perceptual foundations, recognizes its many forms and intensities, and addresses its significance to global tonal structure in a given composition. -
Music Tonality and Context 1 Running Head: MUSICAL KEY AND
CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk Provided by Lancaster E-Prints Music Tonality and Context 1 Running head: MUSICAL KEY AND CONTEXT-DEPENDENT MEMORY Music Tonality and Context-Dependent Recall: The Influence of Key Change and Mood Mediation Katharine M. L. Mead and Linden J. Ball* Lancaster University, UK ____________________________ *Corresponding author: Department of Psychology, Lancaster University, Lancaster, LA1 4YF, UK. Email: [email protected] Tel: +44 (0)1524 593470 Fax: +44 (0)1524 593744 Music Tonality and Context 2 Abstract Music in a minor key is often claimed to sound sad, whereas music in a major key is typically viewed as sounding cheerful. Such claims suggest that maintaining or switching the tonality of a musical selection between information encoding and retrieval should promote robust “mood-mediated” context-dependent memory (CDM) effects. The reported experiment examined this hypothesis using versions of a Chopin waltz where the key was either reinstated or switched at retrieval, so producing minor- -minor, major--major, minor--major and major--minor conditions. Better word recall arose in reinstated-key conditions (particularly for the minor--minor group) than in switched-key conditions, supporting the existence of tonality-based CDM effects. The tonalities also induced different mood states. The minor key induced a more negative mood than the major key, and participants in switched-key conditions demonstrated switched moods between learning and recall. Despite the association between music tonality and mood, a path analysis failed to reveal a reliable mood-mediation effect. We discuss why mood-mediated CDM may have failed to emerge in this study, whilst also acknowledging that an alternative “mental-context” account can explain our results (i.e., the mental representation of music tonality may act as a contextual cue that elicits information retrieval). -
Tonality and Modulation
Theory Dr. Crist Tonality and Modulation Tonality - The hierarchical relationship of tones to a pitch center or "tonic." Tonal music involves the use of twelve major and twelve minor keys, the scales that comprise these keys, and the tertian harmonies generated from the notes of these scales. A harmony may be constructed on each of the seven diatonic scale degrees resulting in seven different harmonic functions. The seven different functions exhibit varying levels of strength but all serve to support the tonic which is embodied in the tonic triad. Tonality is achieved through a variety of means. The strongest tonality would involve: (1) Only diatonic pitches. (2) A pitch center (tonic) which exhibits a sense of stability and to which all tonal movement flows. (3) Strong cadences. Perfect authentic cadences (PAC) especially. (4) Begin and end with the tonic key. (5) Pedal points and ostinatos which involve reiteration of the tonic scale degree. (6) Strong harmonic progressions. In particular, dominant to tonic progressions which involve the leading-tone resolution to tonic. (7) Doubling of the tonic pitch. The tonic is given long rhythmic durations. The tonic appears in the outer voices. The tonic is framed by neighboring tones. The following progression employs many of the above mentioned techniques creating a strong sense of C major. PAC I IVP I V7 I I6 IV V7 I Modulation - The process of moving from one key to another. There must be a distinct aural shift from the original key to some other key center. A modulation consists of three parts: (1) a tonality is confirmed, (2) the tonal center changes, (3) a new tonality is confirmed by a cadence in that tonality. -
Beyond Major and Minor? the Tonality of Popular Music After 19601
Online publications of the Gesellschaft für Popularmusikforschung/ German Society for Popular Music Studies e. V. Ed. by Eva Krisper and Eva Schuck w w w . gf pm- samples.de/Samples17 / pf l e i de r e r . pdf Volume 17 (2019) - Version of 25 July 2019 BEYOND MAJOR AND MINOR? THE TONALITY OF POPULAR MUSIC AFTER 19601 Martin Pfleiderer While the functional harmonic system of major and minor, with its logic of progression based on leading tones and cadences involving the dominant, has largely departed from European art music in the 20th century, popular music continues to uphold a musical idiom oriented towards major-minor tonality and its semantics. Similar to nursery rhymes and children's songs, it seems that in popular songs, a radiant major affirms plain and happy lyrics, while a darker minor key underlines thoughtful, sad, or gloomy moods. This contrast between light and dark becomes particularly tangible when both, i.e. major and minor, appear in one song. For example, in »Tanze Samba mit mir« [»Dance the Samba with Me«], a hit song composed by Franco Bracardi and sung by Tony Holiday in 1977, the verses in F minor announce a dark mood of desire (»Du bist so heiß wie ein Vulkan. Und heut' verbrenn' ich mich daran« [»You are as hot as a volcano and today I'm burning myself on it«]), which transitions into a happy or triumphant F major in the chorus (»Tanze Samba mit mir, Samba Samba die ganze Nacht« [»Dance the samba with me, samba, samba all night long«]). But can this finding also be transferred to other areas of popular music, such as rock and pop songs of American or British prove- nance, which have long been at least as popular in Germany as German pop songs and folk music? In recent decades, a broad and growing body of research on tonality and harmony in popular music has emerged. -
In Search of the Perfect Musical Scale
In Search of the Perfect Musical Scale J. N. Hooker Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA [email protected] May 2017 Abstract We analyze results of a search for alternative musical scales that share the main advantages of classical scales: pitch frequencies that bear simple ratios to each other, and multiple keys based on an un- derlying chromatic scale with tempered tuning. The search is based on combinatorics and a constraint programming model that assigns frequency ratios to intervals. We find that certain 11-note scales on a 19-note chromatic stand out as superior to all others. These scales enjoy harmonic and structural possibilities that go significantly beyond what is available in classical scales and therefore provide a possible medium for innovative musical composition. 1 Introduction The classical major and minor scales of Western music have two attractive characteristics: pitch frequencies that bear simple ratios to each other, and multiple keys based on an underlying chromatic scale with tempered tuning. Simple ratios allow for rich and intelligible harmonies, while multiple keys greatly expand possibilities for complex musical structure. While these tra- ditional scales have provided the basis for a fabulous outpouring of musical creativity over several centuries, one might ask whether they provide the natural or inevitable framework for music. Perhaps there are alternative scales with the same favorable characteristics|simple ratios and multiple keys|that could unleash even greater creativity. This paper summarizes the results of a recent study [8] that undertook a systematic search for musically appealing alternative scales. The search 1 restricts itself to diatonic scales, whose adjacent notes are separated by a whole tone or semitone. -
ONLINE CHAPTER 3 MODULATIONS in CLASSICAL MUSIC Artist in Residence: Leonard Bernstein
ONLINE CHAPTER 3 MODULATIONS IN CLASSICAL MUSIC Artist in Residence: Leonard Bernstein • Define modulation • Recognize pivot chord modulation within the context of a musical score • Recognize chromatic pivot chord modulation within the context of a musical score • Recognize direct modulation within the context of a musical score • Recognize monophonic modulation within the context of a musical score • Analyze large orchestral works in order to analyze points of modulation and type Chapter Objectives of modulation Composed by Leonard Bernstein in 1957, West Side Story has been described by critics as “ugly,” “pathetic,” “tender,” and “forgiving.” The New York Times theater critic Brooks Atkinson said in his 1957 review, “Everything contributes to the total impression of wild- ness, ecstasy and anguish. The astringent score has moments of tranquility and rapture, BSIT and occasionally a touch of sardonic humor.” E E W Watch the performance of “Tonight” from the musical West Side Story. In this scene, the melody begins in the key of A♭ major, but after eight bars the tonal center changes. And in VIDEO a moment of passion and excitement, the tonal center changes again. By measure 16, the TRACK 26 tonal center has changed four times. Talk about a speedy courtship! Modulations in Classical Music |OL3-1 Study the chord progression from the opening ten bars of “Tonight.”1 What chords are chromatic in the key? Can they be explained as secondary chords? Based on the chord progression, can you tell where the tonal center changes? E ! /B ! A ! B ! / FA ! B ! / F Tonight, tonight, It all began tonight, A ! G-F- G !7 C ! I saw you and the world went away to - night. -
2005: Boston/Cambridge
PROGRAM and ABSTRACTS OF PAPERS READ at the Twenty–Eighth Annual Meeting of the SOCIETY FOR MUSIC THEORY 10–13 November 2005 Hyatt Regency Cambridge Boston/Cambridge, Massachusetts 2 SMT 2005 Annual Meeting Edited by Taylor A. Greer Chair, 2005 SMT Program Committee Local Arrangements Committee David Kopp, Deborah Stein, Co-Chairs Program Committee Taylor A. Greer, Chair, Dora A. Hanninen, Daphne Leong, Joel Lester (ex officio), Henry Martin, Shaugn O’Donnell, Deborah Stein Executive Board Joel Lester, President William Caplin, President-Elect Harald Krebs, Vice President Nancy Rogers, Secretary Claire Boge, Treasurer Kofi Agawu Lynne Rogers Warren Darcy Judy Lochhead Frank Samarotto Janna Saslaw Executive Director Victoria L. Long 3 Contents Program…………………………………………………………........ 5 Abstracts………………………………………………………….…... 16 Thursday afternoon, 10 November Combining Musical Systems……………………………………. 17 New Modes, New Measures…………………………………....... 19 Compositional Process and Analysis……………………………. 21 Pedagogy………………………………………………………… 22 Introspective/ Prospective Analysis……………………………... 23 Thursday evening Negotiating Career and Family………………………………….. 24 Poster Session…………………………………………………… 26 Friday morning, 11 November Traveling Through Space ……………………………………….. 28 Schenker: Interruption, Form, and Allusion…………………… 31 Sharakans, Epithets, and Sufis…………………………………... 33 Friday afternoon Jazz: Chord-Scale Theory and Improvisation…………………… 35 American Composers Since 1945……………………………….. 37 Tonal Reconstructions ………………………………………….. 40 Exploring Voice Leading.……………………………………….. -
Lissajous Figures, Musical Intervals, and the Just Diatonic Scale," the Physics Teacher 56 424 (October 2018)
Michael J. Ruiz, "Lissajous Figures, Musical Intervals, and the Just Diatonic Scale," The Physics Teacher 56 424 (October 2018). Lissajous Figures, Musical Intervals, and the Just Diatonic Scale Michael J. Ruiz University of North Carolina at Asheville, Asheville, NC The frequency ratios for the just diatonic scale are obtained by identifying musical intervals corresponding to Lissajous figures. The demonstration integrates the engineering physics of Lissajous patterns with the recognition of musical intervals through simple ear training. A free HTML5 app has been developed for this class activity and the program can be run online or downloaded to the desktop. A video1 is provided illustrating the use of the software. Background Discussion of musical scales can be found in an early issue (1934) of The American Physics Teacher2 and a recent issue (2015) of its successor journal, the American Journal of Physics.3 Both references include discussion of the equal-tempered tuning we use today as well as tunings based on the perfect integer ratios described in this paper. These tunings are listed in Table 1, where the first note in the major scale has been set to 240 Hz. For years I have used 240 Hz for the first degree of the major major since all the frequencies with integer ratios work out easily as whole-number frequencies without a calculator. Reference 2 lists the relative frequencies as whole numbers where 24 is assigned to Do (the note C), a procedure that was made by the legendary Helmholtz as far back as 1895 in his masterpiece On the Sensations of Tone as a Physiological Basis for the Theory of Music.4 Table I.