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Topic: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?  (Read 5391 times)

Offline cometear

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Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
on: August 13, 2015, 10:05:32 PM
Hi there,

In a lot of Classical or Romantic era music, you find at the climax of the piece the composer might go from C7 to B or something like that, if it's going to end in E minor. What is this called? and why is it so powerful?
Clementi, Piano Sonata in G Minor, No. 3, op. 10
W. A. Mozart, Sonata for Piano Four-Hands in F Major, K. 497
Beethoven, Piano Concerto, No. 2, op. 19

Offline chopinlover01

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #1 on: August 13, 2015, 11:52:24 PM
Typically it's the result of a deceptive cadence, and the power you're feeling is probably the V-I progression.
For example, in the Chopin prelude in E minor, the ending has a C7, then a pause, then a I-V-I cadence.

Offline nystul

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #2 on: August 16, 2015, 01:34:13 AM
Sometimes you will see the augmented sixth chord.  A chord built like (C,E,A#) in the key of E.  There could be a G in there as well, or even an F#.  This chord would typically function as a predominant.  The C is a leading tone that tends to go down to B, and the A# is a leading tone that tends to go up to B.  There are different ways to explain it theoretically.  In any case it's a dissonant chord which can be used to lead to the dominant.

Offline quantum

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #3 on: December 03, 2015, 05:29:15 AM
It's all about leading to the dominant.  Think back to a straight forward V-I cadence.  If you insert chords before the V that have the effect of giving the V more gravitas, there will be a heightened anticipation in returning to the I.  In the bigger picture you are still dealing with a V-I movement, but you embellished the V by adding chords adjacent to it.  

Have a look at augmented 6th chord progressions to give you ideas on some variants of this idea.  
Made a Liszt. Need new Handel's for Soler panel & Alkan foil. Will Faure Stein on the way to pick up Mendels' sohn. Josquin get Wolfgangs Schu with Clara. Gone Chopin, I'll be Bach

Offline dcstudio

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #4 on: December 03, 2015, 08:46:13 PM

it's a substitution chord for the V of V if we are talking

C7--B7--Eminor--C7 functions as the secondary dominant that would be F#7 in Eminor but is being substituted... in classical as a Gr, Fr,or It augmented 6th chord most likely.



why is it so powerful?... because your ear is expecting the progression to be... F#m7 b5--B7--Emin..  instead the ii chord is replaced by C7 and you have in essence two cadences instead of one and it makes for a very strong resolution.

btw--it's not just in classical... :)  it's powerful in jazz, too.

Offline pianoguy711

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #5 on: December 16, 2015, 11:05:22 PM
Curious, is this called a tritone substitution? Replacing the F#m7 chord with C7?

Offline dcstudio

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #6 on: December 16, 2015, 11:24:32 PM
Curious, is this called a tritone substitution? Replacing the F#m7 chord with C7?

EXCELLENT QUESTION!!!   ;D ;D ;D


YES---and no.   lol. not the F#m7--(actually in Emin the chord would be F#m7b5 or F# half-diminished)--but the secondary dominant...or 5 of 5 (V7 of V7)---.  By substituting the F#7 with the C7 in jazz...yes siree bob...that's it: tritone substitution.   In traditional theory it is functioning as a Gr, Fr, or It, augmented 6th chord -- the closest representation of tritone substitution in traditional theory is the Neapolitan 6th which is the bII7 resolving to i instead of the V-i cadence we all are tired of.

you are substituting one dom7 for another dom7 in tritone substitution because dom7th chords a tritone apart share the same interval between the 3rd and 7th... so one of the chords cannot be a m7...  but otherwise you were right on the money.

Offline cynmore

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #7 on: December 08, 2016, 08:56:43 AM
Hi,

I'm new here. Earlier today, I was practicing the piano and happened to be playing an arrangement of Blueberry Hill from the Reader's Digest book, Remembering the '50s. In the bridge, there is a C7 B7 chord sequence. It didn't fit any progression I was familiar with, but it sounded great. So I did a search for "music theory forums". I don't recall the exact search text. This forum did not pop up, but another one in the Banjo Hangout website did. So I posted my question over there. I got several helpful responses.

One respondent asked why I was posting on a banjo forum and I replied that it was because that was what came up in my search. So then I did another search and that time this one came up. As I was browsing, I happened to see this thread, which I thought was an incredible coincidence.

Anyway, thanks for the discussion. I don't understand everything you are saying, but it gives me some things to read.

I scanned the 4 lines of the bridge and attached it as a jpg over on Banjo Hangout. I tried to attach it here as well, but that doesn't seem to be working. Preview doesn't seem to be working for me either.

Offline ted

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #8 on: December 08, 2016, 08:12:50 PM
But don't you people find the effect of any musical feature per se to be transient ? Some particular feature, not necessarily harmonic of course, takes my fancy and I use it flat out. After a while it becomes merely a habit, its fascination decreasing until finally it becomes trite and annoying; then I look for something else, anything else. Maybe my brain is wired differently with respect to musical meaning but very few of these initially pleasing features seem to retain their power in any permanent sense.
"Mistakes are the portals of discovery." - James Joyce

Offline cometear

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #9 on: December 12, 2016, 12:33:48 AM
Hi,

I'm new here. Earlier today, I was practicing the piano and happened to be playing an arrangement of Blueberry Hill from the Reader's Digest book, Remembering the '50s. In the bridge, there is a C7 B7 chord sequence. It didn't fit any progression I was familiar with, but it sounded great. So I did a search for "music theory forums". I don't recall the exact search text. This forum did not pop up, but another one in the Banjo Hangout website did. So I posted my question over there. I got several helpful responses.

One respondent asked why I was posting on a banjo forum and I replied that it was because that was what came up in my search. So then I did another search and that time this one came up. As I was browsing, I happened to see this thread, which I thought was an incredible coincidence.

Anyway, thanks for the discussion. I don't understand everything you are saying, but it gives me some things to read.

I scanned the 4 lines of the bridge and attached it as a jpg over on Banjo Hangout. I tried to attach it here as well, but that doesn't seem to be working. Preview doesn't seem to be working for me either.

That is quite a coincidence! It's also quite a coincidence that I haven't been on this forum for probably over 2 months and I log in only 3 days after this post! Rad! Going to print out your music and take a look.

But don't you people find the effect of any musical feature per se to be transient ? Some particular feature, not necessarily harmonic of course, takes my fancy and I use it flat out. After a while it becomes merely a habit, its fascination decreasing until finally it becomes trite and annoying; then I look for something else, anything else. Maybe my brain is wired differently with respect to musical meaning but very few of these initially pleasing features seem to retain their power in any permanent sense.

Honestly, no. Certain things could possibly, but I don't find myself using them enough to become bland. For example, what I was posting about originally could only really be used (in my opinion) at some extreme and passionate climax. I'm not nearly good enough at improvisation or composition to utilize this. Although I did write something once that way overused it, and I do repudiate that composition. So in a way I agree, but when used tastefully, I disagree.
Clementi, Piano Sonata in G Minor, No. 3, op. 10
W. A. Mozart, Sonata for Piano Four-Hands in F Major, K. 497
Beethoven, Piano Concerto, No. 2, op. 19

Offline ted

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #10 on: December 12, 2016, 12:35:47 AM
Interesting, I must be a bit peculiar then, but that wouldn't be anything new. On the other hand, having an unstable aesthetic has the advantage of driving me to reach out for new things all the time. At sixty-nine, I find most of my contemporaries seem to consolidate an increasingly narrow outlook until they keep listening to the same handful of classical or jazz pieces; I couldn't bear ending up like that so perhaps it's for the best.
"Mistakes are the portals of discovery." - James Joyce

Offline cometear

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #11 on: December 12, 2016, 12:47:31 AM
Just for the heck of it I went to the piano to play around with it and the Tempest wouldn't go out of my head.

I'd say listen from 1:05 to 1:30. Around 1:22 Beethoven uses F#dim7 to go to an E chord. F#dim7 shares 3 notes in common with F7. In my opinion, he used this so early on in this because it wasn't climactic as it could be used to be but it espoused a sort of anxiousness. Very cool stuff.



Hi,

I'm new here. Earlier today, I was practicing the piano and happened to be playing an arrangement of Blueberry Hill from the Reader's Digest book, Remembering the '50s. In the bridge, there is a C7 B7 chord sequence. It didn't fit any progression I was familiar with, but it sounded great. So I did a search for "music theory forums". I don't recall the exact search text. This forum did not pop up, but another one in the Banjo Hangout website did. So I posted my question over there. I got several helpful responses.

One respondent asked why I was posting on a banjo forum and I replied that it was because that was what came up in my search. So then I did another search and that time this one came up. As I was browsing, I happened to see this thread, which I thought was an incredible coincidence.

Anyway, thanks for the discussion. I don't understand everything you are saying, but it gives me some things to read.

I scanned the 4 lines of the bridge and attached it as a jpg over on Banjo Hangout. I tried to attach it here as well, but that doesn't seem to be working. Preview doesn't seem to be working for me either.

That song was a perfect example! Then it went into E Major so sort of went away from the coolness of it but still cool.
Clementi, Piano Sonata in G Minor, No. 3, op. 10
W. A. Mozart, Sonata for Piano Four-Hands in F Major, K. 497
Beethoven, Piano Concerto, No. 2, op. 19

Offline cometear

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #12 on: February 05, 2017, 02:34:49 AM
I found the answer, at least, something that contributes. It seems the type of chord that leads home is the Neopolitan 6th chord, or Neopolitan chord. It's the supertonic lowered. Pretty chillin.
Clementi, Piano Sonata in G Minor, No. 3, op. 10
W. A. Mozart, Sonata for Piano Four-Hands in F Major, K. 497
Beethoven, Piano Concerto, No. 2, op. 19

Offline pianoplunker

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #13 on: February 05, 2017, 09:20:58 AM
Hi,

I'm new here. Earlier today, I was practicing the piano and happened to be playing an arrangement of Blueberry Hill from the Reader's Digest book, Remembering the '50s. In the bridge, there is a C7 B7 chord sequence. It didn't fit any progression I was familiar with, but it sounded great. So I did a search for "music theory forums". I don't recall the exact search text. This forum did not pop up, but another one in the Banjo Hangout website did. So I posted my question over there. I got several helpful responses.

One respondent asked why I was posting on a banjo forum and I replied that it was because that was what came up in my search. So then I did another search and that time this one came up. As I was browsing, I happened to see this thread, which I thought was an incredible coincidence.

Anyway, thanks for the discussion. I don't understand everything you are saying, but it gives me some things to read.

I scanned the 4 lines of the bridge and attached it as a jpg over on Banjo Hangout. I tried to attach it here as well, but that doesn't seem to be working. Preview doesn't seem to be working for me either.

The image worked fine for me.  C7 to B7 is how we get to Em B7 for the bridge. The C7 to B7 is to enhance the transition from C to Em.  B7 is dominant to Em so if we resolve to B7 we can resolve to start the bit with Em B7 Em B7 E which resolves softly to G which takes us back to C.

Offline cometear

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Re: Why is C7 to B or any example like that so powerful?
Reply #14 on: February 05, 2017, 06:39:43 PM
I found a more specific example that actually is the name of the 7 chord, but it's not actually a 7 chord! It's an augmented 6th chord! The C7 leading to B7, if B7 is the 5 of Em, is an Em German augmented 6th chord! Totally rad!!!!! It's similar to the Neopolitan 6th chord because the Neopolitan chord has the same structure, but titled differently when the dominant 7th, or augmented 6th is added! RAD!!!
Clementi, Piano Sonata in G Minor, No. 3, op. 10
W. A. Mozart, Sonata for Piano Four-Hands in F Major, K. 497
Beethoven, Piano Concerto, No. 2, op. 19
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